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Episode 382: Lucy Sexton and Joe Sexton

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It’s that Atavistian time of the month and we’ve got a two-for-one, BOGO!, with Lucy Sexton, a documentary filmmaker, and Joe Sexton, a lifelong newspaperman and father to Lucy.

Lucy was working on a doc about the Iran hostage crisis when her father was taken hostage while reporting in Libya. What came out of it was “Held Together,” edited by Seyward Darby.

What’s all the more compelling is the dual authorship, not in the traditional co-bylined affairs that are uniform in nature with two names atop the story. This is two distinctly tuned instruments playing together in harmony.

Episode 381: Michael Finkel

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I think of my office as my big batter’s eye. In my peripheral vision, when I’m sitting at my desk, from left to right and all the way in front of me, I like blank walls. And then I’ll put all of my research behind me. It’s kind of a crazy thing. I have stacks and stacks of research that I can’t see unless I turn around and grab it. That fools me into the fact that I there’s like tabula rasa, there’s a blank slate in front of me and all my research is behind me. And that’s when I can really do my writing.
Michael Finkel, Ep. 381

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By Brendan O’Meara

Michael Finkel (@MikeFinkel) is here to talk about his new book The Art Thief: A True Story of Passion, Obsession, and a Monumental Crime Spree (Knopf). You could say this is a story of passion and obsession. It’s quite good.

Michael is an accomplished journalist and best selling author of The Stranger in the Woods and True Story.

His work has appeared in Sports Illustrated, The New York Times Magazine, and National Geographic.

Episode 371: Jen A. Miller

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If you can turn in clean copy on time, you will be 95% ahead of everybody else.
Jen A. Miller, Ep. 371

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By Brendan O’Meara

Jen A. Miller (@byJenAMiller) is back with another ebook, Freelance Writing for Laid-Off Journalists (and Those Who Want to Quit).

If Jen is good at anything, it’s breaking down how possible it is to make a nice living as a freelance writer. I mean, I SUCK at it, but that’s not Jen’s fault.

Episode 363: Eric Pape

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By Brendan O’Meara

Eric Pape (@ericpape) came by CNF Pod HQ to talk about his piece for The Atavist, “Sins of the Father.“

This is one’s a gut punch. And, as Seyward Darby, editor-in-chief of The Atavist, says in this interview, she pushes against the gimmicky. This piece delivers a brutal punch, takes us on a journey around an abusive marriage, conspiracy theories, anti-vaxxers, Tony Robbins-esque self-help, and more.

How Eric kept it all together is a testament to his skill as a reporter and a writer.

Episode 359: Shannon McCaffrey

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By Brendan O’Meara

Who doesn’t like a good elephant story? Shannon McCaffrey, @shannonajc1, she of the Atlanta Journal Constitution, wrote a piece called “Sanctuary” for this month’s Atavist Magazine.

Here’s a little nugget from the piece:

There are many kinds of love stories. This one involves a woman and an elephant, and their bond spanning nearly 50 years. It involves devotion and betrayal. It also raises difficult questions about the relationship between humans and animals, about control and freedom, about what it means to own another living thing.

Shannon wrote this piece on spec as it was part of her MFA project from the University of Georgia. This is something of a rarity for Seyward Darby, editor-in-chief of the Atavist, and we talk a little bit about that at the top of the show.

In this conversation, you’ll find:

Episode 357: Adam Popescu

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By Brendan O’Meara

Los Angeles-based journalist and writer Adam Popescu (@adampopescu) is here! He visited Congo and wrote about how Virunga, its national park, is the first of its kind to mine Bitcoin.

This piece is the intersection of his taste. Check this from his website:

He specializes in narratives on power, culture, wildlife, climate, and the dark side of big tech.

Episode 354: Nile Cappello

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By Brendan O’Meara

Nile Cappello (@liketheriver_) is back!

You might remember her from this:

Here’s a link to that story, “The Girl in the Picture.”

And she’s back, this time to talk about kidfluencer culture in “Crushed.” Brace yourself, CNFers, this one’s a doozie.

Episode 345: Sarah Souli

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By Brendan O’Meara

Sarah Souli (@sgsouli) is here to talk about her new feature for The Atavist Magazine called “A Matter of Honor.” Man, how’d she pull this off?

Three Afghan women were murdered at the border of Greece and Turkey and Sarah doggedly pursued the story to give names, faces, lives to lives of these three women. It’s not a story you’d read to your kid at night, but maybe once you put them to bed?

We dig into how she went about the reporting, how she faced the rejection of this story and kept going, refiled, and landed it with Seyward Darby and The Atavist. Lots of goodies here I think you’ll enjoy, like the clanging monkey hitting cymbals in her head. Yeah, it’s a thing.

Episode 336: Cassidy Randall

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By Brendan O’Meara

Cassidy Randall is a freelance writer based out of Montana, and her piece for The Atavist Magazine, “Alone at the Edge of the World,” just dropped.

It’s a harrowing piece and one that really flexes the muscles of what a reporter/writer can do to re-create scenes when they weren’t present for the “main action.”

We talk about how reading fiction helps her with her nonfiction, dealing with rejection, attention to rhythm in sentences, pacing, and a whole lot more.

Episode 330: Kim H. Cross

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By Brendan O’Meara

Ever have one of those friends who bails you out of jail? Me neither, but Kim H. Cross came pretty damn close because at the last minute she was willing to fire up the mics and head on down to CNF Pod’s digital HQ for her second time back to the show.

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Kim is the author of What Stands in a Storm and The Stahl House. Her work has been anthologized by Best American Sports Writing (RIP) and Year’s Best Sports Writer (the phoenix!). Something about Kim: few people are more passionate about telling true stories than she is.

In this episode we talk about: