Happy birthday to us, it's been a year since we launched The Lit Hub Podcast! Not that you'd know it, because Drew completely forgot and didn't include a word about it in the episode itself. But still, we're proud!!

This week, Drew talks to Boris Kachka of The Atlantic about their new travel-writing series "The Writer's Way" (featuring the likes of Lauren Groff visiting Lady Murasaki's Kyoto and Honor Jones in le Carré's Corfu). Then, Allison Miriam Smith and Brandon Taylor drop by to chat about why they launched Smith & Taylor Classics and how they're putting together the colorful, playful, vibrant series of classics-in-conversation. And finally, to welcome "The World in Time" to the Lit Hub Radio family, an excerpt from a recent episode to whet your whistle.

The Lit Hub Podcast is a production of Lit Hub Radio

Hosted by Drew Broussard

Music by Dani Lencioni of Evelyn

Produced and engineered at Stardust House

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September means back-to-school! Hooray for learning! Hooray for fall! There's definitely not anything bad or weird going on as relates to education, the weather, spooky season, or anything else...

First up this week, Joelle Renstrom talks with Drew about being a teacher in 2025 and her recent essay for the site about Cliffs Notes. Then, Molly Odintz joins Drew to chat with Max Booth III about Ghoulish Books in San Antonio getting harassed by MAGA types for a saucy chalkboard and, more broadly, about the state of horror in these horrifying times. Finally, Michael Kelly (publisher of Undertow Publications) calls in from Canada to give listeners some updates on what's going on with shipping between Canada (or, really, everywhere...) and the US.

Oh also, Drew's book rec of the week: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark, now available as an Olive Edition!

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Superheroes are back, baby! You will believe a man can fly — but did you know that such things were happening in the decades before Siegel and Schuster created Kal-El in 1938? Joshua Glenn, editor of Before Superman: Superhumans of the Radium Age and overall series editor of MIT Press's Radium Age Science Fiction series, stops by to tell Drew about the Radium Age of SF and discovering all these proto-supermen (and women!) for this new collection.

Then, Diana Arterian drops in to chat about The Annotated Nightstand and gets some of Drew's TBR out of him. Also, they come up with a great idea for a holiday stream that interested parties should definitely tell Drew they're excited by. And finally, a call from fellow bookseller and novelist Mo Daviau (author of Epic and Lovely, out next week!) about a particular bookselling challenge...

Oh, also, a shout-out to Andrew Kaufman's Enjoy Your Stay at the Shamrock Motel!

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Oh summer colds, you might be the worst kind of cold. But that won't stop The Lit Hub Podcast! 

This week, as we celebrate the dog days of summer, Brittany Allen drops by to tell Drew about curating Lit Hub's ongoing, weekly list of nice things. Then, an intro (for those who don't already know them!) to Lit Hub Radio stalwarts Fiction/Non/Fiction with an excerpt from their recent interview with Gary Shteyngart. And finally — in more ways than one — we're opening up our phone lines! We want to hear from you! Our first caller is Maggie Smith, the new host of The Slowdown! 

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Drew's been working on (gasp) a novel and it seems to be going well (because saying so certainly won't jinx it) so this week is a bit of writer-work-focused!

Kicking off with a shout to Ursula K. Le Guin's Steering the Craft, we are then joined by Erin Somers (author of Stay Up with Hugo Best and the forthcoming The Ten Year Affair but also a reporter & editor at Publishers Lunch) to explain the one-stop-publishing-shop that is Publishers Marketplace—you know, with the deal announcements you see your writer-friends posting on Instagram?

Then, an excerpt of Jonny Diamond's conversation with Maris Kriezman on the last stop of Maris's book tour for I Want to Burn This Place Down, recorded live at the Northern Spy Reading Series at Left Bank Ciders in Catskill, NY. And finally, James Folta pops in with a quick update on why more than half of the longlisted authors have withdrawn from this year's Polari Prize.

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Summer, to me, means long days and hanging out in nature and Shakespeare — specifically Shakespeare in the Park. After James Folta wrote about NYC Comptroller Brad Lander's sonnet for the ribbon cutting at the revamped Delacorte Theater in Central Park, his office reached out to remind us that the Comptroller has done this multiple times now... and so obviously, Drew had to talk to him about diving into the poetic form and the power of art to build empathy in these otherwise selfish times.

Then, Stefan Tobler (publisher of & Other Stories) drops in to tell Drew what it's like to be a small press that wins a big prize — and why it is that copies of 2025 International Booker Prize winner Heart Lamp have taken so long to reach US bookshops.

Plus, a quick love letter to a recent read: Strange and Perfect Account from the Permafrost!

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We're back from our lil summer break and shaking off the rust! It's been hot, but getting maybe better—and we're trying to take the slow pace and the long view before we truly roll into the fall. Speaking of: what are you reading for the rest of the summer? Perhaps try the Sealey Challenge (all funds this year going to the Sameer Project)! Or start reading the Booker Prize longlist!

Also, you could pick up an old issue of Lapham's Quarterly to get in the mood for the storied mag's revival—and we have acting editor Donovan Hahn on the show to tell us more about that slow pace, that long view, and the future of Lapham's. Or perhaps you're feeling like it's a real socialist gothic summer—and McKayla Coyle is here to chat with Drew about the socialist fundamentals of gothic literature and the very specific burgeoning sub-genre that is Socialist Gothic.

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Halfway through the year means it's time to anticipate again! That's right: the Lit Hub staff has compiled a list (multiple lists, actually) of books you should be looking forward to for the rest of the calendar year—and now we bring you a bunch of staff members talking about some (some!) of the books they're most excited for.

Featuring (in order of appearance): Drew Broussard, Jonny Diamond, Julia Hass, Brittany K. Allen, McKayla Coyle, Calvin Kasulke, Jessie Gaynor, Dan Sheehan, Emily Temple, James Folta, and Drew again (because he is just that excited about SO MANY BOOKS).

Lit Hub's Most Anticipated Books of 2025, Part Two

Our 33 Most Anticipated Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Horror Books for the Rest of 2025

The Most Anticipated Crime Fiction of Summer 2025

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"...that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from this earth."

No, Lincoln didn't say that on July 4th—but Jefferson was a racist and Adams wasn't all that inspiring a speaker ("sit down, John!") and we certainly aren't going to quote Hamilton (the guy or the show).

Anyway, not a real episode this week—just a little holiday note and an acknowledgement that after next week's Most Anticipated audio, we'll be taking a two week break and coming back in August!

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We're riding the high of something going right in the world (see: NYC's mayoral primary) and leaning mostly into hijinks and happiness this week—but not before we remind you all of the very real stakes facing artists of all stripes right now, the frankly-existential threat that is generative AI.

First up, Brittany Cavallaro drops by to introduce the "Against AI" open letter that Lit Hub just published. Then, Calvin Kasulke hosts a rollicking conversation with Cat Fitzpatrick and Casey Plett about LittlePuss Press, trans publishing, and what it's like to run a small press. Finally, Drew chats with McKayla Coyle and Oliver Scialdone about fan-fiction in a conversation with perhaps more giggles-per-minute than any we've yet aired on the show. Maybe.

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