Karin Slaughter Interview

Listen to us dance around all the twists in Karin Slaughter's newest book, Fractured. One, two, three; turn, one, two, three...
KARIN SLAUGHTER - BOOK TALK WYPL.mp3

Delaune' Michel Interview

I spoke with Delaune' Michel this summer about her book The Safety of Secrets. We had a nice time.

David Wroblewski Interview

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is definitely the best-written book that I've read this year. And this is probably the best author interview I've ever done. David Wroblewski is articulate and thoughtful, and I thought we had a wonderful time talking about his book. I am damn proud of myself. No joke.

John Perkins Interview

John Perkins is the author of the best sellers Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and Secret History of the American Empire. The books have made a big splash, and I really wanted to like them, but I found Perkins's tone to be self-aggrandizing, and he really only got out of the biz when the checks stopped coming in. I really think he over eggs the pudding, much as Simon Winchester did in The Professor and the Madman.

In person, he was a very pleasant fellow. I was a bit combative, and for this I must apologize. I get a bit defensive when I run into what I presume to be knee-jerk anti-Americanism. Absolving Arab and Muslim empires for their bloody expansions in the past just gets under my skin. The "West" isn't the only expansionistic and imperialistic culture around. It isn't the first and it won't be the last. Our world has been a long history of peoples invading peoples, and to hold the West up to specific and, I believe, disingenuous scrutiny shows a lack of awareness of world history at best and willful cultural mendacity at its worst.

Enjoy, if I haven't scared you off.

Kevin Brockmeier Interview

I talked with Kevin Brockmeier in late April 2008 about his latest collection of short stories, The View from the Seventh Layer. He handles SF and the fantastical with a very literary fiction-oriented approach. We also talked about comics. (I had to bluff my way through part of that, my comics knowledge is all second hand from friends. Thanks to Gabe Vaughn, Cold Eth, and the late Rick Driskill for giving me the skills to fake it to make it.)

http://www.mediafire.com/?jtyznb2vvtb

Chuck Thompson - Book Talk Podcast - March 2008

Man, talking with Chuck Thompson was mighty fun. Not only is he an engaging guy with a sense of humor, but he was also a member of Mood Paint which was a precursor to one of my favorite bands, Pond. He also co-wrote one of my favorite Pond songs, Young Splendor. His book is a travel memoir called Smile When You are Lying: Confessions of a Rogue Travel Writer. He dishes some dirt, but he also tells some great stories without much snark. Click here for the goodness.

Woo Hoo! I Interviewed Neil deGrasse Tyson!

INTERVIEW WITH DR. NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON

OK, sometimes stuff just falls in one's lap. Last week I got to interview Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, host of NOVA science NOW, director of the Hayden Planetarium, and all-around smart guy. He was in Memphis for a lecture and I had called his people two weeks prior to see if I could get him to come on to the radio program I produce for WYPL Radio called Book Talk. His publicity person didn't call me back until the day he was in town, THREE HOURS before his only window. I was really nervous because I hadn't even bothered preparing for an interview that I wasn't expecting to happen.

So I drove downtown to pick him up at his hotel. We got back to the station and had a nice 30 minute chat. On the way back, he plugged his iPhone into my car stereo, and we listened to "American Woman" by The Guess Who and "Atomic Dog" by George Clinton. Listening to George Clinton with Neil deGrasse Tyson while driving in my Saturn. Life is way too odd sometimes.

I finally have figured out how to store files online, so you can download the interview here. And a bonus for all you, this is the full interview. The one for radio had 2.5 minutes pared off. I will also start posting my other interviews on my blog. It's not quite a real podcast. But I've talked to some cool people over the years, like Walter Mosley, Kinky Friedman, Haven Kimmel, and Bruce Campbell. So check back once a week and listen to me be nervous and listen to authors talk about themselves. And extra bonus, all the interviews are done in-person so the audio quality is usually pretty good.