fiction/non/fiction

In the wake of the news that Kate Middleton, the Princess of Wales, has cancer, author S.L. (Sandi) Wisenberg joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about the control that public—and private—figures should have over the disclosure of their diagnoses. Wisenberg, who survived breast cancer, and Terrell, who was recently diagnosed with prostate cancer, name books they have read that have helped them discover humor in their journey from testing to treatment, and reflect on the challenging nuances of what it means to have cancer. They talk about how and when they decided to tell their loved ones, friends, and students about their condition. Wisenberg reads from her 2009 book The Adventures of Cancer Bitch, which will be reissued in paperback in October.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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf and Jasmine Shackleford.S.L. (Sandi) Wisenberg The Adventures of Cancer Bitch The Sweetheart Is In Holocaust Girls The Wandering Womb Others: “Princess of Wales Apologizes, Saying She Edited Image,” by Mark Landler and Lauren Leatherby | The New York Times Kate Middleton announces her cancer diagnosis | NBC News  Time on Fire: My Comedy of Terrors by Evan Handler Cancer Made Me a Shallower Person: A Memoir in Comics by Miriam Engelberg Memoir of a Debulked Woman by Susan Gubar Our Cancer Year by Harvey Pekar and Joyce Brabner The Cancer Journals by Audre Lorde Dr. Susan Love’s Breast Book by Susan Love Señor Wences American Splendor Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje  Dick York Nora Ephron Carl Bernstein Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In anticipation of the total solar eclipse forecast for April 8, author and journalist David Baron joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his award-winning book, American Eclipse, which chronicles the remarkable solar eclipse of 1878. Baron, a self-proclaimed umbraphile, or eclipse chaser, explains why he chose to write about the Wild West-era event, which darkened skies from Montana to Texas. He also talks about what has driven him to see eight total solar eclipses across the globe. As the upcoming eclipse is forecast to affect a sizable swath of the U.S.—the last time this will happen until 2045—he reflects on why these rare occurrences captivate humanity and discusses how their lore has influenced famous writers, including Mark Twain and Emily Dickinson. He reads from American Eclipse.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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf and Amanda Trout.David BaronAmerican Eclipse: A Nation's Epic Race to Catch the Shadow of the Moon and Win the Glory of the WorldBeast In The Garden: The True Story Of A Predator’s Deadly Return To Suburban AmericaTED Talk: "You owe it to yourself to experience a solar eclipse"Others:"It Sounded as if the Streets Were Running" by Emily DickinsonKing Lear by William Shakespeare The Eclipse by James Fenimore Cooper"Battle of the Eclipse in the Lydian and Median War of Ancient Greece" | GreekBoston.com A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark TwainTeaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters by Annie DillardSuperman IV: The Quest for PeaceLog Your Eclipse | Eclipse-Chasers.com“Eclipse Literature” by Lara Dodds | Northwestern UniversityThe Eclipse, or the Courtship of the Sun and the Moon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In anticipation of the total solar eclipse forecast for April 8, author and journalist David Baron joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his award-winning book, American Eclipse, which chronicles the remarkable solar eclipse of 1878. Baron, a self-proclaimed umbraphile, or eclipse chaser, explains why he chose to write about the Wild West-era event, which darkened skies from Montana to Texas. He also talks about what has driven him to see eight total solar eclipses across the globe. As the upcoming eclipse is forecast to affect a sizable swath of the U.S.—the last time this will happen until 2045—he reflects on why these rare occurrences captivate humanity and discusses how their lore has influenced famous writers, including Mark Twain and Emily Dickinson. He reads from American Eclipse.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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf and Amanda Trout.David Baron American Eclipse: A Nation's Epic Race to Catch the Shadow of the Moon and Win the Glory of the World Beast In The Garden: The True Story Of A Predator’s Deadly Return To Suburban America TED Talk: "You owe it to yourself to experience a solar eclipse" Others: "It Sounded as if the Streets Were Running" by Emily Dickinson King Lear by William Shakespeare  The Eclipse by James Fenimore Cooper "Battle of the Eclipse in the Lydian and Median War of Ancient Greece" | GreekBoston.com  A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters by Annie Dillard Superman IV: The Quest for Peace Log Your Eclipse | Eclipse-Chasers.com “Eclipse Literature” by Lara Dodds | Northwestern University The Eclipse, or the Courtship of the Sun and the Moon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Novelist Sally Franson joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about Fashion Week 2024, the role fashion plays in characterization, and how stylish authors and characters have modeled and influenced tastes and trends. Franson reflects on her time working in the industry and discusses insiders’ perceptions of various Fashion Weeks around the globe. She discusses literary style icons including Isabel Archer, Nancy Mitford, James Baldwin, and Bridget Jones, and considers the influence of fashion in her first novel, A Lady’s Guide To Selling Out, which has just been reissued in paperback. She reads an excerpt from that 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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf.Sally Franson A Lady’s Guide To Selling Out  Big In Sweden (forthcoming) "Shoe Obsession for the Ages: Prince’s Killer Collection of Custom Heels, Now on View" August 3, 2021 | The New York Times Others: "Top 10 best-dressed characters in fiction" by Amanda Craig, July 1, 2020 | The Guardian  “The Best Looks from New York Fashion Week Fall/Winter 2024” | Elle.com "Off the page: fashion in literature" by Helen Gordon, September 18, 2009 | The Guardian "Literature-inspired menswear collections for summer 2024" by Paschal Mourier| France24 "Anna Sui’s new collection is inspired by Agatha Christie, so obviously the runway was at the Strand." by Emily Temple | Literary Hub James Baldwin Joan Didion Not-Knowing by Donald Barthelme Rachel Comey and The New York Review of Books The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh   Little Women by Louisa May Alcott  The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Following a record-smashing performance by University of Iowa basketball star Caitlin Clark, now the all-time leading scorer in NCAA Division I basketball, novelist and former professional squash player Ivy Pochoda joins host V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about portrayals of women athletes in media, literature, and film. Pochoda considers the gender binary that continues to divide most sports and how athletes from Serena Williams to Lynette Woodard to Clark have been treated differently due to systemic bias. She discusses the lack of adult literary fiction featuring women athletes, as well as her new favorite novel in this category, the Booker-nominated Western Lane. Pochoda also reflects on how her athletic training helps her as a writer and reads an excerpt from a middle grade fantasy book she wrote with Kobe Bryant, Epoca: The Tree of Ecrof, in which sports play a central role. 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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf.Ivy Pochoda Sing Her Down These Women Wonder Valley Visitation Street Epoca: The Tree of Ecrof (with Kobe Bryant) Others: “Caitlin Clark's record-setting night fuels No. 6 Iowa in 108-60 win at Minnesota,” by Marielle Mohs |CBS News “Fox Sports to Feature Caitlin Clark Solo Camera on Tiktok for Iowa-Maryland Game,” by Tim Capurso | Sports Illustrated “We did not help build women’s tennis for it to be exploited by Saudi Arabia,” by Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova |The Washington Post “Caitlin Clark passes Lynette Woodard for major-college record,” by Michael Voepel | ESPN Nyad |Official Trailer A League of Their Own | Official Trailer “‘Western Lane’ Finds Solace From Grief on the Squash Court,” by Ivy Pochoda |The New York Times Western Lane by Chetna Maroo "In This Satire, Televised Blood Baths Offer Prisoners a Path to Freedom|You can’t applaud Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah’s thrilling debut novel, 'Chain-Gang All-Stars,' without getting blood on your hands." by Giri Nathan, April 28, 2023 | The New York Times Borg vs. McEnroe | Official Trailer "R. R. Knudson, a Writer Whose Subject Was Sports, Dies at 75," by Dennis Hevesi, May 10, 2008 | The New York Times Ghost by Jason Reynolds The President’s Daughter by Ellen Emerson White Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Writer Emily Raboteau joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about mothering in the face of climate change and systemic inequality. Raboteau discusses the difference between “resilience” and “trauma-informed growth,” and considers which one more realistically describes how people react to devastation. She also reflects on writing about Indigenous communities and histories, developing language to capture shifting environmental realities, and the intersections of climate and racial justice. Finally, she explains the influence of her late father, Albert Raboteau, a groundbreaking professor of African American religion, on her community-minded approach to these topics. She reads from Lessons for Survival, her new collection of essays about care and mothering in the climate crisis. 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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf.Emily Raboteau Lessons for Survival: Mothering Against “the Apocalypse” Searching for Zion: The Quest for Home in the African Diaspora The Professor’s Daughter “Climate Signs”|The New York Review of Books, February 1, 2019 “Lessons in Survival”|The New York Review of Books, November 21, 2019 “The Unequal Racial Burdens of Rising Seas”|The New York Times, April 10, 2023 “Gutbucket”|Orion Magazine Others: Fiction/Non/Fiction: Season 2, Episode 15: “Emily Raboteau and Omar El Akkad Tell a Different Kind of Climate Change Story” “Special Report: Global Warming of 1.5 ºC”|Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, October 2018 “UN Says Climate Genocide Is Coming. It’s Actually Worse Than That” by David Wallace-Wells|New York Magazine, October 10, 2018 The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming by David Wallace-Wells “Young Readers Ask: The Uninhabitable Earth by David Wallace-Wells” by Geronimo Lavalle|Orion Magazine, April 9, 2019 “In Pictures: New York Under a Haze of Wildfire Smoke|Le Monde, June 7, 2023 Rising: Dispatches from the New American Shore by Elizabeth Rush “Why Indonesia Is Shifting Its Capital From Jakarta”|Bloomberg, August 24, 2019 “Sea Level Rise and Implications for Low-Lying Islands, Coasts and Communities”|Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, September 2019 “Managed Retreat through Voluntary Buyouts of Flood-Prone Properties” by Katherine J. Mach et. al.|Science Advances, October 9, 2019 “Climate Change Isn’t the First Existential Threat” by Mary Annaïse Heglar|ZORA, February 18, 2019 Anya Kamenetz “‘Culture Will Be Eroded’: Climate Crisis Threatens to Flood Harriet Tubman Park”|The Guardian, November 23, 2019 Charleston: Race, Water, and the Coming Storm by Susan Crawford and Annette Gordon-Reed Justin Brice Guariglia Albert Raboteau Slave Religion: The "Invisible Institution" in the Antebellum South by Albert Raboteau Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Writer Briallen Hopper joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about in vitro fertilization and the recent Alabama State Supreme Court ruling declaring that frozen embryos have the same rights as children. Hopper speaks about the science and thought behind freezing embryos versus eggs, as well as the religious language embedded in the court’s decision. She reads an excerpt from a 2019 Washington Post essay about her choice to freeze embryos as a single person and reflects on repeating the process later, with a partner.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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf.Briallen Hopper Hard to Love: Essays and Confessions Gilead Reread (forthcoming, Columbia University Press) “Single Women Looking to Extend their Fertility Usually Freeze Eggs. I Froze Embryos.”|Washington Post, May 10th, 2019 Others: James LePage, et al. v. The Center for Reproductive Medicine and Mobile Infirmary Association | Supreme Court of Alabama  The Human Life Protection Act | Alabama - May 15, 2019 Tammy Duckworth | Access to Family Building Act   Dobbs | The Supreme Court - June 24, 2022 The Radical Freedom Of IVF by Krys Malcolm Belc, Romper Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rachel Bitecofer, author of the new book Hit ’Em Where It Hurts: How to Save Democracy by Beating Republicans at Their Own Game, joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk shop about the election strategies Democrats should implement to combat Republicans and prevent fascism. Bitecofer discusses how Republicans use “negative partisanship” to win elections by slamming Democrats as a whole, and argues that Democrats must turn the tables and attack the GOP’s now-extremist brand, which poses an urgent threat to Americans. Bitecofer reads from a section of Hit ’Em Where it Hurts that describes what it means to “wedge” an issue, and talks about how Democrats can do 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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf.Rachel Bitecofer Hit ’Em Where It Hurts: How to Save Democracy by Beating Republicans at Their Own Game, with Aaron MurphyOthers: Dobbs | The Supreme Court State of the Union Address 2023  Project 2025: Presidential Transition Project Stephen Miller (Southern Poverty Law Center) "At CPAC, Stephen Miller Describes His Plan to Round Up Migrants into Camps and Deport Them" | MediaMatters for America "The Benghazi Timeline, Clinton Edition” by Eugene Kiely, June 30, 2016 | factcheck.org Hur Report | The Justice Department "Trump vows to end birthright citizenship for children of immigrants in US illegally" by Ted Hesson | Reuters Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As the 2024 Presidential race heats up, award-winning fiction writer Margot Livesey joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss the value of seeing the future in politics and in family life. Are the polls right? Will Donald Trump beat President Joe Biden in the November election? Livesey talks about the role predictions play in our political landscape and in her new novel, The Road from Belhaven, in which a young woman named Lizzie Craig, raised by her grandparents in 19th century Scotland, has the gift of second sight. Livesey discusses the ways that literature has handled the concept of “seeing the future” over time, including the role second sight plays in Macbeth. She reads from her novel. 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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf.Margot Livesey The Road From Belhaven The Boy in the Field Homework Eva Moves The Furniture The Flight of Gemma Hardy Others Daniel Deronda by George Eliot Fiction/Non/Fiction: Season 3, Episode 24: “Summer Books Extravaganza: Margot Livesey and Jaswinder Bolina on Beach Reading When the Beach is Closed” Fiction/Non/Fiction: Season 5, Episode 35: "Boris Johnson: Margot Livesey on British Politics, the Brexit Blunder, and the Prime Minister’s Lies"  No Great Mischief  by Alistair MacLeod  The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis  Macbeth by William Shakespeare Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon L.M. Montgomery Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Two years after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, novelist, journalist, and veteran Matt Gallagher joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss the current state of the Russo-Ukrainian war and why the country desperately needs the emergency aid in a bill currently under consideration in Congress. Gallagher, whose new novel Daybreak is set in Ukraine, weighs in on where the U.S. stands on the war by comparing it to military conflicts of the past, from World War II to more recent involvements in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan. He also reflects on how reporting and training civilians in Ukraine influenced Daybreak, in which an Army veteran explores his own motivations for aiding the country’s fight for freedom as well as the flawed, messy realities of war. He reads from the novel. 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 episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf.Matt Gallagher Daybreak Empire City Youngblood “This is no time to give up on Ukraine” by Matt Gallagher | Boston Globe “There Are Only Two Options Left in Ukraine” by Matt Gallagher | Esquire, Nov. 20, 2023 “The Secret Weapons of Ukraine” by Matt Gallagher | Esquire, Feb. 23, 2023 “My Advice for American Veterans Who Want to Get On a Plane to Ukraine” by Matt Gallagher | The New York Times, April 10, 2022 “Notes from Lviv” by Matt Gallagher | Esquire, March 31, 2022 Others: “Ukraine is resorting to attacking Russia with small drones because it's running out of artillery ammunition” by Tom Porter | Business Insider “Ukraine and Israel Aid Bill Inches Ahead as Divided G.O.P. Demands Changes” by Karoun Demirjian | The New York Times, 2024 The Forever War by Joe Haldeman The Forever War by Dexter Wilkins “What Should a War Movie Do?” by Whitney Terrell | The New Republic, Nov. 21, 2016 Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 1, Episode 1: The Art of Taking a Knee: Colin Kaepernick Edition Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 4, Episode 13: Cancellation or Consequences? Meredith Talusan and Matt Gallagher on Accountability in Literature Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 5, Episode 9: Anton Troianovski and Marci Shore on a Possible Russian Invasion of Ukraine  Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 6, Episode 2: How Dostoevsky’s Classic Has Shaped Russia’s War in Ukraine, with Explaining Ukraine’s Tetyana Ogarkova and Volodymyr Yermolenko Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 6, Episode 51: Tetyana Ogarkova and Volodymyr Yermolenko on How Artists Are Responding to the War in Ukraine  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices