Bookends with Mattea Roach cover image

Bookends with Mattea Roach

Latest episodes

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Dec 15, 2024 • 37min

Nita Prose: The Maid series returns with a Christmas twist

The bestselling Maid mystery series has a new festive novella, and Nita Prose joins Mattea Roach onstage for the first Bookends live show. 
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Dec 11, 2024 • 33min

Charles Burns: Why the comics icon keeps returning to teenage angst

Charles Burns's latest graphic novel, Final Cut, revolves around a group of teens in the 1970s and draws on his favourite sci-fi and horror movies. Charles joins Mattea Roach to talk about his evolution as an artist and how Final Cut was inspired by his own youth.
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Dec 8, 2024 • 34min

Pasha Malla: Parodying a wellness resort with horror and humour

The Canadian author's new novel, All You Can Kill, opens with the narrator floating through the sky and landing in an erotic wellness retreat --- and it only gets stranger from there. Pasha speaks with Mattea Roach about the nuances of writing about identity and the joy of a story with no rules.
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Dec 4, 2024 • 32min

Sarah Leavitt: Illustrating grief too wide for words

The Canadian graphic novelist talks with Mattea Roach about life with their late partner, who had an assisted death, and using art to confront grief in Something, Not Nothing
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Dec 1, 2024 • 34min

Nalo Hopkinson: How Caribbean folktales inspired her fantastical novel, Blackheart Man

Nalo Hopkinson’s latest work, Blackheart Man, is a dynamic sci-fi story that took 15 years to complete. The novel takes readers to the fantastical land of Chynchin, which was inspired by Afro-Caribbean histories and traditions. Nalo joins Mattea Roach to discuss the folktale-inspired world her characters live in, and the process of crafting a utopian novel while battling financial insecurity and chronic illness.
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Nov 27, 2024 • 28min

Leslie Jamison: Capturing Peggy Guggenheim in fiction and honouring a friend's dream

The novel Peggy fictionalizes the life of art collector Peggy Guggenheim and is Rebecca Godfrey's final project. Rebecca worked on Peggy for ten years before she died from lung cancer, leaving behind an unfinished manuscript and notes. Her close friend, writer Leslie Jamison, stepped in to fulfill Rebecca’s wishes and complete the book. Leslie talks to Mattea Roach about bringing Peggy's story to life and honouring her friend's legacy.
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Nov 24, 2024 • 39min

Teresa Wong: Illustrating her family's past — in all its ordinary and epic moments

In the graphic memoir All Our Ordinary Stories, Teresa Wong uses spare black-and-white illustrations and thought-provoking prose to unpack how intergenerational trauma and resilience can shape our identities. Teresa and Mattea Roach discuss the art of cartooning and the intricate, often challenging journey of piecing together family history.
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Nov 20, 2024 • 34min

Paula Hawkins: Exploring the dark side of the art world in new thriller The Blue Hour

When Paula Hawkins dropped her pen name and switched from writing romantic comedies to thrillers, she wrote The Girl on the Train. Now she has a new book called The Blue Hour. It follows a reclusive painter named Vanessa Chapman and reflects on themes of power and legacy. Paula and Mattea Roach talk about the motivations and inspiration behind the women at the centre of her stories. 
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Nov 17, 2024 • 40min

Anne Fleming: Why her latest novel is a gender-bending tale of witchcraft and forbidden love

In Anne Fleming's new novel, Curiosities, an amateur historian becomes fascinated by the lives of two girls from 1600s England. But as she pieces their stories together, the very nature of truth itself comes into question. Curiosities is a finalist for the 2024 Giller Prize. Anne and Mattea Roach discuss the pull of the 17th century and the exploration of gender and identity at the heart of the novel.
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Nov 13, 2024 • 35min

Eric Chacour: Exploring the power of familial expectations and forbidden love

When Montreal author Eric Chacour wrote his first book, he didn't expect it to become a huge hit in France. Translated from French to English by Pablo Strauss, What I Know About You is a novel set in Cairo and Montreal, exploring sexuality as well as family secrets and pressures. It's nominated for this year's Giller Prize and Atwood Gibson Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Eric and Mattea Roach discuss the inspiration behind his debut novel. 

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