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Episode 422: Thirty Years of “The Last Shot,” Lessons from Obstacles, and Old-School Note Taking with Darcy Frey

By Brendan O’Meara

Darcy Frey’s The Last Shot: City Streets, Basketball Dreams (Mariner Books, Spiegel & Grau audio) is a masterpiece in writing, structure, and immersive journalism — not participatory — but true immersion. It’s also a master class in how best to use the first person in a work that predominantly focuses on its core group of central figures.

Darcy’s essays and journalism for Harper’s and the New York Times Magazine have received numerous awards, including a National Magazine Award, a Livingston Award, and an Award for Public Service from the Society for Professional Journalists. His work has been adapted for stage and screen, and anthologized in The Best American Essays, Best American Science Writing, and the Library of America series. He teaches in the English department at Harvard.

The Last Shot was recommended to me by the late great Dick Todd, who worked on this book with Darcy. So we talk a little bit about Dick and how Darcy came to know and work with him.

Episode 421: Cole Heilborn says, “We’re Gonna Find What We Find”

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By Brendan O’Meara

Hey! We’ve got Cole Heilborn, a documentary filmmaker and founder of Port Side Productions, a company focusing on outdoor storytelling. His latest film is Inches to Miles, a film made in collaboration with Athletic Brewing. I’m an ambassador! Use BRENDANO20 at checkout for a slick discount, friend! (I don’t get any dough, just points toward beer.)

Episode 420: Rebecca Renner Makes the Pig

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By Brendan O’Meara

Look who it is! It’s Rebecca Renner (@rebeccarennerfl on IG), freelance journalist and author of Gator Country: Deception, Danger, and Alligators in the Everglades (Flatiron Books).

Rebecca‘s work has appeared in National Geographic, Outside Magazine, and The Paris Review, among others.

I was struck by Rebecca’s self-assuredness, something I categorically lack, which made me think during this conversation as it was happening, like, Wow, what must that be like?

Episode 419: Maggie Gigandet Red Paperclipped Her Way into Freelancing

Maggie Gigandet Photography by Nathan Morgan

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By Brendan O’Meara

It’s yet another Atavistian podcast, this with Maggie Gigandet, a freelance writer behind “The Extra Mile.“

After a horrific accident, doctors told Todd Barcelona that he’d likely never run again. So he and his wife decided to run farther than they ever had before.

Maggie used to be a trial attorney, and she made the pivot to freelance writing during the height of the pandemic, so we dig into how she made that change and what skills transferred over.

Episode 418: Surrendering to the Subconscious with John Julius Reel

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By Brendan O’Meara

Hey, CNFers, happy CNFriday, and, boy, what a fun episode we’ve got! It’s John Julius Reel! He’s @johnjuliusreel on the Instagrams and he’s the author of the memoir My Half Orange: A Story of Love and Language in Seville (Tortoise Books).

John is a writer, radio host, and language instructor based out of Spain and My Half Orange (a Spanish idiom for soul mate) bridges his native culture with his adopted one, and it’s the latter where he found a greater place in the world personally and artistically.

In this conversation (Cut down from two hours. I’ll post some of the outtakes for the Patreon gang.) we talk about letting the subconscious in on the joke, how to make memoir relatable, and the never-ending quest to impress your father.

Episode 417: ‘Stories Can Save Us’ and the Enduring Legacy of Matt Tullis

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By Brendan O’Meara

Special episode this week, CNFers, as we celebrate Matt Tullis and his post-humous book Stories Can Save Us: America’s Best Narrative Journalists Explain How (University of Georgia Press).

It’s a collection of transcripts from Matt’s Gangrey the Podcast that includes a special reported afterward written by Justin Heckert (@justinheckert), one of the key ambassadors of this book.

Justin wrote many memorable stories over the last twenty years like a dude inspired by Jackass, Blockbuster Video, the story of an unused ticket, and many, many more. He wrote a great afterward in Walt Harrington’s Artful Journalism and appeared in The Next Wave: America’s New Generation of Great Literary Journalists (The Sager Group).

Episode 416: A Lifelong Search for Voice with Acamea Deadwiler

By Brendan O’Meara

Acamea Deadwiler (@acamea) is here with her debut memoir Daddy’s Little Stranger (Riddle Brook Publishing).

It started as an essay collection, but at the behest of her publisher, she was tasked with making it more of a traditional memoir. The result is a coming-of-age story of a young woman who grew up without a father and how she navigated her early life without that influence. Better put, how she navigated her early life with that absence.

We also talk about her influences, studying inspiration texts, what her basketball career taught her about what it takes to be a writer, and finding that elusive voice. Really rich talk.

Episode 415: Sam Jefferies, Hammering Out Screed

By Brendan O’Meara

Sam Jefferies is a freelance writer and communications specialist and his first book is Legacy on Ice: Blake Geoffrion and the Fastest Game on Earth. Credit The University of Wisconsin Press for publication.

It’s a book that chronicles the college hockey and the rise of hockey in the South. And at the heart of it is the Geoffrion familly whose bloodline in hockey goes back to the formation of the slapshot.

Blake Geoffrion had the pressure to keep the generational NHL lineage alive. And he did, though his career was cut short by a devastating head injury.

This is a story of the weight of that legacy.

Episode 414: John Rosengren on Cuts, Note Taking, and Darkness for The Atavist

Photo credit: Scott Streble

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By Brendan O’Meara

It’s that Atavistian time of the month and, boy, is “Anatomy of a Murder” a dark one. Brilliant, but bleak.

John Rosengren is the reporter behind this gripping story of how a vigilante murder divided a town. The story couldn’t be in better hands than John’s.

He is the author of twelve books including The Greatest Summer in Baseball History, Hammerin’ Hank, George Almighty and the Say Hey Kid, as well as the novel A Clean Heart.

Episode 413: Young Woman and the Sea, from Book to Movie

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By Brendan O’Meara

Always a treat with the one and only Glenn Stout visits the show be it to talk about new books he’s written or, in this case, to celebrate the cinematic release of Young Woman and the Sea: How Trudy Ederle Conquered the English Channel and Inspired the World (Mariner Books).

Of the many books I’ve read of Glenn’s, this one’s my favorite and it, at long last, is in movie theaters starring Daisy Ridley.

In this episode, we talk about the journey of how this book came to be adapted, the hiccups along the way, how serendipity played a role in the adaptation, and a lot more book-writing stuff you’ll love to hear about.