GrottoPod

Everybody, it seems, aspires to be a travel writer. This week’s guest, Kimberley Lovato, author of Unique Eats and Eateries of San Francisco and two more books, is already there. Join us as Lovato shows us how the travel-writer sausage is made,

Many authors come to writing later in life, but few make the kind of splash Julie Lythcott-Haims did. She was a Dean at Stanford (and, before that, an attorney) when she quit to pursue an MFA in her 40s. Flash forward,

Ben Marks, the general manager of Collectors Weekly, brings his colorful backstory to the GrottoPod on this week's episode. Join us as we trace his wanderings from a childhood in San Rafael to a career that has included working on a lobster boat in Mai...

Some people want to meet their heroes; writer/historian Dennis McNally made a career out of meeting his. Already the author of the definitive Beat biography, Desolate Angel: Jack Kerouac, the Beat Generation and America,

Writer Mary Ladd was carving out a niche for herself as a San Francisco food and nightlife scribe when she ran headlong into a diagnosis of breast cancer. Looking ahead to a long road of treatment, illness, fear and a concerned husband and small child, she chose to tackle the crisis with humor. This week, on the eve of her “nipple launch” party, Ladd joins BQ and Larry to discuss how cancer change...

Maw Shein Win is the place where punk and poetry meet. Win is a prolific poet -- and the poet laureate for the Bay Area city of El Cerrito. She's also the former percussionist, along with Mark Dutcher, for Los Angeles post-punk band Pearls Before Swine. She joins us on the GrottoPod this week for a wide-ranging conversation that touches on the many shades of her colorful life, including her long c...

What’s your New Year's resolution? Does it have something to do with writing? Do you want to write and publish more (or less)? Ease into the new year -- and your literary resolutions -- with Larry and BQ, who toss around some thoughts about how to appr...

For next “best of” GrottoPod episode we return to our roots -- and the San Francisco Writers Grotto’s roots -- with guests Po Bronson and Ethan Watters. The Grotto co-founders joined us for GrottoPod Episode 2 to discuss the Grotto’s humble beginnings ...

This week, we travel back in time to visit with GrottoPod producer Lee Kravetz as he anticipates the release of his second book, Strange Contagion, last June -- and then return to the present as Lee recaps the mania of his past six months.

2017 has been quite a year for our inaugural GrottoPod guest, Shanthi Sekeran. Her novel, Lucky Boy, has been named to several “best of” lists, including NPR’s Best Books of 2017, and she’s travelled far and wide -- from Nashville to Honolulu to Edinbu...

Guinevere de la Mare, author of I’d Rather Be Reading, calls the compilation of art and essays “a love letter to reading.” De la Mare's life-long love of reading led her to create the Silent Book Club, a “happy hour for introverts” that now has chapter...

How do agents spend their time? This week, Jennifer March Soloway, associate agent at the Andrea Brown Literary Agency, joins her old running buddy BQ and Larry in the GrottoPod to clear up some of the mysteries surrounding the agent-writer relationshi...

This week, seven-time novelist Cristina Garcia joins the GrottoPod to discuss the evolution of both her best-selling debut novel Dreaming in Cuban (1992) and herself, tracking her path from Havana to the Bay Area (with stops in New York, Miami,

How’s your NaNoWriMo coming? This week, Larry and BQ pause at the annual novel-writing sprint’s halfway point to reflect on their experiences keeping up a 1,700-words-per-day pace, and to discuss the ins and outs of speed-dating your latest writing pro...

Activist, sex worker, lecturer, Juggalo, editor and writer Kitty Stryker has no shortage of interests and no trouble staying busy. Already a widely-published journalist and essayist, her new book Ask: Building Consent Culture,

Kaitlin Solimine thought her future would be in international business -- until a high-school Mandarin class changed the course of her life. Two decades later, this former exchange student, East Asian Studies major, Harvard-Yenching scholar and U.S.

Sometimes writers just need a pep talk. Fortunately, Grant Faulkner's new book provides 52 of them. Faulkner, the author of Pep Talks: 52 Insights and Actions to Boost Your Creative Mojo and Executive Director of National Novel Writing Month joins the ...

The Long Winters frontman John Roderick joins us on the GrottoPod this week and talks about how making a splash -- anywhere -- can lead to a book deal. Roderick, who formed the long-running Seattle band with fellow ex-Harvey Danger member Sean Nelson,

This week, Larry and BQ honor San Francisco’s biggest (and liveliest) literary festival, Litquake, by focusing this guest-free episode on literary readings: what makes them succeed (or not!), how they build community and why writers -- and aspiring wri...

On the eve of Litquake, San Francisco's renowned literary arts festival, co-founder Jack Boulware joins the GrottoPod to talk about his life in the literary scene. Boulware is also the co-founder of the legendary comedy magazine The Nose,

This week, Laurie Ann Doyle -- author of the new short-story collection World Gone Missing, founder of the Babylon Salon literary performance series and GrottoPod co-producer -- sits down for a warm, honest and revealing discussion about her writing pr...

This week, the GrottoPod travels to the downtown Oakland office of Grotto alum Mary Roach, the New York Times best-selling author of six titles, including Stiff: the Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, Bonk: the Curious Coupling of Science and Sex, and her most recent work, Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal. Join us for a wide-ranging conversation with one of the Bay Area’s favorite writers.

What do you do when a music industry meltdown kills your band’s record sales? If you’re “Dr. Frank” Portman of East Bay pop-punk pioneers The Mr. T Experience, you get to work becoming a successful YA author. Portman,

What are the unique challenges of being a best-selling author? Find out this week as Janelle Brown -- whose latest book, Watch Me Disappear, debuted at #13 on the New York Times bestseller list -- joins the GrottoPod to talk about expectations,

When Christian Winn moved from Seattle to Boise, he didn’t realize that he was also jump-starting his writing career. Twenty years later, he’s Idaho’s writer-in-residence and a central piece of Boise’s literary scene. Winn,