Otherppl with Brad Listi

Jesmyn Ward is the guest. She was the 2011 recipient of the National Book Award for her novel, Salvage the Bones, and her new memoir, Men We Reaped, is now available from Bloomsbury. The New York Times Book Review raves "[Ward] chronicles our American story in language that is raw, beautiful and dangerous… [Her] singular voice and her full embrace of her anger and sorrow set this work apart from t...

Chris L. Terry is the guest. His debut novel, Zero Fade, is now available from Curbside Splendor.  Audrey Niffenegger, author of The Time Traveler's Wife, says "Chris Terry has bestowed Kevin, the hero of Zero Fade, with an especially acute case of teenage angst, and the results are sweet, painful, and very recognizable to anyone who has survived seventh grade. This is a wonderful book." And Linds...

Lauren Grodstein is the guest. Her new novel, The Explanation for Everything, is now available from Algonquin Books. It is the official October selection of The TNB Book Club. Tom Perrotta calls it "Very smart and touching and unexpected.” And The Washington Post says “[Grodstein has] fashioned in her smart, assured third novel, The Explanation for Everything, . . . a gripping tale of a biologist...

Ethel Rohan is the guest. Her new story collection, Goodnight Nobody, is now available from Queen's Ferry Press. Peter Orner raves “Ethel Rohan speaks in many voices, all of which need to be heard. She goes so deeply into the hearts and souls of her people. And she wounds, she heals, often in the same sentence. Plain and simple, Goodnight Nobody is a great and unique collection of stories.” And Ro...

Cari Luna is the guest. Her debut novel, The Revolution of Every Day, is now available from Tin House. Kirkus says "Luna creates an array of complex characters caught up in emotions, relationships and situations far from the ordinary as they examine their commitment to their merged family and explore their own ideals and expectations. Enlightening and marked by inventive subject matter, intense re...

Jeff Jackson is the guest. His debut novel, Mira Corpora, is now available from Two Dollar Radio.  Don DeLillo says "It's fine work in its manic pacing and its summoning of certain cultural emblems. Present tense with a vengeance. I hope the book finds the serious readers who are out there waiting for this kind of fiction to hit them in the face." And Dennis Cooper says "Jeff Jackson is one of the...

Jonathan Lethem is the guest. His latest novel, Dissident Gardens, is now available from Doubleday. The Los Angeles Times raves "Lethem is as ambitious as Mailer, as funny as Philip Roth and as stinging as Bob Dylan...Dissident Gardens shows Lethem in full possession of his powers as a novelist, as he smoothly segues between historical periods and internal worlds...Erudite, beautifully written, wi...

Edwidge Danticat is the guest. Her new novel Claire of the Sea Light (Knopf), is the official September selection of The TNB Book Club. Kirkus says “Claire of the Sea Light reads like the work of a writer eager to create another world . . . A sense of the possibilities is tangible, where Danticat delves into parenting, revenge, reconciliation and remorse. Claire Limyè Lanmè is the daughter of a wi...

Curtis Sittenfeld is the guest. She is the bestselling author of the novels Prep and American Wife, and her new book, Sisterland, is now available in hardcover and ebook from Random House. The paperback edition is due out in Spring 2014. The Boston Globe raves “The power of [Sittenfeld’s] writing and the force of her vision challenge the notion that great fiction must be hard to read. She is a mas...

Tom Perrotta is the guest. He is the author of several acclaimed works of fiction, including Election, Little Children, The Abstinence Teacher, and The Leftovers. His new story collection, Nine Inches, is now available from St. Martin's. Kirkus, in a starred review, says "The acclaimed novelist displays perfect tonal pitch in this story collection, as nobody explores the darker sides of suburbia w...

Mitchell S. Jackson is the guest. His debut novel, The Residue Years, is now available from Bloomsbury. Jesmyn Ward says "I know these characters well: Champ with his swagger and invincibility, doing all he can to protect his fiercely beating heart. Grace, held together with polish and a prayer, trying to make a way when there isn’t one. Both of them longing, for a better life, a clear path out of...

Roy Kesey is the guest. His latest story collection, Any Deadly Thing, is now available from Dzanc Books. Elizabeth Crane says "Roy Kesey's stories in Any Deadly Thing are perfect, masterful portraits of an international cross-section of wise, broken souls—hopeful, brutal, funny as hell, and heart-crushing, every last one." And San Diego City Beat raves "Most short-story writers are like baseball...

Cal Morgan is the guest. He is a senior vice president and executive editor at the Harper division of HarperCollins, where he is also the editorial director for Harper Perennial and Harper Paperbacks. Monologue topics: voicemail, animal rights, vegetarianism, Brooklyn, Los Angeles, Miley Cyrus, the cultural conversation, the show's format. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adcho...

Beth Lisick is the guest. Her new book, Yokohama Threeway and Other Small Shames, is due out from City Lights Publishers on September 24, 2013.  Kathleen Hanna raves "This book is fucking great. There is a story in it called ‘PANDA AMBULANCE!!!’ How is Beth Lisick not as famous as David Sedaris?” And Matthew Zapruder says "These short pieces, which at first seem casually constructed and connected,...

Mark Leibovich is the guest. His new book, This Town, is a #1 New York Times bestseller. It's available now from Blue Rider Press. Politico says “Not since Truman Capote’s Answered Prayers knocked New York society on its heels with its thinly fictionalized revelations of real players who had thought the author was their friend has a book so riled a city’s upper echelons.” And The Financial Times s...

Peter Orner is the guest. His new story collection, Last Car Over the Sagamore Bridge, is now available from Little, Brown.  Tom Bissell says “Peter Orner is a true writers’ writer, which is to say a writer writers complain to writers about readers not reading. His novel The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo (a title, one senses, Orner had to fight hard to retain) ranks high among the best works of...

Lindsay Hunter is the guest. Her new story collection, Don't Kiss Me, is now available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux.  Kirkus Reviews raves “Don’t Kiss Me, Hunter’s second short story collection, is a bold, haunting, and beautiful observation of lives lived outside the scope of the mainstream . . . Hunter near-effortlessly captures the hopes, fears, realizations, regrets, and desires of the uglier...

Gregory Sherl is the guest. His new book Monogamy Songs is now available from Future Tense. The Huffington Post raves "The problem with post-confessionalism is that its most uninspired iterations have been sprinkled across America for the past quarter-century; that is, the problem with post-confessionalism isn't post-confessionalism, it's post-confessionalists. No longer: Gregory Sherl is the post...

Susan Orlean is the guest. A staff writer for The New Yorker magazine, she is also the bestselling author of several books, including The Orchid Thief and Rin Tin Tin. The New York Times Book Review raves "The collecting mania that Susan Orlean has so painstakingly described is, like the orchid, a small thing of grandeur, a passion with a pedigree...Stylishly written, whimsical yet sophisticated,...

Peter Mattei is the guest. His new novel, The Deep Whatsis, is now available in the United States from Other Press, and in the UK from The Friday Project.  Kate Christensen raves "With zingy, hilarious glee, Peter Mattei takes a sharp stick and pokes it at many deserving underbellies: the puffery of corporate America; hipsters, yoga dudes, and the general pretentiousness of north Brooklyn; and man...

Megan Abbott is the guest. Her latest novel, Dare Me, is due out in paperback from Reagan Arthur / Back Bay Books on August 27, 2013. The New York Times Book Review raves "Megan Abbott has [written]...The Great American Cheerleading Novel, and—stop scowling—it's spectacular.... Subversive stuff... Heathers meets Fight Club good." And Entertainment Weekly calls it "A psychologically astute thriller...

Molly Ringwald is the guest. Her debut novel, When It Happens to You, is now available in paperback from It Books, an imprint of HarperCollins. Lauren Groff, bestselling author of Arcadia, raves "When It Happens to You is absolutely lovely, a smart, emotionally sophisticated, intricately dovetailed novel of stories. World, I'm telling you now: Molly Ringwald is the real deal." And Kirkus calls it...

Janice Clark is the guest. Her debut novel, The Rathbones, is now available from Doubleday.  It is the official August selection of The TNB Book Club. Publishers Weekly, in a starred review, says “A teenager comes of age and grapples with the heavy burdens of family secrets against the backdrop of the 19th Century New England whaling industry in this beautifully written, playful and intricate debu...

Adelle Waldman is the guest. Her debut novel, The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P., is now available from Henry Holt.  Jess Walter calls it “A smart, engaging 21st-century comedy of manners in which the debut novelist Adelle Waldman crawls convincingly around inside the head of one Nathaniel (Nate) Piven. [She shows] herself to be  . . . a savvy observer of human nature . . . . terrific at describing...

Abigail Tarttelin is the guest. Her new novel, Golden Boy, has just been published in the United States by Atria Books. Booklist, in a starred review, calls it “A dramatic, thoroughgoing investigation of the complexities of sexuality and gender.... A warmly human coming-of-age story, thanks to the fact that Max is such an appealing character. And so his desperate search for identity is gripping, e...