Podcasts about Shanthi Sekaran

Join host Ned Buskirk in conversation with novelist & television writer Shanthi Sekaran, as they talk about her new book Boomi's Boombox, how she went about tackling the issue of grief for a fictional 12-year old, & her secondhand experience of death/grief, mostly in story form, from her own mother.Shanthi Sekaran'swebsite: https://www.shanthisekaran.com/ ig: https://www.instagram.com/shanthi.sekaran/ pre-order/order Boomi's Boombox: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/boomis-boombox-shanthi-sekaran ”Imperfect Eulogy for Elmer Morrissey”: https://www.zyzzyva.org/2012/04/25/imperfect-eulogy-for-elmer-morrissey/ [an excerpt from this piece was included in this episode]Produced by Nick JainaAssociate Produced by Jasmine PritchardSoundscaping by Nick JainaExcerpt from “Imperfect Eulogy for Elmer Morrissey” by Shanthi Sekaran, scored by Nick Jaina”YG2D Podcast Theme Song” by Nick JainaFOLLOW YOU'RE GOING TO DIEon Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yergoing2die/ on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/yergoingtodie/ on Twitter: https://twitter.com/YerGoing2Die THIS PODCAST IS MADE POSSIBLE WITH SUPPORT FROM LISTENERS LIKE YOU.Become a podcast patron now at https://www.patreon.com/YG2D.

Shanthi Sekaran lives in Berkeley. Her book for juvenile readers, The Samosa Rebellion, came out in September of 2021.

⏰ Listening commitment: 9 minutes Muki and his family are "moths" in the country of Mariposa. Muki uncovers the president's plan to send moths, people not born here to camps and maybe out to other countries. The president commits to protecting the butterflies, those who "belong in Mariposa" because this is their country where they and their family have lived for many generations. Transcript here.

This week we ask you to consider the places in your own life where you've experienced migrations—whether you're an immigrant or your family has been in the same place for generations. We all experience migrations throughout our lives, in the form of life events, identities, and movements across time and place—and this week's guest, Shanthi Sekaran, has much to say on this all-important topic and much more.

Shanthi Sekaran's most recent novel, The Samosa Rebellion, was written for 8-13 year olds, but it's definitely the kind of book adults can get into, too. (I LOVED it!) Her most recent adult novel, Lucky Boy (Putnam/Penguin), was named an IndieNext Great Read and an NPR Best Book of 2017. Her writing has also appeared in The New York Times, Salon.com, LA Review of Books and Huffington Post. When she's not writing books, she writes for television, on the staff of the NBC medical drama, New Amsterdam. Shanthi lives in Berkeley with her family and a cat named Frog. Connect with Shanthi at www.shanthisekaran.com. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/dallas-woodburn/support

Another archive, recorded some years ago. I spoke with Shanthi Sakaran about her novel, Lucky Boy. 

In 's, 'Lucky Boy, Solimar Castro Valdez is eighteen and drunk on optimism when she embarks on a perilous journey across the US/Mexican border. Weeks later she arrives on her cousin's doorstep in Berkeley, CA, dazed by first love found then lost, and pregnant. This was not the plan. But amid the uncertainty of new motherhood and her American identity, Soli learns that when you have just one precious possession, you guard it with your life. For Soli, motherhood becomes her dwelling and the boy at her breast her hearth.  Kavya Reddy has always followed her heart, much to her parents' chagrin. A mostly contented chef at a UC Berkeley sorority house, the unexpected desire to have a child descends like a cyclone in Kavya's mid-thirties. When she can't get pregnant, this desire will test her marriage, it will test her sanity, and it will set Kavya and her husband, Rishi, on a collision course with Soli, when she is detained and her infant son comes under Kavya's care. As Kavya learns to be a mother - the singing, story-telling, inventor-of-the-universe kind of mother she fantasized about being - she builds her love on a fault line, her heart wrapped around someone else's child.  Lucky Boy is an emotional journey that will leave you certain of the redemptive beauty of this world. There are no bad guys in this story, no obvious hero. From rural Oaxaca to Berkeley's Gourmet Ghetto to the dreamscapes of Silicon valley, author Shanthi Sekaran has taken real life and applied it to fiction; the results are moving and revelatory. Shanthi Sekaran is a writer and educator from Berkeley, California. Her writing has also appeared in The New York Times, Salon.com, LA Review of Books and Huffington Post. She teaches creative writing and literature at Mills College in Oakland, CA.

An optimistic young Mexican woman gets pregnant while trying to cross the border into the states.  An Indian-American woman struggles with infertility. When undocumented Solimar is detained by the state, Kavya and her husband foster and then fall in love with her little boy. They’re good people, the law is on their side, and it’s hard not to root for them, but we’re forced to ask ourselves - what defines parenthood? Is it the biological connection or is it the daily grind of feeding, changing diapers, and tending to all their needs? In addition to a mother’s love, Lucky Boy (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2017) deals with immigration, undocumented workers, the struggle between haves and the have-nots, infertility, survival, and love. Shanthi Sekaran is a writer and educator from Berkeley, California. Lucky Boy was named an IndieNext Great Read and an NPR Best Book of 2017. It won the Housatonic Book Award and was a finalist for Stanford University's Saroyan International Prize for Writing. Her essays and stories have also appeared in The New York Times, Salon.com, and the LA Review of Books. Sekaran is a member of the San Francisco Writers' Grotto, an AWP mentor, and she teaches writing at Mills College. She was born in Sacramento, is the daughter of immigrants from India, and has two older brothers, a husband, two young sons, and a cat. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

An optimistic young Mexican woman gets pregnant while trying to cross the border into the states.  An Indian-American woman struggles with infertility. When undocumented Solimar is detained by the state, Kavya and her husband foster and then fall in love with her little boy. They’re good people, the law is on their side, and it’s hard not to root for them, but we’re forced to ask ourselves - what defines parenthood? Is it the biological connection or is it the daily grind of feeding, changing diapers, and tending to all their needs? In addition to a mother’s love, Lucky Boy (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2017) deals with immigration, undocumented workers, the struggle between haves and the have-nots, infertility, survival, and love. Shanthi Sekaran is a writer and educator from Berkeley, California. Lucky Boy was named an IndieNext Great Read and an NPR Best Book of 2017. It won the Housatonic Book Award and was a finalist for Stanford University's Saroyan International Prize for Writing. Her essays and stories have also appeared in The New York Times, Salon.com, and the LA Review of Books. Sekaran is a member of the San Francisco Writers' Grotto, an AWP mentor, and she teaches writing at Mills College. She was born in Sacramento, is the daughter of immigrants from India, and has two older brothers, a husband, two young sons, and a cat. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You’ll hear a “bookish moment of the week” from each of us: a surprise book present, an accessory to make binge-reading the next big thing, and choosing books for a trip. Next, we tackle what we are currently reading, just two titles from each of the three of us because that still gives you a whole stack to check out. Our deep-dive this week delves deep into the ins and outs of running a book club. And this episode is for you whether you have a group of friends that meet at a coffee shop each month or you are looking for a group of bookish friends on the internet so you can “book club” in your PJs! We even toss around some ideas for those of us (like Meredith and Kaytee) who are “book-club challenged” in that our inner rebel shows up whenever someone says we have to read a certain title. As always, we finish up with A Book (yep, capitalized) that we’d like to press into every reader’s hands. This week we have some classic dude-friendly literature, a lovely little fun romp, and a sweeping American and African family story. Time-stamped show notes are below with references to every book and resource we mentioned in this episode. If you’d like to listen first and not spoil the surprise, don’t scroll down!  .  .  .  .  .  0:45 - MomAdvice.com 0:58 - The MomAdvice Book Club on Facebook 2:59 - idealbookshelf.com 3:40 - Ideal Bookshelf on Instagram: @idealbookshelf 4:21 -LEVO G2 Tablet Clamp Stand 9:13 - Swiss Family Robinson by Johann Wyss 9:31 - The War That Saved My Life by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley 12:46 - Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert 12:53 - East of Eden by John Steinbeck 13:28 - The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas 14:14 - Serial Reader App 14:35 - Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas 15:39 - Heartland by Sarah Smarsh 15:49 - Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance 19:00 - Nevermoor by Jessica Townsend 19:18 - The Selection (Series) by Kiera Cass 19:44 - The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins 21:24 - The Hating Game by Sally Thorne 21:38 - Wundersmith (Second book in Nevermoor series) by Jessica Townsend 22:34 - Elevation by Stephen King 25:42 - River Of Stars by Vanessa Hua 28:39 - Ghosted by Rosie Walsh 31:29 - Liane Moriarty books (specifically: Nine Perfect Strangers and Truly Madly Guilty) 32:50 - Seven Tips for Hosting a Successful Book Club article on MomAdvice.com 37:07 - Lucky Boy by Shanthi Sekaran 39:11 - meetup.com - LOL it still exists!! 40:14 - The Lazy Genius Podcast episode #72: The Lazy Genius Hosts a Book Swap 45:40 - All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr - and Amy’s interview with Anthony 46:18 - MomAdvice Book Club on Facebook 48:00 - Shogun by James Clavell 50:54 - The Book of Polly by Kathy Hepinstall 52:42 - Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 55:13 - Amy on Instagram: @momadvice *Please note that all book titles linked above are Amazon affiliate links. Your cost is the same, but a small portion of your purchase will come back to us to help offset the costs of the show. Thanks for your support!*  

Tens of thousands of undocumented women have made the journey across the southern border of the United States. The trip is expensive. Some migrants are raped by guides or fellow travelers. That was Soli's story in the novel "Lucky Boy," by author Shanthi Sekaran. Soli arrives in the U.S. pregnant and tries to juggle motherhood and work as a nanny in Berkeley, California. When immigration agents find out about her, she's faced with deportation and possibly being forced to relinquish her child to adoption. That's when her path crosses with an Indian-American couple wanting to adopt. Soli may have to accept that someone else could love her child. Through the story of one "Lucky Boy," Sekaran explores the complexities of U.S. immigration and adoption policies. She sat down with CapRadio's Donna Apidone to talk about it.  Interview Highlights Why is this boy "lucky"? He's lucky in a very sincere way because he is loved very much by these two mothers and by Rishi [his foster mother's husband]. So, in that he's lucky, you know, he's wanted. But also there's some irony in that. [He's] lucky because he doesn't know — people don't know where he's going to end up. His fate is sort of thrown to the wind because of this love, because of these people who have had him and who want him. The book is named for the child. How do you get from these people who are very integrated into each other's lives and still keep that focus on the child at all times? How do you get all that on paper? It's all about the child really. It's about an unborn child. It's about Ignacio, the son of Soli. Rishi has a line where he says, "That's all people want. They just want healthy babies." So that's what the people in the novel all kind of center around, whether they know it or not. They're distracted by all these other things but I think the core of the book is Ignacio. You wrote a piece for The New York Times late last year called "The Privileged Immigrant" and you said that Indians are different in coming to the U.S. because they have a path. Can you talk about that? Yeah. So this piece I wrote for The New York Times talked a little about my parents and the fact that they were brought over. They came over to the U.S. in the mid ‘60s because the U.S. was recruiting foreign medical graduates. And so it was very hard for them. They were up in Albany, New York. You know I think around 1960 there were like a total of 12,000 Indians in the entire United States. So it was a lonely experience and it was physically cold and it was probably emotionally very isolated.  My point was that my parents and South Asians of their generation, especially who were brought over on things like the foreign medical graduate program, were given a visa. They were given a training program to be in here. My father and mother were given an apartment in Albany. It was very hard but they had these little steps put in place for them that allowed them to have a job, earn money, save money, create credit history. It allowed them to take the steps that they needed to take to establish a stable life in this country. And now we have a lot of people in America who were not given this path. They work here. They make money. There are technically legal ways for an undocumented immigrant to start something like a bank account. But it's terrifying to walk into a bank, you know, if you're undocumented and you could be picked up at any moment, to walk into a bank and give them your name and be officially then on the record. So that has ramifications for generations. They don't save the money. They don't establish credit history. They cannot integrate themselves into the economy and into the system of succeeding the way that maybe my parents could. Donna Apidone interviewed Shanthi Sekaran on Feb. 7, 2017.

In this episode of AAWW Radio, we’re featuring writers and activists confronting our immigration system that threatens families of people of color in this age of xenophobic resurgence. In early 2017, Shanthi Sekaran released her newest novel Lucky Boy which follows an undocumented eighteen-year-old Chicano mother who winds up in immigration detention--causing her son to be adopted by an upper class Desi foster mother. To write the book, Shanthi relied partly on the "Shattered Families" report produced by the racial justice organization Race Forward. Race Forward Senior Strategist and author Rinku Sen also joins us to break down the mechanisms of structural racism and how immigration enforcement splits apart children from their families. Their conversation is moderated by Kavita Das, former Race Forward staff member and author of the upcoming biography Poignant Song: The Life and Music of Lakshmi Shankar.

For episode 9, V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell talk with Ron Charles, editor of The Washington Post Book World and Shanthi Sekaran, author of Lucky Boy, about obscenity, literature, and immigration. In the first half of the show, Charles leads us through the famous 1933 obscenity trial involving James Joyce's Ulysses and the 1964 trial involving Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer. Then Shanthi Sekaran talks to us about Trump's infamous shithole comments, his immigration policy, and how she believes the language surrounding immigration—"ICE," "illegal alien"—is more profane than any curse word. Plus: Whitney reads the dirtiest passage he can find in Ulysses and embarrasses his mother. Readings: Ulysses by James Joyce; Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller; The Awakening by Kate Chopin; Lucky Boy by Shanthi Sekaran. In the Stacks features Anthony Stromoski of Rough Draft Bar and Books in Kingston, NY. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Behind appearances are stories — and sometimes they're complex, frightening stories that people hide. People milling through The Cheeseboard on Shattuck Avenue are harboring heart-stopping secrets in Shanthi Sekaran's page-turner, ‘Lucky Boy.' That normal-looking guy at the Chinatown restaurant is actually fleeing a scandalous Hong Kong celebrity career, in ‘Deceit and Other Possibilities' by Vanessa Hua, also a columnist with the San Francisco Chronicle. Characters cope with mental illness in ‘The Border of Paradise' (“stunning,” said the New York Times) by Esme Wang, who also blogs about cultivating resilience amidst disabilities. Start the morning with pathos, truth and wisdom from three dazzling fresh voices.

Shanthi Sekaran is the author of the novel “Lucky Boy”, about adoption, immigration and motherhood, in Berkeley, CA. Two mothers’ paths cross unexpectedly due to their love for this boy, Ignacio – the lucky… Continue reading →

How far would you go for someone you love? These three gripping novelists contemplate the unexpected barbs, the questions, and disappointments of love's promise. With provocative looks at relationships between parents, children, lovers, and friends, this event reminds us that love, as Stephen King put it, “has teeth.” Sylvia Brownrigg, Edan Lepucki, Shanthi Sekaran, moderated by Barbara Lane.

 Writers and artists routinely reckon with anxiety and loathing as part of their creative process. Author and comedian Sara Benincasa, writer and illustrator Mari Naomi, and novelist Shanthi Sekaran, in conversation with writer and literary organizer Michelle Tea, discuss with humor and honesty the role fear has played in their work and their creative process. Be part of a larger discussion of how we learn to manage the stress of daily life.For photos from the program, click here. 

  Hey there word nerds! Today I have the pleasure of interviewing Shanthi Sekaran, author of the new novel Lucky Boy, a book that has been getting a lot of pre-publication buzz and is an Indie Next Great Read pick for January 2017.   In this episode Shanthi and I discuss: The importance of fiction in humanizing different groups of people by bringing them and their experiences to life on the page. Using both research and imagination to create a vivid experience for your readers, and in particular how she crafted the dramatic immigration scenes in her book. Connection to the point of view of the characters and how to capture their experiences and emotions with authenticity. Crafting her book around the theme of motherhood, and how “mother” can mean very different things to different people. The universality of the “immigrant experience” in America, and how there are many common threads between immigrants from wildly different experiences. How there are also stark differences between immigrants with different levels of privilege, and how it’s important for us to understand these varied experiences. Why it’s important that writers live their lives and be present in the world. Plus, her #1 tip for writers. About the Author Shathi teaches creative writing at California College of the Arts, and is a member of the Portuguese Artists’ Colony and the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto. Her work has appeared in Best New American Voices and Canteen, and online at Zyzzyva and Mutha Magazine. A California native, she lives in Berkeley with her husband and two children. Lucky Boy Lucky Boy is a moving story about two unforgettable women in California: an undocumented Mexican woman and an Indian-American wife. Both love the same child but can’t have him. The novel beautifully weaves together the themes of motherhood, immigration, infertility, adoption and minority life in America (and tackles immigrant detention centers) and is a must-read in our current political environment. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/132

Shanthi Sekaran, author of the recently published Lucky Boy, talks to Daniel Ford about how her mother influenced her storytelling, her research process for Lucky Boy, how she developed the novel’s memorable main characters, and why writers need to step out of their comfort zones. Daniel also makes a statement about President Trump’s recent Executive Order regarding U.S. immigration policy.

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Shanthi Sekaran, author of Lucky Boy, published earlier this month by Putnam. Shanthi teaches creative writing at California College of the Arts. And her work has appeared in best New American Voices and Canteen as well as online at Zyzzyva and Mutha Magazine and recently The New York Times. Her first novel was The Prayer Room. Before we begin... Lucky Boy is a novel about a sweet little boy, Ignacio El Viento Castro Valdez, Iggy, Nacho, whose little life is made extremely complicated by the fact that two “forces” love him dearly. The book details the relationship of Kavka and Rishi Reddy, Ignacio’s foster parents and Soli, Solimar Castro Valdez, Iggy’s natural mother who spends her brief time in America trying desperately to hold on to him and then to rejoin him. The book, in a non-judgmental fashion deals with the issues associated with immigration, documentation, motherhood, fosterparenthood and the overarching needs and rights of a child. The reader is asked, early on, to go to work, to try to determine for him or herself who is right, what is best and to make a decision as to what comes down as the proper conclusion to the story.

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Shanthi Sekaran, author of Lucky Boy, published earlier this month by Putnam. Shanthi teaches creative writing at California College of the Arts. And her work has appeared in best New American Voices and Canteen as well as online at Zyzzyva and Mutha Magazine and recently The New York Times. Her first novel was The Prayer Room. Before we begin... Lucky Boy is a novel about a sweet little boy, Ignacio El Viento Castro Valdez, Iggy, Nacho, whose little life is made extremely complicated by the fact that two “forces” love him dearly. The book details the relationship of Kavka and Rishi Reddy, Ignacio’s foster parents and Soli, Solimar Castro Valdez, Iggy’s natural mother who spends her brief time in America trying desperately to hold on to him and then to rejoin him. The book, in a non-judgmental fashion deals with the issues associated with immigration, documentation, motherhood, fosterparenthood and the overarching needs and rights of a child. The reader is asked, early on, to go to work, to try to determine for him or herself who is right, what is best and to make a decision as to what comes down as the proper conclusion to the story.

Pull out a cozy blanket - it's time to find out what you'll be reading this winter! As always, Ann and Halle end with what they're reading this week. Books and other media mentioned in this episode: Ann's picks: Eight Flavors: The Untold Story of American Cuisine by Sarah Lohman (releases December 6, 2016) The Dry by Jane Harper (releases January 10, 2017) The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden (releases January 10, 2017) Lucky Boy by Shanthi Sekaran (releases January 10, 2017)  Hey Harry Hey Matilda by Rachel Hulin (releases January 17, 2017) Behind Her Eyes by Sarah Pinborough (releases January 31, 2017)- Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn- The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins All Our Wrong Todays by Elan Mastai (releases February 7, 2017)- The Jetsons (TV)- Dark Matter by Blake Crouch- Ernest Cline books Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman (releases February 7, 2017)- Coraline by Neil Gaiman- Stardust by Neil Gaiman- Stardust (film)- The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman Halle's picks: Books for Living by Will Schwalbe (releases December 27, 2016)- The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe Small Admissions by Amy Poeppel (releases December 27, 2016) Everything You Want Me to Be by Mindy Mejia (releases January 3, 2017) The Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen (releases February 7, 2017)- The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen- The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction- Episode 26 - Short Stories- In the Country by Mia Alvar Her Every Fear by Peter Swanson (releases January 10, 2017)- The Kind Worth Killing by Peter Swanson- Episode 2 - What to Read After The Girl on the Train - Rear Window (film) The Animators by Kayla Rae Whitaker (releases January 31, 2017) The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (releases February 28, 2017) The Fortunate Ones by Ellen Umansky (releases February 14, 2017) What We're Reading This Week: Ann: The Girl Before by J.P. Delaney (releases January 24, 2017)- "The Gone Girl with the Dragon Tattoo on the Train" (FiveThirtyEight article by Emily St. John Mandel)- The Girl Before (film) Halle: Written in the Stars by Aisha Saeed- Serial: Season 1 (podcast)