Dan Keane

american.nz

Society EN ↓ 6 episodes

I'm an American writer in Aotearoa New Zealand. These are my letters home. www.american.nz

Author

Dan Keane

Episodes

Expat Life is a Hell of a Drug 04.09.2025 10:08

In which the failure to afford a cucumber makes an expat dad kick the habit. What is a new country but a life sentence for your kids? Get full access to american.nz at www.american.nz/subscribe

As Ethical as You Can Get, For Sex Work 03.07.2025 39:09

Antonia Murphy has one of the wildest US/NZ stories I’ve heard yet. The San Francisco native founded and ran The Bach, a self-consciously ethical brothel in the small North Island city of Whangārei. (This is 100 percent legal in New Zealand!) Her memoir of those years, Madam , is an admirably frank depiction of sex work as work —joyful and frustrating, honorable and complicated—and it’s now an int...

Will We Die as Americans? A conversation with Gregory Garretson 26.06.2025 1:07:32

Thanks to everyone who joined my live chat this morning with Gregory Garretson of Living Elsewhere ! We had a great turnout. This was the first livestream for us both—wow, what cool energy out there! Gregory and I had a blast haggling through some big questions: the flexibility of national identity, the search for home, and the complicated Americanness of leaving America. With shoutouts to fellow...

As We That Have Left Grow Old 01.05.2025 10:35

A letter from Anzac Day. How do Americans mourn this country's honored dead? With biplanes, suppressed tears, Benedict Anderson, and a pint down at the Workies. Read the letter at american.nz . Get full access to american.nz at www.american.nz/subscribe

Talking Kiwi in the Dark 28.04.2025 8:34

Hey y’all! Thought I’d read last week’s letter aloud and fire it off as a podcast, just for kicks. I plan to do more in this space in the days ahead—call this a soft launch as I figure out all the tricks. Click the button above to listen, or find it on Spotify . Hope you enjoy! I welcome any feedback. Big thanks to the NZ Department of Conservation for the birdsong intro. They’ve got a great libra...

This Song Won't Fix the Distance 06.02.2025 4:07

When it’s sunny in New Zealand, it’s hard to imagine living anywhere else. Today, in fact, is one of those days: every window open, the wild summer light, fat birds stealing ripe plums in the yard. When it rains, though—and reader, it rains a lot—my sense of geographical destiny blows clean away. There’s rain on my windowsill , I sing on those wet July days. There’s a storm blowing past my door ,...