New Yorker staff writer Jelani Cobb joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new essay collection, Three or More is a Riot: Notes on How We Got Here: 2012-2025. Cobb recalls how he began the project by trying to understand how George Zimmerman’s killing of unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in 2012 set the tone for the era to come. Cobb considers how history’s exceptions skew narratives, so that writers miss the bigger picture. He reflects on how discourse about race shifted between the Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations and considers the juxtaposition of Martin’s murder with Obama’s presidency. Cobb also speaks on the significance of transparency in journalism, calling for reporters to show their work to reinforce public trust. He explains his preference for a lowercase “b” in “black” as a racial term, given that the word is not a proper noun, does not designate a nationality, and that capitalization may perpetuate inaccurate racial ideologies. Cobb reads from Three or More Is a Riot.

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Bri Wilson, Emma Baxley, Hope Wampler, and Elly Meman.

Jelani Cobb

Three or More Is a Riot: Notes on How We Got Here: 2012-2025

The Matter of Black Lives: Writing from The New Yorker, edited with David Remnick

The Essential Kerner Commission Report, edited with Matthew Guariglia

The Substance of Hope: Barack Obama and the Paradox of Progress

The Devil and Dave Chappelle and Other Essays

To the Break of Dawn: A Freestyle on the Hip Hop Aesthetic

"Lessons of Later-in-Life Fatherhood" | The New Yorker, June 14, 2025

Full text of Jelani Cobb's 2025 Reuters Memorial Lecture: Trust Issues. Credibility, Credulity and Journalism in a Time of Crisis 

Others:

Lincoln 

Django Unchained

Gwen Ifill

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Acclaimed fiction writer and essayist Edwidge Danticat joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss her new essay collection We’re Alone. Danticat reflects on misinformation and xenophobic rhetoric, such as Trump’s false 2024 debate claim about Haitian immigrants eating pets in Springfield, Ohio, and how that type of language and propaganda has broadened during Trump’s second term to include even more immigrant communities. She recounts what she has learned about conditions in prisons and detention centers during her visits there and also considers today’s immigration policies, including the Trump administration’s attempts to end Temporary Protected Status for Haitian immigrants and how deliberately humiliating immigrants not only hurts them, but also deters others considering crossing borders. Danticat describes her connection to Haiti and the ways natural disasters can unexpectedly bring people together as well as how these disasters are tied to migration. She reflects on political instability in Haiti, the meaning behind the title of her new book, and how writers like Toni Morrison, Audre Lorde, Jean Rhys and Paule Marshall shaped her thinking and writing process. Danticat reads from We’re Alone. 

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, Amelia Fisher, Victoria Freisner, Wil Lasater, and S E Walker.

Edwidge Danticat

We're Alone

Create Dangerously

Breath, Eyes, Memory

Brother, I'm Dying

Others:

Jamaica kincaid (@virtuouspomona) • Instagram photos and videos

Rootedness: The Ancestor as Foundation | Black Women Writers (1950-1980)

The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde

Dany Laferrière

Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

Immigrants can have ponies | Seinfeld (1989)

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Fiction writer Yiming Ma joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new novel These Memories Do Not Belong To Us. Ma, who was born in Shanghai and visited China frequently after immigrating to the U.S. and Canada, talks about how terrifyingly easy it can be to live in a society in which censorship is the default, and the dangers of self-censorship. Ma, who has an MBA, also reflects on the gap between how the tech and business worlds discuss artificial intelligence versus his peers in the arts. He explains how he developed the protagonist of his novel, a young man who struggles to decide what to do with an inheritance of forbidden memories; reflects on how his book’s structure, which moves between those memories, works as a “constellation novel,” in the tradition of Olga Tokarczuk; and considers how his characters demonstrate survival as a form of resistance. He reads from These Memories Do Not Belong To Us.

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Moss Terrell.

Yiming Ma

These Memories Do Not Belong to Us

"When fear silences the writer" - The Globe and Mail 

Others:

Robot: Mere Machine to Transcendent Mind by Hans Moravec

Flights by Olga Tokarczuk

“The Purloined Letter” by Edgar Allan Poe

"Mirrors, Memories, Rebellions: An Interview with Yiming Ma” Chicago Review of Books 

Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 8, Episode 51: Omar El Akkad on Gaza and Western Empire

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Journalist Caleb Gayle joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new book Black Moses: A Saga of Ambition and the Fight for a Black State, which recounts the efforts of Edward McCabe, a Black settler who became a prominent politician in the late 1800s and spearheaded a mission to establish a majority-Black state in the American West. Gayle sets the scene of McCabe’s upbringing as a free Black man on the East Coast and his move across the country to majority-Black towns in Kansas and Oklahoma. Gayle also talks about how Black settlers navigated the challenges of the supposed promised land, including bleak weather and the machinations of white politicians. Despite great difficulties, Gayle explains, McCabe persisted, and while his dreamed-of state never came to fruition, his legacy is visible in some Western towns even today. Gayle reads from Black Moses: A Saga of Ambition and the Fight for a Black State. 

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Moss Terrell.

Caleb Gayle

Black Moses: A Saga of Ambition and the Fight for a Black State

We Refuse to Forget: A True Story of Black Creeks, American Identity, and Power

What Was the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921?

Others:

Victor LaValle’s Lone Women

Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 6, Episode 25: "Alone on the Range: Victor LaValle on Lone Women’s Homesteaders, History, and Horror"

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Writer Omar El Akkad joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his recent nonfiction book, One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, which was just nominated for the National Book Award in nonfiction. El Akkad talks about developing the arc of the book, which addresses how Israel’s genocide in Gaza led to his “breaking away from the notion that the polite, Western liberal ever stod for anything at all.” He explains how he conceptualized the West as a young man moving from Egypt to Qatar to Canada and finally the U.S. He also talks about how he can no longer vote for Democrats simply because they are “the lesser evil.” He reflects on how to talk to children about naming and understanding the world as it really is. El Akkad reads from One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This. 

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Moss Terrell.

Omar El Akkad

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This

What Strange Paradise

American War

Omar El Akkad on Genocide, Complicit Liberals, and the Terrible Wrath of the West | Literary Hub

Omar El Akkad on X: "One day, when it's safe, when there's no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it's too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this."

Others:

Suzanne Nossel, PEN America Leader, to Leave Embattled Organization - The New York Times (October 31, 2024)

A Campus for All | Faculty & Academic Affairs (University of Minnesota)

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Novelist Jessica Francis Kane joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss her new novel Fonseca, which fictionalizes writer Penelope Fitzgerald’s 1952 trip to Mexico. Kane talks about imagining Fitzgerald in her mid-thirties, before she had become a novelist, when she was living a financially precarious life and editing a journal with her husband Desmond. Kane reflects on Fitzgerald’s decision to travel to Mexico with her son Valpy, a prospective heir for sisters there who are distantly connected to their family. Kane explains how she came to correspond with Fitzgerald’s children and the choice to use those letters as part of the book; her belief that the trip had a formative effect on Fitzgerald; “following the plot” based on the available facts; and introducing historical speculation, like an acquaintance with painter Edward Hopper, into the storyline. Kane reads from Fonseca. 

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Moss Terrell.

Jessica Francis Kane

Fonseca

Rules for Visiting

This Close

The Report

Bending Heaven

Penelope Fitzgerald:

"Following the plot" | Penelope Fitzgerald | London Review of Books

Our Lives are Only Lent to Us | Penelope Fitzgerald | Granta Magazine

The Means Of Escape

Offshore

The Blue Flower

Others:

Penelope Fitzgerald: A Life by Hermione Lee

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Fiction writer and editor Patrick Ryan joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his debut novel, Buckeye, which traces two generations of two Midwestern families connected by a secret. Ryan recalls the coincidental conversation that informed his portrayal of one character’s experiences with disability in World War II-era Ohio, and reflects on taking Ann Patchett’s advice to keep the point of view very close when depicting experiences one hasn’t personally had. He explains how a spiritualist character became “the good heart of the book,” as well as his favorite fiction writing experience of all time. He also talks about troubling two fictional marriages and leaving his characters few paths through their woes. Ryan reads from Buckeye. 

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Moss Terrell.

Patrick Ryan

Buckeye

The Dream Life of Astronauts

Send Me

Saints of Augustine

In Mike We Trust

Gemini Bites

Others:

Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

The Gilded Age

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New York Times book critics Jennifer Szalai and Alexandra Jacobs join co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss their recent article, “Love Jack Kerouac? Read These Great American Road Trip Books Next,” which they co-authored with their fellow critic Dwight Garner, and which includes books published after Kerouac's On the Road. They talk about road trips as escapism, claustrophobia, exploration, and nostalgia, and reflect on their picks, including Hilma Wolitzer’s 1980 novel Hearts, Gypsy Rose Lee’s 1957 eponymous memoir, Michael Paterniti’s 2000 non-fiction book Driving Mr. Albert, and Jesmyn Ward’s 2017 novel Sing, Unburied, Sing. Szalai and Jacobs talk about developing an expansive conception of what qualifies as a road trip book, leaving Lolita out, and favorite road trip music and games. They read from the article. 

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Moss Terrell.

Jennifer Szalai and Alexandra Jacobs

"Love Jack Kerouac? Read These Great American Road Trip Books Next." by Dwight Garner, Alexandra Jacobs, and Jennifer Szalai - The New York Times 

Others:

On the Road by Jack Kerouac

Hearts by Hilma Wolitzer

Gypsy by Gypsy Rose Lee

Driving Mr. Albert by Michael Paterniti

Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward

Tigerlily by Natalie Merchant

The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery O’Connor

Still Here: The Madcap, Nervy, Singular Life of Elaine Stritch by Alexandra Jacobs

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Biographer Nicholas Boggs joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his groundbreaking new book, Baldwin: A Love Story, the first major biography of James Baldwin to be published in three decades. Boggs recalls how finding Baldwin’s only children’s book in a Yale library as a college student led him to track down the volume’s illustrator, the French artist Yoran Cazac, Baldwin’s last great love. He talks about interviewing people who had never previously spoken about their relationships with the iconic author, including Cazac, whom at least one previous biographer had wrongly guessed was deceased. Boggs reflects on the importance of considering Blackness, queerness, and chosen family as central to Baldwin’s life and art. He discusses Baldwin’s youth in Harlem, his years in Europe and Istanbul, and his relationships with the painters Beauford Delaney and Lucien Happersberger, the actor Engin Cezzar, and Cazac, as well as many others. Boggs considers how Baldwin’s deepest friendships and romances influenced his life and work, including Another Country, Go Tell It on the Mountain, Notes of a Native Son, and Giovanni’s Room. He reads from the book.

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the ⁠Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account⁠, the ⁠Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel⁠, and our show website: ⁠https://www.fnfpodcast.net/⁠

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Moss Terrell.

⁠Nicholas Boggs⁠

⁠Baldwin: A Love Story⁠

⁠Little Man, Little Man (ed.)⁠

⁠“They Will Try to Kill You”: James Baldwin’s Fraught Hollywood Journey | Vanity Fair⁠

⁠James Baldwin’s Love Stories | Vogue⁠ 

⁠James Baldwin⁠

⁠"Open Letter to the Born Again" | The Nation⁠

“⁠If Black English Isn't a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is?⁠” | The New York Times

⁠Giovanni’s Room⁠

⁠Another Country ⁠

⁠Notes of a Native Son⁠

⁠Go Tell It on the Mountain⁠

⁠Everybody’s Protest Novel⁠

Others:

⁠James Baldwin′s Turkish Decade by Magdalena J. Zaborowska⁠ 

⁠James Baldwin: A Biography by David Leeming

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Journalist Will Bardenwerper joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new book, Homestand: Small Town Baseball and the Fight for the Soul of America, which explores the consequences of Major League Baseball cutting 40 affiliated minor league teams, each one only as expensive as an average Major League salary. He explains how the accessibility and affordability of minor league baseball has made it a unique gathering point for working-class communities like the one in Batavia, New York, where Bardenwerper followed the local team, the Muckdogs, for a season. He celebrates the traditions and resilience of the Muckdogs fans and owners, who revived the team after it was eliminated as a minor league franchise. He also reads from Homestand. 

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, and Moss Terrell.

Will Bardenwerper

Homestand: Small Town Baseball and the Fight for the Soul of America

“Minor Threat: MLB puts the farm system out to pasture” by Will Bardenwerper |Harper’s Magazine

The Prisoner In His Palace: Saddam Hussein, His American Guards, and What History Leaves Unsaid

Others:

Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 3, Episode 4: Wild Ecologies: So Go the Salmon, So Goes the World: Tucker Malarkey, Will Bardenwerper, and Stan Brewer In Conversation

Moneyball by Michael Lewis

Field of Dreams (1989)

Shoeless Joe by W.P. Kinsella

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