Kobo in Conversation

Nathan spoke with novelist Zalika Reid-Benta, 2020 winner of the  Rakuten Kobo Emerging Writer Prize  for her debut book  Frying Plantain ,  and author of the new novel  River Mumma . It's the story of a young woman named Alicia, who we meet at a time in her life when things are no longer going as well as they used to. Then Alicia meets a water deity named River Mumma who tasks her with recovering...

Michael spoke with crime novelist S. A. Cosby, author of the 2021 breakout bestseller  Razorblade Tears . His new book is  All the Sinners Bleed , the story of Titus Crown, former FBI agent and Charon County Virginia's first ever Black sheriff, who's moved back to the county to live with his aging father. On the first anniversary of his election to sheriff he's called to a school shooting. The inv...

We're taking a little bit of time off for summer, so this episode is a re-release of one we put out early last year. It's with science writer Britt Wray. Nathan spoke with her last May about her book Generation Dread: Finding Purpose in an Age of Climate Crisis , which deals with the psychological and emotional implications of climate change, a topic that has only grown in relevance since it was f...

Michael spoke with writer John Vaillant, author of page-turning non-fiction that examines the relationship between humans and the natural world. His new book is  Fire Weather: The Making of a Beast .  At its heart is the 2016 wildfire that ravaged Fort McMurray, a city that stands at the heart of Canada's petroleum industry—but it's really about every city, every home, and the lives of every one o...

On stage in downtown Toronto, Nathan interviewed authors  Kevin Powers and Ausma Zehanat Khan about their latest novels, which introduce us to people working in the criminal justice system to solve violent crimes with far-reaching geopolitical causes—informed by each author's own unique perspective and expertise. Live at MOTIVE: Global Issues on the Page

In this episode recorded in-person in Kobo's new office in downtown Toronto, Nathan spoke with novelist Tom Rachman, author of books including  The Imperfectionists   and  The Italian Teacher .  It's our first in-person episode of  Kobo in Conversation  since 2020—and that's why it sounds a little different from the episodes we've been making over Zoom over the past few years.  The Imposters   is...

Nathan spoke with Samantha Irby, screenwriter on the TV series  Shrill and most recently the  Sex and the City  reboot  And Just Like That..., and the author of books including  We Are Never Meeting in Real Life ,  Wow, No Thank You , as well as the new essay collection  Quietly Hostile . They chatted about joining a TV writers' room as a superfan and why she hasn't (yet) written a book called "Ga...

Michael spoke with Rithu Bhasin, social justice advocate, entrepreneur, and author of  We've Got This: Unlocking the Beauty of Belonging , a book about building a culture where everyone feels welcome to show up with their whole self. And it's also a very personal book, in which she shares her own difficult journey towards a sense of belonging. Ritu Bhasin, on the good, the bad, and belonging

We spoke with Ore Agbaje-Williams, author of the new novel  The Three of Us . It's a story about three people: a husband and wife, and the wife's friend, who is definitely not the husband's friend. It's a wickedly funny book told through three voices in tension with one another, and possibly also objective reality.   Ore Agbaje-Williams on writing a character who says it all out loud

We spoke with Canadian journalist and bestselling romance novelist Carley Fortune, author of the new book  Meet Me at the Lake . It's a summer love story about Fern Brookbanks, who's forced to grieve the sudden death of her mother while trying to run her family's lakeside resort, alongside the manager who happens to be her ex. Unbeknownst to her, Fern's mom had hired a consultant just before she d...

We spoke with David Grann, author of non-fiction page-turners including  The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon  and  Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI , to say nothing of his many incredible articles about crime and adventure that he's written over the past twenty years for The New Yorker. And he has a new book,  The Wager: A Tale of Ship...

Shelley Read is the author of the novel  Go as a River , a story set in the 1940s on a peach farm in a Colorado town called Iola. She spoke with us about finding the voices of her quiet characters through her deep knowledge of the history and geography of the region. Shelley Read on bringing life to quiet characters

We spoke with Zoe Whittall, poet, screenwriter, and novelist. Her new book  The Fake  is a novel about a liar named Cammie and two people who fall under her spell—and then have to pick up the pieces of their lives when they fall out of it. Zoe Whittall on the truth about liars

We spoke with writer Hua Hsu, author of  Stay True: A Memoir . It's a heartfelt, thoughtful book about family, friendship, and figuring out who you are—and was widely lauded as one of the best non-fiction books of 2022. Hua Hsu on the strange characters of memoir

We spoke with Lindsay Wong, author of the memoir  The Woo-Woo: How I Survived Ice Hockey, Drug Raids, Demons, and My Crazy Chinese Family ,  which was a finalist for Canada Reads in 2019, and the YA novel  My Summer of Love and Misfortune . And she has a marvelously macabre new short story collection, Tell Me Pleasant Things about Immortality . Lindsay Wong tells us pleasant things about discomfor...

We were joined by novelist Cherie Dimaline, author of  The Marrow Thieves ,  its sequel  Hunting by Stars ,  and the acclaimed literary novel  Empire of Wild .  Her new book is  VenCo , a work of speculative fiction in which a secretive corporation named VenCo hires a powerful witch to assemble an elite coven—before the recruits are found by an ancient witch hunter. Cherie Dimaline on connecting w...

We're bringing you a conversation from the Kobo Writing Life Podcast, where writers talk about how they're navigating the many publishing options available to authors today. Check out Jackie Lau on the Kobo Writing Life Podcast, with links to Jackie's books and the books discussed in this episode:  KWL – 310 – Writing Romance, Working with Kobo Originals, and More with Jackie Lau And here's our Q&...

We spoke with author and book designer CS Richardson, whose first novel  The End of the Alphabet   won the 2008 Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best 1st Book. His new book,  All the Colour in the World is a kaleidoscopic novel about a boy's love affair with art and a man's struggle with loss. And while we had him on the line, we took the opportunity to talk a bit about his other career as one of Ca...

We spoke with Kai Thomas, author of the novel In the Upper Country .  It's a story set in the fictional Canadian town of Dunmore, a place where people fleeing slavery in the southern United States build new lives. Kai Thomas conjures fiction from the history of the upper country

Because you can never hear about too many great books, here's another batch of the best books Kobo staff read in 2022. There's memoir, investigative journalism, fun facts, romance, and more (also moors)! The best books we read in 2022

We asked the staff of Kobo about the best eBooks and audiobooks they read in 2022, and we heard about memoirs, literary masterpieces, page-turning non-fiction, family sagas, mind-opening nature writing, sci-fi love stories across time, and so much more.  The best books we read in 2022

We spoke with award-winning science writer Harold McGee, author of the new book Nose Dive: A Field Guide to the World's Smells ,  a wondrous and entertaining guide to the smells of food, yes, but also of our surroundings—indoor as well as outdoor, from rotten eggs and wet dogs to coffee and perfume—and offers readers a whiff of the very building blocks of the universe itself. Harold McGee on the s...

The final of three interviews we recorded at Toronto's Harbourfront Centre as part of the Toronto International Festival of Authors . With novelists André Forget author of In the City of Pigs, and Naben Ruthnum author of  A Hero of Our Time we spoke about their darkly comic novels that play with themes of work, art, and the unreality of even so-called real estate. Beneath the veneer with Naben Rut...

The second of three interviews we recorded at Toronto's Harbourfront Centre as part of the Toronto International Festival of Authors . We interviewed novelist Jean Hanff Korelitz, author of several critically acclaimed bestselling novels, but most recently The Latecomer . It's the story of the Oppenheimer family, who are materially very comfortable, and fairly uncomfortable in just about every oth...

Over the next few weeks we'll be sharing recordings of live interviews conducted at Toronto's Harbourfront Centre as part of the  Toronto International Festival of Authors . The first of these features international bestselling author Marian Keyes speaking about her pandemic project,  Again, Rachel , the unexpected (to her) sequel to her breakout 90s bestseller  Rachel's Holiday . We spoke with Ma...