Living The Next Chapter: Candid Conversations with Authors and Writers for Readers Searching for a New Read

EPISODE  698 - Joe Battaglia - Award-winning journalist, From High School Sports to Olympic Coverage - We Go for Gold “Beneath The Rings”

Joe Battaglia is a seasoned and award-winning journalist who spent years in The Olympics arena. With over two decades in sports media, Battaglia has led content creation across news, politics, and athletics, including a role on the NBCOlympics.com team that earned a Sports Emmys for Outstanding New Approaches To Sports Event Coverage for the 2008 Beijing and 2012 London Summer Olympics. He currently lives in Texas with his family. Joe is the author of the award-winning children’s book, The ABCs of Track & Field: A Fast Start For Future Runners Jumpers & Throwers, and Beneath the Rings is his debut adult novel.

Book - Beneath The Rings - The Doha 2040 Summer Olympics are supposed to be about gold medals and global unity. Instead, they kick off a descent into terror when 12 Israeli and Lebanese athletes vanish, leaving behind only the chilling threat of The Obsidian Hand and an impossible $500 billion ransom. Veteran journalist Nova Mendelsohn finds herself entangled with a cryptic Ancient Arabic note and a mysterious local merchant, forced to race the clock. Her pursuit of the truth will take her from the glittering Olympic Village into the city’s darkest corners and onto the blood-soaked sands of the desert, where a centuries-old vengeance threatens to ignite a catastrophic final act. What secrets lie beneath the surface of the Games, and what will it cost Nova to uncover them?

https://booksbybattaglia.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

Episode 697 - Rae Dumont - In the Shadow of Silence - A Novel of love and joy leading to the descent of untreated depression and unbearable loss

In this episode, author Rae Dumont shares the inspiration behind her novel In the Shadow of Silence, a story drawn from her decades as a pediatrician and family therapist. Living in a New Jersey suburb near Manhattan, Dumont explains how the book demanded to be written, capturing fundamental truths about families facing mental health struggles, particularly depression. Influenced by James Baldwin's commitment to truth, she focuses on relational dynamics rather than specific events, portraying no person as an island.

The novel centers on Lyman, a man battling depression, and his family's emotional turmoil—anger, guilt, inadequacy, and confusion among his wife Eva and children. Dumont wrote for those suffering in silence, emphasizing they are not alone; help exists through therapy, medication as an adjunct, couples counseling, exercise, and awareness practices. She highlights how children notice parental moods early, like Lyman's young daughter’s tears prompting his initial treatment, and stresses modeling help-seeking as strength, not weakness, to break generational cycles of unspoken trauma and suicide.

Family members grapple with mixed feelings, such as frustration when efforts to help fail, and the dangers of stopping treatment impulsively without support. Dumont addresses cultural stigmas, especially for men, urging collaborative monitoring instead of solo battles. Post-tragedy, she advocates space for diverse reactions—fury, grief, or silence—using tools like family mapping to reveal what kids already sense.

Key Takeaway: You are not alone in depression or supporting a loved one through it—reach out for help, talk openly, and model vulnerability to foster healing and connection across generations. 

About Rae Dumont

 I am a mother, a widow, a friend. 

As a pediatrician and a family therapist, I have shared in many people’s experiences, and tried to help.

I hope to bring these lives to the page, and to share what they taught me.

This book is for you, if you have struggled with depression. There are people who love you, and reasons to live.

If you have tried to help a loved one who does battle with darkness, this book will show that you are not alone

https://www.raedumontwriting.org/

Please read  my blog on SUBSTACK

https://raedumont.substack. com

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

EPISODE 696 - Heather Ogden - The Lies We Fear - The Betrayal, Dark Fantasy, Power and Control, Truth as Rebellion

Heather Ogden is a writer, fantasy worldbuilder, and lifelong storyteller who finds strength in solitude and meaning in imagination. As an introvert, she’s always been drawn to quiet spaces where deep emotions and layered characters can unfold without noise.

She writes to explore identity, power, and the fragile line between loyalty and truth—often through morally gray characters and emotionally intense worlds. Her stories come from a place of reflection, curiosity, and a desire to understand the unspoken.

When not writing, Heather loves immersive storytelling in all forms: whether it’s sinking into a novel, strategizing through a D&D campaign, or exploring character-driven video games. She believes fantasy is a mirror—and that some truths are best discovered in the dark.

The Betrayal: The Lies We Fear - Poised with regal grace and pristine wealth, Angelette Arabella is the dutiful daughter of Valerius Arabella, a dictator who rules with an iron fist.

When she stumbles upon a series of long-buried secrets that threaten to dismantle their carefully crafted lives, she faces a harrowing choice: expose the truth and risk everything or remain silent and let the lies continue. As tensions rise and loyalties shift, she must decide who to trust in a game where betrayal lurks around every corner.

Will Angelette have the courage to face the darkness, or will her fear silence her forever?

https://www.thelieswefear.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

EPISODE 695 - Becca Pearce - You Don’t Have to Achieve to Be Loved - Identity, Health Scare and Rebuilding, and For What

In this heartfelt conversation, Becca Pearce shares her personal journey from striving for relentless achievement to discovering the simple truth that love does not depend on accomplishment. Joining from Baltimore, Maryland, Becca recounts how her community, the influence of her city’s sporting legacy, and her close network of family and friends helped shape her sense of self. Early in her career, she took on a massive challenge: leading Maryland’s implementation of the Affordable Care Act. Despite her dedication, the project’s failed launch left her facing public professional loss and an identity crisis.

Soon after, Becca was diagnosed with a brain tumor that upended her life even further. Recovery demanded extraordinary vulnerability and forced her to accept help from her young daughter and family. These experiences, coupled with the slow journey of healing and re-learning basic skills, made Becca realize that her worth wasn’t tied to her career, her title, or her ability to “do it all.” She describes powerful moments of shifting from the desire for external validation to a new focus on the relationships and inner values that truly matter.

As she wrote her book, Becca revisited old stories she’d told herself, confronting difficult truths and embracing narrative change. She found that the act of writing became a path to healing, helping her rewrite her own perceptions and guiding the book’s structure to support others going through change. Becca’s book leads readers through a step-by-step transformation process, with journaling prompts to help recognize unhappiness, break free from achievement-driven thinking, and re-center life around values and authentic connection.

Becca also offers practical advice on how to recover from setbacks and ego bruises, such as stopping to breathe, expressing emotions in healthy ways, and assessing the trusted people who remain when achievements fall away. She emphasizes the importance of uncovering and living your personal core values, and how these can evolve as your definition of success changes. Through all her coaching work, Becca aims to help clients move from confusion and discomfort toward clarity and purposeful living.

For listeners, the episode is a reminder that true love and worth are found not in perfection, titles, or achievement, but in the simple act of showing up as your authentic, vulnerable self.

Key Takeaway:
Becca’s story challenges the belief that we must achieve to be loved. Instead, it offers hope: no matter the setbacks, losses, or life changes, you can rewrite your own narrative, reconnect with your values, and discover fulfillment through self-acceptance and meaningful relationships.

Book Information:
"You Don’t Have to Achieve to Be Loved: Escape the Lies You’ve Been Sold to Design the Life You Want" is available wherever books are sold.

https://morebeccapearce.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

EPISODE 694 - Anna B Reardon - Wethersfield Road - A love letter to anyone who’s ever felt like they were too much

Living The Next Chapter welcomes author Anna B. Reardon to dive into her debut novel, Wethersfield Road, and the deeply human journey behind it. Speaking from her home in Austin, Texas, Anna shares the vibrant backdrop of her city and how its mix of nature and creativity mirrors the many layers of her own story—a story of recovery, self-discovery, and learning to love being “too much in the best way.”

Anna describes Wethersfield Road as “autofiction,” blending truth and imagination to explore her path to sobriety and wellness in her twenties. The novel follows Amelia, a young woman who, after a life-altering accident, begins the difficult but beautiful process of rebuilding her relationship with herself and with the world. As Anna explains, the horse, the forest, and the natural world became metaphors for healing—reminding her that the journey back to being human often starts with connecting to something simple and alive.

Writing the book, she says, was both healing and frightening, the act of putting private chaos into public words. Anna shares that some passages came from journal entries written during her darkest times, offering an authentic lens on depression and recovery. She discusses how fiction gave her freedom to tell emotional truths safely—Amelia could voice the thoughts Anna once couldn’t. And in one of many poetic moments, Anna recounts writing a scene about ladybugs only to feel one land on her arm mid-sentence, a synchronicity that affirmed her belief in paying attention to life’s quiet signs.

Throughout the conversation, Anna reflects on addiction not only to substances but to validation, control, and even distraction. She describes the concept of “coping mechanism whack-a-mole,” where one unhealthy escape replaces another, and how true healing comes when we stop chasing external fixes and begin to trust our own inner resilience. Her metaphor of “the national forest versus the amusement park” captures this beautifully—the forest being the authentic, grounded self that doesn’t need flash or noise to be enough.

The episode also touches on broader themes of millennial womanhood—the ache of growing up under impossible standards, the challenge of learning emotional literacy in the digital age, and the rediscovery of self-worth that so many experience in adulthood. Ultimately, Anna’s story is a testament to transformation, connection, and creative courage.

Key takeaway: Healing is not about becoming someone new—it’s about remembering who you already are. As Anna reminds listeners, discomfort isn’t a red light, it’s a green one. Growth often feels unnatural before it becomes second nature.

https://www.anna-writes.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

EPISODE 693 - Lally Pia - Fortune Teller’s Prophecy: A Memoir of an Unlikely Doctor

Lally Pia is a child and adolescent psychiatrist and an award-winning author. Her debut memoir, The Fortune Teller’s Prophecy: A Memoir of an Unlikely Doctor was published by She Writes Press in April, 2024. It received first place in the Chanticleer International Book Awards (2023), third place at the Independent Book Publisher Awards (2024) and second place at Book Fest (2024).

Lally was a finalist in the nationwide talent search for America’s Next Great Author (2022). Her article about recovery from a stroke featured in The Davis Enterprise and on Doximity’s Op-Med. A video, A Day in the Life of a Psychiatrist, landed over 71,000 views. She amassed over half a million views on TikTok @theunlikelydoctor.

Lally worked as assistant professor at California North State University School of Medicine and is currently a voluntary faculty member there. She is on the Board of Directors for the Sacramento California Writers Club.

Lally has lived in Sri Lanka, Wales, England and Pennsylvania and she currently lives in Davis, California with her husband, Tim. She is currently completing a novel, Andorea, (psychological suspense). She is pitching a TV pilot based on her memoir.

Book: The Fortune Teller's Prophecy - A single mother must navigate the difficult path of family, promises and elusive dreams.

When Lally was three months old, a fortune teller told her father that she would one day become a doctor. Could he be right?

https://www.lallypia.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

EPISODE 692 - Sandra Freels - Anneke Jans in the New World - an ordinary woman who lived an extraordinary life

Originally from Indiana, Sandra Freels majored in Russian at Indiana University and then completed a PhD in Slavic Languages and Literatures at Stanford University. The author of three textbooks, for many years she headed the Russian Program at Portland State University. An interest in genealogy led Sandra to the Council Records of New Netherland and the delicious stories of the people who once lived there. She claims descent from Anneke Jans and sixteen other major and minor characters in her debut novel, Anneke Jans in the New World. Sandra at present lives in Portland, Oregon, with her husband Joel and their two cats.

COMING JANUARY 6, 2025
Timed perfectly to publish just as New York celebrates its 400th birthday, a riveting story of a spirited young mother who faces the unknowns of seventeenth-century New Amsterdam after fleeing the Old World in search of a better life.

It’s 1630, and Anneke Jans has just arrived in the fledgling colony of New Netherland with her husband, Roelof, and their two young daughters to create a new life for herself and her family. One of very few women in the colony, Anneke quickly realizes that she will need to make her own rules if she is to survive.

When Roelof dies, Anneke marries Everardus Bogardus, the flamboyant minister of the Dutch Reformed Church. With this marriage, Anneke joins the elites of the colony—but when the colony’s new director provokes war with the region’s American Indians and her new husband emerges as the head of the anti-war opposition, she also finds herself in the midst of political turmoil. As difficulties mount, she must rely more than ever on her quick wits to protect herself and her growing family.

Based on real events, Anneke Jans in the New World tells the story of an ordinary woman who lived an extraordinary life.

https://sandrafreels.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

Episode 691 - Laura L Engel - You’ll Forget This Ever Happened - Secrets, Shame, and Adoption in the 1960s

This intimate conversation with memoirist Laura Engel explores late blooming creativity, the cost of secrecy, and the profound impact of reunion and loss across generations. Speaking from the foothills outside San Diego, Laura reflects on beginning her first book at sixty eight, transforming decades of journals and memories into a deeply personal memoir about closed adoption in the nineteen sixties. She describes teaching herself to write a book draft by draft, learning to trust editors, and slowly finding the courage to tell a story she had been told to bury.

Laura shares how writing moved her from isolation to community. After a career in real estate and title insurance, she discovered that writers form a different kind of tribe, one built on shared obsession, vulnerability, and encouragement. She urges aspiring authors of any age to never give up, to seek out classes and critique groups, and to write even if publication is not the goal. For Laura, the act of putting words on the page became both a craft and a lifeline.

At the heart of the episode is the story behind her memoir, You’ll Forget This Ever Happened. As a seventeen year old in nineteen sixty seven, Laura was sent to an unwed mothers home in New Orleans, pressured into a closed adoption, and shamed into silence for decades. She recalls the lasting trauma of leaving her newborn son behind, the small act of defiance in pocketing his birth card, and the way that secret shaped her sense of self, her health, and her relationships. For fifty years, she carried that grief alone, hiding it from her children and most of the people closest to her.

Everything changed when her firstborn son found her through DNA testing, just as she had retired and begun taking creative writing classes. The reunion, which she describes as both miraculous and exhausting, brought overwhelming joy, new grandchildren, and a longed for chance to be authentic about her past. It also revealed how complex reunion can be when histories, families, and expectations collide. Their four and a half years together were filled with visits, laughter, and deep conversation, even as he faced divorce, job loss, and growing depression.

Laura then recounts the shattering aftermath of her son’s death by suicide and the agonizing decision about whether to publish a book that originally ended on a hopeful first Christmas together. With the support of another author, she chose to add an epilogue and release the memoir, confronting not only the stigma of unwed motherhood but also the stigma of suicide.

The episode closes with a look at Laura’s next project: a fiction based on her father’s stories and her parents’ love story in Biloxi, Mississippi, starting in nineteen twenty eight. Writing this second book has brought a different kind of joy, allowing her to portray her parents in a fuller light and to honor the promise her father once made when he gave her a little desk and asked her to write him a book someday.


https://lauralengel.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

EPISODE 690 - Cindy Eastman - True Confessions of An Ambivalent Caregiver, Grief, Loss and The Next Chapter

About the author
Cindy Eastman is a writer and an educator.

Her career has taken a wide and diverse route from introducing computer skills to elementary schoolchildren, teaching freshman English as an adjunct at a community college to facilitating a writing course for seniors for the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. In her weekly essay on Substack called Silver Linings, she discusses getting older with a sense of humor--a must!

Eastman makes her home in Connecticut with her husband, Angelo. Her second collection of essays, "True Confessions of an Ambivalent Caregiver" will be published by She Writes Press in Sept. 2024 and she is submitting an anthology on grief to publishers. She can be found writing or teaching unless she gets to spend time with her grandkids. Then all bets are off.

Book: True Confessions of an Ambivalent Caregiver: A Memoir in Essays

Written for caregivers of parents and spouses, this funny but brutally honest collection of essays from award-winning author Eastman challenges the romanticized notion of caregiving, portraying it as an elegant conflict that reshapes family dynamics.

At first grateful to be able remodel the dining room of her family's modest home in Connecticut to accommodate her eighty-six-year-old father for what everyone felt would be a short duration of care, Cindy Eastman ultimately experienced a whole gamut of feelings over the course of what turned out to be four years of caring for her dying dad. Caregiving impacts everyone, and this account—told in essays recorded before, during, and after the time Eastman's father was with her—details that impact, not just on the primary caregiver but also the rest of the family.

One of the reasons Eastman committed to writing down her experiences was because she predicted that once her dad died, there would be a tendency to soften or even deny any of the negative and challenging times—and there were many. As of 2020, more than 53 million adults provide homecare in this country, and the reality of that arrangement is different for every family. It is not, as some might suggest, a "noble gesture" but rather an elegant conflict—an intricate reassembling of the family dynamic that many people don't ever see coming. In these candid, often poignant essays, Cindy Eastman brings all the emotions of taking on the challenging responsibility of caregiving a parent at the end of their life to the surface.

With lots of humorous insight, Cindy Eastman validates the struggles and sacrifices and describes what you want to say - even if you never utter a word. Eastman isn't afraid to reveal genuine thoughts and feelings about caregiving, even if these aren't always flattering.

True Confessions of an Ambivalent Caregiver shows that, sometimes, just getting through the day is an accomplishment, and it's enough.
~ Courtnee Turner Hoyle
for Readers' Favorite

https://cindyeastman.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

EPISODE 689 - Matthew Neal Boedy - The Seven Mountains Mandate - Exposing the Dangerous Plan to Christianize America and Destroy Democracy

A movement driven by prosperity preachers, extremist politicians, and right-wing power brokers laid the groundwork for Trump’s presidency and is now advancing its agenda under his second administration. This multipronged effort against our national institutions is being led by millennial “kingmaker” Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and the new face of Christian Nationalism.

"A sobering assessment of the evolution of Christian nationalism." - Publishers Weekly

Matthew Boedy has written for many publications and authored three books. He's appeared on CNN and MSNBC and in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and other media outlets.

He has been a leader in faculty organizing since 2020 as president of the Georgia conference of the American Association of University Professors, a national higher education advocacy group.

He completed his Ph.D. in English in 2015 at the University of South Carolina where he also received in 2010 a master's in creative writing. He most prizes his bachelor's degree in journalism in 2001 from the University of Florida and his work at the campus newspaper, the Independent Florida Alligator.

He is a full professor of rhetoric at the University of North Georgia. He researches and writes about religious rhetoric, particularly in the last few years about the rise of Christian Nationalism.

He was once a crime reporter and high school teacher. He resides with his wife and two daughters in Gainesville, Georgia.

https://www.matthewboedy.com/

Support the show

___
https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca