Write On Radio

Josh talks with Kate Pickett and Richard G. Wilkinson about their most recent work The Inner Level: How More Equal Societies Reduce Stress, Restore Sanity and Improve Everyone's Well-Being. The Inner Level explains how inequality affects us individually -- how it alters how we think, feel, and behave.  Then Conor interviews Steve Toutonghi about his second novel Side Life --  a dazzling, intriguing, and philosophical blend of literary science fiction. It explores explores ideas of consciousness and parallel universes.

On Tuesday January 29th, Josh will be talking with Norman Mitchell about the release of his first novel The Hidden One, a political thriller surrounding The fate of those caught up in the “Iron Cage” after World War II. In addition to writing and his fascination with history, Mitchell also enjoys reading, biking, listening to music and following politics. He and his wife live in Golden Valley, MN.  Then, we rebroadcast an interview Steve conducted with Minnesota author Leif Enger about his recent novel Virgil Wander. Virgil Wander is set in a small Minnesotan town bordering Lake Superior. With intelligent humor and captivating whimsy, Enger conjures a remarkable portrait of a region and its residents, who, for reasons of choice or circumstance, never made it out of their defunct industrial district.  Write On! Radio airs from 7-8pm CT on KFAI, 90.3 FM in Mpls/St. Paul, and on the web at www.kfai.org

On Tuesday, January 22nd, Josh will be talking with Andrew S. Curran about his latest book Diderot And The Art Of Thinking Freely. A spirited biography of the prophetic and sympathetic philosopher, Denis Diderot, who helped build the foundations of the modern world. Curran's previous books include The Anatomy of Blackness: Science and Slavery in an Age of Enlightenment, and Sublime Disorder, Physical Monstrosity in Diderot's Universe. Anna talks with Blythe Baird about the upcoming release of her poetry collection If My Body Could Speak. A celebration of girlhood and all of its struggles and triumphs, If My Body Could Speak balances the softness of femininity with the sharpness that girls are forced to become. Baird is a viral and award-winning writer who has garnered international recognition for her poems that speak out on sexual assault, mental illness, eating disorder recovery, sexuality, and healing.

On Tuesday, January 15th, Anna will be talking with Michael Bazzett about his translation of The Popul Vuh. the first English verse translation of the Mayan creation epic, this is a story of the generative power of language. A story that asks not only Where did you come from, but How might you live again? Michael Bazzett is the author of You Must Remember This, which received the 2014 Lindquist & Vennum Prize for Poetry, and The Interrogation. Steve talks with Jacqueline West about her new middle grade fantasy The Collectors. She is also the author of the New York Times bestselling middle grade series The Books of Elsewhere and the young adult novel Dreamers Often Lie. Her debut, The Shadows, was a Junior Library Guild selection, an Indie Next List Top Ten Pick and a finalist for a Minnesota Book Award.

On Tuesday, January 8th, Write On! Radio talks with local poets Adrienne Novy, Miss K, & Chavonn Williams Shen about their recent work and publications. Novy recently published her coming of age journey through poems in Crowd Surfing with God: a story of self-acceptance that discusses growing up with a rare genetic disorder & mental illness. Miss K is an active protest poet who works and attends Hamline University. Novy and Miss K have been featured prominently as performing poets with Button Poetry. If you would like to see their readings along with the best and brightest performance poets of today, you can find their readings on buttonpoetry.com or on The Button Poetry Youtube Channel. Chavon has had her poetry appear in Footnote #4: A Literary Journal of History, A3 Review, and The Coil. Writing has shown Chavonn to use art to explore new worlds, build communities, and advocate for the marginalized. She is currently pursuing her MFA in creative writing at Hamline University, as well.

We speak with Meg Matich about Cold Moons, a poetry collection by Magnus Sigurdsson, which she translated. She is a poet and translator, and a recent recipient of the PEN/Heim Translation grant. Magnus Sigurdsson is an Icelandic poet who, in this collection, pays rare attention to the minute revelations of nature. We also talk with Jack Zipes about The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: An Anthology of Magical Tales, which he edited, as well as Tales of Wonder: Reading Fairy Tales through Picture Postcards. He is a professor at the University of Minnesota who has written extensively about fairy tales and magic in literature.

Our Christmas episode features two local writers.  Steve talks to Kate DiCamillo about her recent children's novel Louisiana's Way Home. Katrina Elizabeth "Kate" DiCamillo is an American writer of children's fiction for all reading levels, usually featuring animals. She is one of six people to win two Newbery Medals, recognizing her novels The Tale of Despereaux and Flora & Ulysses. Then he speaks to Leif Enger about Virgil Wander. It's the first in ten years from the award-winning, million-copy bestselling author. Midwestern movie house owner Virgil Wander is 'cruising along at medium altitude' when his car flies off the road into icy Lake Superior. Virgil survives but his language and memory are altered and he emerges into a world no longer familiar to him.

On Tuesday December 18th, Josh talks with Mary Desjarlais about her new novel The Cutter's Widow. Set against the backdrop of 1915 urban poverty in St. Paul, it focuses on a young widow who becomes a baby broker and partners with a local pickpocket. Ultimately, she becomes the focus of attention in a murder investigation by one of Saint Paul’s first female police officers. Mary Desjarlais's first novel published was Dorie LaValle in 2011 and re-released through Calumet Editions in the end of 2017. Her second novel, The Cutter's Widow, was also published through Calumet Editions and released in August. Conor will be talking with Chad Medellin about his recent collection of poetry. Chad is a part-owner of Caydence Records and Coffee located in St. Paul.

On Tuesday December 11th, Amy talks with David Mura about his latest work A Stranger’s Journey: Race, Identity & Narrative Craft in Writing, a book on creative writing that addresses our increasingly diverse American Literature. Mura is a writer, memoirist, poet and performance artist who brings a unique perspective to our multi-racial and multi-cultural society. A third-generation Japanese-American, he has written intimately about his life as a man of color and the connections between race, sexuality and history. Conor talks with John Wray about his new novel Godsend. Wray explores the circumstances that could impel a young American to abandon identity and home to become an Islamist militant, inspired by the true-life events of John Walker Lindh. Wray is a novelist and regular contributor to The New York Times Magazine and currently lives in Park Slope, Brooklyn.

  Ian talks with the one and only Dessa about her latest work, My Own Devices: True Stories from the Road on Music, Science, and Senseless Love. Rapper and singer Dessa gives a candid account of her life in the van as a hard-touring musician, her determination to beat long odds to make a name for herself, and her struggle to fall out of love with someone in her band. Conor talks with Nancy Trembley about her fictional story based on real-life experiences with The Hat Man. Since Nancy was sixteen, she has been stalked at night by a black, faceless figure in a wide brimmed hat and a long jacket. He has stalked her in Ohio, Georgia, and several locations in Germany and Minnesota. What Nancy discovered later is that she wasn't the only person who sees Him! Join us in our discussion with Nancy talking about her book The Hat Man.

Paul talks with Joseph DiPrisco about his memoirs The Pope of Brooklyn and Subway to California. By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, Subway to California recounts Joe’s battles with his personal demons, bargains struck with angels, and truces with his family in this richly colorful tale that reads like great fiction. In his follow-up memoir, The Pope of Brooklyn,  Di Prisco memorably traces how secrets revealed about his family led to even deeper mysteries. He's the author of the novels All for Now, The Confessions of Brother Eli, and Sibella & Sibella. Steve talks with Kate DiCamillo about her newest children's book Louisiana's Way Home. the heartbreakingly irresistible Louisiana Elefante was introduced to readers in Raymie Nightingale — and now, with humor and tenderness, Kate DiCamillo returns to tell her story. Kate is a former National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature and a two-time winner of the Newbery Medal, for The Tale of Despereaux and Flora & Ulysses. She lives in Minneapolis where she writes two pages a day, five days a week.

Steve talks with Minnesota's own Leif Enger about his new novel Virgil Wander. Leif Enger worked as a reporter and producer for Minnesota Public Radio before writing his bestselling and award-winning debut novel Peace Like a River. His second novel, So Brave, Young, and Handsome was also a bestseller. Anna speaks with Mike Corrao, also a Minnesotan, about his new novel Man, Oh Man – a humorous but insightful experiment that will have you questioning how you've always approached novels. Mike Corrao is a writer and filmmaker whose work has been featured in publications such as Entropy, Always Crashing and The Portland Review.

Conor talks with Gary Lindberg about his new biography on Elvis Presley titled Letters from Elvis: Shocking Revelations to His Secret Confidante. Letters from Elvis is an explosive revelation of Elvis’s inner life, an exposé of heinous Hollywood crimes that targeted Elvis, a touching tale of friendship, an eerie ghost story, and a series of startling new Elvis mysteries. Because rigorous copyright laws prevent direct publication of the actual letters, the book also tells the story of the author’s thirty-year struggle to bring this new information about Elvis to light. Liz talks with Amy Hallberg about her memoir German Awakening: Tales from an American Life. A small-town teacher's kid, little sister of a genius, Amy Hallberg dreamed of escape by way of a West German exchange in 1987. The resulting friendship with her exchange sister, Eva, awakened a lifelong quest to understand all things German. She soon discovered the most profound lessons were notes to self, delivered not in German, but in her own mother tongue. Amy is a graduate of Carleton College and the Loft Literary Center's Foreword Apprenticeship in Creative Nonfiction. Write On! Radio airs from 7-8pm CT on KFAI, 90.3 FM in Mpls/St. Paul, and on the web at www.kfai.org

We speak with Mira Bartok about her new children’s novel The Wonderling. She is the author of numerous books, including The Memory Palace: A Memoir, which won the 2011 National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography. We also talk with Douglas Schofield about his new novel Killing Pace, a mystery about a woman with amnesia who is held prisoner by a man claiming to be her boyfriend. Douglas Schofield is also the author of Time of Departure and Storm Rising.

Liz talks with Dianna Hunter about her memoir Wild Mares: My Lesbian Back-to-the-Land Life. A firsthand account of the lesbian feminist movement at its inception, Wild Mares is a deeply personal, wryly wise, and always engaging view of identity politics lived and learned in real life and, literally, on the ground, flourishing in the fertile soil of a struggling dairy farm in the American heartland. Dianna Hunter is the author of the book and radio series Breaking Hard Ground: Stories of the Minnesota Farm Advocates. She taught writing and women’s and gender studies at four universities, including the University of Wisconsin–Superior, where she was a lecturer and director until she retired in 2012. Steve talks with Lou Berney about his most recent novel November Road. A thriller and love story set against the backdrop of the JFK assassination, it centers on a desperate cat-and-mouse chase across 1960s America—a story of unexpected connections, daring possibilities, and the hope of second chances from the Edgar Award-winning author of The Long and Faraway Gone.

Liz talks with Suzanne Schiffman about her new murder mystery Between a Rock and a Dark Place, surrounding the death of a French entrepreneur in a rural American backwater. She has degrees in journalism and French and has been writing most of my life. She lives with her husband in rural Virginia and on Amelia Island, Florida. When not writing, she is either walking, hiking, biking, reading or traveling. Conor interview Meghan O'Gieblyn on her collection of essays titled Interior States. Meghan is a writer who was raised and still lives in the Midwest. Her essays have appeared in Harper's Magazine, n+1,The Point, The New York Times, The Guardian, The New Yorker, Best American Essays 2017, and the Pushcart Prize anthology. She received a B.A. in English from Loyola University, Chicago and an MFA in Fiction from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She lives in Madison, Wisconsin with her husband.

Liz talks with Gary Morganstein about his new novel A Mound Over Hell, a post-apocalyptic book about baseball, in which America has nearly been wiped out by radical Islam, and where holograms run the bases for out-of-shape players. Gary Morganstein is the author of many books, including Jesse's Girl, Loving Rabbi Thalia Kleinman, How to Find a Woman...or Not, and Take Me Out to the Ballgame. Conor will be interviewing Amy Bonnaffons about her story collection The Wrong Heaven, which straddles the line between the real and the fantastical. Her stories uncover the mysteries beneath the mundane surfaces of our lives. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Kenyon Review, and has been read on This American Life.

We are having another Pledge Drive Episode. We will be asking for your support in keeping community radio alive while we share our personal experiences being involved with KFAI, Write On! Radio!, and maybe even hear us share our own writing on the air. Liz will be interviewing Jenni Walsh for her recent work Side By Side: A Novel of Bonnie & Clyde. Jenni L. Walsh has spent the past decade enticing readers as an award-winning advertising copywriter. Her passion lies in transporting readers to another world, be it in historical or contemporary settings. She is a proud graduate of Villanova University, and lives in the Philly 'burbs with her husband, daughter, son, and goldendoodle. She is the author of Becoming Bonnie.

Anne talks with Emily France about her Young Adult novel Zen and Gone. Emily France is the critically acclaimed young adult author of Signs of You. She graduated from Brown University and also holds an MFA in Creative Writing and a JD. She lives in sunny Colorado with her husband and son. Her Zen practice is the taproot of her inspiration. Connect with her online at emilyfrancebooks.com. Liz talks with Siobhan Adcock about her latest novel of speculative fiction The Completionist. In a near future in which plummeting birth rates have ominous political and personal implications for women, a young man's search for his missing sister leads him into a disturbing and desperate underworld, where bitter freedoms are bought at a terrible price. Entertainment Weekly ranked it as one of the "10 prescient new feminist dystopias to read after The Handmaid's Tale". Siobhan is also the author of The Barter, 30 Things Everyone Should Know How to Do Before Turning 30, and Hipster Haiku.

We speak with Keziah Frost about her debut novel The Reluctant Fortune Teller, which is about friendship, small acts of kindness and recognizing one’s talents. She holds a master’s degree in English and counseling, and works as a psychotherapist who specializes in pet grief. We also talk with Lisa Carrico, who is the Director of Family and Veteran Programs for the Missouri Humanities Council. She coordinates Veterans Writing Workshops in the state of Missouri and her organization partners with Southeast Missouri State University Press on Proud to Be: An Anthology of American Warriors, an annual writing contest and anthology which features the work of veterans and family members of veterans.

On September 11th, Lynette Reini-Grandell talks with former long-time "Write On! Radio" host Jules Nyquist about her newest collection of poetry Homesick, Then. Jules Nyquist has an MFA from Bennington College in Vermont and formerly was a program associate for education at the Loft as well as a "Write On! Radio" co-host. She founded Jules' Poetry Playhouse in Albuquerque, MN, where she now lives. Her previous collections of poetry include Behind the Volcanoes and Appetites. Steve speaks with Steven Johnson about his new book Farsighted: How We Make the Decisions that Matter the Most. He is the bestselling author of 11 books, including Wonderland, Where Good Ideas Come From, and The Invention of Air. He is also the host and co-creator of the PBS and BBC series How We Got to Now.

Write On Radio   September 3 at 8:32 AM ·  On September 4th, Ian talks with Roma Calatayud-Stocks about her recent work A Symphony of Rivals. A Symphony of Rivals, the second book in a trilogy, is a compelling historical novel set in 1930s Germany, Austria, Italy, and the United States. Alejandra Stanford Morrison pursues her dream of becoming a symphonic conductor at an unfortunate time when culture and the arts are falling under the influence of Nazism, but through her devotion to music and Beethoven's legacy, she finds a measure of hope and strength. Award-winning novelist and composer Roma Calatayud-Stocks holds a Bachelor's degree in Music and Psychology, and a Master's Degree in Social Work from the University of Minnesota. She later continued her studies in creative writing at the University of St. Thomas. She's currently working on the third book, An Ode to Joy. We then hear from author Thomas Lamarre discussing his latest work in Japanese animation, The Anime Ecology: A Genealogy of Television, Animation, and Game Media. With his field-defining study The Anime Machine, critics established Lamarre as a leading voice in the field of Japanese animation. He now returns with more broadening insights to give a complete account of anime’s relationship to television while placing it within important historical and global frameworks.

Steve speaks with Jill Santopolo about her debut adult novel The Light We Lost. She is also the author of three successful children’s and young adult series, including The Nina, The Pinta, and the Vanishing Treasure, and the Sparkle Spa Shimmering Collection books. She works as the editorial director of Philomel Books, and in addition, she is an adjunct professor in the New School’s MFA program.  Ian talks with Lezlie Lowe about her recent work No Place To Go: How Public Toilets Fail Our Private Needs. No Place To Go is a toilet tour from London to San Francisco to Toronto and beyond. From pay potties to deserted alleyways, No Place To Go is a marriage of urbanism, social narrative, and pop culture that shows the ways — momentous and mockable — public bathrooms just don't work. Lezlie Lowe is a freelance journalist and journalism instructor based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She has been recognized for her long-form journalism by the Canadian Association of Journalists and the Atlantic Journalism Awards. She holds an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of King’s College, where she also teaches in the Journalism department. No Place To Go is her first book. 

Josh talks with Christopher Bolton about his recently published Interpreting Anime.  Interpreting Anime is a thoughtful, carefully organized introduction to Japanese animation for anyone eager to see why this genre has remained a vital, adaptable art form for decades. What emerges from the sweep of Interpreting Anime is Bolton’s original, articulate case for what makes anime unique as a medium: how it at once engages profound social and political realities while also drawing attention to the very challenges of representing reality in animation’s imaginative and compelling visual forms.

Liz talks with Brantley Hargrove about his first book The Man Who Caught the Storm: The Life of Legendary Tornado Chaser Tim Samaras. Brantley Hargrove is a journalist who has written for Wired, Popular Mechanics, and Texas Monthly. He’s gone inside the effort to reverse-engineer supertornadoes using supercomputers and has chased violent storms from the Great Plains down to the Texas coast. He lives in Dallas, Texas, with his wife, Renee, and their two cats. The Man Who Caught the Storm is his first book. Jessie will talk with our very own Steve McEllistrem about his newest work Hound of God, the story of a researcher doing DNA testing and preparing for grad school, suddenly becoming a werewolf. At first, she doesn’t believe it. However, she soon realizes that the dreams are real and that she has become the victim of an ancient mystical curse. Steve McEllistrem has been a writer and editor for more than 25 years. His Susquehanna Virus novels include The Devereaux Dilemma and The Devereaux Disaster, both finalists for the International Book Award in Science Fiction, The Devereaux Decision, named a finalist for a Minnesota Book Award, a Midwest Book Award and an International Book Award, and The Devereaux Deity, also a finalist for an International Book Award. He has been a producer and host of Write On! Radio in Minneapolis - where he interviews local, national and international authors - for many years.

Ian talks with Marilene Phipps about her memoir Unseen Worlds: Adventures at the Crossroads of Vodou Spirits and Latter-day Saint. In this powerful memoir, we enter the lives of a family who are both descendants of European aristocrats and African slaves. We meet Phipps's godfather, the rebel leader Guslé Villedrouin, and we relive her experiences with Vodou priests and spirits, a cold-eyed pope, a charismatic Muslim astrologer, Catholic monks and exorcists, American Mormon bishops, scholars and missionaries. Her collection, The Company of Heaven: Stories from Haiti, won the Iowa Short Fiction Award. Her poetry won the 1993 Grolier poetry prize, and her collection, Crossroads and Unholy Water won the Crab Orchard Poetry Prize. Steve talks with Gail Honeyman about her debut novel Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine. It has received massive praise from many outlets, including the NY Times, NPR, the Frankfurt Book Fair, and was selected by Reese Witherspoon for her book club and for the film rights. Honeyman studied French language and literature at Glasgow University. While working as an administrator, Honeyman enrolled in a Faber Academy writing course where she submitted the first three chapters of what would become Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine to a competition for unpublished fiction by female writers run by Cambridge’s Lucy Cavendish College.

Paul speaks with Heidi Czerwiec and Anthony Ceballos, and Roy Guzmán about their work. Heidi Czerwiec is the author of the poetry collection Conjoining as well as the essay Sweet/Crude: A Bakken Boom Cycle. Her work has been published in many publications. She teaches in the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop. Anthony Ceballos received his BFA from Hamline University. His work has been featured in The Fulcrum and Yellow Medicine Review. Raised in Miami, Roy G. Guzmán is a Honduran poet whose first collection will be published by Graywolf Press.  Jessie speaks with Cecilia Konchar Farr about her book The Ulysses Delusion: Rethinking Standards of Literary Merit. She is a Professor of English and Women’s Studies at the women's college St. Catherine University in St Paul. Her research interests all circle around novels—their history, their (women) readers, and their social, educational, aesthetic, and political work.

Steve talks with Jason Mott about his new novel The Crossing, a literary post-apocalyptic work about two siblings trekking to see the last great thing humanity will ever do. His poetry and fiction has appeared in various literary journals. He was nominated for a 2009 Pushcart Prize award and Entertainment Weekly listed him as one of their 10 "New Hollywood: Next Wave" people to watch. He is also the author of The Wonder of All Things and The Returned, which was made into the TV series Resurrection. Paul talks with Joseph Di Prisco about his novel coming out on August 14th Sibella and Sibella. Part tell all, part mystery, and part coming-of-age novel, Sibella & Sibella is a biting look at the world of publishing from a reluctant witness who pulls no punches with anyone. Least of all herself. Di Prisco was born in Brooklyn and lives today in Northern California, with his wife. He's the author of the novels All for Now, The Alzhammer, The Confessions of Brother Eli, and books about childhood and adolescence.

On July 10th, Conor talks with Issac Baily about his memoir My Brother Moochie. A rare first-person account that combines a journalist’s skilled reporting with the raw emotion of a younger brother’s heartfelt testimony of what his family endured for decades after his eldest brother killed a man and was sentenced to life in prison. Bailey was born in St. Stephen, South Carolina, and holds a degree in psychology from Davidson College in North Carolina. Having trained at the prestigious Poynter Institute for journalists in St. Petersburg, Florida, he has been a professional journalist for twenty years. He has taught applied ethics at Coastal Carolina University and, as a Nieman Fellow at Harvard, has taught journalism at Harvard Summer School. Bailey has won numerous national, state, and local awards for his writings. He currently lives in Myrtle Beach with his wife and children. Josh talks with Joe Hart about his newest novel Obscura. Merging thrilling science-fiction adventure with mind-bending psychological suspense, Hart explores both the vast mysteries of outer space and the even darker unknown that lies within ourselves. Wall Street Journal bestselling author Joe Hart is the author of eleven novels that include The River Is Dark, Lineage, EverFall, and the highly acclaimed Dominion Trilogy. When not writing, he enjoys reading, exercising, exploring the great outdoors, and watching movies with his family.

Josh & Paul talk with Chuck Palahniuk about his new novel Adjustment Day. Chuck Palahniuk's novels are the bestselling Fight Club, which was made into a film by director David Fincher, Diary, Lullaby, Survivor, Haunted, and Invisible Monsters. Portions of Choke have appeared in Playboy, and Palahniuk's nonfiction work has been published by Gear, Black Book, The Stranger, and the Los Angeles Times. He lives in the Pacific Northwest. Conor talks with Jonathan Santlofer about his memoir The Widower's Notebook. Jonathan Santlofer is a writer and artist. His debut novel, The Death Artist, was an international bestseller, translated into seventeen languages, and is currently in development for screen adaptation. His fourth novel, Anatomy of Fear, won the Nero Award for best novel of 2009. His short stories have appeared in numerous anthologies. He is also the creator and editor of several anthologies including It Occurs to Me That I Am America, a collection of original stories and art. His paintings and drawings are included in many public and private collections. He lives in New York City.

Jessie talks with Francesca Lia Block about her recently published book on the craft of writing,The Thorn Necklace: Healing Through Writing and the Creative Process. Francesca Lia Block is the bestselling author of more than twenty-five books, including the award-winning Weetzie Bat series. Her writing has been called "transcendent" by The New York Times, and her books have been included in "best of" lists compiled by Time magazine and NPR. In this long-anticipated guide, Block offers an intimate glimpse of an artist at work and a detailed guide to help readers channel their own experiences and creative energy. Sharing visceral insights and powerful exercises, she gently guides us down the write-to-heal path, revealing at each turn the intrinsic value of channeling our experiences onto the page. Paul talks with K.J. Howe about her newest Kidnap-and-Ransom Thriller Skyjack. She is a Thriller and Barry Award nominee, and she has won several writing awards, including three Daphne du Maurier Awards for Excellent in Mystery and Suspense. While honing her fiction skills, KJ worked as a medical, health, and fitness writer. She then became involved with the International Thriller Writers as the Executive Director of ThrillerFest, the organization’s annual conference held every July in New York City. In preparation for writing The Freedom Broker series, which focuses on elite kidnap negotiator Thea Paris, KJ spent extensive time researching the dark world of kidnapping. She has interviewed former hostages, negotiators, hostage reintegration experts, special forces operatives, and K&R insurance executives.

We speak with Gary Kaunonen about his new book Flames of Discontent: The 1916 Minnesota Iron Ore Strike, which just won the 2018 Hognander Minnesota History Award. He is the author of several books, including Finns in Michigan, Challenge Accepted, and the co-author of Community in Conflict. He is an independent historian of labor and immigration, and a documentary filmmaker based in International Falls. Also, as a special feature of our pledge drive episode, Write On! Radio hosts read from their work. 

Liz talks with Scott Holliday about his new book Punishment in the Detective Barnes Series. Scott J. Holliday was born and raised in Detroit. In addition to a lifelong love of books and reading, he’s pursued a range of curiosities and interests, including glassblowing, boxing, and much more. His two previous novels are Stonefly and Normal, the latter of which earned him recognition in INKUBATE.com’s Literary Blockbuster Challenge. He loves to cook and create stories for his wife and two daughters. Conor interviews Sheila O'Connor about her latest book Until Tomorrow, Mr. Marsworth. Sheila O’Connor is a multi-genre writer whose novels for both adults and young people include Where No Gods Came and Sparrow Road. She is a professor in the MFA program at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota, where she also serves as Fiction Editor for Water~Stone Review. In fall 2019, her new hybrid novel for adults, V, will be published by Rose Metal Press.

Steve interviews CJ Box about his new novel The Disappeared, his eighteenth Joe Pickett mystery/thriller. He is also the author of six stand alone novels and a story collection. He has won the Edgar, Anthony, Macavity, Gumshoe and two Barry awards, among others. Jessie talks with Rachel Wiley about her second full-length poetry collection, Nothing is Okay. Rachel's work simultaneously deconstructs the lies that we were taught about our bodies and our beings, and builds new ways of viewing ourselves. As she delves into queerness, feminism, fatness, dating, and race, Wiley molds these topics into a punching critique of culture and a celebration of self. A fat positive activist, Wiley's work soars and challenges the bounds of bodies and hearts, and the ways we carry them.

Josh talks with John Connolly about his most recent novel He. John Connolly conjures the Golden Age of Hollywood in this moving, literary portrait of two men who find their true selves in a comedic partnership. When Stan Laurel is paired with Oliver Hardy, affectionately known as Babe, the history of comedy--not to mention their personal and professional lives--is altered forever. Connolly is the author of the Charlie Parker mysteries, The Book of Lost Things, the Samuel Johnson novels for young adults and, with his partner, Jennifer Ridyard, the co-author of the Chronicles of the Invaders series. His debut, Every Dead Thing, swiftly launched him into the top rank of thriller writers, and all his subsequent novels have been Sunday Times bestsellers. He was the first non-American writer to win the US Shamus award, and the first Irish writer to be awarded the Edgar by the Mystery Writers of America. Ian Graham Leask talks with Hanna Orstavik about the English translation of her book Love. With the publication of the novel Cut in 1994, Hanne Ørstavik (b. 1969) embarked on a career that would make her one of the most remarkable and admired authors in Norwegian contemporary literature. Her literary breakthrough came three years later with the publication of Love (Kjærlighet), which in 2006 was voted the 6th best Norwegian book of the last 25 years in a prestigious contest in Dagbladet. Since then the author has written several acclaimed and much discussed novels and received a host of literary prizes.

Steve talks with Jennifer Zeynab Joukhadar about her debut novel The Map of Salt and Stars. She is a Syrian American author whose short stories have appeared in The Paris Review Daily, The Kenyon Review, The Saturday Evening Post and elsewhere. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and the Best of the Net.

We speak with Sequoia Nagamatsu about his story collection Where We Go When All We Were Is Gone, a collection of twelve fabulist and genre-bending stories inspired by Japanese folklore, historical events, and pop culture. His work has in appeared in many publications, including Lightspeed Magazine, The Fairy Tale Review, and One World: A Global Anthology of Short Stories. He teaches creative writing at St. Olaf.  We also talk with Gary W. Evans about his debut novel Death by Drowning, inspired by the series of drownings of young men near college campuses in the 1990s and 2000s. He has spent 30 years in Midwest newsrooms as an award-winning writer, editor and publisher.

We speak with Andrea Swensson about her new book Got to Be Something Here: The Rise of the Minneapolis Sound. She is an author, radio host, and music journalist. She hosts a weekly program about the Minnesota music scene, The Local Show, at Minnesota Public Radio’s 89.3 The Current and contributes to the Local Current Blog. Prior to joining MPR, she was the music editor at City Pages, where she founded the AAN AltWeekly Award-winning Gimme Noise music blog.  We also talk with James Rollins about his new Sigma Force novel The Demon Crown. His bestselling thrillers have been translated into 40 languages and they all explore some element of the real world in addition to maintaining their breakneck pace. His most recent works are The Seventh Plague, The Bone Labyrinth, and The 6th Extinction.

On May 22nd, Liz talks with John Copenhaver about his new book Dodging and Burning: A Mystery.  His short fiction has appeared in Glitterwolf Magazine, Roanoke Review, and Gaslight, the Lambda Emerging Voices Anthology. He won the 2015 Larry Neal Writers’ award for short fiction, and was first runner-up in the F. Scott Fitzgerald Short Story Contest and the Narrative Magazine Winter Story Contest. He lives in Washington, D.C. Ian interviews Brian Freeman about his latest book in the The Jonathan Stride series Alter Ego.  Brian Freeman writes psychological thrillers that have been sold in 46 countries and 22 languages. His novel Spilled Blood won the award for Best Hardcover Novel in the annual Thriller Awards, and his novel The Burying Place was a finalist for the same award. Other winners of this award have included authors Lisa Gardner, John Sandford, and Stephen King.

Paul talks with Kristin Hannah about her most recent novel The Great Alone. The novel, an epic love story and intimate family drama set in Alaska in the turbulent 1970's is a daring, stay-up-all-night story about love and loss, the fight for survival and the wildness that lives in both nature and man. Kristin Hannah is an award-winning and bestselling author of more than 20 novels including the international blockbuster, The Nightingale, which was named Goodreads Best Historical fiction novel for 2015 and won the coveted People's Choice award for best fiction in the same year Steve also speaks with Kaethe Schwehn about her debut novel The Rending and the Nest. Her memoir, Tailings, won the 2015 Minnesota Book Award for creative nonfiction and her chapbook of poems, TANKA & ME, was selected by Kiki Petrosino for the Mineral Point Chapbook Series. Schwehn is a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and currently teaches at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota.

Steve talks with Chris Clearfield about Meltdown: Why Our Systems Fail and What We Can Do About It, which he wrote with Andras Tilcsik. The book reveals why ugly designs make us safer, why teams with fewer experts are better at managing risk, and why diversity is one of our best safeguards against failure. The result is an eye-opening, empowering, and entirely original work. Chris Clearfield is a former derivatives trader who worked in New York, Hong Kong, and Tokyo. He is a licensed commercial pilot and a graduate of Harvard University, where he studied physics and biology. Chris has written about complexity and failure for The Guardian, Forbes, and the Harvard Kennedy School Review. He lives in Seattle. Conor talks with Steve Toutonghi about his new book Side Life. Set in Seattle, Steve Toutonghi's second novel is a dazzling, intriguing, and philosophical blend of literary science fiction. A native of Seattle, Steve Toutonghi studied fiction and poetry while completing a BA in Anthropology at Stanford. After various professional forays, he began a career in technology that led him from Silicon Valley back to Seattle. He is the author of a previous novel, Join.

We speak with D. Laszlo Conhaim about his new adventure novel Comanche Captive. He is also the author of Autumn Serenade. In 1995, Conhaim co-founded The Prague Revue, the longest-running literary journal to serve the community of international writers in Prague.  We also talk with James Tucker about his debut novel Next of Kin, a Detective Buddy Lock mystery. He is a Minneapolis attorney who was awarded a fiction position at the Loft’s Mentor series and attended the Community of Writers at Squaw Valley and the Tin House Writers’ Workshop in Portland.

In this episode of Write On! Radio, Paul talks with Dan Darling about his new novel Aracheopteryx. Currently, he teaches English composition, creative writing, and literature at Normandale College in the Twin Cities, where he lives with his wife and young kid. You can find him bowling every Tuesday night. Liz Olds will also be speaking with Tommy Murray about his new novel Fathers, Sons, and the Holy Ghosts of Baseball. Tommy Murray is a retired teacher from the Minneapolis Public Schools. He is the author of one other novel: the forthcoming The Empty Set.

Tuesday, April 17th, on Write On! Radio, we speak with Michael Kardos about his new novel Bluff. Michael Kardos is also the author of the novels, Before He Finds Her, and The Three-Day Affair, as well as the story collection One Last Good Time. We also chat with our own Lynette Reini-Grandell about her new poetry collection Wild Verge. Lynette is one of the early producers for Write On! Radio, and has also written Approaching the Gate (Holy Cow! Press, 2014), which won the 2015 Northeastern Minnesota Book Award for Poetry.

We speak with Scott Hartley about The Fuzzy and the Techie: Why the Liberal Arts Will Rule the Digital World. He has served as a Presidential Innovation Fellow at the White House and is a venture capitalist and start-up advisor. He is a contributing author to the MIT Press book Shopping for Good. He has also written for publications such as Inc., Foreign Policy, Forbes, and Boston Review. We also chat with poet and essayist Heidi Czerwiec about her recently-released poetry collection Conjoining. She is also the author of the forthcoming lyric essay collection Fluid States, winner of Pleiades Press’ 2018 Robert C. Jones Prize for Short Prose, and is the editor of North Dakota Is Everywhere: An Anthology of Contemporary North Dakota Poets. She lives in Minneapolis, where she is Senior Poetry Editor with Poetry City, USA and mentors with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop. You can visit her at http://heidiczerwiec.com

We speak with Tana French about her new novel The Trespasser, now out in paperback. She is also the author of In the Woods, The Likeness, Faithful Place, Broken Harbor and The Secret Place. She has won the Edgar, Macavity, Anthony and Barry, the Los Angeles Times Award for best Mystery/Thriller, and the Irish Book Award for Crime Fiction. We also talk with Greg Gardner about his debut thriller In Plain Sight. He is a former U.S. Navy Officer, government consultant, and technology expert who has worked in the aerospace industry, at the Pentagon, and with most federal and many state agencies.

We speak with Alison Morse about her collection of flash fiction, If You Wave a Chicken Over Your Head. Her poems and prose have appeared in Water~Stone Review, Natural Bridge, Rhino, and mnartists.org, among other journals and anthologies. She also won the 2012 Tiferet Fiction Award. We then talk with Stephanie Chrismon, writing as DC Edwards, about Bright City, a dystopian coming of age urban fantasy. She has an MFA in creative writing from Hamline University, is a participant in the 2016-2017 Loft Mentor Series in Poetry and Creative Prose, and was a fellow in the 2015 Emerging Writers’ Mentor Program sponsored by the Givens Foundation for African American Literature.

We speak with Sean McFate about his new Tom Locke thriller Deep Black, which he wrote with Bret Witter. They are also the authors of Shadow War. Sean McFate is a professor of strategy at the Nat’l Defense University and Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. He also wrote Modern Mercenary: Private Armies and What They Mean for World Order. We then rebroadcast an interview we conducted with bestselling author Adam Makos about his book Devotion: An Epic Story of Heroism, Friendship, and Sacrifice. He is also the author of A Higher Call: An Incredible True Story of Combat and Chivalry in the War-Torn Skies of World War II.

We speak with Sean Hemingway, grandson of Ernest Hemingway, about The Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway: The Hemingway Library Edition, which also features a personal foreword from Hemingway’s sole surviving son Patrick. Sean Hemingway has a Ph.D. from Bryn Mawr College and is a curator in the Department of Greek and Roman Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. We also talk with Rick Polad about his new novel Cold Justice, a Spencer Manning mystery. He is the author of four previous novels in the series: Change of Address, Dark Alleys, Harbor Nights and Missing Boy. In addition to being an author, he is an environmental geologist, an earth science instructor, a Coast Guard volunteer, a jazz trumpeter and an editor.

We speak with #1 New York Times bestselling author Dean Koontz about his new novel The Silent Corner, the first book in a new series featuring Jane Hawk, an FBI agent gone rogue. Dean Koontz has sold 500 million copies of his books in 38 languages and has won many awards for his work. We also talk with Nora Murphy about her new memoir White Birch, Red Hawthorn. She is a fifth generation Irish Minnesotan and has worked and volunteered in the native community since 1995. She has published 5 books, including Knitting the Threads of Time.

We speak with with Dennis Carstens about his new mystery Political Justice. A native of Worthington, MN, he has published six previous Marc Kadella mysteries, including The Key to Justice, Desperate Justice and Personal Justice.  We also talk with Marcie Rendon about her debut novel Murder on the Red River. Marcie Rendon is an enrolled member of the White Earth Nation and the author of two nonfiction children’s books – Pow Wow Summer and Farmer’s Market: Families Working Together. She is also a poet and playwright and the creative mind behind Raving Native Theater