Other People with Brad Listi

February 22, 2012

Episode 46 — Cheryl Strayed

Cheryl Strayed is the guest. She’s the author of the new memoir Wild, due out from Knopf on March 20, 2012. And she’s also Sugar, the popular advice columnist over at The Rumpus.

Wild, which details Strayed’s 1,100-mile solo hike on the Pacific Crest Trail in 1995, is generating a ton of good buzz. Kirkus, in a starred review, calls it “a candid, inspiring narrative of the author’s brutal physical and psychological journey through a wilderness of despair to a renewed sense of self.”

So much fun talking with Cheryl. We had plenty to discuss.

Topics of conversation include: Sugar, love, advice, self-help, narcissism, anonymity, personal vs. universal, internal vs. external, Pacific Crest Trail, Appalachian Trail, heroin, sex, grief, California, wilderness, blisters, Oregon, self-destruction, grunge, purification, journaling, book tour, William Faulkner, Adrienne Rich, The Rumpus, The Dream of a Common Language, family, suffering, pain tolerance, book burning, beauty, As I Lay Dying, and llamas.

Monologue topics: Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail, perspective, boredom, fear, Shenandoah National Park, Merlin, hippies, boxed wine, parties, Patrick, grounding, knives, murder, the carotid artery, and inventing things to do.

Please remember to subscribe to the show over at iTunes, or at Stitcher. It’s free.

Or just push PLAY below.

Many thanks for listening, and enjoy the program…

-BL

PS. Like the podcast? Please take a moment to rate and review it on iTunes. Thank you!

[Photo: Benjamin Brink / The Oregonian]

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Episode 45 — Adam Wilson

Adam Wilson is the guest. He’s the author of the debut novel Flatscreen, now available from Harper Perennial.

Raves Sam Lipsyte: “Adam Wilson is a gutsy, funny, and often beautiful writer, and Flatscreen is one of the most hilarious and commanding debuts I’ve read in a long time.”

And Booklist, in a starred review, calls it “an auspicious debut that promises, in Wilson, a standout addition to a new generation of writers.”

Plenty to discuss.

Topics of conversation include: Austin, bad jobs, whiskey, depression, screenwriting, Richard Linklater, bad decisions, heat, Columbia, Brooklyn, Bookcourt, Don DeLillo, Bret Easton Ellis, The Hold Steady, Boston, Tufts, Jonathan Wilson, social media, shyness, stoners, comedy, O.J. Simpson, The Paris Review, and work habits.

Monologue topics: Israel, Cormac McCarthy, Philip Roth, not reading novels, the Santa Fe Institute, honesty, history, and profit motive.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the show over at iTunes, or at Stitcher. It’s free.

Or just push PLAY below.

Many thanks for listening, and enjoy the program…

-BL

PS. Like the podcast? Please take a moment to rate and review it on iTunes. Thank you!

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February 15, 2012

Episode 44 — Eleanor Henderson

Eleanor Henderson is the guest. She’s the author of the debut novel Ten Thousand Saints, now available in trade paperback from Ecco. It was named one of the 10 Best Books of 2011 by the New York Times Book Review.

In a glowing review for the Times, Stacey D’Erasmo writes:

The ambition of Ten Thousand Saints, Eleanor Henderson’s debut novel about a group of unambitious lost souls, is beautiful. In nearly 400 pages, Henderson does not hold back once: she writes the hell out of every moment, every scene, every perspective, every fleeting impression, every impulse and desire and bit of emotional detritus. She is never ironic or underwhelmed; her preferred mode is fierce, devoted and elegiac.

A great deal to talk about here.

Topics of conversation include: Ithaca, Greece, bumper stickers, teaching, luck, children’s books, agents, revisions, rejections, editorial notes, Jim Rutman, Sterling Lord Literistic, the sales process, Lee Boudreaux, bedside manner, editorial tricks, pregnancy, anxiety, straight edge, Split Lip, fundamentalism, punk rock, nerds, dating, architecture, West Palm Beach, Virginia, Soul Asylum, freon, drugs, death, environmentalism, aging, hippies, convictions, savants, Georgia, and extreme moderation.

Monologue topics: love, divorce, cute old couples, hunchbacked old couples, weddings, psycho-sexual mind games, Filmmaker magazine, and my burgeoning literary media empire.

Please remember to subscribe to the show over at iTunes, or at Stitcher. It’s free.

Or just push PLAY below.

Many thanks for listening, and enjoy the program…

-BL

PS. Like the podcast? Please take a moment to rate and review it on iTunes. Thank you!

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February 12, 2012

Episode 43 — Ben Marcus

Ben Marcus is today’s guest. He’s the author of four books of fiction, the most recent of which is the critically acclaimed novel The Flame Alphabet, now available from Knopf.

“Think again,” writes Fiona Maazel at Book Forum. “[The Flame Alphabet] can operate on multiple registers: as metaphor, sociology, conventional thriller, and, at bottom, discourse on parenthood and family that is freakishly sad and incredibly good.”

And George Saunders raves: “I don’t use the word lightly, in fact, I don’t use it at all, but Ben Marcus is a genius, one of the most daring, funny, morally engaged and brilliant writers, someone whose work truly makes a difference in the world. His prose is, for me, awareness objectified—he makes the word new and thus the world.”

Thrilled to have Ben on the program. Plenty to discuss.

Topics of conversation include: David Markson, literary collage, Brown, Robert Coover, Ralph Waldo Emerson, literary backstabbing, history, suicide, Nicholson Baker, WWII, writing strategies, reviews, teaching, kids, reading, attention spans, dismissiveness, self-imposed rules, primal circumstances, publishing, Yaddo, MacDowell Colony, Austin, Chicago, sports, water skiing, and how a book begins.

Monologue topics: in-laws, artifacts of youth, stuff, hoarding, Smurfs, figurines, creepy dolls, retainers, smells, food, putrefaction, waste, and the dream of having nothing.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the show over at iTunes, or at Stitcher. It’s free.

Or just push PLAY below.

Many thanks for listening, everybody. Enjoy the show…

-BL

PS. Like the podcast? Please take a moment to rate and review it on iTunes. Thank you!

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February 8, 2012

Other People Makes Filmmaker Magazine’s ‘Super 8′

Good news! Filmmaker magazine has included Other People in its Winter 2012 ‘Super 8‘ list! (Thanks to Scott Macaulay and everyone over at Filmmaker!)

Here’s the write-up:

Episode 42 — Ben Tanzer

Ben Tanzer is the guest. He’s the author of several books, including 99 Problems, You Can Make Him Like You, and My Father’s House. He is also the proprietor of vast faux media empire.

Michael Fitzgerald, author of Radiant Days, calls My Father’s House “a sincere and important book full of grace, beauty, and…I’m happy to report…a delicious humor.”

A very good conversation with a writer whose work has won him many fans in the indie lit scene and beyond.

Topics of conversation include: Chicago, sports fandom, Little League, running, endorphins, Obama, OCD, booze, drugs, regimens, maturity, The Grateful Dead, raves, lethargy, genetics, screenwriting, popularity, narrative formulas, painting, defining your audience, Stephen Gaghan, Traffic, luck, ambition, readings, theft, and The Nervous Breakdown.

Monologue topics: friends, Crested Butte, storytelling, wayward youth, chemically enhanced situations, The Price is Right, Dickey Betts, homicide, mushrooms, amputees, and Vietnam.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the show over at iTunes, or at Stitcher. It’s free.

Or just push PLAY below.

Many thanks for listening, and enjoy the program…

-BL

PS. Like the podcast? Please take a moment to rate and review it on iTunes. Thank you!

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February 5, 2012

Episode 41 — Claire Bidwell Smith

Claire Bidwell Smith is the guest. She’s the author of the memoir The Rules of Inheritance, available now from Hudson Street Press.

Darin Strauss, the author of Half a Life, calls it “a perfectly crafted story — not about grief, but how to walk out of grief with your soul intact; it’s not a lamentation, but a lesson. The Rules of Inheritance should be required reading for anybody who’s trying to get their arms around a big sadness.”

A tremendous amount to talk about here.

Topics of conversation include: pregnancy, nausea, boys vs. girls, hospice, focus, parenthood, WWII, language, grief, traveling, alcohol, guilt, Dave Eggers, Spain, Greyhound buses, San Francisco, Atlanta, beauty, love, funerals, apathy, religion, circles, sex, the afterlife, heaven, hell, catharsis, and self-medication.

Monologue topics: death, grief, Ben Kenobe, John Lennon, Davo, Crested Butte, watery balls, absurdity, $5 foot-long, horse sex, and ridiculous species.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the show over at iTunes, or at Stitcher. It’s free.

Or just push PLAY below.

Many thanks for listening, and enjoy the program…

-BL

PS. Like the podcast? Please take a moment to rate and review it on iTunes. Thank you!

Correction: In this episode’s monologue, I say that Claire Bidwell Smith was 26 when her father passed away; she was 25. My apologies for the error. -BL

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Tagged as 826 LA, AA, afterlife, alcohol, apathy, Atlanta, author interview podcasts, author interviews, authors, beauty, books, Brad Listi, cancer, Claire Bidwell Smith, Dave Eggers, death, funerals, Greyhound bus, grief, grief memoirs, heaven, hell, hospice, humor, language, literature, memoirs, nausea, new nonfiction, nonfiction, Other People with Brad Listi, parenthood, podcasts, pregnancy, publishing, San Francisco, sex, Spain, The Rules of Inheritance, traveling, writers, writing

February 1, 2012

Episode 40 — Susan Sherman

Susan Sherman is the guest. She’s the author of the acclaimed debut novel The Little Russian, now available from Counterpoint Press. And she’s also the co-creator of one of the most successful television shows in the history of Disney.

Library Journal, in a starred review, has this to say about The Little Russian:

“Sherman’s extraordinary debut novel plunges her readers into the bitter cold, deprivation, and upheaval of early 20th-century wartime Russia…a fascinating mix of petty vanity, devoted parenting, and breathtaking courage, fleshed out with cinematic detail that’s both irresistible and spectacularly illuminating. All fiction readers will enjoy.”

So much to talk about here.

Topics of conversation include: Russia, Green Bay, fur, negotiating, luck, television writing, Hollywood, Disney, agents, girl teams, timing, sexism, money, freedom, France, death, collaboration, history, research, immaturity, cave people, narrative sculpture, and religion.

Monologue topics: complaining, Navy SEALS, perspective, art problems, human agony, man’s search for meaning, and war.

Please remember to subscribe to the show over at iTunes, or at Stitcher. It’s free.

Or just push PLAY below.

Many thanks for listening, and enjoy the program…

-BL

PS. Like the podcast? Please take a moment to rate and review it on iTunes. Thank you!

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Tagged as author interview podcasts, author interviews, authors, books, books podcasts, Brad Listi, collaborations, Counterpoint Press, Disney, fiction, France, Green Bay, historical fiction, history, Jewish authors, literature, luck, Madame Curie, narrative sculpture, new fiction, new historical fiction, Other People with Brad Listi, podcasts, publishing, Raven Symone, religion, Russia, screenwriting, sexism, Susan Sherman, television writing, That's So Raven, The Little Russian, Wisconsin, writers, writing

January 29, 2012

Episode 39 — Caroline Leavitt

Caroline Leavitt is the guest. She’s the author of nine novels, the most recent of which is called Pictures of You, a New York Times bestseller, now available from Algonquin Books.

Kirkus Reviews calls it “heartfelt, deft, and highly readable fiction.”

A great publishing success story. A breakout book on the ninth try, by an author who never stopped working, even when the chips were down.

Topics of conversation include: Algonquin, elves, false summits, neuroticism, criticism, Amazon rankings, life-changers, Waltham, disorientation, fear, bullies, bad luck, Ann Arbor, Berkeley, Brandeis, Norman Mailer, bad teachers, Hoboken, Manhattan, and depression.

Monologue topics: famous recluses, homeless speed freaks, making out with strange dogs.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the show over at iTunes, or at Stitcher. It’s free.

Or just push PLAY below.

Many thanks for listening, and enjoy the show…

-BL

PS. Like the podcast? Please take a moment to rate and review it on iTunes. Thank you!

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Tagged as Algonquin Books, Ann Arbor, author interview podcasts, author interviews, authors, Berkeley, bestsellers, Brad Listi, Brandeis, Caroline Leavitt, depression, fiction, Hoboken, literature, Madison, Manhattan, Massachusetts, New York, New York Times bestsellers, Norman Mailer, novels, Other People with Brad Listi, Pictures of You, podcasts, publishing, Waltham, writers, writinga

January 28, 2012

Full Stop Comments on Episode 37

Full Stop magazine has written about the podcast:

In the past week I came across two rather disparate author reactions to their fans. Strangely enough, the “nice guy” writes books that focus on, in his words, “a preoccupation with the invasive nature of violence in our lives.” The not-so-nice guy is a children’s book author.

It all started with Brad Listi’s brilliant “Other People” podcast, specifically an interview with Alan Heathcock, author of the critically acclaimed story collection Volt. Alan spoke about his intensive book touring schedule, which lasted from March through November and involved a lot of time away from his wife and kids. When Brad asked if he ever got tired of the touring grind, Alan shared a surprising answer:

To read the rest, just click right here.

Episode 46 — Cheryl Strayed

Episode 45 — Adam Wilson

Episode 44 — Eleanor Henderson

Episode 43 — Ben Marcus

Other People Makes Filmmaker Magazine’s ‘Super 8′

Episode 42 — Ben Tanzer

Episode 41 — Claire Bidwell Smith

Episode 40 — Susan Sherman

Episode 39 — Caroline Leavitt

Full Stop Comments on Episode 37

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