memoir – Home of The Creative Nonfiction Podcast

Episode 452: lamb of god’s Randy Blythe’s Search for Perspective in ‘Just Beyond the Light’

Friday, Feb. 21, 2025

Promotional support is brought to you by the Power of Narrative Conference, celebrating its 26th year on the last weekend of March 28 and 29. 300-400 journalists from around the world are coming. Keynote speakers Susan Orlean, Connie Schultz, Dan Zak and Connie Chung will deliver the knowledge. Listeners of this podcast can get 15% off your enrollment fee by using the code CNF15. To learn more visit combeyond.bu.edu … and use that CNF15 code.

Become a Patron!

If Randy Blythe’s first book, Dark Days, was about accountability, his second book, Just Beyond the Light: Making Peace with the Wars Inside Our Head (Grand Central), is about perspective.

In essays ranging from the premature death of a young fan to surfing waves to revering his beloved grandmother, Randy talks about art and music and the messiness of being a creative person.

Episode 451: When Beach Read Meets a System with Lindsay Jill Roth

Friday, Feb. 14, 2025

Become a Patron!

When Lindsay Jill Roth (@lindsayjillroth) described her latest book as beach read meets system, that was pretty spot-on. There’s a breezy, conversational tone to Romances & Practicalities: A Love Story (Maybe Yours?) in 250 Questions (William Morrow). It weaves the research and interviews Lindsay did along with her personal story of finding her partner.

Lindsay is an award-winning television producer and writer, with novel under her belt as well, What Pretty Girls Are Made Of (Simon & Schuster). She has worked events like The Grammys, The TONYs, and The Masters.

Episode 448: Evan Ratliff Returns … Or Did He?

Become a Patron!

[Downloadable Transcript TK, CNFers]

Very nice to welcome Evan Ratliff (@ev_rat_public) back to the program, the special occasion being his incredible podcast Shell Game, the show where Evan created an AI voice agent in his own image and set it loose on the world.

It raises many questions about the ethics and the utility of the increasingly sophisticated world of voice agents. It won’t be too far into the future where they will be indistinguishable from actual humans.

Episode 447: Brooke Champagne Sits Back from the Suckitude

Become a Patron!

By Brendan O’Meara

Brooke Champagne (@champagne_brooke) knows many things, but maybe most of all is that feeling of being able to sit and labor through shitty writing to get to the good writing. And get to the good writing she did in her brilliant essay collection Nola Face: A Latina’s Life in the Big Easy (University of Georgia Press).

You can’t put this essay collection in a box, unless that box is titled “really cool shit.”

Episode 446: Harrison Scott Key and the Plight of Memoir

By Brendan O’Meara

Become a Patron!

Harrison Scott Key (@harrisonscottkey) has written three memoirs, and what’s key to them as the narrator is making yourself either the idiot or the villain. In How to Stay Married: The Most Insane Love Story Ever Told (Avid Reader Press) he was, for a time, the victim of his wife’s affair. But in deftly maneuvering and playing with structure he treats his marriage like a crime novel.

Harrison saves some of the biggest punches for himself as and his wife pieced together the wreckage into something lasting.

Harrison is also the author of The World’s Largest Man and Congratulations, Who Are You Again? He’s masterfully funny and handles the balance between jokes and earnestness with a skill few possess.

Episode 442: Steven Hyden Revisits Springsteen’s ‘Born in the USA’

Become a Patron!

By Brendan O’Meara

Promotional support is brought to you by the Power of Narrative Conference, celebrating its 26th year on the last weekend of March 28 and 29. 300-400 journalists from around the world are coming. Keynote speakers Susan Orlean, Connie Schultz, and Dan Zak will deliver the knowledge. Listeners of this podcast can get 15% off your enrollment fee by using the code CNF15. To learn more visit combeyond.bu.edu … and use that CNF15 code.

We’ve got Steven Hyden today (@steven_hydenwriter on IG). He returns to the show to talk about There Was Nothing You Could Do: Bruce Springtseen’s ‘Born in the USA’ and the End of the Heartland. It is published by Hachette Books.

Episode 439: Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz and Paul Peart-Smith Bring a Graphic Interpretation of “An Indigenous People’s History of the United States” to Life

Become a Patron!

By Brendan O’Meara

It being a week before Americans, by and large, celebrate a major Thursday holiday, it seemed like great timing to have Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz and Paul Peart-Smith on the show to talk about the graphic interpretation Roxanne’s seminal text An Indigenous People’s History of the United States (Beacon Press).

Here’s a link to the source text and a link to the graphic text. Both incredible, must-read books, learning that takes place, as Roxanne writes, “outside the academy.”

Episode 438: How It’s All Connected with Taiyon J. Coleman

Become a Patron!

By Brendan O’Meara

Hey, CNFers, very happy to introduce you to (in case you haven’t met) Taiyon J. Coleman, a leader, instructor, professor, and the author of Traveling without Moving: Essays from a Black Woman Trying to Survive in America (Univ. of Minnesota Press).

It’s a fine collection that highlights systemic injustices that go largely invisible to people of privilege, like myself. So it’s all the more important to read about the experiences of our fellow Americans, to find a greater sense of empathy and feel the weight of their truths. We need to mainline other truths, people! The book is heavy and buoyant, and I hope you’ll consider picking up a copy.

Episode 436: Mira Ptacin and the Story of How One Town Drove Out a Nazi

Become a Patron!

By Brendan O’Meara

It’s that Atavistian time of the month and Mira Ptacin (@miramptacin) is here! She is a writer, journalist, teacher, and did you see that sweater in her pic? Her story for The Atavist Magazine, “The Crash of the Hammer,” details how one town in rural Maine ran a new-Nazi (Christopher Polhaus, aka Hammer) out of town.

The crux of the piece is this notion of the paradox of tolerance. When you become tolerant of intolerant people (because tolerance) you invite the conditions for greater intolerance. Tolerating intolerance ultimately squashes out tolerance. Hence the paradox.

Episode 435: Seth Godin Travels at the Speed of Trust in ‘This is Strategy’

Become a Patron!

By Brendan O’Meara

What a treat to have Seth Godin back on the podcast, his third CNFin’ rodeo. He’s here this time around to talk about his latest (as of 2024) book This is Strategy: Make Better Plans (Author’s Equity).

It’ll make you think. Like … it’ll MAKE you think, if you follow me.