Otherppl with Brad Listi

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 374, my conversation with Matt Sumell, author of the novel-in-stories Making Nice (Picador). It first aired on August 5, 2015.Sumell is a graduate of UC Irvine's MFA program, and his fiction has since appeared in Esquire, the Paris Review, Electric Literature, One Story, Noon, and elsewhere. He lives in Los Angeles, California. ***Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc.Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter.Support the show on PatreonMerch@otherpplInstagram YouTubeTikTokEmail the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] comThe podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Yiyun Li, author of several works of fiction and a memoir, talks about finding characters in real life, her attraction to characters who hold back their emotions, exploring cliches, editing for effect in writing, her upbringing in Beijing, and the intersection of politics and life during the 2016 election.

Myriam Gurba is the author of the essay collection Creep: Accusations and Confessions, available from Avid Reader Press.Gurba is a writer and artist. She is the author of the true-crime memoir Mean, a New York Times Editors' Choice. O, the Oprah Magazine, ranked Mean as one of the best LGBTQ books of all time. Publishers Weekly describes Gurba as having a voice like no other. Her essays and criticism have appeared in The Paris Review, TIME.com, and 4Columns. She has shown art in galleries, museums, and community centers. She lives in California.***Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc.Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter.Support the show on PatreonMerch@otherpplInstagram YouTubeTikTokEmail the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] comThe podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 546, my conversation with Laura van den Berg, author of five works of fiction. It first aired on October 10, 2018.Laura van den Berg was born and raised in Florida. Her books include The Third Hotel (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018), a finalist for the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award, and I Hold a Wolf by the Ears (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020), which was one of Time Magazine’s 10 Best Fiction Books of 2020. She is the recent recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Strauss Livings Award from the American Academy of Arts & Letters, and a literature fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. Her next two novels, Florida Diary and Ring of Night, are forthcoming from FSG.***Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc.Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter.Support the show on PatreonMerch@otherpplInstagram YouTubeTikTokEmail the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] comThe podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maggie Downs is an award-winning journalist, travel writer, and the author of the memoir Braver Than You Think:Around the World on the Trip of My (Mother’s) Lifetime (Counterpoint Press). Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Palm Springs Life, and McSweeney's and has been anthologized in The Lonely Planet Travel Anthology: True Stories from the World's Best Writers and Best Women's Travel Writing. She lives in Yucca Valley, California.***Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc.Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter.Support the show on PatreonMerch@otherpplInstagram YouTubeTikTokEmail the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] comThe podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rebekah Bergman is the author of the debut novel The Museum of Human History, available from Tin House. It is the official August pick of the Otherppl Book Club.Bergman's fiction has been published in Joyland, Tin House, The Masters Review anthology, and other journals. She lives in Rhode Island with her family.***Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc.Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter.Support the show on PatreonMerch@otherpplInstagram YouTubeTikTokEmail the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] comThe podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, a special episode remembering the life and work of Tom Hansen, who died this week of esophageal cancer. Hansen was born in Seattle and raised by adoptive parents in nearby Edmonds, Washington. A failed skateboarder, dishwasher, and punk rock guitarist, he turned to shooting and dealing smack. He later kicked his habit, returned to school, and eventually earned an MFA in writing from the University of British Columbia. His books include the memoir American Junkie (Soft Skull Press) and the retro noir thriller This Is What We Do.***Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc.Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter.Support the show on PatreonMerch@otherpplInstagram YouTubeTikTokEmail the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] comThe podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 24, my conversation with biographer Charles Shields, author of And So It Goes— Kurt Vonnegut: A Life, available now in trade paperback from St. Martin's Press. It first aired on December 7, 2011.Shields's other books include Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee, and I Am Scout: The Biography of Harper Lee (Henry Holt Books for Young Readers). He grew up in the Midwest and taught in a rural school in central Illinois for several years. He has been a reporter for public radio, a journalist, and the author of nonfiction books for young people. He and his wife live near Charlottesville, Virginia.***Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc.Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter.Support the show on PatreonMerch@otherpplInstagram YouTubeTikTokEmail the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] comThe podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maya Binyam is the author of the debut novel Hangman, available from Farrar, Straus, and Giroux.Binyam is a fiction writer and critic whose work has appeared in The Paris Review, The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, New York, Bookforum, Columbia Journalism Review, The New York Times Book Review, and elsewhere. She is a contributing editor at The Paris Review and has previously worked as an editor at Triple Canopy and The New Inquiry. She lives in Los Angeles.***Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc.Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter.Support the show on PatreonMerch@otherpplInstagram YouTubeTikTokEmail the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] comThe podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emily Rapp Black, author and professor, discusses truth in creative nonfiction. They explore the distinction between creative nonfiction and other forms, reflect on death's impact on life perspective, engage in extreme sports for release, delve into the challenges and subjectivity of truth, share experiences with hate mail, writing personal topics and finding inspiration, discuss resurrection and curiosity in creative nonfiction, and recommend craft books and resources for writers.