Author Interview – Page 15 – Home of The Creative Nonfiction Podcast

Episode 319: Neal Bascomb

By Brendan O’Meara

Many of you know I’m a newsletter junkie. I collect them like baseball cards.

And Neal Bascomb, author of Faster, Red Mutiny, and several other gripping books of narrative journalism, has newsletter out called Work/Craft/Life.

Neal (@nealbascomb) profiles regular people about the craft of their work. Each profile is a wonderful character sketch of how people go about their work. It’s like Humans of New York, Studs Terkel, This American Life, and Walt Harrington’s Acts of Creation rolled into one. It’s great, and Neal’s just getting started with profiles of an abstract artist, a chef, and an ER doctor. Soon, he’ll have one of a war reporter.

We talk about how this departure stemmed from book burnout, what energizes him about these profiles, and how he disagrees with John McPhee about tape recorders.

Episode 318: Greg Donahue

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By Brendan O’Meara

Greg Donahue (@GregJDonahue) is a freelance journalist, and he returns to The Atavist Magazine for “The Fugitive Next Door.”

It’s a riveting story, but what else would you expect from the Atavist or Greg?

Greg talks about some of his writerly insecurities, the power of endings, and a dynamite recommendation dealing with sentences.

We start off this episode speaking with Jonah Ogles, the lead editor of this piece.

More show notes TK. I promise!

Episode 317: Brad Listi

Photo credit: Dove Shore

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By Brendan O’Meara

Brad Listi (@otherppl) is the author of my favorite book of the year to date, Be Brief and Tell Them Everything.

Brad also is the longtime host and producer of Otherppl, a podcast with in depth conversations with today’s leading writers. It’s one of my favorite podcasts. He’s been producing it since 2011, so even longer than us here at CNF Pod HQ.

Brad’s book is written in these chunklets and touches on being a creative person, the messiness of life and a creative life, reading, books, social media, fatherhood, and more.

We talk about a lot of themes in the book and the incredible prep it takes to bring one podcast into the world.

Episode 316: Chip Scanlan

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Guess who’s back? It’s Chip Scanlan (@chipscanlan), and he’s here to talk about 33 Ways to Not Screw Up Your Journalism.

It’s a zippy little book that uses contemporary examples that point out blindspots in our reporting and writing and help us fix them for the next day’s work, the next piece.

He hopped on the pod for Ep. 292 about his book Writers on Writing, which is a multi-vitamin of inspiration and writing tips. Actionable to boot.

Episode 315: Tad Friend

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By Brendan O’Meara

Tad Friend (@tadfriend) needs little introduction, but here it goes: He’s a staff writer for The New Yorker and has written some of my favorite pieces. There’s the profile on Bryan Cranston, Master Class, and Impossible Foods.

Most recently, he’s the author of the memoir In the Early Times: A Life Reframed (Crown). In it, Tad tries to better understand his father, but comes to grips with his own role as a father and husband, a writer and … squash player. It’s a wonderful book, but, then again, did you expect anything less?

Tad also is the author of Cheerful Monday: Me, My Family, and the Last Days of Wasp Splendor as well as the collection Lost in Mongolia: Travels in Hollywood and other Foreign Lands.

In this episode we talk about structure, tension, reporting and running toward the doom. Lots of great stuff to unpack and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Episode 314: How ‘Top Chef’ Can Help Your Writing

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Sponsor: Athletic Greens, athleticgreens.com/EMERGING

By Brendan O’Meara

Listen … just discovered “Top Chef” (don’t judge) on account of Peacock.

I’ve always been inspired by chefs and how they go about the work. When I was watching “Chopped” several years ago, I remember one chef talking about how he was on onion duty in the kitchen. And instead of lamenting it, he vowed to be the best damn cutter of onions. It’s a great attitude, something we can all heed.

The parallels between high-level cooking and writing are similar. We started with Season 18, Top Chef: Portland. Why? Well, we live in Oregon so we jumped into that, spoilers of past winners be damned.

And in the first episode, Richard Blais, restaurateur and one of the judges told the chefs to have “authorship” of their dishes. Another, Melissa King, said you have to “edit” your plates and choose what to leave on the plate and what to leave off.

Sound familiar?

Episode 313: ‘A Crime Beyond Belief” for The Atavist with Katia Savchuk

Is this not the greatest headshot you’ve ever seen?

View on Zencastr

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By Brendan O’Meara

Katia Savchuk speaks fluent Russian. She went to Harvard. She went to the Columbia School of Journalism. She’s written for The New Yorker, The Washington Post, Forbes and … The Atavist!

And that’s what brings Katia (@katiasav) to the podcast this week as we talk about her piece “A Crime Beyond Belief.” It’s an incredible feat of reporting, writing, structure, tension, all the things.

We talk about her Talk of the Town in a recent issue of The New Yorker, “Vlog of War.” We talk about how her viral tweet got her grandmother and father out of Kyiv.

My 94 yo grandmother, a Holocaust survivor, is trapped in her Kyiv apartment with my father. She can’t really walk, and he can’t drive due to a disability. If anyone knows of any resources that can help with evacuation, please let me know.
— Katia Savchuk (@katiasav) March 5, 2022

A rare instance of social media doing some good in this world.

Anyway …

We also talk about tape recorders, empathy, organization, it’s a great chat.

The show’s Instagram handle, @creativenonfictionpodcast, and you can always keep the conversation going on Twitter @CNFPod.

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Episode 312: Meredith May

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By Brendan O’Meara

Ever have a dog that fundamentally changed the course of your life? One who disrupted just about everything you knew about dogs and about yourself and about your marriage?

Meredith May has the book for you in Loving Edie: How a Dog Afraid of Everything Taught Me to be Brave (Park Row Books).

Meredith thought she knew just about all there was to know about raising a golden retriever puppy, but Edie came along and showed everyone that dogs are very much individuals and sometimes we have to accommodate them. They don’t always integrate neatly into our lives.

Great book. You might also like The Honey Bus, her 2019 memoir about her grandfather and bees and so much more.

In this conversation, we talk about writing community, lifting people up, opening doors, changing expectations around dogs, the privilege of being able to afford the care some need, and lots more.

Episode 311: Jane Friedman

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Jane Friedman came back, CNFers!

She’s practically running a school for writers with the incredible offerings she has over at janefriedman.com. If you want to be a better writer and, more importantly, have a greater understanding of what it means to marry your art with commerce, Jane’s work is required.

Though we didn’t delve into book proposals, a CNFin’ faux pas if there ever was one (my b), but I had taken a book proposal refresher with her as part of Creative Nonfiction Magazine’s offerings. She’s a pro. (@janefriedman)

So we dig into plenty of stuff that’s germane to your journey like author platform, building a newsletter audience, social media (and its trappings) and the tension you can glean from a show like Better Call Saul.

Episode 310: Leah Flickinger

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By Brendan O’Meara

It’s not often this show features stone-cold, bad ass editors. But that’s what we bring you today. I’m sure Leah Flickinger (@LeahFlickinger) will recoil at the remark, but it’s true.

She has edited pieces that made their way to Best American Sports Writing, won the National Magazine Award, and, oh, by the way, the Pulitzer Prize.

Yeah, that thing.

That was “Twelve Minutes and a Life” by Mitchell S. Jackson about the life and murder of Ahmaud Arbery. Leah edited Kim H. Cross’s incredible story “Leon + Noel” with the now-famous palindrome structure. (Don’t try this at home, kids).

So Leah is here to talk about how she developed these pieces and how she frames conversations with writers to get the most out of them and the pieces they’re working on.

Brendan’s Monthly Newsletter: First of the month! No spam! Can’t beat it!