A writing podcast for writers and curious readers, featuring interviews with authors, poets, agents and editors. Twice chosen as one of Writer’s Digest Magazine’s 101 Best Website for Writers. Vermont-grown.
Episodes
Apr 26, 2021
Apr 26, 2021
46 min
Author David Arnold, whose new novel is The Electric Kingdom (Viking Books for Young Readers).
This week’s Write the Book Prompt was generously offered by my guest, David Arnold. His first inspiration for The Electric Kingdom came to him as he was a new stay-at-home Dad, caring for his newborn son. It was the image of a boarded-up farmhouse in the middle of the woods. (I suggested that maybe his new-dad brain was trying to encourage him to rent a cabin as a writing retreat. He said no...) For him, the farmhouse allowed him to begin taking notes for The Electric Kingdom. He invites us to use that same image as a prompt this week. A farmhouse, deep in the woods, boards over the windows. Where does this take you?
Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.
Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro
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Apr 25, 2021
Apr 25, 2021
56 min
Two interviews from the archives. Ralph Culver, author of Both Distances (Anabiosis), has a new book coming in the fall: A Passable Man (MadHat Press). And James Fallon is the author of The Psychopath Inside: A Neuroscientist's Personal Journey into the Dark Side of the Brain (Current).
This week's Write the Book Prompt is again visual. Take a look at the photo, below, and write!
Image via https://unsplash.com/@bewakoofofficial
Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.
Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro
673
Apr 17, 2021
Apr 17, 2021
54 min
An interview from the archives with author, film maker, and founding editor of the online magazine The Rumpus, Stephen Elliott. Since our interview, Elliott has been in the news for filing a lawsuit in New York court against Moira Donegan, the creator of the Shitty Media Men spreadsheet. I didn't know about the suit when I aired this week's show. I include relevant news links here in case you want to read more about the situation.
This week's Write the Book Prompt is visual. Have a look at the photo below, and write.
Image by Balaji Srinivasan
Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.
Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro
672
Apr 5, 2021
Apr 5, 2021
59 min
An interview from the archives with Vermont Poet Neil Shepard. We spoke in 2013 about his collection, (T)ravel/Un(t)ravel (Mid List Press).
Have you ever felt like a displaced tourist? Ever get lost in Rome, trying to find your friends at the Trevi Fountain? Or even in your hotel, trying to find the bar, unable to recall how to ask directions? Did you ever try to do something as simple as try to feed a meter in Montreal, and have no clue in the world how to do it? This week’s Write the Book Prompt is to write about that moment, the feelings you had, the person who helped you, if anyone did, or the person who most certainly did not. Write about how you unraveled, and then (hopefully), reintegrated--raveled, as Neil Shepard puts it--back to a place of comfortable belonging.
Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.
Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro
671
Apr 3, 2021
Apr 3, 2021
59 min
Local Irish Poet Angela Patten from 2015. She has a new book since this conversation: The Oriole & the Ovenbird (Kelsay Books).
Given that Angela Patten’s new poetry collection concerns birds and their meaning in our lives, today’s Write the Book Prompt is to observe the birds as they come back to our attention with the advent of spring, and write them into your work.
Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.
Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro
670