

The Coode Street Podcast
Jonathan Strahan & Gary K. Wolfe
Discussion and digression on science fiction and fantasy with Gary K. Wolfe and Jonathan Strahan.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Aug 12, 2020 • 14min
Episode 483: Ten Minutes with Alec Nevala-Lee
Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
Hugo-nominated biographer, Analog contributor, and novelist Alec Nevala-Lee talks with Gary about his current research for a biography of R. Buckminster Fuller, who was a good friend of Arthur C. Clarke but also once gave a lecture at a Hubbard organization in the early 1950s; Alec’s own fascination with the cultural history of the 1960s, the evolution of futures studies, and the comfort to be found in returning to Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes tales, and the metafictional “grand game” that has evolved from them. Alec’s first collection, Syndromes, is available now as an audiobook original from Recorded Books.
Books mentioned include:
Syndromes: Science Fiction Stories by Alec Nevala-Lee
Astounding: John W. Campbell, Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlen, L. Ron Hubbard, and the Golden Age of Science Fiction by Alec Nevala-Lee
Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Joan Didion
Miami and the Siege of Chicago: An Informal History of the Republican and Democratic Conventions of 1968 by Norman Mailer
The Armies of the Night by Norman Mailer
The Annotated Sherlock Holmes by W.S. Baring-Gould
The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes by Leslie S. Klinger

Aug 11, 2020 • 22min
Episode 482: Ten Minutes with Arkady Martine
Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
Today Jonathan calls up newly minted Hugo Award winner for Best Novel, Arkady Martine, to talk about reading, writing, and working during the pandemic, how influence on writers is often quite different from what a reader might expect, the current state of space opera, her next novel, and a new novella coming late next year from Subterranean Press.
Books mentioned include:
A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine
A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine
Rose House by Arkady Martine (forthcoming)
Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse
Range of Ghosts by Elizabeth Bear
The Grid: The Fraying Wires Between Americans and Our Energy Future by Gretchen Bakke
Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx is Burning: 1977, Baseball, Politics, and the Battle for the Soul of a City by Jonathan Mahler
Dead Astronauts by Jeff VanderMeer

Aug 10, 2020 • 14min
Episode 481: Ten Minutes with Molly Gloss
Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
World Fantasy Award nominee Molly Gloss joins Gary to chat about listening to fiction on her commute to the horses, taking some solace in novels with pastoral settings (including SF), the eerie feeling of reading Sarah Pinsker's A Song for a New Day at the very beginning of the lockdown, recent reprints of her classic novels by Saga Press, her long friendship with Ursula K. Le Guin, and her award-nominated retrospective collection Unforeseen.
Books mentioned include:
Unforeseen: Stories by Molly Gloss
The Dazzle of Day by Molly Gloss
Wild Life by Molly Gloss
Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James
Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner
A Song for a New Day by Sarah Pinsker
The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker
The Horseman by Tim Pears
This is Happiness by Niall Williams

Aug 10, 2020 • 13min
Episode 480: Ten Minutes with K.M. Szpara
Ten minutes with... is a regular series of short podcasts presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
Gary kicks of the second series of Ten Minutes with by spending a few minutes with Hugo and Nebula-nominated K.M. Szpara discussing the appeal of audiobooks, young-adult mysteries and horror stories (and their value in learning about plotting), what it’s like to launch a novel at the very beginning of the lockdown, and his own forthcoming work.
Books mentioned include:
Docile by K.M. Szpara
First, Become Ashes by K.M. Szpara (forthcoming April 2021)
Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson
The Hand on the Wall by Maureen Johnson
The Vanishing Stair by Maureen Johnson
In the Hall with a Knife: A Clue Mystery by Diana Peterfreund
Rules for Vanishing by Kate Alice Marshall
Here for It; Or, How to Save Your Soul in America by R. Eric Thomas

Aug 2, 2020 • 57min
Episode 479: What Comes Next?
Well, without really planning it, we had a bit of a hiatus. It seems like recording over a hundred episodes in a row left us - or at least Jonathan - with the need for a little break, but we're back! We think.
With the Virtual ConZealand not quite over, Gary and Jonathan sit down to talk awards, congratulate the award-winners, talk about inclusiveness and the need for a fresher take on the genre, thank the ConZealand team and shout out to coming conventions, and more. Oh, and thank the World Fantasy Awards for a very unexpected nomination! Thank you!
As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. We should be back soon with more!

Jul 16, 2020 • 10min
Episode 478: Ten Minutes with Sarah Monette and Katherine Addison
Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
Today Jonathan spends ten minutes or so chatting with Sarah Monette about living and writing during the pandemic, her alter ego Katherine Addison, the comforts of immersive reading and true crime, and the recurring attraction of the work of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and the world of his famous detective.
Books mentioned include:
The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison
The Angel of the Crows by Katherine Addison
The Witness for the Dead by Katherine Addison (forthcoming)
The Anatomy Murders by Lisa Rosner
Raven: The Untold Story of the Rev. Jim Jones and His People by Tim Reiterman
The Baby Farmers: A Chilling Tale of Missing Babies, Shameful Secrets and Murder in 19th Century Australia by Annie Cossins

Jul 13, 2020 • 12min
Episode 477: Ten Minutes with James P. Blaylock
Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
Today Jonathan spends ten minutes or so calling up Orange Country, California to talk to World Fantasy and Philip K. Dick Award winner James P. Blaylock about reading and writing during these strange times, the allure of crime novels, what's up with Langdon St Ives, his new novel-in-progress, and a lot more.
Books mentioned include:
The Gobblin' Society by James P. Blaylock
River's Edge by James P. Blaylock
Generation Loss by Elizabeth Hand
Freddy's Book by John Gardner
Lady in the Lake by Laura Lippman
The Easy Rawlins Novels by Walter Mosely
The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens
City of Fallen Angels by Paul Buchanan

Jul 11, 2020 • 18min
Episode 476: Twenty One Minutes with Peter Watts
Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
With the Ten Minutes with... series complete as a daily thing, Jonathan fires up the computer and calls Hugo and Shirley Jackson award winner Peter Watts to discuss how this apocalypse is only a tiny taste of the real thing, how he's coping with working and reading right now, Jevon's Paradox, the value of depressive realism, and a lot more.
Books mentioned include:
Peter Watts is an Angry, Sentient Tumor by Peter Watts
"Incorruptible" by Peter Watts
Stealing Worlds by Karl Schroeder
Gamechanger by L.X. Beckett

Jul 11, 2020 • 18min
Episode 475: Ten Minutes with M. John Harrison
Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
One of England’s finest novelists, M. John Harrison, talks with Gary about the paradoxical insights of the poet Charles Simic, the essays of Olivia Laing, the early John le Carré novels, and his own new novel and forthcoming story collection.
Books mentioned include:
The Sunken Land Begins to Rise Again by M. John Harrison
Settling the World: Selected Stories 1969-2019 by M. John Harrison
Things That Never Happen by M. John Harrison
The Monster Loves his Labyrinth: Notebooks by Charles Simic
Funny Weather: Art in an Emergency by Olivia Laing
The Early George Smiley novels by John le Carré

Jul 9, 2020 • 16min
Episode 474: Ten Minutes with Jane Yolen
Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.
Legendary Grand Master Jane Yolen shares with Gary some delightful personal news, as well as her advice to aspiring authors on how the lockdown can be seen as a gift to writers, the pleasures of "munchie" writing like Cat Valente or Gregory Maguire, the short stories of Theodora Goss, and Linda Barnes's Carlotta Carlyle mysteries.
Books mentioned include:
The Midnight Circus by Jane Yolen
The Emerald Circus by Jane Yolen
How to Fracture a Fairy Tale by Jane Yolen
The Book of Dragons edited by Jonathan Strahan
Deathless by Catherynne M. Valente
Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente
Egg and Spoon by Gregory Maguire
Carlotta Carlyle series by Linda Barnes


