DIY MFA Radio

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Jason Naylor.

Jason is an award-winning artist and designer based in NYC. He is known for his bright colors and even brighter messages. His work has received tons of awards and recognition, including the Golden Novum Design award and two CLIO Fashion&Beauty Bronze medals. He has also been featured on HGTV and the Discovery Channel.

In 2018, Jason was named by BUMBLE as one of the 100 Most Inspiring New Yorkers, and his colorful creations have found partnership with brands like Coach, Guess, Pepsi, and Maybelline. Jason's mission is to spread color and positivity across the globe. His brightly colored designs and positive words reflect his zeal for life, his quest for joy and his love of LOVE.

• The ways his book is a visual version of the perfect mixed tape.
• How negative space and imagination work together to create a story.
• Why people see the same colors differently (hint: it's rooted in science!).

Plus, his #1 tip for writers.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/341

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Adam Smyer.

Adam Smyer is an attorney, martial artist, and mediocre bass player. His nonfiction has appeared in the Johannesburg Review of Books, and his debut novel, Knucklehead, was the sole title short-listed for the 2018 Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence. Adam lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife and cats. You Can Keep That to Yourself is his latest work, and we'll be discussing it today.

• The tremendous amount of luck involved between starting and publishing a book.
• Why eradicating micro-aggressions is important in eliminating major aggressions.
• The important role humor can play in addressing a very serious topic.

Plus, his #1 tip for writers.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/340

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Rachel Beanland.

Rachel Beanland writes fiction and essays, and has recently released her debut novel. Her essays have appeared in Creative Nonfiction and Broad Street, among other places, and she has an MFA in creative writing from Virginia Commonwealth University.

With bachelor's degrees in art history and journalism, Rachel worked in public relations and nonprofit management before focusing on writing full time. She currently lives in Richmond, Virginia with her husband and three children.

Her debut novel is Florence Adler Swims Forever, which we'll be discussing here today.

• How a family tragedy influenced her approach to writing her debut novel.
• Why rotating perspectives helped with secret-keeping throughout her story.
• Her experience with workshopping her novel as she wrote it.

Plus, her #1 tip for writers.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/339

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Alexandra Monir.

Alexandra is an Iranian-American author and recording artist who has published six popular young adult novels. Her internationally-bestselling debut, Timeless was a Barnes & Noble Bestseller and Amazon.com "Best Books of the Month." In 2018 she published the hit sci-fi novel The Final Six and Sony Pictures optioned the film rights in a major pre-empt deal. More recently, she has followed up with a sequel—The Life Below—which was published earlier this year.

Alexandra was chosen as part of a group of global bestselling authors to write for the New York Times-bestselling DC ICONS series. Her book is Black Canary: Breaking Silence, the first-ever YA novel about that DC Comics superhero. Next up, Alexandra is writing a historical fantasy YA for Disney based on Princess Jasmine.

• How she honors her grandmother in her career, especially in her latest book.
• Her method for creating a complex cast of villains for Black Canary.
• Why she incorporated original music into the release of her book.

Plus, her #1 tip for writers.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/338

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Brad Fox.

Brad is a novelist, journalist, translator, and former relief worker currently quarantined in rural Peru. His novel To Remain Nameless was a Paris Review staff pick, an SPD recommended new fiction title, has been a small press bestseller since its release. It was named by Dennis Cooper as a Best Book of 2020.

Brad's stories, essays, and articles have appeared in The New Yorker, Guernica, and the Whitney Biennial and some of his upcoming work will be featured in "From the Deep," a major exhibition at the Smithsonian Museum of African Art in 2021.

Brad left the US in the late 1990s and began working as a feature writer and television producer in the former Yugoslavia. Since that time, he has worked in various countries around the globe, doing different forms of humanitarian and arts-related work.

In March earlier this year, he left New York for what was meant to be a twelve-day trip to northeastern Peru, with the goal of studying with a traditional medicine practitioner and completing a book on the bathysphere dives — the first eyewitness account of the deep ocean. That twelve-day trip has extended much longer than those original twelve days, and he's been doing virtual book launch events from a little table on the edge of the jungle, surrounded by monkeys, hummingbirds and poisonous ants.

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• How his partner's experiences as a doula inspired many of the characters and the structure of his book To Remain Nameless.
• What voice and POV techniques Brad used to transition between past and present to give his language "energy".
• Why "writing for no reason" and experimenting in the moment is a large part of Brad's writing process.

Plus, their #1 tip for writers.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/337

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Marcella Pixley, the author of four acclaimed books for young people.

Her novel Freak was a Kirkus Best Book of the Year for 2007, Without Tess was a Junior Library Guild Selection, and Ready to Fall was a Bank Street of Education Best Book for 2017. Her most recent novel Trowbridge Road was just recently named as one of ten books for children for the National Book Awards 2020.

Marcella first began her writing career as a poet and has published in several literary journals including Sow's Ear Poetry Review, Prairie Schooner and Poet Lore, plus she was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her fiction has a lyric quality, which makes sense given her roots in poetry, and teaches 8th grade Language Arts at the Carlisle Public Schools.

Today we'll be discussing Marcella's most recent book, Trowbridge Road.

• How her personal childhood experiences and her diagnosis of OCD inspired her book Trowbridge Road.
• Why she believes that MG should be written authentically to reflect realistic, traumatic, and difficult childhood experiences.
• What character voices, detailed moments, and scenes she specifically crafted to reflect her experiences.

Plus, their #1 tip for writers.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/336

Hey there word nerds!

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Diane Zinna.

Originally from Long Island, Diane received her MFA from the University of Florida and went on to teach creative writing for ten years. She formerly worked at AWP—the Association of Writers & Writing Programs—which hosts the largest literary conference in North America each year.

In 2014, Diane created the AWP Writer to Writer Mentorship Program, helping to match more than six hundred writers over twelve seasons. Diane lives in Fairfax, Virginia, with her husband and daughter, and The All-Night Sun is her debut novel.

• How a dream she had, her experience with grief, and her memories of Sweden inspired the premise of her novel.
• Why she started the story where she did and why she almost wrote Lauren a completely different ending.
• What kind of heartfelt teaching Diane feels is imperative to the workshop experience.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/335

Hey there word nerds!

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Veena Rao.

Veena Rao is the author of Purple Lotus: A Novel (She Writes Press), as well as founder, publisher and editor-in-chief of NRI Pulse, a popular Atlanta-based Indian-American news publication. She is in the Limca Book of Records as the first Indian-origin woman to edit and publish a newspaper outside India.

Veena Rao has a background in print journalism, having worked on the news desk of The Indian Express in India, and a couple of community publications in Atlanta as editor. She has a Masters' Diploma in Journalism and Communication from Symbiosis International University and a Masters' in Economics from Fergusson College, India.

She has been featured in several major Asian print publications including the BBC Telugu, the Hindu, Indian Express, Gulf News, the Khaleej Times, India Review etc. She currently lives in Tucker, GA.

• How her life circumstances forced her creative writing to take a backseat and how she got her writing life back.
• What skills her journalism background afforded her when approaching difficult topics such as domestic abuse and mental illness.
• Why She Writes Press was a great fit for the kind of book Veena wanted to write.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/334

Hey there word nerds!

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Sara Schaff.

Sara is the author of two short story collections The Invention of Love and Say Something Nice About Me. She is a CLMP Firecracker Award Finalist in fiction and a finalist for the 2017 Next Generation Indie Book Award for short fiction. Her writing has appeared in Catapult, Kenyon Review Online, Yale Review Online, The Belladonna, Michigan Quarterly Review, LitHub, and others.

A graduate of Brown University and the MFA program at the University of Michigan, Sara has taught at Oberlin College, the University of Michigan, and St. Lawrence University, as well as in China, Colombia, and Northern Ireland, where she also studied storytelling. She lives in the North Country and is an assistant professor of English at the SUNY Plattsburgh.

• How approaching her characters emotions more authentically created a significant change in her writing style.
• What a writer can do to best bring a reader into the story, and help a reader fully get to know their characters.
• Why feedback from other writers isn't always helpful if it relies too much on suggestions for fixes and harsh criticisms, and not enough on building community.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/333

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Andi Cumbo-Floyd.

Andi is a writer of both magical realism and nonfiction, but in the last year, she has taken on a new persona as ACF Bookens, author of cozy mysteries. Today we'll be talking about her process and strategy in crafting this series.

When she's not writing, Andi is also an editor and writing coach, and she runs a beautiful, supportive online community. She lives in Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains with a number of animals who cannot possibly coordinate their veterinary needs.

• Why Andi cautions against writing for the market, but encourages writing in a particular niche that you love.
• What Cozy mystery tropes readers tend to expect, find funny, and appreciate.
• How writers of the Cozy mystery genre tend to market themselves, including newsletter writing tips.

For more info and show notes: diymfa.com/332