Paul Lisicky remembers when he first heard Joni Mitchell on the radio, and when he found one of her records in a bin at Korvettes. < Back Song So Wild and Blue: A Life with the Music of Joni Mitchell Paul Lisicky March 4, 2025 Paul Lisicky remembers when he first heard Joni Mitchell on the radio, and when he found one of her records in a bin at Korvettes. He was inspired by her musicality, her poetry, and her willingness to defy musical conventions. Nearly every one of her songs spoke to him in some way. As a budding songwriter whose music was widely performed in churches around the country, he was motivated by her superb tunings, phrasing, and melodies. Later, he focused more on lyrics and prose, hers and his own, eventually earning a master’s in creative fiction and working in the world of professional writing. He continued to follow Joni’s career and never got tired of her music, which helped him navigate the ups and downs of his life. Song So Wild and Blue: A Life with the Music of Joni Mitchell (HarperOne, 2025) is a beautiful memoir about the struggle of a gay writer intertwined with the life and career of the magnificent Joni Mitchell. Paul Lisicky grew up in southern New Jersey but has lived most of his adult life in Massachusetts and New York City. He earned bachelor's and master’s degrees in English from Rutgers University and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop (1990). He authored seven books, including Song So Wild and Blue: A Life with the Music of Joni Mitchell, The Burning House, Famous Builder, Later , The Narrow Door, and Lawn Boy . His work has appeared in The Atlantic, BuzzFeed, Conjunctions, The Cut, Fence, The New York Times, Ploughshares, Tin House, and in many other magazines and anthologies. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, he is currently a professor of English in the Creative Writing MFA Program at Rutgers University-Camden, where he is the editor of StoryQuarterly . He lives in Brooklyn, New York and is passionate about music, animals, and travel. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

Two children stumble upon a mass grave in the forest outside of Minsk in Belarus where the NKVD, Stalin’s secret police, buried tens of thousands of innocent victims of torture. < Back The Singing Forest Judith McCormack January 25, 2022 Two children stumble upon a mass grave in the forest outside of Minsk in Belarus where the NKVD, Stalin’s secret police, buried tens of thousands of innocent victims of torture. The Singing Forest , by Judith McCormack (Biblioasis 2021) weaves the story of a low-rung enforcer of that torture in pre-WWII Belarus and a modern-day Canadian lawyer on the team prosecuting long-forgotten crimes. Stefan Drozd’s life from earliest childhood lacked anything resembling kindness, nurturing, or morality. He has no understanding of human interaction, never had a friend, and did whatever he had to do to survive, even when that required torturing, murder, or lying to get into Canada after the war. Years later, Drozd is in his nineties and doesn't understand why anyone is making a fuss about something that happened so long ago. Leah Jarvis, a somewhat timid and confused young lawyer from an eccentric family, is helping prosecute him for war crimes. Leah knows that Drozd is guilty, but she needs hard evidence. While working on this case, she grapples with her own history – the death of her mother, the disappearance of her father, and her erratic upbringing by three uncles. Leah questions her Jewish heritage and wonders how a person becomes evil, how power is wielded by those who have it, and how justice is served. This is a beautifully written, lyrical novel about truth, heritage, and memory. Judith McCormack was born outside Chicago and grew up in Toronto, with brief stints in Montreal and Vancouver. Her first short story was nominated for the Journey Prize, and the next three were selected for the Coming Attractions Anthology. Her collection of stories, The Rule of Last Clear Chance, was nominated for the Commonwealth Writers Prize and the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Award and was named one of the best books of the year by The Globe and Mail. Her work has been published in the Harvard Review, Descant and The Fiddlehead, and one of her stories has been turned into a short film by her twin sister, Naomi McCormack, an award-winning filmmaker. Her most recent short story in the Harvard Review was recorded as a spoken word version by The Drum and has been anthologized in 14: Best Canadian Short Stories. Backspring, her first novel, was shortlisted for the Amazon First Novel Award in 2016. McCormack has several law degrees, which have mostly served to convince her that law is a branch of fiction, and she tries to point out as often as possible that Honoré de Balzac, Henry James, Paul Cézanne, Cole Porter and Geraldo Rivera were lawyers. She is a recipient of the Guthrie Award for outstanding public service and contributions to access to justice, and the Law Society Medal for outstanding service in the highest ideals of the profession. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

Lydia Warren has a particular kind of amnesia. She vaguely recalls arriving in Santorini with a one-armed man whom she calls David Copperfield, who takes care of her. Lydia spends her days watching the sea and the changing light, trying to remember who she is. < Back The Weary God of Ancient Travelers Jessica Stilling November 2, 2021 Lydia Warren has a particular kind of amnesia. She vaguely recalls arriving in Santorini with a one-armed man whom she calls David Copperfield, who takes care of her. Lydia spends her days watching the sea and the changing light, trying to remember who she is. She takes walks, befriends a kindly old antiques dealer who might have been a Nazi and a French woman who helps people remember their past lives. Bits and pieces of what might or might not have been past lives appear in brief visions. A lamp she buys from the antiques dealer reminds her of an New York apartment she once lived in, but it’s the 1960’s, well before she was born. Then she’s visited by someone from The Hague investigating war crimes, and she learns that she has an uncle who lives like a hermit behind a monastery, also somewhere in Greece. This is a story about memory, the mysterious workings of the brain, and the human capacity for forgiveness. Jessica Sticklor earned a BA from the New School and an MFA in Creative Writing from the City University of New York. Before The Weary God of Ancient Travelers, she wrote The Beekeeper’s Daughter (Bedazzled Ink Press), Betwixt and Between (IG Publishing), Nod, and the young adult Pan Chronicles Series (D.X. Varos). Her short stories have appeared in The Warwick Review, The Hawaii Pacific Review and Wasifiri, and her nonfiction has appeared in The Writer Magazine, Ms. Magazine, and Tor.com. She has worked as an editor at THe Global City Press and the The Global City Review and has taught creative writing at both high school and university level. She has published young adult fantasy under the name J.M. Stephen, lives in southern Vermont, and writes for the very local newspaper, the Deerfield Valley News. Jessica grew up in the Chicagoland area. She has lived in New York City and Southwestern Vermont. She loves skiing, hiking, Virginia Woolf and anything Icelandic. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

Yes, we eat this for breakfast! < Back Chocolate Zucchini – Apple Cake June 25, 2019 Prep Time: 15 Minutes Cook Time: 30-50 Minutes Serves: 6-8 Slices of Cake Tags: Muffins and Breads, Baking, Vegetarian, Breakfast, Cakes & Pies & Icing About the Recipe p.84 Battered: A Whipped and Sipped Mystery At least once a week, Kacey’s mother came over to the Whipped and Sipped Café. Isobel was another difficult woman in Alene’s orbit, and as soon as she arrived, she usually started lecturing the servers and the people sitting around her about the evils of coffee. She brought her own food in a container that she plucked from her purse. Alene would politely request that Isobel put away whatever she’d brought. “We sell raw pastries with cashew cream and chocolate pecan crusts and we have brownies made from different kinds of beans sweetened with date or coconut sugar, for goodness sake. We offer every kind of salad under the sun, Isobel. I’m sure you can find something to your liking on our menu.” “I’m sure you think your offerings are healthful,” Isobel would respond smugly, her chin jutting forward. “But I concentrate on a mostly raw, macrobiotic diet.” Alene would point out the sign on the door that politely explained their policy of not allowing patrons to bring food into the cafe. Wondering why someone with dyed-red hair, who wore mascara and leather sandals, was so concerned with being natural, she would invite Isobel to order from the raw, the vegan or the smoothie menu. Isobel would pack up what she’d brought, glowering, and grudgingly order a cup of herbal tea. Ingredients For the Cake: 1 ½ cups grated zucchini 1 small tart apple (like Gala or Honey-crisp), seeded and grated 3 eggs 1 cup packed dark brown sugar 1 ½ tsp vanilla 2 cups unbleached or gluten free flour 4 TBSP unsweetened cocoa powder 1 TBSP apple cider vinegar 1 tsp baking soda ½ tsp salt 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips For the Icing: 1 cup semi-sweet chips ½ cup almond, rice or coconut milk ½ cup brown sugar Optional additions: 1/2 tsp cinnamon or 1/2 tsp pure vanilla or almond extract. Preparation Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease and sugar two round 8” pans (a Bundt will need more time but looks nice). Throw everything into the food processor and blend until smooth. Add ¼ cup room temp water if batter is too thick. Pour into greased and sugared pan(s) of choice and bake about 30 -50 minutes until top springs back. COOL COMPLETELY before removing from pan and icing. Icing (optional): Zap 1 minute in microwave and stir until smooth. Slather between layers or thin it with water and drizzle over the top of the cake. Previous Next

“July 25, 1969 12:41am Hunts Landing. Acrid sulfur from the fireworks faded with the nighttime breeze. Dr. Theodore Wexler held up his glass-red flashes from the police cars on the Quad pulsed chestnut in the bourbon. Pulse. Pulse. The cadence matched his heartbeat, steadier now, settled after this disrupted day of jubilee.“ < Back The Dead Won't Tell S.K. Waters (aka Sue Arroyo 1966-2024) December 6, 2022 In The Dead Won't Tell (Camcat Books, 2022), Abbie Adams is hired to write an article about an unsolved murder that took place in a small southern college town on the evening of the Moon Landing in 1969. She’d almost completed her doctorate but was derailed at the end, and instead became a journalist. She’s widowed with two teenagers, and the faculty advisor who’d refused to pass her dissertation seems to be connected to the crime. She’s forced to speak to him for the first time since he derailed her career, but he refuses to tell her anything. So, in addition to hosting an old college friend with his own journalistic quest, Abbie seeks out the few living witnesses in order to piece together the events of that evening. When two of those witnesses are murdered and another is pushed down the stairs, it becomes clear that someone doesn’t want the truth coming out. Abbie’s friends rally to protect her as she rushes to meet either her deadline or her downfall. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

Mako Yoshikawa's Secrets of the Sun: A Memoir (Mad Creek Books 2024) contains a host of essays about her difficult, brilliant father. Shoichi Yoshikawa grew up in a wealthy family in 1930s Japan, but his mother died when he was five, and he died alone on the eve of Mako’s wedding. < Back Secrets of the Sun Mako Yoshikawa February 20, 2024 Mako Yoshikawa's Secrets of the Sun: A Memoir (Mad Creek Books 2024) contains a host of essays about her difficult, brilliant father. Shoichi Yoshikawa grew up in a wealthy family in 1930s Japan, but his mother died when he was five, and he died alone on the eve of Mako’s wedding. He had been a genius, renowned for his research in nuclear fusion and respected at Princeton, until he fell apart. She remembered him being alternatingly kind or violent when bipolar disease gripped him. Her mother packed up and left the house with Mako and her sisters, later remarrying a wonderful man and brilliant chess player who Mako considered the father she always wanted. Mako wants to understand him; why he cross-dressed, why he was so passionate about fusion, why he alienated his daughters so that he hadn’t even been invited to Mako’s wedding. Mako Yoshikawa is the author of the novels One Hundred and One Ways and Once Removed . Her novels have been translated into six languages; awards include a Massachusetts Cultural Council Grant and a Radcliffe Fellowship. As a literary critic, she has published articles that explore the relationship between incest and race in 20th-century American fiction. After her father’s death in 2010, Mako began writing about him and their relationship: essays which have appeared in the Missouri Review , Southern Indiana Review , Harvard Review , Story , Lit Hub , Longreads , and Best American Essays . These essays became the basis for her new memoir, Secrets of the Sun . Yoshikawa grew up in Princeton, New Jersey but spent two years of her childhood in Tokyo, Japan. She received a B.A. in English literature from Columbia University, a Masters in Shakespeare and Renaissance Drama at Lincoln College, Oxford, and a Ph. D. in English literature from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Mako is a professor of creative writing and the director of the MFA program at Emerson College. In addition to her MFA classes, Mako teaches Comedic Lit to undergraduates in Emerson’s Comedic Arts program. She also teaches as often as she can in the Emerson Prison Initiative, a degree-granting program that is based in MCI-Norfolk, a medium-security prison for men. She lives with her husband and two unruly cats in Boston and Baltimore. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

The recipes uses 2 bananas and a whole small seed apple. < Back Gluten-Free/Nut Free/Vegan Banana Bread January 28, 2020 Prep Time: 20 Minutes Cook Time: 75 Minutes Serves: 1 loaf of bread Tags: Muffins and Breads, Gluten Free, Vegetarian, Baking, Vegan About the Recipe p. 8 Smothered: A Whipped and Sipped Mystery “Would you like a pot of chamomile tea, Julian?” Alene, who also drank water with vinegar every morning, scowled at Olly and smiled at Julian. “The banana muffins and ginger molasses cookies are still warm.” Edith said, “Or you can have smoothies made with flax, hemp and chia, goji, maca powder, romaine lettuce, and fruit. I think drinking smoothies makes me feel much better despite the serious head injury I suffered recently.” Edith needed to mention the attack at least once a day. Ingredients 2 TBSP flax seeds ½ cup water 1 small apple (I use Gala) 3 ripe bananas 1TBSP apple cider vinegar ½ packed dark brown, coconut, or monk fruit sugar ¼ cup canola or olive oil 1 tsp pure vanilla extract 1 tsp cinnamon 1 tsp coriander (adds complexity but you won’t taste it) 2 cups gluten-free flour 1 tsp baking soda ½ tsp salt Preparation Preheat oven to 325 Prepare a standard loaf pan by spraying oil and dusting w/sugar In a small bowl combine water with flax seeds – it will thicken In processor blend water, apple, cider vinegar and sugar Add oil, vanilla and cinnamon, pulse until mixed In small bowl stir gluten-free flour with baking soda and salt Add to processor and pulse until everything is blended Pour batter into prepared loaf pan Bake 70 – 75 minutes until toothpick comes out clean Cool in pan until you can remove the pan and cool cake on a rack Leftover loaf will be denser the following day, but it’ll still taste great! Previous Next

Trevor McFarquhar is haphazardly running a struggling bicycle shop, with few friends, little ambition, and an inability to form a lasting relationship. Then, during the chaos of the 1995 Transit Strike in Paris, Trevor does something horrible. Five years later, he gets a chance to redeem himself. < Back The Art of Regret Mary Fleming December 3, 2019 Trevor McFarquhar was traumatized by the silence following the deaths of his sister and father. He was again traumatized when his mother moved him and his brother to Paris, remarried, and expected him to treat her new husband as his new father. In his late thirties, he’s haphazardly running a struggling bicycle shop, with few friends, little ambition, and an inability to form a lasting relationship. Then, during the chaos of the 1995 Transit Strike in Paris, Trevor does something horrible. Five years later, he gets a chance to redeem himself. Originally from Chicago, Mary Fleming moved to Paris in 1981, as a freelance journalist and consultant. Before turning full time to writing fiction, she was the French representative for the American foundation: The German Marshall Fund. A long-time board member of the French Fulbright Commission, Fleming continues to serve on the board of Bibliothèques sans Frontières. She and her husband have five grown children and split their time between Paris and Berlin. The Art of Regret (She Writes Press, 2019) is Fleming’s second novel. She writes a blog called A Paris-Berlin Diary . She is also an amateur photographer and fights a puzzle addiction; crosswords and Sudoko, specifically. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

Greg Sarris, PhD and tribal leader serving his sixteenth term as Chairman of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria, about his latest story collection, The Forgetters. The stories are connected to two sister crows who sit all day and night on Sonoma Mountain talking about the creation of the world, human frailty, silliness, and suffering. One crow sister can only ask the questions, and one can only answer in tales about Native American Indians struggling to remember the stories that made them who they are. < Back The Forgetters Greg Sarris April 16, 2024 In Greg Sarris' book The Forgetters (Heyday Books, 2024), Answer Woman, a crow, cannot come up with a story until she is asked by Question Woman, her sister. But they both want to remember those who forgot the stories – because only by retelling the stories can they learn lessons of the past. From the time before creation to the near future, Answer Woman knows stories about clouds and sky, people who might be animals, storytelling contests of the past, and lessons learned from mistakes. Greg Sarris’s creation stories represent age old Coast Miwok and Southern Pomo Native American storytelling traditions, whose goals are to comfort and inspire while understand human frailty and striving. Greg Sarris is an accomplished author, university professor, and tribal leader serving his sixteenth term as Chairman of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria. He is the current board chair of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian. In 1992, he co-authored the Graton Rancheria Restoration Act which restored federal recognition and associated rights to the Coast Miwok and Southern Pomo Native Americans of California, including the right to reestablish tribal lands. Sarris graduated summa cum laude with a degree in English from the University of California, Los Angeles and received his Ph.D. in Modern Thought and Literature from Stanford. He has taught American and American Indian Literature, and Creative Writing at UCLA, Stanford, Loyola Marymount University, and Sonoma State University. Currently, he serves as a member of the Board of Regents for the University of California and is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is also a producer, playwright, and the author of several books, including the award-winning How a Mountain Was Made (2017), starred Kirkus review Becoming Story (2022), and Grand Avenue (1995), which he adapted for an HBO film, and co-produced with Robert Redford. He is co-executive producer of Joan Baez: I Am A Noise (2023) and a recent short story, Citizen (2023), was adapted by San Francisco’s Word for Word theater. He is passionate about riding his horse and remembering to connect with the landscape around him. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next

We were desperate for pancakes so I tweaked another recipe I was working on to make these. < Back Gluten-Free Pancakes January 24, 2021 Prep Time: 10 Minutes Cook Time: 20 Minutes Serves: 10 Pancakes Tags: Muffins and Breads, Gluten Free, Baking, Breakfast About the Recipe Ingredients 1 cup gluten-free flour 1 cup almond flour 1 tsp baking soda ½ tsp baking powder ½ tsp cinnamon 2 eggs 1 cup plain kefir or yogurt 1 cup water 1/3 cup canola oil 1 TBSP unfiltered apple cider vinegar 1 tsp pure vanilla extract Preparation In a medium bowl, stir together the dry ingredients. Mix the wet ingredients together in a smaller bowl and pour wet ingredients into drive ingredients. Stir just until blended. Heat a large baking pan to medium high. Scoop a large spoonful of batter (it’s thicker than usual pancake batter), three or four at a time. Flip when bubbles form and bottom is golden brown. Place finished pancakes on a serving plate and cover lightly with a tea towel until all the pancakes are ready. We love eating them with Earth Balance and real maple syrup. Note: there is no sugar added to the batter. Previous Next

Explore engaging historical fiction author interviews with G. P. Gottlieb. Dive into NBN Podcast Episodes for insightful historical fiction author interviews. NBN Podcast Episodes Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb Historical Fiction March 3, 2026 Well of Deception Cynthia Leal Massey When turkey farmer Maggie Schneider is shot to death one morning in 1958, her neighbor and brother-in-law, Amos Becker, is the prime suspect, but he’s disappeared. 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 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 July 18, 2023 The Isolated Seance Jeri Westerson It’s 1895, and Tim Badger, who is quite familiar with the inside of a jail cell, and his intuitive friend Ben Watson, who is Black in a society that is weary of difference, are unlikely detectives. But Tim was once one of the Baker Street Irregular urchins who ran errands and spied for the great Sherlock Holmes, and the two young men are trying to be detectives. Listen to Episode Buy Book May 23, 2023 After the Barricades Jessica Stilling After her mother dies in a tragic accident, Anna cleans out her closet and finds a striking painting that she’d never seen before. She also finds a trove of letters from Stefan Terre, a name she’s never heard. Listen to Episode Buy Book January 17, 2023 I Meant to Tell You Fran Hawthorne I Meant to Tell You, by Fran Hawthorne (Stephen F. Austin State University Press, 2022) opens during a conversation between Miranda Isaacs and her fiancé, Russ, who is going through an FBI security check as a prelude to getting his dream job in the U.S. Attorney’s office. Listen to Episode Buy Book November 29, 2022 We are All Together Richard Fulco Stephen Cane is a guitarist – he’s already walked out on one band to join another one that subsequently falls apart. He gets himself to New York City to try to rejoin his first band, the one headed by his best friend and former bandmate, Dylan John. It’s 1967, drugs and girls are everywhere, Dylan is on the verge of becoming a rock n’ roll star, and Stephen makes some extremely poor choices. Listen to Episode Buy Book November 15, 2022 The Lindbergh Nanny Mariah Fredericks Charles Lindbergh and his wife were out on the night of the kidnapping, but the nanny was home. After the baby disappeared from his bed, that nanny, Betty Gow, became a prime suspect, and her life was never the same. She was known thereafter as the Lindbergh Nanny. Listen to Episode Buy Book October 11, 2019 The Flavia de Luce Mystery Series Alan Bradley This book introduced the intrepid 11-year-old protagonist, Flavia de Luce, who lives in an enormous manor house in England, with her widowed father and two sisters. It’s 1950, and England is still rebuilding itself after WWII. Listen to Episode Buy Book November 8, 2022 Under a Veiled Moon Karen Odden When the Princess Alice pleasure boat collides with a huge iron-hulled cargo ship on the Thames River, it’s split in half, and only 130 of the 650 passengers and crew members survive. It’s 1878, and clues point to sabotage by the Irish Republican Brotherhood, which has already used violence in hopes of restoring Home Rule. Listen to Episode Buy Book November 17, 2020 The Anglophile's Notebook Sunday Taylor Californian Claire Easton, who writes a magazine column called “The Anglophile’s Notebook,” travels to England to do research for a book about Charlotte Brontë. She’s already in love with England, where her late mother grew up and where she plans to find some healing now that her marriage of twenty years is imploding. Listen to Episode Buy Book October 27, 2020 Death of the Chinese Field Hands Anne Louise Bannon When Anne Louise Bannon heard her husband, then archivist for the City of Los Angeles, speak about the how early Angelenos dug a large ditch (a zanja) to cull water from the Porciuncula River (now known as the Los Angeles River), her first thought was that the Zanja would be an interesting place to find a dead body. Listen to Episode Buy Book August 12, 2020 Road to Delano John DeSimone In John DeSimone's Road to Delano (Rare Bird Books, 2020), it's 1968, and Cesar Chavez is organizing the United Farm Workers to fight for decent working conditions and basic human rights, while growers get increasingly violent in trying to prevent unionization. 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 28, 2020 Into the Suffering City Bill LeFurgy Sarah Kennecott is a brilliant young doctor who cares deeply about justice for murder victims after her own family is murdered. She’s not like other people; she doesn’t like noises and smells, she doesn’t understand chit chat, and she cannot interpret inflection or nuance. Listen to Episode Buy Book Load More

After her mother dies in a tragic accident, Anna cleans out her closet and finds a striking painting that she’d never seen before. She also finds a trove of letters from Stefan Terre, a name she’s never heard. < Back After the Barricades Jessica Stilling May 23, 2023 Today I talked to Jessica Stilling about her new novel After the Barricades (DX Varos, 2023). After her mother dies in a tragic accident, Anna cleans out her closet and finds a striking painting that she’d never seen before. She also finds a trove of letters from Stefan Terre, a name she’s never heard. She travels to Paris for work and also to learn more about her mother, Bethany, who studied at the Sorbonne in 1968. That was a year of student protests and labor strikes by students and workers demanding better pay, workplace safety, and a more equitable society. Bethany never told Anna about her affair with Stefan, a Romanian Jew who survived the Holocaust, became a painter, and was working as a waiter when she met him in Paris. Now it’s 2019, and Anna wants Stefan to tell her about how her mother once wanted to change the world. Jessica Stilling earned a BA from the New School and an MFA in Creative Writing from the City University of New York. Before she published After the Barricades, she published The Weary god of Ancient Travelers, Between Before and After, The Beekeeper’s Daughter (Bedazzled Ink Press), Betwixt and Between (IG Publishing), Nod, and the Hugo Award nominated young adult Pan Chronicles Series (D.X. Varos). Her short stories have appeared in The Warwick Review, The Hawaii Pacific Review and Wasifiri, and her nonfiction has appeared in The Writer Magazine, Ms. Magazine, and Tor.com. She has worked as an editor at The Global City Press and The Global City Review and has taught creative writing at both high school and university level. She has published young adult fantasy under the name J.M. Stephen, lives in southern Vermont, with her family, which includes a dog, a cat, and many chickens, whose squawking sounds exactly like a T-Rex if you listen closely enough. Listen to Episode Buy Book Previous Next