Dive into the world of paranormal fiction with G. P. Gottlieb. Enjoy engaging paranormal fiction author interviews in each NBN Podcast episode. NBN Podcast Episodes Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb Paranormal Fiction June 8, 2021 One Kind Favor Kevin McIlvoy (1953-2022) Based loosely on a tragic real-life incident in 2014, One Kind Favor (WTAW Press 2021) explores the consequences of the lynching of a young black man in rural North Carolina. Listen to Episode Buy Book June 28, 2022 Proof of Life Sheila Lowe Proof of Life (Write Choice Ink 2021) is the second book in author Sheila Lowe’s Beyond the Veil paranormal suspense series. Listen to Episode Buy Book Load More

Explore engaging author interviews with G. P. Gottlieb. Discover diverse author interviews in NBN Podcast Episodes. Tune in now! NBN Podcast Episodes Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb November 19, 2025 If the Owl Calls Sharon White As the Sami community (Norway) struggles to protect ancestral lands from the building of a damn in 1979, Oslo detective Hans Sorensen arrives in the north of the country to investigate sabotage on a damn. Listen to Episode Buy Book November 11, 2025 Happy New Years Maya Arad After finishing her teaching degree in Israel, Leah emigrates to the U.S. for a teaching position that she thinks of as temporary. She ends up staying for 5 decades. Listen to Episode Buy Book November 4, 2025 Simone in Pieces Janet Burroway Simone Lerrante is a Belgian orphan whose memory is damaged by the trauma of her father being shot by Nazis and her subsequent escape to England. Listen to Episode Buy Book October 14, 2025 Violent Seed Mary Price Birk Lady Anne is in the Cotswolds with her 8-month-old son, there to restore a famous walled garden. The magnificent home has been hosting a television cooking special over the summer, and Anne’s husband, Lord Terrence Reid, is there to enjoy a “Summer of Chefs” week with his wife and baby son. Listen to Episode Buy Book September 30, 2025 Isabella's Way Barbara Stark Nemon In early-seventeenth-century Portugal, Spain, France, and Germany, dangers are plentiful—especially for those of Jewish heritage. Non-Catholics have been expelled from Spain, and the Inquisition has come to Portugal to impose its prohibitions. Listen to Episode Buy Book September 9, 2025 Mona's Eyes Thomas Schlesser Mona’s Eyes (Europa Editions, 2025) is an enchanting debut novel written by art historian Thomas Schlesser. It tells the story of a 10-year-old girl living in Paris who briefly loses her vision. Listen to Episode Buy Book September 2, 2025 The Beauty and The Hell of It and Other Stories Lynda Williams The Beauty and the Hell of It and Other Stories (Guernica, 2025) conjures up images of women who struggle through difficult transitions, unpleasant encounters, or ghastly boyfriends and husbands. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 26, 2025 Go On Pretending Alina Adams Rose Janowitz is surprised to get a production job with a radio soap opera and stunned to fall in love with the show’s African American leading man. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 12, 2025 The Dime Museum Joyce Hinnefeld The Dime Museum is a novel told in stories that span from the 1920s, when Dime Museums were a way for people to gawk at human differences, through 2020, during the ravages of the Coronavirus Pandemic. Listen to Episode Buy Book July 8, 2025 Yankeeland Lacy Fewer Lacy Fewer inherited sacks of letters from a great aunt who emigrated from Ireland to America in 1908 and turned the letters into a novel. Listen to Episode Buy Book July 1, 2025 Port Anna Libby Buck Port Anna tells the story of a quiet town on the Maine coast that has attracted the attention of wealthy investors seeking a picturesque, windswept summer cottage overlooking the ocean. Listen to Episode Buy Book June 24, 2025 The Palace at the End of the Sea Simon Tolkien Theo Sterling is eleven when his grandfather kidnaps him, just for the afternoon. He learns that his father had shed his Jewish identity, married a very Catholic woman from Mexico, and stopped talking to either of his parents. Listen to Episode Buy Book June 17, 2025 Not From Here: the Song of America Leah Lax When Leah Lax was asked to write an opera to celebrate local immigrants, she began by spending a year listening to accounts of upheaval, migration, and arrival told her in confidence by people from around the globe. She felt she had discovered America, found its great beating heart. Listen to Episode Buy Book May 29, 2025 River Gold Jeff Nania In River Gold (Feet Wet Writing, 2025) Sheriff John Cabrelli is pulled into a murder investigation after a nationally known Great Lakes historian is robbed of his briefcase and shot in the leg. Listen to Episode Buy Book May 20, 2025 The Murmur of Everything Moving Maureen Stanton Maureen Stanton’s new memoir, The Murmur of Everything Moving (Columbus State University 2025) opens when she was in her early twenties, working at a bar saving for a backpacking trip through Europe. Listen to Episode Buy Book Load More

Murder, suspense, and recipes: anything but cozy. G. P. Gottlieb is a Chicago-based author of the Whipped and Sipped Mystery series and a host for New Books in Literature, a podcast of the New Books Network. New Edition! Battered A Whipped and Sipped Mystery: Book 1 Available from these sellers Click on the icon below to purchase a copy today When Whipped and Sipped Café proprietor Alene Baron finds a dead body next door, she calls the police and dashes home — to make soup for her family. Alene is 38 and divorced, living in a Chicago high rise with her father and children. She wonders if the murderer is an ex-spouse, a neighbor, or one of her employees. Then someone batters two more people who are connected to the café. There’s another mystery, closer to Alene’s heart: Is the lead detective going to take her seriously? Latest News and Essays There are a lot of exciting changes coming. New Cover Designs Coming Soon I can't wait to share them with you! Read More September 23, 2025 Battered Is Back On the Shelves! My books have found a new home at Anamcara Press. Read More September 11, 2025 "Alene's a wonderful, credible character - flawed and nurturing at the same time. The narrative propels itself forward, while pausing just enough to give the characters context and nuance. What I liked best was the sort of ordinary chaos of fractured families and improvised relationships - how much depends on patience and good will, and a sort of faith that human beings can redeem themselves even with small acts and gestures. And how remarkable to find a sort of suburban neighborhood flourishing in the upper reaches of a condo!" Esther Schor , author of Emma Lazarus and Bridge of Words: Esperanto and the Dream of a Universal Language Latest New Books Network Podcasts Click on the Book Cover to listen to the episode. November 19, 2025 As the Sami community (Norway) struggles to protect ancestral lands from the building of a damn in 1979, Oslo detective Hans Sorensen arrives in the north of the country to investigate sabotage on a d . . . November 11, 2025 After finishing her teaching degree in Israel, Leah emigrates to the U.S. for a teaching position that she thinks of as temporary. She ends up staying for 5 decades. . . . November 4, 2025 Simone Lerrante is a Belgian orphan whose memory is damaged by the trauma of her father being shot by Nazis and her subsequent escape to England. . . . October 14, 2025 Lady Anne is in the Cotswolds with her 8-month-old son, there to restore a famous walled garden. The magnificent home has been hosting a television cooking special over the summer, and Anne’s husband, . . . About G. P. Gottlieb Chicago-based author of The Whipped and Sipped Mystery Series I earned music degrees during the last century and over the years, have performed, taught, composed and administrated while writing stories, songs, and several unwieldy manuscripts. After recovering from breast cancer in 2015, I turned to writing in earnest, melding my two passions; nourishment for mind and body and recipe-laced murder mysteries. I host New Books in Literature, a podcast channel on the New Books Network, and have interviewed over 250 authors. I've been on the board of Sisters in Crime Chicagoland since 2020, and also belong to SinC Colorado, SinC Wisconsin, and MWA. Battered was re-launched September 2025 by Anamcara Press . Smothered and Charred , Books 2 and 3 in the series will show up in the coming months, and POUNDED: A Whipped & Sipped Mystery will be released in the spring of 2026! Follow me on Instagram #wix @whippedsipped Load more Get Monthly Updates Be the first to find out about new recipes, podcast updates, and my latest writing! Email Sign Up Thanks for submitting!

Discover engaging literary fiction author interviews with G. P. Gottlieb. Dive into literary fiction author interviews for inspiring insights. NBN Podcast Episodes Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb Literary Fiction November 19, 2025 If the Owl Calls Sharon White As the Sami community (Norway) struggles to protect ancestral lands from the building of a damn in 1979, Oslo detective Hans Sorensen arrives in the north of the country to investigate sabotage on a damn. Listen to Episode Buy Book November 11, 2025 Happy New Years Maya Arad After finishing her teaching degree in Israel, Leah emigrates to the U.S. for a teaching position that she thinks of as temporary. She ends up staying for 5 decades. Listen to Episode Buy Book November 4, 2025 Simone in Pieces Janet Burroway Simone Lerrante is a Belgian orphan whose memory is damaged by the trauma of her father being shot by Nazis and her subsequent escape to England. Listen to Episode Buy Book September 9, 2025 Mona's Eyes Thomas Schlesser Mona’s Eyes (Europa Editions, 2025) is an enchanting debut novel written by art historian Thomas Schlesser. It tells the story of a 10-year-old girl living in Paris who briefly loses her vision. Listen to Episode Buy Book September 2, 2025 The Beauty and The Hell of It and Other Stories Lynda Williams The Beauty and the Hell of It and Other Stories (Guernica, 2025) conjures up images of women who struggle through difficult transitions, unpleasant encounters, or ghastly boyfriends and husbands. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 26, 2025 Go On Pretending Alina Adams Rose Janowitz is surprised to get a production job with a radio soap opera and stunned to fall in love with the show’s African American leading man. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 12, 2025 The Dime Museum Joyce Hinnefeld The Dime Museum is a novel told in stories that span from the 1920s, when Dime Museums were a way for people to gawk at human differences, through 2020, during the ravages of the Coronavirus Pandemic. Listen to Episode Buy Book July 1, 2025 Port Anna Libby Buck Port Anna tells the story of a quiet town on the Maine coast that has attracted the attention of wealthy investors seeking a picturesque, windswept summer cottage overlooking the ocean. Listen to Episode Buy Book June 24, 2025 The Palace at the End of the Sea Simon Tolkien Theo Sterling is eleven when his grandfather kidnaps him, just for the afternoon. He learns that his father had shed his Jewish identity, married a very Catholic woman from Mexico, and stopped talking to either of his parents. Listen to Episode Buy Book April 15, 2025 Discipline Debra Spark Debra Spark’s latest novel was inspired by the life of Walt Kuhn, who introduced Americans to modern art, and also by an infamous east coast boarding school that was forcibly shut down in 2014. The novel twists and turns through the lives of an artist and his wife, a teenager forced to attend a horrifying boarding school, the artist and his wife’s lonely daughter after their deaths, and a divorced art appraiser studying the works of the dead artist. Listen to Episode Buy Book April 1, 2025 Beautiful Dreamers Minrose Gwin Memory Feather, who was born with a misshapen hand and was able to communicate with animals, looks back to when she was a child living with her newly divorced mother in a dilapidated hotel far from home. Listen to Episode Buy Book March 11, 2025 The Immortal Woman Su Chang Lemai never forgets the humiliation of her teachers and the burning of books during the Cultural Revolution. Listen to Episode Buy Book February 18, 2025 Naked Girl Janna Brooke Wallack After their mother dies, Jackson Jones is too busy selling drugs and bedding young women to pay attention to his two motherless children. Listen to Episode Buy Book February 11, 2025 We Would Never Tova Mirvis Hailey Gelman just learned that her soon-to-be ex-husband was murdered in his home. Listen to Episode Buy Book February 4, 2025 Isola Allegra Goodman Based on the true story of a 16th century heiress who is left to die on a deserted island off the coast of what was then called New France (now Canada). Listen to Episode Buy Book Load More

Dive into thrilling and suspenseful tales with NBN Podcast Episodes. Enjoy thriller and suspense author interviews hosted by G. P. Gottlieb. NBN Podcast Episodes Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb Thriller and Suspense October 14, 2025 Violent Seed Mary Price Birk Lady Anne is in the Cotswolds with her 8-month-old son, there to restore a famous walled garden. The magnificent home has been hosting a television cooking special over the summer, and Anne’s husband, Lord Terrence Reid, is there to enjoy a “Summer of Chefs” week with his wife and baby son. Listen to Episode Buy Book April 29, 2025 Hall of Mirrors John Copenhaver Hall of Mirrors (Pegasus Crime 2025) was selected as a New York Times Crime Novel of the Year. Listen to Episode Buy Book January 1, 2025 The Drowning Game Barbara Nickless Sisters Nadia and Cass are heirs to a company that builds yachts for the super wealthy, and both are excited about a commission that will introduce them to the huge Asian market. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 28, 2020 The Black Cage Jack Fredrickson In this well-written mystery, The Black Cage: A Milo Rigg Mystery (Severn House Publishers), it’s bitter winter in Chicago, and disgraced crime reporter Milo Rigg wakes up every night dreaming that his wife is calling to him from a black cage. Listen to Episode Buy Book April 24, 2020 Hour of the Assassin Matthew Quirk After a decade spent protecting public officials, Nick Averose has the unique ability to think like an assassin. Now he works as a red-teamer, who tests security systems to find vulnerabilities. His latest assignment, to assess the security of a former CIA director’s home, goes horribly wrong, and Nick gets entangled in a vicious crime that rocks Washington D.C. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 29, 2022 Iconoclast: A Sean McPherson Novel Laurie Buchanan Burdened by the pressing weight of survivor's guilt, Sean McPherson, an ex-cop, is desperate for redemption. Listen to Episode Buy Book Load More

Explore engaging author interviews with G. P. Gottlieb. Dive into NBN Podcast Episodes for queer fiction author interviews today! NBN Podcast Episodes Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb Queer Fiction April 29, 2025 Hall of Mirrors John Copenhaver Hall of Mirrors (Pegasus Crime 2025) was selected as a New York Times Crime Novel of the Year. Listen to Episode Buy Book April 1, 2025 Beautiful Dreamers Minrose Gwin Memory Feather, who was born with a misshapen hand and was able to communicate with animals, looks back to when she was a child living with her newly divorced mother in a dilapidated hotel far from home. Listen to Episode Buy Book December 24, 2024 The Case of the Missing Maid Rob Osler Set in 1898, Harriet Morrow is 21, supports her 16-year-old brother, and has been accepted as the first female detective at the Prescott Agency. Listen to Episode Buy Book January 30, 2024 The Half-White Album Cynthia Sylvester Cynthia Sylvester's The Half-White Album (University of New Mexico Press 2023) is a collection of stories, flash fiction, and poems revolving around the journey of a travelling band, The Covers. Listen to Episode Buy Book January 23, 2024 Nadiia Christine Evans Nadia is a young Bosnian refugee who has lost everyone she’s loved. In 1997 she gets into England on a fake passport and finds temp work in a shady office that might be doing something illegal. A new temp shows up and Nadia knows he’s from her country even though he says he’s Armenian. She can tell that he’s Serbian, perhaps the kind that hunted down Bosnians like her. Nadia sees danger everywhere. Listen to Episode Buy Book October 3, 2023 Dry Land B. Platek It's 1917 during WWI, and Rand Brandt is living with two dangerous secrets, either of which could destroy him: 1) he can grow any plant or tree, but everything he grows will die within days, and 2) he is gay during a time when the army does not accept homosexuality. Listen to Episode Buy Book September 12, 2023 American Scholar Patrick E. Horrigan American Scholar is about memory, queer love, first love, and being gay during the onslaught of AIDS in the 1980s. It’s also the story of a famous Harvard historian and literary critic who had to hide his love affair with a man, and who ultimately took his own life. James Fitzgerald is in a happy, open marriage to a wonderful man, has a beautiful young boyfriend, and his first novel just launched, but a letter written by his first boyfriend, who took his own life, sends him into a tailspin. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 22, 2023 The Orphans of Mersea House Marty Wingate Olive Kersey is both penniless and alone at 37 – her brother and her boyfriend both died during WWII, her father not long after, and Olive spent all the years taking care of her ailing mother. Listen to Episode Buy Book February 7, 2023 Tell Me One Thing Kerri Schlottman Quinn and a friend are driving from New York City to Pennsylvania when she sees 9-year-old Lulu sitting on a trucker’s lap, smoking a cigarette. At the truck stop for her friend to score drugs, Quinn takes an astounding picture and then leaves, disappointing Lulu, who thinks maybe people will see the picture and help her. Quinn goes on to live the heady life of a successful photographer while Lulu is confronted with various kinds of abuse and dysfunction. Despite the differences in their lives, both women experience moments of great joy, and significant amounts of despair This is a novel about haves and have-nots, those who find love and those who don’t, how the AIDS epidemic fractured New York’s gay community, and the confusing world of art. Listen to Episode Buy Book October 21, 2019 Degrees of Difficulty Julie Justicz Ben Novotny was born with a rare chromosomal abnormality that caused profound mental retardation and seizures. He is severely limited but forms a tight bond with his older brother Hugo, who invents fun distractions and games that become dangerous as Ben gets older and bigger. Degrees of Difficulty follows the family over several decades as they each come to an understanding of how Ben affected their lives. Listen to Episode Buy Book October 5, 2020 The Red Shirt Corey Sobel Nobody knows why he chose King, but Reshawn, who is assigned as Miles’s roommate, refuses to talk about it. Turns out he’s also struggling to be something he’s not and focuses on his research about the school’s slave-owning founders. The decisions they make will change both their lives. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 18, 2020 The World Doesn't Work that Way, But it Could Yxta Maya Murray These compelling stories are based on recent headlines from before the pandemic crisis, when environmental regulations were overturned at breakneck speed and society had already started to become numb in the face of moral depravity and a lack of objective truth. Listen to Episode Buy Book December 10, 2018 This is How it Always Is Laurie Frankel In her new novel This is How it Always Is (Flatiron Books, 2017), Laurie Frankel tells the story of the Walsh-Adams family and how they grapple with the youngest child, the fifth son, who announces at age three that he wants to be a girl. Listen to Episode Buy Book January 5, 2021 Art Is Everything Yxta Maya Murray Written as a series of web posts, Instagram essays, Snapchat posts, rejected Yelp reviews, Facebook screeds, and streams-of-consciousness that merge volcanic confession with eagle-eyed art criticism, Art Is Everything is about a woman who has to grapple with being derailed. Listen to Episode Buy Book Load More

Explore insightful African American author interviews with G. P. Gottlieb. Dive into engaging African American author interviews now! NBN Podcast Episodes Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb African American Fiction December 3, 2024 Mirror Me Lisa Williamson Rosenberg Today I talked to Lisa Williamson Rosenberg about Mirror Me (Little a, 2024) Listen to Episode Buy Book November 26, 2024 Dazzling Chikodili Emelumadu Today I talked to Chikodili Emelumadu about Dazzling (Harry N. Abrams, 2023). Listen to Episode Buy Book October 8, 2024 Blood on the Brain Esinam Bediako Today I talked to Esinam Bediako about here novel Blood on the Brain (Red Hen Press, 2024). Listen to Episode Buy Book October 24, 2023 Indigo Field Marjorie Hudson A sweeping picture of family trauma, Native American and Black history, and the earth’s vengeance on human pettiness. A retired colonel’s wife dies, leaving him alone in a snooty North Carolina senior community. Reba, an elderly Black woman who speaks to the ghosts of her family, takes in the white child whose father killed her beloved niece. The colonel mistakenly causes damage to Reba’s old car and unleashes a torrent of spirits, while his son guards the bones that have been unearthed in what was once “Indian Field.” This is a stunning debut about race relations, land use, history, and memory. Listen to Episode Buy Book April 18, 2023 Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi’s novel Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions: A Novel in Interlocking Stories (Amistad 2022), is a moving and unforgettable collection of stories that span a lifetime. Listen to Episode Buy Book September 22, 2020 What You Don't See Tracy Clark Cass Raines left the Chicago Police force after a morally bankrupt cop nearly got her killed. Now she runs her own Private Detective agency. Listen to Episode Buy Book September 8, 2020 Saving Ruby King Catherine Adel West Two south side Chicago families are bound together by a violence-infused past. Ruby’s mother, Alice King, has been murdered. Her father, Lebanon King, is an abusive man who endured a terrible childhood. Listen to Episode Buy Book July 31, 2020 Pale Edward A. Farmer It’s 1966, and Bernice’s husband has either died or abandoned her. Her brother Floyd invites her to join him as a servant working for white owners of an old plantation house in Mississippi. Floyd warns Bernice about the housekeeper, Silva, who lives there with her two young sons. The owner and his wife don’t speak much and there seem to be secrets hidden in every corner. Listen to Episode Buy Book July 27, 2020 The Gone Dead Chanelle Benz A decrepit house in Greendale, Mississippi once belonged to Billie James’s father, a renowned black poet who died unexpectedly when she was four years old. Her mother dies of cancer. Then years later, her paternal grandmother dies and leaves Billie the old Mississippi Delta house. Listen to Episode Buy Book June 30, 2020 Tea by the Sea Donna Hemans A new father walks out of the hospital with his day-old baby while the mother recuperates from giving birth. He tells a series of lies and moves houses or countries whenever the truth gets too close. The young, broken-hearted mother devotes herself to searching for her missing daughter. Listen to Episode Buy Book June 8, 2020 Everywhere You Don’t Belong Gabriel Bump In Everywhere You Don’t Belong (Algonquin Books, 2020), Gabriel Bump has created an unforgettable debut novel that will sometimes make you laugh, and sometimes pull at your gut. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 31, 2021 What Passes as Love Trisha R. Thomas In 1850, at age six, Dahlia Holt is taken from the only home she knows and moved into the big house to serve her two older sisters. They share a father, who owns the house and its slaves. On her sixteenth birthday, Dahlia gets to dress up in one of the sister’s discarded dresses for a trip to the city. There, she gets separated from her family, and meets a young Englishman who thinks she’s white. Listen to Episode Buy Book October 27, 2022 Cora's Kitchen Kimberly Garrett Brown Cora, who works at Harlem’s 135th Street library, reads a powerful poem by the young Langston Hughes, who begins to offer advice about her own writing. She’s awakened to thoughts about society and the role of women, prejudice, and the plight of Black women. Listen to Episode Buy Book December 7, 2021 Gone Missing in Harlem Karla FC Holloway The Mosbys leave their life in Sedalia within hours after six-year-old Percy loudly notes that his father’s boss has made a mistake in calculating what is owed. Percy’s parents know what would happen if they stayed. Listen to Episode Buy Book January 18, 2022 What Storm, What Thunder Myriam J. A. Chancy At the end of a long, sweltering day, as markets and businesses begin to close for the evening, an earthquake of 7.0 magnitude shakes the capital of Haiti, Port-au-Prince. Listen to Episode Buy Book Load More

After finishing her teaching degree in Israel, Leah emigrates to the U.S. for a teaching position that she thinks of as temporary. She ends up staying for 5 decades. < Back Happy New Years Maya Arad November 11, 2025 In Happy New Years (New Vessel Press, 2025), after finishing her teaching degree, Leah emigrates to the U.S. for a teaching position that she thinks of as temporary. She ends up staying for 5 decades. She keeps up with her old classmates in an annual New Year’s letter that outlines mostly her triumphs, with brief allusions to her losses, her failures, and her misery. She tells the truth to just one friend who is still in Israel. We slowly come to understand Leah’s optimism and cheerfulness as she glides over the secrets and shame that turned her into who she is. Leah falls in love, is the object of vile gossip, gets unfairly maligned, makes some bad decisions, is alternately proud or aggravated about her sons, and is betrayed more than once. Despite the hardships and her flaws, Leah has moments of great joy, travels the world, and lives a full and rich life. Maya Arad is the author of twelve books of Hebrew fiction, as well as studies in literary criticism and linguistics. Born in Israel in 1971, she received a PhD in linguistics from University College London and for the past twenty years has lived in California, where she is writer in residence at Stanford University’s Taube Center for Jewish Studies. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

Simone Lerrante is a Belgian orphan whose memory is damaged by the trauma of her father being shot by Nazis and her subsequent escape to England. < Back Simone in Pieces Janet Burroway November 4, 2025 Simone Lerrante is a Belgian orphan whose memory is damaged by the trauma of her father being shot by Nazis and her subsequent escape to England. From 1940 to 2000, we see 9-year-old Simone standing through the long voyage and later through various perspectives of those whose lives she touches. From Sussex, she reaches New York and ends up across the states, married, divorced, and alone. She falls in love with literature, experiences new traumas, but cannot remember her early years. Over the years, she recalls snippets of the parents she loved, the life she escaped, and the people who saved her along the way. Janet Burroway’s beautiful novel is a remarkable portrait of a fascinating woman. Janet Burroway is the author of poems, plays, essays, children’s books, a memoir and nine novels, including The Buzzards ; Raw Silk; Opening Nights; Cutting Stone (all Notable Books of NYTBR ); and Simone in Pieces (Nov. 2025). Her Writing Fiction, the most widely used creative writing text in America, is now in a tenth edition; her four-genre text Imaginative Writing is in its fifth. Her plays have been produced and read in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and London. Her stories and poems appear in many literary magazines, including Prairie Schooner, New Letters, Narrative Magazine, and Five Points. She is Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor Emerita at Florida State University and winner of the Florida Humanities Lifetime Achievement Award. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

Martin Walker: Bruno, Chief of Police Mysteries < Back Martin Walker Author of The Bruno, Chief of Police Mysteries July 25, 2019 Martin Walker works at a private think-tank, is Editor Emeritus and writes an award – winning syndicated column for UPI, writes for the Guardian and other papers, has presented several BBC television series, serves on all kinds of boards, writes acclaimed history books, and authors the delightful Bruno, Chief of Police mystery series. You’re probably one of those gifted individuals who need only four hours of sleep, Mr. Walker, but I just made challah dough and hummus, roasted vegetables, washed the dishes, swept the floor, and set the table, so you’re not the only one who knows how to get things done. I’m admittedly in love with the hero, Benoît Courrèges, aka Bruno, who lives and works as a policeman in the fictional village of St. Denis in the South of France (where the real Mr. Walker and his wife have a home). The townsfolk fondly refer to Bruno as the Chief of Police, but he’s just a policeman, an injured veteran who carries a gun but never uses it. He’s also a gourmet chef who whips up fabulous meals after a trip to the local market. And he instinctively discerns the correct wine pairing at every enticing-sounding meal. A truffle omelet? Yum. I first met Bruno (and in real life I’m sure that if I came over for dinner, he would avoid cooking all those gross-sounding meats), when he first appeared in 2008. When he’s not helping his fellow St Denis townies with problems big and small or participating in the town’s many activities, Bruno actively helps foil aggressive EU inspectors that try to meddle with tradition. He relishes his slow-paced village life, and he’s passionate about the land. In the first book of the series, an elderly immigrant is found murdered, and suspicion falls on anti-immigrant militants. Working with an attractive young officer from the city, Bruno remembers that the victim fought for the French Army during WWII. He slowly figures out the connection between the victim and the war, which was a dark chapter in the history of France. Neither Mr. Walker nor Bruno shy away from difficult or sensitive subjects, and each of the Bruno tales include some kind of societal issues that require Bruno’s sensitivity and finesse. I hope you will continue writing these books, Mr. Walker – they are just delicious. Previous Next

Inspired by Leona Woods, the only woman who worked on the Manhattan Project, Atomic Love (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2020) tells the story of Rosalind Porter, a physicist recruited by Enrico Fermi to join his team at the University of Chicago. < Back Atomic Love Jennie Fields October 13, 2020 Inspired by Leona Woods, the only woman who worked on the Manhattan Project, Atomic Love (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2020) tells the story of Rosalind Porter, a physicist recruited by Enrico Fermi to join his team at the University of Chicago. During the war, Rosalind had fallen in love with Weaver, a fellow scientist working on the project. After the bombs are dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he suddenly drops her, and she’s fired from the project based on a false report claiming that she’d become unstable. Now she works at the antique jewelry counter in Marshall Fields’ Department Store and struggles to pay her Michigan Avenue rent. It’s 1950, five years after the war ends, and suddenly Weaver is trying to get back in her life. He broke her heart, and probably got her fired, so she never wants to see him again. But the FBI gives her a chance to make it up to all those who died because of her work on the atomic bomb. All she needs to do is go back to Weaver. Jennie Fields received an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and is the author of the novels Lily Beach , Crossing Brooklyn Ferry , The Middle Ages, and The Age of Desire . A Chicago native who loved Marshall Fields and used to live in the same neighborhood as her protagonist, Fields was inspired by her own mother’s work as a University of Chicago-trained biochemist in the 1950s. Fields now lives with her husband in Nashville, Tennessee, where she is working on her next novel. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

Nadia is a young Bosnian refugee who has lost everyone she’s loved. In 1997 she gets into England on a fake passport and finds temp work in a shady office that might be doing something illegal. A new temp shows up and Nadia knows he’s from her country even though he says he’s Armenian. She can tell that he’s Serbian, perhaps the kind that hunted down Bosnians like her. Nadia sees danger everywhere. < Back Nadiia Christine Evans January 23, 2024 Christine Evans' Nadia (U Iowa Press, 2023) is a dark novel about how the trauma of war follows people no matter how far they’ve fled. A few years after the Balkan War, two refugees from Sarajevo are temping in the same questionable London office. Nadia, who is Bosnian, is unhinged by memories of starvation, deprivation, and losing everyone she loved, including her family and her girlfriend, Sanja. She sees potential snipers and visions of Sanja throughout London, sometimes becoming unhinged by it. All she has is her office friends, and the Indian family where she has tea with buns every day. Iggy was a Serbian sniper who gunned down Bosnians as part of a militaristic street gang, but he justifies all the innocent people he kills by weighing them against the people he saved by distracting his friends or purposefully missing. They’re both forced to confront their choices during the chaotic days of the war, but Nadia still struggles with survivor’s guilt, the ethical choices she made in taking a job in a shady office, and her queer sexuality. Christine Evans writes internationally produced plays, opera libretti, and fiction. Christine’s theater and opera work has been staged at the Sydney Opera House, the American Repertory Theater and many other venues, and her plays are published by Samuel French. She is a multiple MacDowell fellow, VCCA fellow, and a recipient of several DC Council on the Arts & Humanities Fellowships. Originally from Australia, she is a Professor of Performing Arts at Georgetown University, and lives in Washington, DC. She loves the ocean beyond all reason, dreams of dividing her time (as they say on the book jackets) between DC and Australia and has just dusted off her mandolin to start playing music again. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next