Podcasts about Bewildered

How do you continue doing ordinary human-life things while the world feels like it’s collapsing in real time? That's what we're trying to figure out on this episode of Bewildered. We talk about ping‑ponging between school runs, summer camp registration, doctor's appointments, and breaking-news notifications that feel like the apocalypse is upon us. If you've been feeling caught in this same unnerving and exhausting back-and-forth, this episode is for you. Tune in and we'll come to our senses together. CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram CREDITSWandering The Path by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deckMusic promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.comCreative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported LicenseSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

LISTEN and SUBSCRIBE on:Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/watchdog-on-wall-street-with-chris-markowski/id570687608 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PtgPvJvqc2gkpGIkNMR5i WATCH and SUBSCRIBE on:https://www.youtube.com/@WatchdogOnWallstreet/featured  What's really happening with Iran? With conflicting reports, shifting narratives, and lessons from past wars, this commentary explores the confusion surrounding U.S. military action, the growing distrust in government claims, and the true cost of Middle East conflicts. A look at history, skepticism, and hope for a quick end to hostilities.

How are you weathering the season you’re in? In this episode of Bewildered, we talk about what it really means to surrender to the season, whether it’s an upstate New York winter, perimenopause, a busy parenting era, or the “my foot hurts and I think my gums are receding” phase of life. We talk about how culture tries to flatten all seasons into one endless, brightly lit, 69-degrees-and-productive-all-the-time moment, and why our bodies, souls, and sanity refuse to go along with that plan.​ Join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram CREDITSWandering The Path by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deckMusic promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.comCreative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported LicenseSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Reading Slump? Tips to Get Out of It + Our “Slump Slayer” Cocktail (Books & Booze Podcast)In this episode of The Plot With a Twist, we chat about what a reading slump feels like, what causes it, and practical ways to get excited about books again—cocktail in hand. We talk about common triggers like overhyped reads that don't deliver, book hangovers after an epic series, reading outside your mood, genre burnout (especially heavy or emotional books), overcommitting to ARCs and beta reads, being mentally stuck in a beloved fictional world, and the way social media/content pressure can suck the joy out of reading. We also cover how life stress, exhaustion, and even falling asleep mid-read or mid-audiobook can contribute. Our slump-busting tips include rereading a comfort favorite, trying a new or rarely-read genre, changing your reading style (paperback/Kindle/audio), and not forcing it. We share specific books and series that helped us recover (including Hunger Games, Fourth Wing, Harry Potter, Bewitched & Bewildered, Lights Out, Ruinous Love trilogy, Trick by Natalia Jaster, Hockey Gods, the Beautiful series by Christina Lauren, the “Why Mummy…” books by Jill Sims, Bishop by L.J. Shen, and Succubus Blues). We finish with our themed drink of the week: the “Slump Slayer,” made with Malibu, vanilla vodka, mango lemonade Celsius, and mango garnish.00:00 Welcome to The Plot With a Twist (Books & Booze Intro)00:30 That ‘Nothing Hits' Feeling: What a Reading Slump Is02:15 Defining the Slump: Bored, Distracted & Doomscrolling04:17 Why Slumps Happen: Overhype, High Expectations & Forcing It06:56 Book Hangovers + Mood Reading + Genre Burnout09:24 Overcommitting to ARCs & Getting Stuck in a Series World11:44 Social Media Burnout: When Posting Sucks the Joy Out13:33 Slump Triggers & the ‘NRN' Shelf (Not Right Now)15:48 How Long Slumps Last + Do All Readers Get Them?21:28 Outside Influences: Life Stress, Exhaustion & Falling Asleep Reading25:28 Tips to Get Out of a Slump: Re-read a Comfort Favorite26:30 Annotating Fourth Wing: tiny print, big plans29:20 Reading Slump Fixes: reread favorites, try a 6-star pick30:41 Switch It Up: new genres + changing your reading format34:33 Books That Broke the Slump: Hunger Games to Hockey Gods35:36 Comfort Re-reads & Indie Gems: Harry Potter, Bewitched & Bewildered38:53 Dark Romance Spotlight: Bishop (LJ Shen) & the chess-series confusion43:34 Cocktail Break: the “Slump Slayer” energy-drink recipe 47:08 Wrap-Up: where to follow + next week's episode tease

Welcome to Once More, With Spoilers, where Kristin Russo & Jenny Owen Youngs revisit every episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, one at a time — for the SECOND time! — this time discussing each episode with spoilers! Bewitched by Amy, Bewildered by Xander, and Bothered by Giles' Lack of Patience?? Bewitched by Cordelia's character arc, Bewildered by Where Buffy Got That Silk Robe, and Bothered by Larry's Absence? No matter what is bewitch, bebother, and bebewildering, please join us, Diana, and Hecate for our coverage of this week's *very* timely Valentine's Day episode! Our original coverage of "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered" — with no spoilers! — aired on May 10, 2017 and you can find it here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/2-16-bewitched-bothered-and-bewildered-a-buffy/id1150241800?i=1000385283111 IN EPISODE LINKS SNL's Dysfucntional Family Dinner READ (OR LISTEN TO!) SLAYERS, EVERY ONE OF US ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bufferingcast.com/book⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ LOCATE YOUR HOSTS UPON THE INTERNET Jenny Owen Youngs | @jennyowenyoungs; ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠jennyowenyoungs.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Kristin Russo | @kristinnoeline; ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠kristinnoeline.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Buffering: A Rewatch Adventure | @bufferingcast on socials MUSIC | Theme song and jingles composed and performed by Jenny Owen Youngs | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bufferingcast.com/music⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ PATREON | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠patreon.com/bufferingcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ MERCH | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bufferingcast.com/shop⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ PODCAST SCHEDULE & EVENTS | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bufferingcast.com/jennycalendar⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Produced by: Kristin Russo, Jenny Owen Youngs, and LaToya Ferguson Edited by: Kristin Russo Logo: Kristine Thune We acknowledge that we and our team are occupying unceded and stolen lands and territories. Kristin occupies the Lenape territories of the Esopus Lenape Peoples. Jenny occupies the Wabanahkik territory of the Abenaki and Pennacook Peoples. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What happens once you authorize your knowing? On this Bewildered, we pick up where we left off about authorizing our essential, deep knowing and explore the question: What happens next? We talk about what it means to stop living by the culture's rules and start seeing life as a video game where we’re not just avatars bopping around—we’re learning to write the code of the game itself. To hear stories of synchronicities and big moves that defied all logic, tune in and get ready to wallow in some magic! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram CREDITSWandering The Path by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deckMusic promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.comCreative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported LicenseSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ever feel like the world is telling you what to think, do, or believe—until you’re not even sure what you know anymore? In this episode of Bewildered, we’re talking about “authorizing your own knowing”—a concept we picked up from the incredible Dr. Lisa Miller. We explore how to reclaim your own inner guidance, trust your instincts, and stop outsourcing your authority to others. If you’re ready to stop spinning and start discovering what you know to be true for you, join us for the full conversation! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram CREDITSWandering The Path by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deckMusic promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.comCreative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported LicenseSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On the 154th episode of What Is a Good Life?, I'm joined by Katie Elliott. Katie is a facilitator, writer, and programme designer working across community and organisational settings. With a background in jazz and a long-standing fascination with human change and habits, she creates tools, conversations, and projects that explore how people make sense of themselves and one another. Her work includes Amiko® Cards, the Adventures in Behaviour Change podcast, a series of children's books, and an album of original piano music.In this conversation, we explore curiosity, bewilderment, and the value of staying with experience rather than rushing to explain or resolve it. We talk about patterns, presence, and how meaning slowly reveals itself in relationships and in life — showing how deeper listening and meaningful conversation can genuinely shift how you see yourself and others.For more of Katie's work:Website: https://www.littlechallenges.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katieelliott/For more of my work:Contact me at mark@whatisagood.life if you'd like to explore your own good life through:- 1-on-1 coaching and online group courses: https://www.whatisagood.life/p/individual-coaching- The podcast's YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife/videos- My newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/p/individual-coaching00:00 — Patterns and Play 04:31 — Bewildered by Humans 07:48 — Not Being Believed 10:21 — Staying Open 13:01 — Kindness Inside 17:17 — Being Human Together 20:56 — Dropping the Mask 23:31 — Jazz and Freedom31:26 — Creating Human Spaces 40:44 — Making Meaning Together 52:31 — What is a Good Life for Katie?

What if the person you say you want to be… isn’t really who you want to be at all? In this episode of Bewildered, we talk about what it means to follow culture instead of joy, and how it all boils down to what Martha has learned (in person and on Instagram) about zebras and horses... Tune in to discover whether you really want to be the person you think you want to be, and find out the meaning of the unforgettable phrase: “Stop saying you want to be a horse!” It’s a fun one (we promise)—join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram CREDITSWandering The Path by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deckMusic promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.comCreative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported LicenseSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Claire Manning (@claireunteed on tiktok and instagram) joins to discuss what happens when a teenage boy acts rashly and emotionally and Sarah Michelle Gellar has to be offset to host SNL

This Sunday, join us as we explore a surprising and powerful passage in the Bible—Revelation 12. We'll discover that Christmas isn't just a nativity scene; it's a cosmic battle of good versus evil. Through this message, you will gain a clear vision of the evil we encounter in this world and our triumph over it in Christ.Come worship with Hillside Covenant Church LIVE at 9:00 & 10:30 AM both online and in person as Wayne Phillips teaches from Revelation 12:1-17.This week's sermon notes are available at: https://u.pcloud.link/publink/show?code=XZte0C5ZyIKYyg3Q5K0fWvshwQyGLXCAvKFyIf you are new to Hillside and are looking for ways to get connected and build community, visit our website: https://www.hillsidecovenant.org/ We welcome you to Hillside and are so glad you joined us today!To give in support of Hillside Covenant and its ministries follow this link: https://hillsidecovenant.churchcenter.com/givingThe sermon from Hillside Covenant Church, Sunday, December 7, 2025.

This Sunday, join us as we explore a surprising and powerful passage in the Bible—Revelation 12. We'll discover that Christmas isn't just a nativity scene; it's a cosmic battle of good versus evil. Through this message, you will gain a clear vision of the evil we encounter in this world and our triumph over it in Christ.Come worship with Hillside Covenant Church LIVE at 9:00 & 10:30 AM both online and in person as Wayne Phillips teaches from Revelation 12:1-17.This week's sermon notes are available at: https://u.pcloud.link/publink/show?code=XZte0C5ZyIKYyg3Q5K0fWvshwQyGLXCAvKFyIf you are new to Hillside and are looking for ways to get connected and build community, visit our website: https://www.hillsidecovenant.org/ We welcome you to Hillside and are so glad you joined us today!To give in support of Hillside Covenant and its ministries follow this link: https://hillsidecovenant.churchcenter.com/givingThe full service from Hillside Covenant Church, Sunday, December 7, 2025.

Do you suffer from “resting misery face”? Many of us do, and in this episode of Bewildered, we’re diving into exactly why that is. A few hints: It has to do with the brain’s “default mode network,” our hardwired negativity bias, the cultural pressures to stay miserable and afraid, and how our imagination tends to conspire against us. The good news is that you can reclaim your “resting joy face” by questioning your thoughts and using curiosity and laughter to shift your mindset. Tune in to learn how! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram CREDITSWandering The Path by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deckMusic promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.comCreative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported LicenseSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Can it be romantic to get spanked, stepped on, and bossed around? Absolutely! This week, Billy interviews Kate about how her submissiveness is deeply entangled with her romantic desires. Depth & Vulnerability | Are They Linked? | Intrinsic Desire & Earnest Belief | Submissive Romantic Desire | You Are the One You've Been Waiting For | Being Seen | Masochism | Kinksters' Communication | Self-Assuredness | Romantic Aesthetics | Falling Into Subspace | Admiration & Respect | Girl on the Net Post | Empty Praise | Romance Kink | Against Chill | Tricked Into Feelings | Incompatibility Credits:Music by PROTODOMEArtwork by Addison FinchBecome a patron to support the show and get access to our private Discord, monthly bonus episodes, and your name mentioned on the show.

The world—in all its beauty and chaos—is a bewildering place. And it is our division from mother nature that threatens the future of our species on this planet. It's time to re-wild our plan for 2026, and beyond.In this episode, I invite you to join me for this year's Annual Planning Challenge, happening LIVE December 11-19th. Hear why I changed the name (again) and why wildness is at the center of my planning framework.Join this year's 2026 Annual Planning Challenge, coming December 11-19: https://www.brittagreenviolet.com/challenge ~ RESOURCES ~⁠⁠⁠Sign up for my weekly Museletter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to get tips like this in your inbox.Follow me on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Substack: Frequency First⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Visit my website: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠brittagreenviolet.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Connect with me on IG: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@brittagreenviolet⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Connect on LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@brittagudmunson⁠

GATEWAY CINEMA is a multi-part series of conversations centered on key ideas in film studies. In these conversations, we interpret and celebrate a set of eclectic feature films from across generations and from around the world, including “La Haine”, “Drum”, “Alien 3 (Assembly Cut)”, “Come and See”, “Perfect Days”, “Sweet Smell of Success”, “The Swimmer”, “Amadeus (Director's Cut)”, “Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia”, “Friday”, “Marie Antoinette”, “The Night of the Hunter”, “Crank” and “Crank 2: High Voltage”, “Portrait of a Lady Fire”, “The Fabulous Baron Munchausen”, “Joker: Folie à Deux”, “Welcome to the Dollhouse”, “Heathers”, and “The Death of Stalin”.***Referenced media in GATEWAY CINEMA, Episode 16:“Joker” (Todd Phillips, 2019)“Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery” (Jay Roach, 1997)“Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me” (Jay Roach, 1999)“Austin Powers in Goldmember” (Jay Roach, 2002)“Alien 3 (Assembly Cut)” (David Fincher, 1992) (Assembly Cut in 2003)“Aliens” (James Cameron, 1986)“Gremlins 2: The New Batch” (Joe Dante, 1990)“Gremlins” (Joe Dante, 1984)“Deadpool & Wolverine” (Shawn Levy, 2024)“Alien: Romulus” (Fede Alvarez, 2024)“Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” (Tim Burton, 2024)“Transformers One” (Josh Cooley, 2024)“Mary Poppins” (Robert Stevenson, 1964)“The Rocky Horror Picture Show” (Jim Sharman, 1975)“Singin' in the Rain” (Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, 1952)“La La Land” (Damien Chazelle, 2016)“Hated: GG Allin and the Murder Junkies” (Todd Phillips, 1993)“Kneecap” (Rich Peppiatt, 2024)“Wicked” (Jon M. Chu, 2024)“Braveheart” (Mel Gibson, 1995)“Megalopolis” (Francis Ford Coppola, 2024)“The Minecraft Movie” (Jared Hess, 2025)“E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” (Steven Spielberg, 1982)“Shoa” (Claude Lanzmann, 1985)Audio quotation in GATEWAY CINEMA, Episode 16:“Joker: Folie à Deux” (Todd Phillips, 2024), including the songs “Uh Oh, I'm in Trouble” (2024) by Hildur Guðnadóttir, https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBKadB95sF45I8ypDP8cYu5glfXTT0FyH, and “That's Life” (1963) by Dean Kay and Kelly Gordon, performed by Lada Gaga, “Bewitched (Bothered and Bewildered)” (1940) by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, performed by Lady Gaga and Joaquin Phoenix, “To Love Somebody” (1967) by the Bee Gees, performed by Lady Gaga and Joaquin Phoenix, “If You Go Away” (1959) by Jacques Brel, performed by Joaquin Phoenix, and “(They Long to Be) Close to You” (1963) by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, performed by Lady Gaga and Joaquin Phoenix, https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKUcDyFltysbYrVO-rWYqfQqSuIKkxxgI

Have you ever been willing to “give up anything” for something you wanted? On this episode of Bewildered, we’re talking about the spiritual lesson that to be truly open to receiving something new, we first have to put something down. We share stories about letting go of things in our own lives and how that made space for wonder, awe, and our most precious experiences. It’s an episode full of laughter, insight, and inspiration to create more spaciousness in your one wild and precious life. Join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram CREDITSWandering The Path by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deckMusic promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.comCreative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported LicenseSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Joy suffered from a heart attack that left her dead for over 30 minutes. Although she was revived, doctors believed she would be in a vegetative state for the rest of her life. However, when Joy woke up, it was quite the opposite.

Joy suffered from a heart attack that left her dead for over 30 minutes. Although she was revived, doctors believed she would be in a vegetative state for the rest of her life. However, when Joy woke up, it was quite the opposite.

Blue Moon is the ninth movie directed by Richard Linklater and starring Ethan Hawke. It is written by Robert Kaplow and “inspired by” the letters of Lorenz Hart and Elizabeth Weiland. Hawke plays Hart on the night that the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Oklahoma! opens on Broadway. And: Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere is written and directed by Scott Cooper based on the book Deliver Me from Nowhere by Warren Zanes. It stars Jeremy Allen White in the title role, and it mostly tells the story of Springsteen writing and recording his 1982 album, Nebraska, and some of the material that appeared on his 1984 followup, Born in the U.S.A. GUESTS: Rebecca Castellani: Co-founder of Quiet Corner Communications and director of marketing at Washington Montessori School Jim Chapdelaine: An Emmy-winning musician and a patient advocate for people with rare cancers Rich Hollant: Founder and principal of CO:LAB, a hall of fame designer, and a co-partner at CENTER Steve Metcalf: Founder and director of the Garmany concert series at the University of Hartford’s Hartt School Irene Papoulis: Taught writing for a long time at Trinity College MUSIC FEATURED (in order): Everything I’ve Got – Blossom Dearie Mountain Greenery – Shirley Horn Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered – Ella Fitzgerald Nebraska – Jeremy Allen White I’m on Fire – Jeremy Allen White I’ll See You on the Radio – Grayson Hugh The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode! Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show. Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On this week's show, Steve, Dana, and Julia pull up proverbially barstools at Sardi's to discuss Richard Linklater's latest film Blue Moon, which is about one night in the life of Broadway lyricist Lorenz Hart. As played by a transformed Ethan Hawke, Hart is witty, needy, and totally captivating. Next, they travel Down Cemetery Road by way of a conversation about the new conspiracy series starring Emma Thompson and Ruth Wilson based on a novel by Mick Heron of Slow Horses fame. Finally, they turn to a piece of real estate that may forever live in infamy as “The Pussy Palace” thanks to Lily Allen's brutally honest and stunningly well-crafted album West End Girl. On an exclusive bonus episode for Slate Plus subscribers, the hosts take up the issue of biographical pictures—aka biopics— and Slate's recent package Portrait Mode about the ubiquitous film genre.    Endorsements: Dana: Lily Allen's song “The Fear”— to listen to and perform at karaoke. Julia: A boule of chocolate sourdough bread from the bakery of Milo & Olive in Los Angeles.  Steve:  Roberto Bolaño's novella By Night in Chile and Ella Fitzgerald singing “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” on the album Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Rodgers & Hart Song Book.   Email us your thoughts at culturefest@slate.com.  Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week's show, Steve, Dana, and Julia pull up proverbially barstools at Sardi's to discuss Richard Linklater's latest film Blue Moon, which is about one night in the life of Broadway lyricist Lorenz Hart. As played by a transformed Ethan Hawke, Hart is witty, needy, and totally captivating. Next, they travel Down Cemetery Road by way of a conversation about the new conspiracy series starring Emma Thompson and Ruth Wilson based on a novel by Mick Heron of Slow Horses fame. Finally, they turn to a piece of real estate that may forever live in infamy as “The Pussy Palace” thanks to Lily Allen's brutally honest and stunningly well-crafted album West End Girl. On an exclusive bonus episode for Slate Plus subscribers, the hosts take up the issue of biographical pictures—aka biopics— and Slate's recent package Portrait Mode about the ubiquitous film genre.    Endorsements: Dana: Lily Allen's song “The Fear”— to listen to and perform at karaoke. Julia: A boule of chocolate sourdough bread from the bakery of Milo & Olive in Los Angeles.  Steve:  Roberto Bolaño's novella By Night in Chile and Ella Fitzgerald singing “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” on the album Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Rodgers & Hart Song Book.   Email us your thoughts at culturefest@slate.com.  Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Does your life ever feel like a game of Tetris, where you get totally overwhelmed by all the pieces coming at you? In this episode of Bewildered, we’re talking about how to get through the chaos that is modern life: from role fragmentation, to relationship and caregiving pressures, to work responsibilities, to sleep deprivation. Join us for some world-class life coaching (and plenty of metaphors) as we explore how to find a way through the morass of obligations, get some sanity, and rediscover joy. CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Final Toast: Answering Your Burning Divorce QuestionsIn this farewell episode of How to Split a Toaster, family law attorney Seth Nelson and co-host Pete Wright tackle a collection of diverse listener questions about divorce, relationships, and co-parenting. From custody concerns to financial disputes, they address the complex challenges many face during separation.Key Questions AddressedThe hosts explore crucial topics including coercive control in divorce, psychological evaluations for new partners, dissipation of assets, and enforcing custody agreements across international borders. Seth provides practical legal insights while Pete offers thoughtful perspective on navigating these challenging situations.Notable Legal InsightsChild support and alimony obligations remain non-dischargeable even in bankruptcyCourts take coercive control seriously when properly documented and presentedForeign divorce judgments can be domesticated and enforced in U.S. courts with proper procedureCo-Parenting ChallengesSeth and Pete discuss strategies for handling difficult co-parenting dynamics, including:Managing relationships with new partnersProtecting children during high-conflict divorcesNavigating custody when mental health issues are involvedAddressing parental alienation concernsFinancial ConsiderationsThe episode covers important financial aspects of divorce:Division of marital assets and debtsHandling joint business interestsPension division through QDROsTax implications of custody arrangementsAs their final episode, Seth and Pete reflect on over 230 episodes helping listeners navigate divorce while preserving relationships. While new episodes won't be produced, the extensive archive remains available as an ongoing resource for those facing divorce and separation challenges.This farewell episode encapsulates the show's core mission: providing practical legal guidance and relationship-saving strategies to help listeners move forward constructively after divorce.Links & NotesSchedule a consult with SethGot a question you want to ask on the show? Click here! (00:00) - Welcome to How to Split a Toaster (00:26) - Listener Questions (00:50) - Question 1: Trapped and Terrified (03:04) - Question 2: Barb L. (04:08) - Question 3: Rhonda and Gene (05:32) - Question 4: Deb (09:59) - Question 5: Deduction Dilemma in Denver (11:54) - Question 6: Drained and Dissipated (14:29) - Question 7: CEO in Crisis (16:43) - Question 8: Secretly Surveilled (18:02) - Question 9: Overseas Obstacle (19:48) - Question 10: Drowning in Debt (20:29) - Question 11: Rental Dilemma (22:23) - Question 12: Expatriot Predicament (23:34) - Question 13: Blindsided Bride (25:05) - Question 14: Bankrupt and Bewildered (26:04) - Question 15: Desperate Dad (27:53) - Question 16: Bullied by the Bar (29:30) - Question 17: Closeted and Concerned (30:52) - Question 18: High-Conflict Headache (31:59) - Question 19: Accused of Agreement Breach (34:23) - Question 20: Stymied by Shoddy Split (38:02) - Our Last Episode!

Sermon by David Rountree on 10-19-2025 at New Covenant Church in Anderson, SC. Bible Passage: John 7:1-36 Preaching Outline: Beat Him (V. 1,2,7,11,19,25, 30, 32) Bewildered by Him (V. 2-4, 12, 13 20, 26-29, 33-36) Burble at Him (v. 14-24) Browse his Words (v. 25-26) Believe Him (v. 31) www.ncchurch.net

Are you looking for ways to handle life when the culture’s rules no longer apply, and everything keeps changing at warp speed? In this episode of Bewildered, we’re talking about “flying blind” with confidence—trusting your body’s wisdom, adapting to new realities, and creating a path forward that’s right for you. We’re sharing personal stories, plenty of metaphors, and practical tips to help you navigate uncertainty and land safely, no matter what the storm may bring. Join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

SUBSCRIBE! LIKE! SHARE, BABY!Yet another episode, yet another opportunity for depth and character building WASTED. This week, Miranda once again leaves her own body and becomes a Looney Tune version of herself as she can't fathom the idea of her son and his gf catching her out in public at a rally for something she is about to have a career in, ON THE ISLAND SHE WORKS ON. Meanwhile, Carrie is desperate to make her nightmare of a downstairs neighbor like her, even though in any other circumstance Lisette would be evicted POST HASTE. Oh also, more penises than ever seen before, including Harry's, of whose we see go from peeing in a toilet (a classic MPK trope) to being serviced by his wife. Enjoy!!!Send us an email: PATCPOD@gmail.comThis month on PATREON:www.patreon.com/podandthecity10/2 Rupaul's Drag Race All Stars 2 S1 E2 "Snatch Game"10/9 Pillow Talk LIVE!10/16 Vanderpump Rules S1 E7 "in Love With Someone Else"10/23 Smash S1 E11 "The Movie Star"10/30 Rupaul's Drag Race S2 E3 "Herstory of the World"LEAVE US A VOICEMAIL FOR OUR MAILBAG AND WE WILL PLAY IT ON AN EPISODE :)https://www.speakpipe.com/msg/s/384376/2/yd2cuctlmk3cm6n7 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We all need to take things in to keep us hydrated, not just physically, but also creatively. In this episode of Bewildered, we discuss what we call “filling the well”—receiving great art, stories, and creativity from others—and how it can replenish us and make us able to give and create ourselves. We share our rituals for getting inspired, explore why delight matters more than productivity, and offer a playful look at the weird, wonderful ways we stay creatively and emotionally nourished. Join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This episode we're Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered as we discuss the 1957 film adaptation of the 1940 stage musical ‘Pal Joey'. Starting Frank Sinatra finds himself in a love triangle with Rita Hayworth and Kim Novak whilst pursuing his dream of owning his own club. Tune in to find out who becomes his Funny Valentine

Send Me a Message! After a break from therapy, today's session was less about deep work and more about catching my therapist up on everything that's been happening. Or, not been happening. She thought I'd be tapering off medications, instead of being on another one.. She seemed genuinely bemused by this, thankfully validating the confusion and frustration I have felt when my wishes aren't be listened to. She reminded me that this isn't a failure of self-advocacy on my part, but rather a reflection of a broken system. While most of the session was devoted to recounting these updates, we finished by re-committing to focus on the bigger picture: finding a new job and moving forward with a career change. --Follow my journey through the chaos of mental illness and the hard-fought lessons learned along the way.Lived experience is at the heart of this podcast — every episode told through my own lens, with raw honesty and zero filter.This is a genuine and vulnerable account of how multiple psychological disorders have shaped my past and continue to influence my future.Support the showYou can follow me on Instagram: @elliot.t.waters, and the show on Facebook!

We’re in the middle of moving house (and Ro’s turning 45!) so our whole daily rhythm is being shaken up. But disruptions can be a great opportunity to consciously redesign your life. In this episode of Bewildered, we explore “day mapping,” staying responsive to nature’s cues, and letting your deepest yearnings guide you—instead of sticking to cultural rules or slipping into inertia. It’s about creating a life that’s structured enough to hold your dreams but not so rigid that it boxes you in. Join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What does a text about chickens have to do with the meaning of life? We're glad you asked! In this episode of Bewildered, we examine how our culture teaches us to avoid touch, fear time, and forego relationships for transactions. We dive deep into how we’ve been pushed away from nature and each other by systems that value money most, and we explore the things that really make life worth living: genuine connection, sensory experience, and living in the moment (which includes cuddling chickens). Join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Our culture believes that the only way to fix all the bad stuff in the world is to stare at it relentlessly, as if our sheer focus could solve things. (Or at least prove we’re not part of the problem.) However, there are more effective ways to be the change, ways that include beauty and joy. On this episode of Bewildered, we’re talking about how we can actively change the world without being consumed by what’s wrong with it—and how creativity might be more revolutionary than resistance. Join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Let's take a Detour and see where it takes us.   www.cocktailnation.net Solitaire Miles-Detour Bryan Schwartz -The Very thought of you  Andy Pratt Trio– Patricia Ike Quebec – Just One More Chance Anne Burnell – Blues In The Night  Towner Galaher -Tell it like it is The Rob Dixon Trio- Mind Mirror The Victor Feldman Trio-Dream Dance Allen Dennard -Dusk  Maria Schaeffer- Bewitched Bothered and Bewildered

Do you find it difficult to share your unique offerings with the world? How about charging money for your work? In this “Best of” episode of Bewildered, we dive into a question from listener Rebecca who’s trying to find the courage to shine her light in the world—and get paid well for it. We share some of our own experiences with this issue too, and offer three magical little words that can banish shame and set you free to shine your light and charge what you’re worth. Join us! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Our Love Expert, Kellie Rasberry, is here to solve your relationship issues! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“QUICK! DO THIS NOW! IT’S URGENT!” Do those words spike your pulse? We're constantly pressured to do things that serve the system, and we’re trained to think of these things as urgent. But are they? In this “Best of” episode of Bewildered, we dive into the topic of urgency: How there’s a type that will crush your soul and a type that will grow it—and how you can tell the difference. If you often find yourself responding frantically to problems which may or may not be urgent, this episode is for you! CONNECT WITH US Follow Martha on Instagram The Bewildered Show Notes Follow Ro on Instagram Follow Bewildered on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

One of the writing skills I am asked about the most is, “How do I get emotion on the page?” People ask this no matter what genre they are writing, because no one wants to produce a manuscript that is flat and unengaging. Emotion is the key, but figuring out how to inspire your reader to feel something is a tricky thing to learn and an even trickier thing to master.In her debut novel, Slanting Towards the Sea (Simon & Schuster, July 2025), Lidija Hilje has mastered it. The story feels so raw and so real—and English is not even Lidija's first language! It's a remarkable achievement. I'm excited to speak with Lidija about her path to publication and how she figured out how to get the emotion of her characters onto the page.Links from the Pod:Article from Jane FriedmanGuide on Literary Fiction from LidijaLidija's website: www.lidijahilje.comAuthor Accelerator book coaches Barbara Boyd and Nita CollinsHey everyone, it's Jenny Nash. This episode happens to feature an Author Accelerator book coach. Author Accelerator is the company I founded more than 10 years ago to lead the emerging book coaching industry. If you've been curious about what it takes to become a successful book coach, which is to say, someone who makes money, meaning, and joy out of serving writers, I've just created a bunch of great content to help you learn more. You can access it all by going to bookcoaches.com/waitlist. We'll be enrolling a new cohort of students in our certification program in October, so now's a perfect time to learn more and start making plans for a whole new career.Transcript below!EPISODE 456 - TRANSCRIPTJennie NashHey everyone, it's Jennie Nash. This episode happens to feature an Author Accelerator book coach. Author Accelerator is the company I founded more than 10 years ago to lead the emerging book coaching industry. If you've been curious about what it takes to become a successful book coach—which is to say, someone who makes money, meaning, and joy out of serving writers—I've just created a bunch of great content to help you learn more. You can access it all by going to bookcoaches.com/waitlist. That's bookcoaches.com/waitlist. We'll be enrolling a new cohort of students in our certification program in October, so now's a perfect time to learn more and start making plans for a whole new career.Multiple Speakers:Is it recording? Now it's recording, yay. Go ahead. This is the part where I stare blankly at the microphone. I don't remember what I'm supposed to be doing. Alright, let's start over. Awkward pause. I'm going to rustle some papers. Okay, now one, two, three.Jennie NashHey writers, I'm Jennie Nash, and this is the Hashtag AmWriting podcast, the place where we talk about writing all the things; short things, long things, fiction, nonfiction, pitches, and proposals. Today I'm talking with Lidija Hilje, the author of the novel Slanting Towards the Sea. And what we're talking about is how to capture emotion on the page—the most elusive thing in the entire writing universe. Lidija lives in Croatia. She's a former lawyer who I know because she became a book coach through Author Accelerator. This is her first novel, and it's something else. As a longtime book coach, it's really hard for me to read for pleasure anymore, because it's so hard not to see the writer at work and the seams of the creation. But Slanting Towards the Sea—I saw none of that. I fell wholly into the story and became lost in it; the olive trees and the sea, the pain of these people and this love triangle, and also just the love that they had for life and each other. It's almost unbearably raw—the way life itself can feel sometimes. And yet, since I know Lidija and her story to becoming a writer, I also know how much work it took to create this feeling and emotion. I'm so excited to speak with Lidija today, and so excited for people to hear about her and her story. So welcome, Lidija. Thanks for coming onto the podcast.Lidija HiljeThank you so much for having me and for this incredible introduction. I'm so honored.Jennie NashWell, before we get started, I want to read the jacket copy for Slanting Towards the Sea, so that our listeners can hear the bones of the story that you wrote. Is that okay if I read it for our listeners?Lidija HiljeAbsolutely. Thank you so much.Jennie NashOkay.Ivona divorced the love of her life, Vlaho, a decade ago. They met as students at the turn of the millennium, when newly democratic Croatia was alive with hope and promise. But the challenges of living in a burgeoning country extinguished Ivona's dreams one after another—and a devastating secret forced her to set him free. Now Vlaho is remarried and a proud father of two, while Ivona's life has taken a downward turn. In her thirties, she has returned to her childhood home to care for her ailing father. Bewildered by life's disappointments, she finds solace in reconnecting with Vlaho and is welcomed into his family by his spirited wife, Marina. But when a new man enters Ivona's life, the carefully cultivated dynamic between the three is disrupted, forcing a reckoning for all involved. Set against the mesmerizing Croatian coastline, Slanting Towards the Sea is a cinematic, emotionally searing debut about the fragile nature of potential and the transcendence of love.That's it! What a—what a—what a summary, right? So I want to start by talking about the genre of this book, Lidija. As a book coach, you specialize in helping people write literary fiction. And you're extremely articulate about defining exactly what it is. And I'd like to just start there, by talking about how you see this novel, where it's positioned and, um, and your sense of it in, as a—in the genre, um, categories, if you will. Um, and I'll share with our listeners before you answer that English is not your first language—which is something we're going to talk about from a writing perspective, but just from a listening perspective, to give people some context for that. So let's talk about—let's talk about genre.Lidija HiljeYeah, well, genre is one of my favorite topics as a book coach, and so naturally it is something I love talking about. So the first book I ever wrote, which is now safely shelved in a drawer at the bottom of a drawer, was women's fiction. And the reason why it was women's fiction was that because I was learning how to write, I was learning how to weave a story together. And in doing so, I was trying to find some commonalities in stories—like how stories work, how you develop them, how you develop a character arc, how you wrap it up towards the end. And—but my intention always was to write literary. I was just not very good at doing it. And so I kind of—like all the feedback that I got throughout my—from developmental editors—it was like geared towards kind of channeling the book towards women's fiction. And this is something that really still strikes me as a book coach: how different it is to coach literary fiction as opposed to genre fiction, which is more formulaic. So basically, that first book is safely shelved. And when I started writing this book, I was working really hard at trying to make it not be formulaic. And actually, one of the book coaches from our community helped me. I had a conversation with Barbara Boyd where I outlined my story for her, and she said there was this moment where I kind of did something in my outline…what could basically be called a cop-out—so that… I killed a character, basically, so that the…you know, that the book would close neatly, right? And so she called me out on it and said—because I talked to her specifically because she coaches literary fiction but didn't like or coach women's fiction—and I thought that perspective was something I needed. And so she said, "Why are you killing that character?” And that was the wake-up moment for me, because that was the moment when I realized that in doing so, that was the typical moment where a writer kind of goes toward the genre. And where the interesting thing in the literary fiction genre lies is exploring, you know, what happens when you don't kill the character—when you don't take the easy way out. And so, genre-wise, what I, you know—I run a book club for writers, and we read a lot of literary fiction. And so, I was constantly trying to figure out, like, what is it about these books that, you know, define genre? And in studying these books, there are several things, and I could talk about this, I guess, for centuries, but I'll try to...Jennie NashI—I love it. Let's do it.Lidija HiljeSo basically, in literary fiction, there are many things that genre fiction also has. There are themes, there are character arcs—you know, a character might grow, though not necessarily. But basically, it's much less clear than in genre fiction. In genre fiction, for instance, you have—especially in women's fiction—you will have a woman who is shy and then she becomes confident toward the end. Or you have a horrible, you know, self-obsessed character who learns their lesson toward the end of the book. It's really clear-cut. The reader can latch on to what the problem is without thinking too much about it. And literary fiction does the opposite. It fans out a little bit. It touches on many different things that kind of seem unrelated, but they are related. And this is a problem in writing it, as well as coaching it, because as a coach or as a writer, you have to be aware of all these things. You have to beware of how these things tie together so that you have the idea of this through line that goes throughout the story, whereas the reader might not be catching on as fast but does have the confidence that you, as the writer, are going to get them there, if that makes sense.Jennie NashOh, it makes so much sense. So when you were working on—I actually remember reading some opening, maybe the opening chapters of the novel that has been shelved. When I read those pages, they struck me as if they had that feeling of literary fiction. Was that your intention with that novel as well?Lidija HiljeYes, it was. It was just that I was unable to... I came to writing late. I mean, I was always a writer in the sense that I was always writing something, but I came to writing fiction and specifically books very late. It was 2017 when I started writing that book in Croatian. And the first, you know, contact with any craft or writing happened in 2019 when I finished the draft and I translated that book into English, and I started looking for ways of pub... you know, publishing that book and realized that the first draft is not the last draft. Like that was the—like it was—sometimes it's so funny to think like how recently I didn't know anything about publishing or writing at all. So basically, I did want that book to be literary fiction. I always wanted to do, you know, to write the type of fiction that I wrote in Slanting [Slanting Towards the Sea], and obviously I hope to, you know, hone my craft in the future, but it wasn't—it wasn't on that level. And the first developmental editor that I worked with in 2019, she was giving me all the logical advice that you can give someone, which is... hone the character arc you are telling here, show, you know, all those things that we tell our clients when we work with them as book coaches. But what it did is it completely stripped the literary part from it, and it made me write in scene, which is not how literary fiction is written. You know, like, one of the differences between commercial fiction and literary fiction is that you don't necessarily write in scenes. You write in summaries, and you write in postcards, which is the type of a scene that goes deeper instead of forward, if that makes sense. So you're not kind of—nothing changes for the protagonist, the protagonist doesn't realize anything, they don't decide on a new course of action, nothing new happens, but the reader's understanding of the character happens. And this is also true when you're looking at the character arc on the, you know, scope of the whole novel. Like in literary fiction, it will often be that, you know, that the character doesn't change much in terms of, like what I said before—she was shy and she stopped being shy, right? It will just be that the reader's understanding of the character deepens. And so my first book was an attempt at literary fiction, but it was not an execution. You know, the execution didn't really match that, and I feel like the advice that I got from my early developmental editor was just kind of trying to put me in the confines of commercial fiction. Which is... you know... understandable. You know, and I'm great— I'm even, like, today—I'm grateful for it because you first have to learn how to walk and then you can run, right? So I did have to go through the process of learning how to write a good scene, of learning how not to tell, of learning how to hide the seams that you—that you were talking about—you need to hide your fingerprints as a writer. And that was my learning book. I learned a lot from writing it, but by the time I was done with it, it was not—it didn't—it was not a bad book, and I got a lot of full requests for it, but it was not—it did not end up being what I had hoped for it.Jennie NashSo, in 2017, when you started that book, you said you came to writing late. Do you mind sharing where you were in your life, if you want to share your age or what you were doing in your life, just to give us some context for what you mean by that—by coming to it late?Lidija HiljeSo yeah, so 2017 was one of the hardest years in my life, I think. I think it's just the moment where I was around 35, I think. I would have to do the math, but mid-30s. And I had just been fired for the second time after my second maternity leave. And, you know jobs in my profession, which is—I was an attorney—were scarce, and I opened my own law firm. And I sat there in my law office, you know, a woman working as an attorney in Zadar, Croatia. It was not, you know, I was not having like flocks of clients, you know, going through the door. And you had to sit there from 8am to 4pm, which is our work time. And I had, um, ii had um... I started writing basically to pass the time. And I was writing just the scenes that I was interested in that, you know, brought me joy and then I, you know, wrote the intermittent scene, and the book grew and grew. And by the time I had finished it, which was a year and a half later, you know, it became... It just became a thing that I was—it took over it took over my whole life. I could not, you know and financially it was a difficult time for us as well. We had reached—my husband and I, like I said mid 30's—and we had kind of peaked career wise here in Croatia. So basically, what people don't understand about Croatia is that even if you're a brain surgeon, or if you're a lawyer, or if you're a programmer—like my husband—the money you make is not much more than the average wage. And so, you know, we were at the top of our game professionally, but not earning enough to make ends meet. And so we had started thinking about moving to Ireland basically, which is the, you know, IT hub for the... in Europe. And in thinking about it, I was sitting in my law office and I was basically crying my eyes out thinking if I go there, I'm going to be stripped of my identity as an attorney. I had been working toward that for basically 15, 20 years. And in trying to get over that pain of working towards something that in Ireland, it's not going to mean anything because, you know, the legal system is so very different and my use of language was not, you know, it's still not really good. Like professional English is not the same as this spoken English, you know, everyday English. And so, in kind of trying to accept that we are going to move and I'm going to be stripped of that identity as a lawyer, I was, in a way, you know, to make it easier for myself, I started accepting all the things that I didn't want to look at, which is I hated my job.Jennie NashRight, right.Lidija HiljeI loved being in a courtroom, like that was a good part of it. But everything else, you know, the intellectual part of it, like thinking about law, applying law to a certain case was interesting to me. But everything else was horrible. And so, once I accepted that, and my husband got a job, you know, like working for... as a freelancer for an outside company, and we could stay in Croatia, I was like, "And what am I going to do now? I can't go back to being a lawyer." And so, because his wage was a little bit more than, you know, for the first time, he could afford for me to go, you know, to take a year off and to see what I could do. And so, for a while, I interned at a foreign literary agency—that didn't go anywhere. Then I wrote, you know, a copy for a startup that didn't end up, you know, paying me. So that was kind of like—I was at the end of my rope by the, you know, toward the end of that year. And then I encountered the Author Accelerator program for book coaches, and I had during that year I had connected with writers and I have realized that basically the legal knowledge really translates beautifully into book coaching. So it was kind of like, you know, working on a story, or if you're working on a case, or working on a book, it's kind of a similar thing, similar logic applies. And so it was a… you—you know, it was, I know I'm mixing a little bit the books coaching and legal and, you know, writing careers...Jennie NashNo, it's fascinating.Lidija HiljeBut they are so intertwined in my life, yeah.Jennie NashI mean, it's fascinating the way that you trained yourself on story, basically. And I remember the conversation when you approached Author Accelerator, because you were nervous about being able to meet the requirements of our program because of your language—that English is not your first language. But I, I mean, we have a system whereby it's you try it, you know, if—if you'd meet the requirements, you meet them and if you don't, you don't. And it struck me that your grasp of story was so profound. That I didn't know... you know, it was one conversation about your grasp of the written language. But, um, you were... you were very nervous about your ability to do the work of book coaching in another language. And it's just interesting from where we sit now, so I want to circle back to the book itself and the novel and what you accomplished in it, because it really does have the thing that so many writers are always trying to do, and they talk about it—it is so elusive. Which is this capturing this feeling, emotion, letting the reader sit in the mirror of what those characters are feeling, and you feel it your own self, and that it, you know, when it, when it works, it's, it's like a magic trick. And it strikes me that you came at that very deliberately. It was not accidental. Is that fair to say? Would you believe that?Lidija HiljeI think I always wanted to write about... I always wanted to write quiet stories. And for quiet stories to work, you have to make the quiet things loud in a way. And the loud things are the emotions. And so yes, yes, it was always my goal. I was not always good at it... in writing emotion. But yeah, like during that process of writing that first book, I struggled with it a lot. I struggled with what I guess happens a lot of the time when we are writing is that we're trying very hard for the reader to see things the way we are seeing them. And this counter-intuitively causes the very reverse effect. You know the reader—is the more you're trying to make them listen to you, the more you're trying to, you know, impose your view of things on them, the more they resist. So the trick is basically, and I'll make it sound very easy, it's not easy at all to execute, but the trick is to kind of, you know, to try to find a way and to deliver that emotion without judgment. Like, this is what I'm feeling, or this is what my character is feeling. And not trying to explain it, not trying to get compassion, not trying to get the reader to feel anything. Like, you're just putting things out in the ether, and you're allowing the reader to do their own math. And this is something you can do in literary fiction, which is more open-ended, right? And the readers of genre fiction, I do need more hand-holding in that sense that they will not maybe work as hard as the literary reader. So yeah, I did work very hard. And, you know, the first book, the “shelved” book, really got to a point where I couldn't do that work anymore. But when I started Slanting [Slanting Towards the Sea]… the literally... the first scene in Slanting [Slanting Towards the Sea], came out the way it did. Like that's…Jennie NashOh wow!Lidija HiljeIt didn't change. We had this meeting of writing friends and one of them said, let's exchange, like, let's read 500 new words and I was not working on anything. I had been focusing on book coaching at that moment—that was 2021. And I went to the moment in that room when she is thinking about her ex-husband, you know, when the protagonist is thinking about her ex-husband, and it just came out the way it is. I don't think I changed basically more than three words since that scene came out the way it is. And so...Jennie NashOh, that's amazing. I want to... I want to read some of the lines from that opening scene, if I can, to give the readers... I mean the listeners a sense of what we're talking about. So here's how Slanting Towards the Sea begins.I open his socials and sift through his photos. I know their sequence like I know the palm of my hand. Better even, because I can never memorize what my palm looks like, how the life line twirls into the love line, how it begins tight and uniform, but then turns ropey. It scares me to look at it, to trace the lines, to see where they might lead me in years to come. But I know Vlaho's photos by heart.And it goes on from there. It's, it's just, it's so haunting. And, and the whole, the whole novel is, is that, has that feel to it. So when did you, when did you know that with this story you had it? You knew with the other one that you couldn't get it back, or that it wasn't going to happen. When did you begin? Was it after the sharing of that scene where you thought, oh, I've got this?Lidija HiljeI knew that I could write a scene, but there's a difference, you know, a postcard. I would call this a postcard. This is the typical example of a postcard, a scene where nothing changes for the protagonist and she doesn't understand anything new, but it kind of deepens the reader's understanding of, you know, her situation. So I knew I could write it, which is something I struggled with, with the first book, but I—there's a long road from doing one good postcard and then, you know, writing an entire book, which in literary fiction you have this additional, you know, challenge. You do a ratio basically of normal scenes and summaries, and postcards, and you have to maintain that ratio throughout the book. So, um, yeah for the... relatively early in the book I had submitted that first scene for some competitions. And I got great feedback. It won a critique match, writing a competition in the literary fiction category. And it was long listed in the BPA Pitch Prize in the UK. So I knew that... you know... you know... that the opening of the book was working. So that was good. But from then on, it was such a struggle, because you read the book, and so you know, it has dual timelines; it spans 20 years. I was struggling so bad trying to figure out whether I should do, you know, the past in flashbacks? Whether I should alternate timelines? How do I set this massive story up, which has, you know, the past, and, you know, the present, which happens over a span of... I don't know... five or six months in the present timeline. So I struggled with it a lot. But the thing that I struggled with the most was accountability. So basically, for the first year and a half—for the first year—I wrote, I think, maybe 150 pages. They were not very well set up. I was unsure of them, and I would always push the book backwards to work on client stories. And so what really changed the game for me was when I—I have this program that I run in summertime and one of our book coaches was in that program, Nita Collins. And after the program ended, we partnered up. And so she was my accountability—you know partner, as well as…you know, feedback giver and cheerleader and all the things. And so, you know, I still struggled with how to set up all the things and how to build up the narrative, which I think is really hard for people to coach literary fiction, because you can basically only offer solutions that are kind of geared towards tropey, right? So the author really does have to do all the work, in that sense, but she was absolutely instrumental in terms of me getting the pages down and just seeing if the pages hit the mark or didn't, why they didn't, you know, talking to her, just voicing, talking about the book. And so this went on for a year and within one year I had a full first draft and from then on it was a quick revising process and within three months I had three agent offers. So it was a fast process from then on, from having the first draft, to getting an agent.Jennie NashWell, big shout out to Nita Collins and the Author Accelerator community. I love that a connection happened for you guys. It's really beautiful the way you describe it. So can you explain why you decided it was time to go out to agents? With the first book you decided... this is not going to go anywhere. I'm putting it aside. And with this one, very soon after you finished the first draft, you decided to pitch. What was that decision-making process like for you?Lidija HiljeSo I want to be completely honest. I didn't shelve the first project because I thought it was not, I could not get it to a level. I was convinced that it was on a level, and I had pitched it, but I had been rejected over 100 times. So basically the industry decided for me that it wasn't going to happen. And one of the things that was really hard for me in that first book is that I set it in the US, which I've never been to the US. So it made it very difficult, but I felt like if I set the book in Croatia, I would, like the cultural perspective would overpower the quiet narrative. And I thought that I couldn't do it. And so I, you know, in Slanting [Slanting Towards the Sea], this is the base of the book. Like, it's, you know, I've found a way to weave the cultural perspective as seamlessly as I could. But the pitching process—I basically... I had the first draft done when I had decided to pitch the book. It was a little bit—to be honest, I was a little bit hasty. I had applied for The Muse & the Marketplace conversation with agents. You could...Jennie NashLike the speed dating.Lidija HiljeYeah, like the speed dating. And so I purchased a few tickets for that. And this was done for two reasons. The first one was to, you know; give myself a goal to work towards—to kind of make it all go faster. And the second goal was to see how the industry looks at this. And if there are any issues that they have with the, you know, with the book or with how it's set up, I would rather know sooner than later. And so, because they were reading not just the pages—they were reading, like, 10 pages, a synopsis, and a query letter—which I would also wholeheartedly recommend writing during the writing phase. Preferably, you know, toward the end of the first draft, you would have to do the pitching materials, because they inform so much of... they make you really focus on what the book is about and kind of drawing out the themes and the plot and kind of parsing all those things out. So I told myself: if I go there, and if I get some, you know the best thing that could happen is I could get some full requests. The worst thing that could happen was they will tell me that I'm not there, that my writing is not there, and that the and/or that the book doesn't hold together. And so what happened is, I was... I had just finished my first draft, but I knew that the ending wasn't right. I had the wrong ending. So I knew I had to rewrite the last third of the book, at least. And I went on to that conference, and out of five agents I had talked to, four had requested a full manuscript—toward, like, when I had it. So it was a huge, you know, confidence builder, and that summer I really, really—I can't, it's really amazing what happened—I just, I was so energized, and I just, you know, I don't know, it's like a visit from the muse, even though it's just work. But it felt—I felt very inspired, and I completely rewrote the book, basically, and that gave it the ending that it needed to have, which was also one of the fights against the genre confinements which I had kind of put on myself. So yeah, so that was the decision that I should be doing that, and at the same time, I wanted to be, like, 100% sure that when I sent the manuscript out, it would be finished—that it would be the best that I can make it by myself, you know, and, you know, for Nita to read it, for a couple of beta readers that I've really trusted—and they have the same taste in books that I do—to read it. And only with that feedback was I really ready to send it out to agents.Jennie NashSo—the—we'll get to what happened with the agents in a minute. But I want to return to something that you said about the culture of Croatia and the role that it has in the story, and you called it foundational. And it really feels both the setting of the country, meaning the land, there's... there's a lot you write about, um, the sea, and the food that comes from the sea, and the winds that travel, um, both on the sea and on the land, and there's olive trees that play a large part in this story. So there is a lot about the country itself, and then there's, there is a lot about the, the culture and the, the changing bureaucracies and politics and things that are going on. And it's interesting that you spoke in your own life about contemplating leaving the country, because your characters at some key points, contemplate leaving as well. So there's—there was very much about the constraints of the world of this place, and that's part of what the, you know, it's interesting that you talk about it as your concern was that it would overwhelm the story, but it's part of, for me, what the container in which that emotion happened. It felt not separate from the story, but a really critical component of it. The way these characters lived on the land, and in this place, and what that allowed them to do,—or to be—or not be and how they bumped up against it. It was... It's really like you have a historian's grasp of that, your world, was that something you were conscious of while you were writing as well?Lidija HiljeYes. I was always worried about writing, you know, a Croatian perspective. Like that was always a big concern for me because I, you know, when you're looking at literature and what interests readers, it's either, you know, the book set in the UK and US, which is kind of the clear narrative, it doesn't, it's, it's a pervasive culture that we all understand when it kind of becomes invisible, or, you know, a background noise, it doesn't really affect the narrative. Whereas the other interesting things that readers, when they want to travel somewhere, they will want to go somewhere exotic, you know, whether it's Nigeria or, you know, Eastern Asia, Japan, China, you know? So it felt like Croatia is different, but not different enough, you know? And so it's, it's kind of like almost like it makes the reader constantly forget that they're in Croatia, while at the same time kind of jarring them when you remind them of the differences, and this was one of the, one of the, you know, key points of my work with Nita, was when she would just notice things like, what is, you know, what is the, why are there, there are no dividers in the hospital between the beds? And it's just like... and now I realize that I have to explain how our hospitals look like, and it's not like yours. Or the difference in the tides, which in America are, you know, over, over, I don't know how many feet, and in Croatia they're just, um, and we talked about it when you were here in Zadar as well. So it's just like, it's very similar to America, but not quite. And that was very frustrating at times to try to depict. But on the other hand, in writing Ivona, I wanted to, I feel, I have felt and still feel a lot of frustration with my country. I love it, but I have been planning, like there have been multiple, you know, periods in my life when I had hoped to leave, just because how frustrating it is to live here sometimes with the bureaucracy and just the way the mentality is here and everything. So basically in writing her story, I wanted to air out those grievances in a way. To give them voice, to examine them, to see what they are, and like everything, you know, it's not black or white, it's the way we are here, and it's also the way I am, you know. I notice this when I interact with people from other areas, and they say that us Croats and, you know, Balkan people are very, you know, always like, always complaining about something, which is true, we are. And so, yeah, so it's difficult. It's difficult because I wanted that to be a part of the story. And at the same time, you know, there, you know, there is the possibility of the American reader who doesn't see that it's a part of the culture here, basically. That they could look at Ivona, and say, you know, why does she just not snap out of it?Jennie NashHmm…Lidija HiljeAnd, you know, it's almost like saying to me to snap out of the issues that I had as I was like, trying, you know, like banging my head against the wall, trying to get my career going, and t's not working. Like whatever you're, you're trying—like it's easier for me to make it in the US, never having set a foot there, than in Croatia.Jennie NashRight.Lidija HiljeI mean, my book is being published in the US; it's still not being published in Croatia, just for the record. So it's really hard, and it's really hard to make that a part of the book, but not have it, like, weigh the book all the way down. So it was a process. It's like all the things you try and miss and, you know, sometimes you go overboard, and then you have to pull back, and you have to be careful not to go too deeply into your own experience and just feel that the character is separate from you, and obviously she has some different issues than I had and a different occupation, but a lot of her grievances are mine as well.Jennie NashWell, that yearning and, can… I guess confusion really does come across. The how will I, how will I live? How will I love? How will I spend my days? I mean, these are the questions of our life, and they're the questions of this character in—as she goes through what she's experiencing. That they're, they're both mundane questions and, and, you know, the most profound. And, and the way you capture it... I mean, that was just to circle back to my initial idea of talking about how to capture emotion on the page, you know, which is the work of a novel. That's what it's for. That's its point. And it's just so hard to do. And you just did it on so many levels in a language that's not your first. And it really is just extraordinary and moving. And in preparing to talk to you today, I read a lot of the early reviews—people who got advanced readers copies, 'cause the book comes out in July, 2025, and we're speaking a few months before that time. So it's not fully out in the world, but it's enough that, um, I can see that reaction rippling through the readers and, and certainly through the, um, professional, um, colleagues and, you know, who've blurbed the book. But this idea of it being—the word people kept using was “moving.” And there was a lot of words like “tender” and “haunting,” you know, people really felt what it sounds like you intended them to feel. So how, from where you sit now, how does that—how does it feel to have gotten that feedback from some of the writers you admire? And to know that it did… it works doing what you want it to do? How does that feel?Lidija HiljeOh, it's, it's impossible to talk about that because I guess I'm typically Croatian in the way that it's easier for me to sit in my failures than to sit in my successes. So it's absolutely incredible. I mean, when you get a blurb from Claire Lombardo, who is, you know, I absolutely adore her books and I think she's insanely talented, you know, and for her, you know, she used the words “humane,” and that really—I was so moved by that. So my… kind of my goal is for, for people to see the humanity in these, these characters. And so it's really, it's really amazing. It's, it's beyond, you know, some of the, you know, I got really great blurbs from authors I really, really deeply admire: Thao Thai, Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai, Amy Lin, and Madeline Lucas, and as well, you know, Claire Lombardo, whom I mentioned. It's really incredible. It's so life affirming for me, you know, to be able to do that. But like I said, it's always, you know, when I'm reading the reviews, which I probably shouldn't be doing, I'm always focusing on the few that are not—just not feeling it. And then I have to remind myself it's not—this is not a book for anyone, for just everyone. And it's, you know, it's a journey. It's still, like you said, early days. I'm learning to be an author, to grow an even thicker skin in that sense. But yeah, it did feel great to get those beautiful reviews. And I'm so grateful to them for reading and donating their time to me.Jennie NashI mean, it's so not fair what I want to say. It's so not fair. But I want to ask anyway. Quite a few of the reviews said they can't wait for your next book, which, you know, it's like you're not a machine. You've just done this one. But are you thinking about that? Are you… do you have thoughts about that?Lidija HiljeYeah, I am trying to work on my new book. But, you know, I'm admiring the writers who put out a book a year. That's definitely not going to be me. There's an insane amount of work in putting the book out. You know, there's invisible work that goes behind the screen, you know, that people don't see, but it's happening and it takes up a lot of time. And there's also this emotional, you know, it's, it's—it's difficult sitting in, like… you're trying to make this your career. You wrote your heart on the paper and you're offering it to the world. And now you're suspended in this period when you put it out and you're waiting to see how it's received, whether someone tramples on it or whether it's upheld. And so it's a difficult, emotionally difficult place to be in, and I'm one of those writers who struggle to create when I'm not, you know, when I'm feeling… when I'm feeling stressed. So work on my second novel is going slowly. I've gotten to page 100, but then I realized it needed, you know, I needed to make some changes, so I'm back to page 30. So it's a, you know, it's a—it's a process. I think, you know, writing literary fiction takes time. It takes self-examination; it takes a lot of reading of other people who have done it successfully—the type of novel that you're trying to execute. So, so yeah, I'm trying to work on it, but, um, but it may, it may be a while.Jennie NashAll right. I know—that's why it wasn't fair to even ask. Um, so back to… I just want to pick up the story back to—you got the three or the four, um, agent requests, and you, you finished the novel, and, um, and you pitched to them. Can you just share what all unfolded? Because… it was pretty extraordinary.Lidija HiljeSo, basically, what happened was I didn't pitch all the four agents that had requested the pages. I had the first querying experience, which is what I said—you know 100 rejections. I took a long, hard look at it and realized that many of the time I was querying the wrong agents, genre-wise, which, you know, I was not aware of at the time. So a lot of those rejections were basically because I was querying a women's fiction book to literary agents. And that was one thing. And the other thing is… I was pretty, you know, unselective with whom I was querying the first time around. And the second time around, I was really intentional with the type of agent and their reputation and the connections within the industry—you know, just much more aware, approaching it much more professionally in terms of, you know, just wanting a good fit that would actually be able to do something for me, you know, to sell the book. And so a friend who had, you know, she had given me a referral to her agent—that didn't pan out. I gave that agent a month, an exclusive. And when that didn't pan out, I basically sent the query to my now agent, Abby Walters, at CAA. And, you know, it was a form on the website. I didn't even write her an email. It was just a form. So I didn't think that anyone would read it, basically. And I got—quickly I got like five or six requests, right out of the gate, those maybe first 10 days. And by the end of the second week I had gotten an offer of representation from Abby. And I followed up with the rest of the agents. The total, uh, the total number of, uh, full requests ended up being, I think, maybe nine out of 20, 25 queries. And, uh, I got three offers of representation, um, from fantastic agents. And, uh, deciding was hell. I was—I was—it was horrible to be in a position where you had to say no to an agent that you admire and that you would genuinely love to work with, but you know, for some reasons I chose Abby and I'm really happy with working with her. She's fantastic. I—I, you know, love her to death. And yeah, so that was the story of getting an agent. It was—it was—it was pretty quick and painless, I have to say, the second time around.Jennie NashRight, from 100 rejections with the first one to—to nine full requests and three offers on—on this one, that's an extraordinary swing, for sure. And I love the—the way that you approached it the second time with that intention. It just says everything about the kind of person and writer you are, and the book landed with Simon & Schuster and will be coming out soon, and I can't wait to share it with our listeners. It's a beautiful, beautiful novel. I just—I cherished reading every page, and we had the really great good fortune of my taking a vacation to Croatia and coming to your town and meeting you and walking through the town with you, and I treasure that for so many reasons. But having read the book, I felt like I could taste it and see it in a really special way, having had a tour of your city with you. So that, for me, was just a special—a special part of it too.Lidija HiljeThank you so much, Jennie. But actually, you kind of were a part of that, because when I thought about the places where Ivona would take a seer to, you know, to see, I had our tour in my—you know, on my mind, because I was thinking, like, what would she show someone who's from another place? Like, where would she take him? And it wouldn't be the things I showed you. I mean, I showed you some of the big things that you have to see when you're here. But I took you to the places that are more intimate to me, like more personally important to me.Jennie NashYeah.Lidija HiljeAnd so this is—this is what's behind the scene where she shows him her school. And, you know, so, yeah… you know, real life.Jennie NashOh, that's amazing. That's amazing. Well, yeah, I did get to see where you went to school and where the law office was. And—and one of the things that's really stayed with me was we went to a bookstore and it… Um, and it—just knowing what your life in books has been, Lidija, and how you've studied them and how you've worked to become a writer of the caliber that you are. And that bookstore was so small, and it had mostly books in Croatian, and it was not anything like the kind of bookstore that one would think would spark a major literary career. And it… that just has stuck with me, because you—you made your own bookstore, right? You found your own literary community. You found your own career and way, and it's just been a joy to watch and to cheer you on. And thank you for coming and talking with us today.Lidija HiljeThank you so much for having me, and all the encouragement over the years. I'm really grateful for that as well.Jennie NashAll right, well, until next time, for our listeners—keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game. Jess LaheyThe Hashtag AmWriting podcast is produced by Andrew Perella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

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