The National Writers Series Podcast

The National Writers series was honored to host Nita Prose at the City Opera House on December 6th, 2023.

Nita Prose is the author of The Maid, which has sold over 1 million copies worldwide and was published in over 40 countries. A #1 New York Times bestseller and a Good Morning America Book Club pick, The Maid won the Ned Kelly Award for International Crime Fiction and was an Edgar Awards finalist for Best Novel. The Mystery Guest is a new mess. A new mystery. And it's up to Molly the Maid to uncover the truth, no matter how dirty.

Erin French joined the National Writers Series at the City Opera House on November 8, 2023 with guest host Cara McDonald.

Erin French is the owner and chef of The Lost Kitchen, a 40-seat restaurant in Freedom, Maine, that was recently named one of TIME Magazine’s World’s Greatest Places and one of “12 Restaurants Worth Traveling Across the World to Experience” by Bloomberg. She is the author of the New York Times bestselling memoir, Finding Freedom, and features in Magnolia Network’s The Lost Kitchen, which is now in its third season. A born-and-raised native of Maine, she learned early the simple pleasures of thoughtful food and the importance of gathering for a meal. Her love of sharing Maine and its delicious heritage with curious dinner guests and new friends alike has been lauded by such outlets such as The New York Times, Martha Stewart Living, NPR’s All Things Considered, The Chew, CBS This Morning, The Today Show, Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, and Food & Wine.

Heather Cox Richardson joined the National Writers Series at Lars Hockstad Auditorium on October 17, 2023 with guest host Neal Rubin.

Heather Cox Richardson is a Professor of History at Boston College. She has written about the Civil War, Reconstruction, the Gilded Age, and the American West in award-winning books whose subjects stretch from the European settlement of the North American continent to the history of the Republican Party through the Trump administration. Her work has appeared in the Washington Post, the New York Times, and The Guardian, among other outlets. She is the cohost of the Vox podcast, Now & Then. She began writing a daily Facebook essay in the midst of the 2019 impeachment crisis, providing historical context for the daily churn of news. It soon became a chart-topping Substack newsletter, Letters from an American, which now reaches more than 2 million subscribers – passionate, dedicated readers who rely on Richardson’s plainspoken, insightful take on America, past and present, as a much-needed dose of sanity in today’s insane world.

The National Writers Series was pleased to welcome V.E. Schwab to Lars Hockstad Auditorium on October 7, 2023 with guest host Beth Milligan.

VICTORIA “V. E.” SCHWAB is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of more than twenty books, including the acclaimed Shadesuniverse, the Villains series, the City of Ghosts series, Gallant, and the international bestseller The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. Her work has received critical acclaim, translated into over two dozen languages, and optioned for television and film. First Kill – a YA vampire series based on Schwab’s short story of the same name – is now a Netflix series. When not haunting Paris streets or trudging up English hillsides, she lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, and is usually tucked in the corner of a coffee shop, dreaming up monsters.

Ken Follett joined the National Writers Series at the Alluvion on October 1st, 2023 with guest host Pat Livingston.

Ken Follett is one of the world’s best-loved authors, selling more than 188 million copies of his 36 books. Follett’s first bestseller was “Eye of the Needle”, a spy story set in the Second World War. In 1989, “The Pillars of the Earth” was published and has since become Follett’s most popular novel. It reached number one on bestseller lists around the world and was an Oprah’s Book Club pick. Its sequels, “World Without End” and “A Column of Fire”, and prequel “The Evening and the Morning”, proved equally popular, and the Kingsbridge series has sold more than 50 million copies worldwide. Follett lives in Hertfordshire, England, with his wife, Barbara. Between them they have five children, six grandchildren, and three Labradors.

Cameron McWhirter and Zusha Elinson joined the National Writers Series onstage at the City Opera House on September 19, 2023 with guest host Benjamin Busch.

Authors Cameron McWhirter and Zusha Elinson are both journalists at the Wall Street Journal who have covered gun culture and the industry, including mass shootings, for years. McWhirter, who lives in Georgia, is the author of Red Summer: The Summer of 1919 and the Awakening of Black America. He has also written for The Atlanta Journal-Constituion, The Detroit News, and the Harvard Review. Elinson, who lives in California, has also written for the Center for Investigative Reporting and The New York Times. The authors received a MacDowell Fellowship to complete this book.

The National Writers series was thrilled to host award-winning science writer Ed Yong at the City Opera House on September 12, 2023 with guest host Ed Ronco.

Ed Yong won several honors for his reporting on the COVID-19 pandemic, including the Pulitzer Prize for explanatory reporting and the George Polk Award for science reporting. His first book, I Contain Multitudes, was a New York Times bestseller. His work has appeared in The Atlantic, The New Yorker, National Geographic, The New York Times, Wired, Scientific American, and more. He lives in Oakland, California.

Ed is also the best-selling author of I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us, a groundbreaking look at the relationship between animals and microbes. His second book, An Immense World, takes a comprehensive look at the fascinating sensory worlds of animals. A New York Times bestseller, An Immense World is longlisted for the PEN America 2023 Literary Award and has made many Best Books of the Year lists. In addition to The Atlantic, his work has appeared in National Geographic, the New Yorker, Wired, Nature, New Scientist, and Scientific American, among others.

The National Writers Series was honored to host Jack Driscoll at the Alluvion on August 27, 2023 with guest host Brittany Cavallaro.

Jack Driscoll is a two-time NEA Creative Writing Fellowship recipient, a PEN/Nelson Algren Award winner, and the author of twelve books, including the story collections, Wanting Only to Be Heard (University of MA Press, 1992), winner of the AWP Grace Paley Short Fiction Prize and The World of a Few Minutes Ago (WSU Press, 2012), winner of the Society of Midland Authors Award and Michigan Notable Book Award.

His most recent story collection, The Goat Fish and the Lover’s Knot(WSU Press, 2017) received a Michigan Notable Book Award and was a finalist for the John D. Gardner Short Fiction Prize. His stories have appeared in The Georgia Review, The Southern Review, Ploughshares, Missouri Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, the Pushcart Prize Anthology, and New Stories from the Midwest. Driscoll was the founding father of the Interlochen Center for the Arts creative writing department, and now teaches in Pacific University’s low-residency MFA program. He resides in Mystic, CT.

Ann Patchett joined the National Writers Series onstage at the City Opera House on August 12, 2023 with guest host Erin Anderson Whiting.

Ann Patchett is the author of nine novels: The Patron Saint of Liars, Taft, The Magician’s Assistant, Bel Canto, Run, State of Wonder, Commonwealth, The Dutch House and Tom Lake. She was the editor of Best American Short Stories, 2006, and has written four books of nonfiction–Truth & Beauty, about her friendship with the writer Lucy Grealy, What Now? an expansion of her graduation address at Sarah Lawrence College, This is the Story of a Happy Marriage, a collection of essays examining the theme of commitment, and These Precious Days, essays on home, family, friendship, and writing. In 2019, she published her first children’s book, Lambslide, illustrated by Robin Preiss Glasser, followed by Escape Goat in 2020.

A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, Patchett has been the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships, including a National Humanities Medal, England’s Women’s Prize, the PEN/Faulkner Award, the Harold D. Vursell Memorial Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Book Sense Book of the Year, a Guggenheim Fellowship, The Chicago Tribune’s Heartland Prize, The Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts, the American Bookseller’s Association’s Most Engaging Author Award, and the Women’s National Book Association’s Award. Her novel, The Dutch House, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Her books have been both New York Times Notable Books and New York Timesbestsellers. Her work has been translated into more than thirty languages.

Readers of all ages will love this Young Adult adaptation of the moving, hopeful, and refreshingly candid memoir by Chasten Buttigieg about growing up gay in his hometown of Traverse City. Chasten’s joyful, witty social media posts, have resonated deeply with a large audience looking for a touch of humanity in their politics.

In this uplifting memoir, I Have Something To Tell You, Chasten recounts his journey to finding acceptance and self-love. He recalls his upbringing in a rural, conservative region, where he felt different from his peers, father, and brothers. He tells the story of his coming out and how he’s healed from the painful responses and isolation. And with unflinching honesty, unflappable courage, and great warmth, Chasten Buttigieg relays his experience of growing up in America and embracing his true self, while inspiring young people across the nation to do the same.