Keep the Channel Open

Writer and friend José Pablo Iriarte returns to the show to discuss their debut middle-grade novel, Benny Ramirez and the Nearly Departed. In our conversation, we talked about building stories without antagonists, writing for young readers, and what makes coming-of-age stories such an enduring phenomenon. Then for the second segment, we talked about the importance of storytelling in creating empathy and connection in our incredibly divided society. (Recorded April 6, 2024.) Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Connect: Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: José Pablo Iriarte Purchase Benny Ramírez and the Nearly Departed: White Rose Books (Kissimmee, FL) | Mysterious Galaxy (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Keep the Channel Open - Episode 23: José Iriarte José Pablo Iriarte - “Proof by Induction” José Pablo Iriarte - “The Substance of My Lives, the Accidents of Our Births” José Pablo Iriarte - “Secrets and Things We Don’t Say Out Loud” José Pablo Iriarte - “Life in Stone, Glass, and Plastic” José Pablo Iriarte - “Spirit of Home” Becky Chambers - A Psalm for the Wild-Built A. S. King’s Instagram post Celeste Ng - Everything I Never Told You Ryka Aoki - Light From Uncommon Stars A. S. King - Attack of the Black Rectangles Transcript Episode credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Sarah Rose Etter is a writer based in Los Angeles, CA. In Sarah’s latest novel, Ripe, a young woman is trapped in a dream-job-turned-corporate-nightmare at a cutthroat Silicon Valley tech startup. Her bosses are capricious and cruel, the city she lives in is crumbling under late capitalism, and everywhere she goes she is followed by her own personal black hole. In our conversation, Sarah and I talked about the relationship between her surrealist fiction and poetry, why visual art is important to her, and what it means for a character to have agency. Then for the second segment we discussed dead authors, reading in translation, and creative insecurity. (Recorded March 2, 2024.) Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Connect: Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Sarah Rose Etter Purchase Ripe: Skylight Books (Los Angeles, CA) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Sarah Rose Etter - The Book of X Keep the Channel Open - Episode 89: Julia Dixon Evans Tommy Pico Lilliam Rivera Kristen Arnett Sarah Rose Etter - “Unpublishable: Censored Emails from Noam Chomsky” Alina Szapocznikow Vija Celmins Nylon - “Sarah Rose Etter’s Ripe and the Rotted Underbelly of Capitalism” Sarah Rose Etter - “Inside the Cardboard Box of My Heart” Mark Rothko Louise Bourgeois Donald Judd Sarah Rose Etter - “Girl, What Is Wrong With You?” Parasite Uncut Gems Sarah Rose Etter - “Subglacial Rivers, A Love Poem, Because… & Either/Or” Crane Brinton - The Anatomy of Revolution Brandon Taylor - “living shadows: aesthetics of moral worldbuilding” Tove Ditlevsen - The Copenhagen Trilogy Louise Bourgeois: The Spider, the Mistress and the Tangerine Transcript Episode Credits: Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

For this KTCO “Book” Club conversation, writer Maggie Tokuda-Hall returns to the show to talk about the game Baldur’s Gate 3. In our conversation, Maggie and I talked about what it’s like to experience a story with so many branching paths, how player choices reflect the player’s personality, as well as some standout storytelling moments from the game. (Recorded February 9, 2024.) Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Connect: Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Maggie Tokuda-Hall Purchase Baldur’s Gate 3 Purchase The Siren, the Song, and the Spy Preorder The Worst Ronin Pools of Darkness Unlimited Adventures Icewind Dale Baldur’s Gate 2 Octopath Traveler The Last of Us The Adventure Zone Dungeons & Daddies Neil Newbon Roger Ebert - “Video games can never be art” The Brothers Sun Sarah Lotz - The Impossible Us Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Olatunde Osinaike is a poet based in Atlanta, GA. In his debut full-length poetry collection, Tender Headed, Olatunde explores Black masculinity, both celebrating and interrogating it in his sonically virtuosic poems. We talked about his approach to poetry, what poetic lineage means to him, and the silences inherent in patriarchy. Then for the second segment, we talked about departure albums and André 3000’s New Blue Sun. (Recorded January 20, 2024.) Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Olatunde Osinaike Purchase Tender Headed: 44th and 3rd Booksellers (Atlanta, GA) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Akashic Books (publisher) Olatunde Osinaike - Upcoming Events Bonus Reading for Patreon Subscribers: Olatunde Osinaike reads “Being Human Takes a Lot of Nerve” Etheridge Knight - “The Sun Came” Gwendolyn Brooks - “truth” Paul M. Angle - “We Asked Gwendolyn Brooks about the Creative Environment in Illinois” André 3000 - New Blue Sun American Fiction They Cloned Tyrone Tristan Harris Knives Out Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

For this KTCO Book Club conversation, poet and podcaster Rachel Zucker returns to the show to discuss Eugenia Leigh’s poetry collection Bianca. In our conversation, we talked about our approaches to talking about books with their authors, how form shapes how we take in intense subject matter in a poem, and how a book can be a means of connection. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Rachel Zucker Purchase Bianca: Print (Portland, ME) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Eugenia Leigh James Schuyler - “This Dark Apartment” Jack Kornfield - “Transform Your Life Through Jack Kornfield’s Most Powerful Stories: A 10 Hour Journey” Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Gerardo Sámano Córdova is a writer and artist from Mexico City. In his debut novel, Monstrilio, Gerardo draws from both horror and literary fiction traditions to tell a story about grief, family, and self-acceptance. In our conversation, Gerardo and I talked about genre expectations, genre fiction as a site of art, and what it means to be monstrous. For the second segment, we talked about the tension between fulfilling your own artistic vision and creating work that will sell. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Gerardo Sámano Córdova Purchase Monstrilio: Books Are Magic (Brooklyn, NY) | Mysterious Galaxy (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Paul Semel - “Exclusive Interview: ‘Monstrilio’ Author Gerardo Sámano Córdova” At Home with Literati: Gerardo Sámano Córdova & Kelly Link CrimeReads - “Horror Does a Body Good, or, the Story of My Teeth” Chuck Tingle Petite Maman Petite Maman - Official Trailer Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is a writer based in the Bronx, NY. In his debut novel, Chain-Gang All-Stars, Nana presents us with a dystopian future America where convicted prisoners fight each other to the death in a televised bloodsport. The book is both a blistering critique of the US carceral system and an insistence on the inalienable humanity of every person. In our conversation, Nana and I talked about what satire and dystopia open up for him as a writer, why it’s important to him to implicate both the reader and himself in his work, and how he thinks about prison abolition. Then in the second segment, we talked about the seductive nature of success as an artist in a capitalist society. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah Purchase Chain-Gang All-Stars: The Lit Bar (Bronx, NY) | Mysterious Galaxy (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Kendrick Lamar - “The Art of Peer Pressure” Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah - Friday Black Metroidvania (game genre) @america_is_the_bad_place Keep the Channel Open - Episode 128: Anahid Nersessian John Keats - “To Autumn” Starship Troopers (1997 film) John Gardner - The Art of Fiction Ta-Nehisi Coates - “Killing Dylan Roof” Kadhja Bonet - The Visitor Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Rachel Zucker is a writer, podcast, and teacher based in New York and Maine. Her latest book, The Poetics of Wrongness, is a collection of essays (originally written and performed for the Bagley Wright Lecture Series) delving into her own poetics, motherhood, the history of confessional poetry, and the ethics of “say everything” poetry. In our conversation, Rachel and I talked about wrongness as a stance against moral purity, about addiction to doubt, and about poetry as an opportunity to create outside of capitalism. Then in the second segment, we talked about her new project, the Commonplace School for Embodied Poetics. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Rachel Zucker Purchase The Poetics of Wrongness: Print (Portland, ME) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Commonplace Commonplace - Episode 110: The Poetics of Wrongness Adrienne Rich - Of Woman Born Joyelle McSweeney - “Wrong Poets Society” Alice Notley - Disobedience Alice Notley - “The Poetics of Disobedience” Liz Lerman’s Critical Response Process Julia Cameron - The Artist’s Way Henrik Ibsen - A Doll’s House A Doll’s House (2023 Broadway production) Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

For our latest KTCO Book Club episode, writer Sarah Gailey joins us for a discussion of H. A. Clarke’s YA novels The Scapegracers and The Scratch Daughters. In our conversation, Sarah and I talked about the ways Clarke’s novels subvert genre expectations, about the quality of teen girls’ rage, and about why these books are “capital-I Important.” Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Sarah Gailey Purchase The Scapegracers: Loyalty (Washington, DC) | Mysterious Galaxy (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Purchase The Scratch Daughters: Loyalty (Washington, DC) | Mysterious Galaxy (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Purchase Just Like Home: Loyalty (Washington, DC) | Mysterious Galaxy (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Subscribe to The Personal Canons Cookbook The Craft Sarah Gailey - When We Were Magic Maggie Tokuda-Hall - Squad Euphoria How different generations react to a gay character being introduced Holly Black - The Cruel Prince Mark Russel & Mike Feehan - Exit Stage Left: The Snagglepuss Chronicles Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Dayna Patterson is a poet, photographer, and textile artist based in the Pacific Northwest. The poems in her latest collection, O Lady, Speak Again, use the voices of the women characters from Shakespeare’s plays to talk about patriarchy, motherhood, sexuality, religion, heritage. In our conversation, Dayna and I discussed her creative process and how she finds her way into a poem, her use of persona in O Lady, Speak Again, and how and why she interrogates that same device within the collection. The in the second segment, we talked about play, and how it interacts with the creative process. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Dayna Patterson Purchase O Lady, Speak Again: Village Books (Bellingham, WA) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Keep the Channel Open - Episode 120: Kazim Ali Keep the Channel Open - Episode 137: Gabrielle Bates NaPoWriMo Othello, Act V, Scene ii Jorie Graham The Winter’s Tale Emily Dickinson - “Tell all the truth but tell it slant” Rachel Zucker - The Poetics of Wrongness Kristiana Kahakauwila Jehanne Dubrow Mike Sakasegawa - Sheets: A Love Letter Bruce Beasley - Prayershreds Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Joshua Burton is a poet and educator based in Houston, TX. The poems in Joshua’s debut collection, Grace Engine, ask what grace means in a hostile world of lynchings, mental illness, self-hate, and suicide. These poems offer no solace, yet nevertheless reach toward beauty and peace. In our conversation, Joshua and I talked about what a grace engine is, processing shame through poetry, and what can be unlocked by returning to the same subject in multiple poems. Then for the second segment, we talked about creating mythology as a way of honoring those whom history may have overlooked. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Joshua Burton Purchase Grace Engine: Brazos Bookstore (Houston, TX) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Mike’s video review of Grace Engine Jeff Buckley - Grace Mono no aware Lynching of Jim McIlherron Lynching of Mary Turner Lynching of Laura and L. D. Nelson (note: link contains graphic images) Royal Robertson William O’Neal Keep the Channel Open - Episode 108: The Craft of the Literary Podcast Interview Joshua Burton - Fracture Anthology Roland Barthes - Camera Lucida Toni Morrison - Song of Solomon Lupe Fiasco - DROGAS Wave Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

For our latest KTCO Book Club episode, media critic Mel Thomas joins us for a conversation about Holly Black’s YA fantasy novel The Cruel Prince. In our conversation, we discuss the ways that craft in YA fiction is often dismissed or overlooked by both critics and readers, the dynamics of abuse and trauma in the novel, and being able to enjoy art on multiple levels. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Mel Thomas Purchase The Cruel Prince: Carmichael’s Bookstore (Louisville, KY) | Mysterious Galaxy (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org David Eddings - The Belgariad Ursula K. Le Guin - A Wizard of Earthsea Nicole Kornher-Stace - Archivist Wasp Kameron Hurley Stephen R. Donaldson - The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant Sarah J. Maas - A Court of Thorns and Roses boygenius - the record Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Gabrielle Bates is a poet based in Seattle, WA. Throughout Gabrielle’s debut collection, Judas Goat, there is a feeling of quiet, that the poems are almost being whispered to you. And yet it is not a soft or comforting quiet that these poems bring, but rather one that often contains a sense of menace. In our conversation, Gabrielle and I talked about that disquieting feeling, the slipperiness of memory, the poetics of attention, and how important narrative to her poetics. Then for the second segment, we discussed what literature and poetry can do. [Recorded Jan 2, 2023] Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Gabrielle Bates Purchase Judas Goat: Open Books (Seattle, WA) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Keep the Channel Open - Episode 123: KTCO Book Club - Song (with Gabrielle Bates) Between the Covers - Claire Schwartz : Civil Service Keep the Channel Open - Episode 134: Luther Hughes Keep the Channel Open - Episode 120: Kazim Ali Gabrielle Bates - Poetry Comics Kazim Ali - “Know No Name” Abi Pollokoff Erin L. McCoy Keep the Channel Open - Episode 112: Ross Sutherland Benjamin Labatut - When We Cease to Understand the World Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Abby Minor is a writer based in central Pennsylvania. In her debut book of poems, As I Said: A Dissent, Abby combines the historical narrative of Ann Lohman—a 19th-century abortion provider in New York City—with personal and family history, creating a collection of poems that challenge the typical notion of an abortion story. In our conversation, Abby and I talked about her approach to documentary poetry, why it was important to her to push back against conventional abortion discourse, and how art and activism intersect. Then in the second segment, we talked about American work culture and the necessity of rest. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Abby Minor Purchase As I Said: A Dissent: Webster’s Bookstore (State College, PA) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org NPR Arts & Letters - “The Wickedest Woman in New York” Erin Marie Lynch - “Using the Lens of Abortion to Look at Other Things” Abby Minor - “Out On This Red Edge” Abby Minor - “Rooms” Contrary Magazine - Interview with Best of the Net 2018 Winner Abby Minor Abby Minor - “Beyond Choice” Abby Minor - Reframing Abortion to Breathe Life into a “Culture of Death” Steven Stoll - Ramp Hollow: The Ordeal of Appalachia Robin Wall Kimmerer - Braiding Sweetgrass Vaughn Stills - Places for the Spirit: Traditional African American Gardens Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Molly Spencer is a poet based in Michigan. The poems in her collections In the House and Hinge engage with chronic illness, divorce, domesticity, motherhood, and the ways that our lives don’t always work out the way we expected them to. In our conversation, we talked about dissolution, the uses of poetry, ways of knowing, and speaking unlovely truths. Then for the second section, we talked about attention—both the kind of attention we’d like to cultivate in our own lives, and what kind of attention we ask of our readers. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Molly Spencer Purchase If the House: Literati (Ann Arbor, MI) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop Purchase Hinge: Literati (Ann Arbor, MI) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop Emily Dickinson - “Make me a picture of the sun” Etel Adnan - Sea and Fog Wallace Stevens - “The Snow Man” Susan Glaspell - “A Jury of Her Peers” Molly Spencer - “On ‘Most Accidents Occur At Home’” Mary Oliver - “Yes! No!” Solmaz Sharif - Customs Dionne Brand - Nomenclature Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Luther Hughes is a poet based in Seattle, WA. The poems in Luther’s debut collection, A Shiver in the Leaves, are tender, erotic, vulnerable, erudite, at times dark, and at times ecstatic. In our conversation, we talked about power dynamics in sexual encounters, different forms of love, and writing as a way of understanding oneself. Then in the second section, we talked about why so many sex scenes in popular media are so strange. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Luther Hughes Purchase A Shiver in the Leaves: Open Books (Seattle, WA) | The Book Catapult (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Brooklyn Poets Reading Series - Luther Hughes, Lynn Melnick, Carl Phillips The Poet Salon Lue’s Poetry Hour Luther Hughes - “On Power” Seattle Times - “Seattle poet Luther Hughes on ‘A Shiver in the Leaves,’ his debut collection” Brandon Taylor - Real Life Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

André Ramos-Woodard is a photographic artist originally from Texas and Tennessee. In their series BLACK SNAFU, André combines photographs celebrating Blackness with appropriated illustrations from racist cartoons as a way of confronting the history and present reality of American racism. In our conversation we discussed appropriation, questions of audience and community, and mental health. Then in the second segment, we talked about what inspires us outside of the visual arts. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: André Ramos-Woodard André Ramos-Woodard - BLACK SNAFU Hannah Jane Parkinson - “Instagram, an artist and the $100,000 selfies—appropriation in the digital age” (Article about Richard Prince Instagram images) William Camargo William Camargo’s IG post riffing on John Diva’s work Kansas City Artists Coalition - André Ramos-Woodard Artist Talk André Ramos-Woodard - African America Roger Ebert - “Video games can never be art” Beyonce - Renaissance Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Amanda Marchand is a Canadian, New York-based photographer. Amanda’s Lumen Notebook series is a body of elegant and strikingly beautiful images that nevertheless layer deep meaning within their seemingly simple compositions. In our conversation, Amanda and I talked about her process in creating these photograms and how working within strict constraints allows her to explore the technique more fully. We also discussed how she uses photography to facilitate connection and presence, and the duality of delight and mortality in her work. Then for the second segment we had a meandering conversation about autism, communication, attention, and using art to process and understand our emotional experiences. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Amanda Marchand Amanda Marchand - The World is Astonishing With You in It Medium Photo - Second Sight lecture with Amanda Marchand Barbara Bosworth - The Meadow Stanley Fish - Is There a Text in This Class? Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal - Louise Bourgeois Linda Connor Kathy Acker Amanda Marchand - Nothing Will Ever Be the Same Again Amanda Marchand - Lumen Circles Keep the Channel Open - Episode 124: Farrah Karapetian Leah Sobsey Mary Oliver - Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver Mary Oliver - “The Summer Day” Tara Brach Jenny Odell - How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Fatemeh Baigmoradi is a photographic artist originally from Iran. In her series It’s Hard to Kill, Fatemeh works with archival family photos from Iran, using fire to obscure or destroy portions of the image—connecting to the way that her own family and many others burned their photos after the Iranian Revolution to protect themselves or others in the photos. In our conversation we talked about the relationship between photography and memory, censorship, and how violence, healing, and cleansing are all intertwined in Fatemeh’s work. Then in the second segment, Fatemeh and I talked about immigration. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Fatemeh Baigmoradi Fatemeh Baigmoradi - It’s Hard to Kill Fatemeh Baigmoradi - Subjectivity and Objectivity Medium Festival of Photography - Fatemeh Baigmoradi lecture Keep the Channel Open - Episode 22: Esmé Weijun Wang Keep the Channel Open - Episode 46: Rizzhel Javier Brandon Shimoda Patrick Nagatani Ignant - “Fatemeh Baigmoradi On Censorship and the Fires of Revolution” Mitra Tabrizian Marcel Proust - Swann’s Way: In Search of Lost Time, Volume 1 Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo

Sarah Hollowell is a writer based in Indiana. Sarah’s debut novel, A Dark and Starless Forest, is a YA contemporary fantasy story centered on a family of foster sisters learning about their magic, until suddenly they start disappearing. In our conversation we talked about the difference in process between short stories and novels, how her novel portrays abuse dynamics, and the importance of fan fiction. Then in the second segment, Sarah and I talked about the Alpha Workshop. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Stitcher | Goodpods | TuneIn | RSS Support: Support our Patreon | Review on Apple Podcasts | Review on Podchaser Share: Tweet this episode | Share to Facebook Connect: Newsletter | Email | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Show Notes: Sarah Hollowell Follow @sarahhollowell on Twitter Purchase A Dark and Starless Forest: Viewpoint Books (Columbus, IN) | Mysterious Galaxy (San Diego, CA) | Bookshop.org Alpha Young Writers Workshop Ashley Schumacher - The Renaissance of Gwen Hathaway Rude Tales of Magic Transcript Episode Credits Editing/Mixing: Mike Sakasegawa Music: Podington Bear Transcription: Shea Aguinaldo