Fall for the Book Podcast

Daniel Simon talks about the globe-striding literature found in A Compass on the Navigable Sea: 100 Years of Literature, which he edited as part of World Literature Today's centenary year. Dive into literary genealogy, the balance of translating, and some regional literature you may not have read before.

Dive into the powerful anthology with your very own copy: https://bookshop.org/a/21133/9781632064134

Two poets gather to discuss their work in the final episode of the season. Iain Haley Pollock’s All The Possible Bodies examines the myths we tell about ourselves, our families and nation, as well as asks the questions: How do we make peace with our hypocrisy and complicity in a social order that harms us all? Can and should we? Matthew Nienow’s If Nothing is a reckoning of alcoholism, fatherhood, longing and loss, and the need for forgiveness.

Kim Magowan and Michelle Ross talk about their co-authored collection Don’t Take This the Wrong Way. The twenty-five stories delight in characters who love to burn bridges, study language – both spoken and physical, and get lost in the moments in life full of affection, pettiness, humor, and self-discovery.

Reading list from the discussion: Tenth of December, George Saunders; Reasons to Live, Amy Hemple; Alice Munroe; Lorrie Moore; Bliss Montage, Ling Ma; and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

Sebastian Matthews and Tom McAllister discuss their experimental memoir structures in this episode of the Fall for the Book Podcast. In The Patient Body: A Personal Narrative in Pieces, Sebastian questions what it means to lead a balanced life as a husband, father, friend, and more through a mosaic of ‘flash’ pieces. McAllister’s It All Felt Impossible: 42 Years in 42 Essays delivers on the ambitious promise of the title. The essays, which all are 1,500 words or less, explores the profound and mundane moments that build a life.

Love gets a second chance after fifteen long years in Jenn Bouchard’s Considering Us, set in Boston and along the New Hampshire coast. When private chef Devon Paige is embroiled in a scandal partly of her own making, she gets a job at an elite boarding school where she’s shocked to see an old flame. In this episode of the Fall for the Book podcast, Bouchard talks beloved romance tropes and Rom Coms, delicious food and bookish drinks, and the power of place.

Get her recipes from her YouTube appearance, Serving Up Some Love here: https://youtu.be/dKdM7s7vikA?si=nqHJ-Ln7SMe3Qlj6

Ashlee Cowles and Danielle Stinson, known collectively as A.D. Rhine, break down their epic duology about of the Trojan War: Horses of Fire, and the newest book, Daughters of Bronze. From the women working behind the scenes of the famous war depicted in The Illiad, to the modern research and retellings, Cowles and Stinson demonstrate their passion and knowledge for the subject, as well as the secrets behind their co-authorship success.

Poet Majda Gama reads from and discusses her new collection In the House of Modern Upbringing for Girls. The collection spans growing up in the Saudi Arabia, her life-changing time in the DC Punk scene, and the power and influence of music in Gama's work.

Caine Prize-winning author Olufemi Terry talks about his debut novel, Wilderness of Mirrors set in Stadmutter, a multiracial city at the southern tip of Africa modeled after Cape Town. Terry talks about the changing political landscape of Cape Town and his novel, his journalism, and the inspirations for the book. Author Lola Shoneyin calls it: “An unsentimental portrait of young adulthood in a city both beguiling and perilous, and which reflects Africans as they are too rarely depicted: hybrid, modern, and shaped by their own profound contradictions. Terry’s pared but illuminating prose captures the weight of its protagonists’ search for their place in the world.”

What happens when even your memories aren't safe from Big Tech and Big Government? Yiming Ma discusses these questions, and his debut speculative novel These Memories Do Not Belong To Us.

Natalia Theodoridou discusses his fever dream of a Bluebeard retelling - about the choice and non-choice of those stuck in cycles of abuse, the power of fairytales, and the toxicity of the patriarchy. He also examines choice and character arcs in interactive fiction, and how his landscape has informed his writing.