Otherppl with Brad Listi

In this special anniversary episode, Brad reflects on 15 years of Otherppl, more than 1,000 conversations with writers, and what the experience has taught him about writing, publishing, ambition, failure, persistence, and the creative life. He also looks back at how the show began, what it has become, and why long-form conversation still matters. *** ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠...

Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 423, my conversation with Chuck Klosterman. We were talking about his book But What If We’re Wrong: Thinking About the Present As If It Were the Past (Blue Rider Press) Air date: July 20, 2016 Klosterman is the bestselling author of nine nonfiction books (including Football; X; The Nineties; and Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs), two...

Vol. 18 of Story Time, featuring an author reading aloud from her work. In this episode, Mark Leidner reads from his new poetry collection, Elegy for Pangaea (Fonograf Editions). Leidner's previous poetry collections are Returning the Sword to the Stone (Fonograf Editions, 2021), Beauty Was the Case that They Gave Me (Factory Hollow Press, 2011), and The Angel in the...

Volume 104 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira weighs in on the death of Gloria Steinem...Florida weather in LA...Mira professes her love for M. Night Shyamalan...is Brad obsessed with Phish?....Mira telephones three different McDonald's restaurants...Brad prepares for the 15th anniversary of his podcasting career...gets huge on Instagram by not talking...Increasingly-Angry Craig from East...

Mark Leidner is the author of the poetry collection Elegy for Pangaea, available from Fonograf Editions. Leidner's previous poetry collections are Returning the Sword to the Stone (Fonograf Editions, 2021), Beauty Was the Case that They Gave Me (Factory Hollow Press, 2011), and The Angel in the Dream of Our Hangover (Sator/Two Dollar Radio, 2011). He also wrote the st...

Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 426, my conversation with Jonathan Franzen. We were talking about his novel Purity, available in trade paperback from Picador. Air date: August 10, 2016 Jonathan Franzen is the author of five novels, including The Corrections, Freedom, and Crossroads, and five works of nonfiction, including Farther Away ...

Vol. 17 of Story Time, featuring an author reading aloud from her work. In this episode, Roberta Recchia reads from her bestselling debut novel All That Is Left of Life (Scribner). Born in Rome in 1972, Roberta Rossella Recchia lived for a time in Lille, France, where she earned a master’s degree in international relations and cultures. She worked for ten years for a big company and...

Volume 103 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira issues a correction after spreading misinformation about Johnny Carson and Porter Wagoner...Mira gets a new tattoo...the Otherppl podcast is about to turn 15....Brad lands a huge interview...Angry Adam is AWOL...the Tom Cruise nostalgia tour continues...Days of Thunder 2 is in the works...Anne Hathaway to co-star...Randy Quaid weighs in...Hunte...

Marlon James is the author of the novel The Disappearers, now available from Riverhead Books. It has been longlisted for the 2026 Booker Prize. James is the Booker Prize-winning and New York Times bestselling author of A Brief History of Seven Killings; the bestselling and National Book Award finalist Black Leopard, Red Wolf; as well as the bestselling Moon Witch, Spi...

Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 149, my conversation with Terry Tempest Williams. We were talking about her book When Women Were Birds: Fifty-Four Variations on Voice, available from Picador. Air date: February 17, 2013. Terry Tempest Williams is the award-winning author of over twenty books of creative nonfiction, including the environmental classic, Refuge:...

Vol. 16 of Story Time, featuring an author reading aloud from her work. In this episode, Deb Olin Unferth reads from her new novel, Earth 7, now available from Graywolf Press. Deb is the author of six books, including Barn 8 and Wait Till You See Me Dance. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and three Pushcart Prizes, and was a National Book Critics Circle Award final...

Volume 102 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Dolly Parton, our Lord & Savior, has shuffled off her mortal coil...Mira laments not being able to cancel the podcast for mental health reasons...Mira ridicules Brad for not marketing his podcast until year 15...Brad's Instagram following explodes...Angry Adam is furious again...does James Blunt have micro-penis?...Harry & Meghan heading back to the...

Roberta Recchia is the author of the debut novel All That is Left of Life, available from Scribner. Translated by Antonella Lettieri. Born in Rome in 1972, Roberta Rossella Recchia lived for a time in Lille, France, where she earned a master’s degree in international relations and cultures. She worked for ten years for a big company and then quit office work to devote herself to teaching...

Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 822, my conversation with Madelaine Lucas, author of the debut novel Thirst for Salt (Tin House). Air date: March 19, 2023. Lucas is formerly a senior editor of NOON, and she is a graduate of Columbia University. She lives in Australia. *** Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already usin...

Beowulf Sheehan is the author of The Father of the Man: The Last Author Portrait Sitting with Cormac McCarthy (Autofocus Books). Sheehan is a photographer of figures in the arts and humanities. To date, he's photographed better than 1,000 writers from more than 60 countries. His work has been published in the likes of Elle, Esquire, L’Uomo Vogue, The New Yorker,&...

Volume 101 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira is late again...was watching a murder trial on her phone...meets her hero Angie K of RHOSC while shopping for underwear...gets a selfie...Brad becomes obsessed with Instagram 'heart doctors'...discovers eleven strange tennis balls in his front yard...Angry Adam drops the hammer...darkness reigns in the world of celebrity...Hayden Panettiere die...

Deb Olin Unferth is the author of the novel Earth 7, available from Graywolf Press. Unferth is the author of six books, including Barn 8 and Wait Till You See Me Dance. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and three Pushcart Prizes, and was a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. Her work has appeared in Granta, Harper’s, McSweeney’s, and The Paris Rev...

Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 761, my conversation with Cara Blue Adams, author of the debut story collection You Never Get It Back (University of Iowa Press). Air date: March 2, 2022. Adams's fiction appears in Granta, the Kenyon Review, American Short Fiction, EPOCH, and Narrative. She is an assistant professor of creative writing...

Volume 100 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira swims with otters, actually experiences joy...also meets her spirit animal, a sloth...Mira and Tyler confront their extremely loud Israeli neighbors...Brad vs. the frowning angry woman...Brad is now eating oatmeal for dinner...the Glen Hansard Instagram crisis...Angry Adam casually delivers his weekly dose of rage...Perez Hilton has a psychotic...

Julie Buntin is the author of the novel Famous Men, available from Random House. Buntin's debut novel, Marlena, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle’s John Leonard Prize, released in ten territories worldwide, and named a best book of the year by over a dozen outlets, including The Washington Post, NPR, and Kirkus Reviews. She is the co-editor of Notes...

Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 381, my conversation with Bill Clegg, esteemed literary agent and author of several books, including the debut novel Did You Ever Have a Family? (Scout Books). Air date: September 23, 2015. Bill Clegg is a literary agent in New York and the author of the bestselling memoirs Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man and&nbsp...

Vol. 15 of Story Time, featuring an author reading aloud from her work. In this episode, Sophie Elmhirst reads from her bestselling book, A Marriage at Sea: A True Story of Love, Obsession, and Shipwreck, now available in trade paperback from Riverhead Books. Sophie Elmhirst is an award-winning journalist who writes regularly for The Guardian Long Read and The Economist; h...

Volume 99 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Brad and Mira see The Odyssey in IMAX 4DX...Mira buys front row tickets, doesn't tell Brad...Brad has a birthday...goes to baseball game...meets an alcoholic gambling addict...the odd American phenomenon of obsessing over the possibility of Trump shitting his pants in the Oval Office...the Angry Adam Blues...healing vibes to Ariana Grande..Jonah Hill...

Sophie Elmhirst is the author of the bestselling book A Marriage at Sea, now available in trade paperback from Riverhead Books. Elmhirst is an award-winning journalist who writes regularly for The Guardian Long Read and The Economist; her work has also appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, and Harper’s Bazaar, among other places. She’s the winner of...

Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 732, my conversation with Alexandra Kleeman, author of the novel Something New Under the Sun (Hogarth Press). Air date: October 13, 2021. Alexandra Kleeman's other books include the short story collection Intimations and the novel You Too Can Have A Body Like Mine, which was awarded the 2016 Bard Fiction Prize and was a New York...