Richard Scott Larson's debut The Long Hallway (University of Wisconsin Press, April 2024) is a lyrical memoir that expresses a boy’s search for identity while navigating the darkness and isolation of a deeply private inner world. Growing up queer, closeted, and afraid, Richard Scott Larson found expression for his interior life in horror films, esp…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Lisa Malawski talks with Rachel Werner about her children’s book, Moving and Grooving to Fillmore’s Beat and her cookbook, Macro Cooking Made Simple. Rachel is a model, an author, a poet, a book reviewer, the founder of The Little Book Project, a freelance writer and digital medical consultant, teaching ar…

Madison author Beth Nguyen’s latest book Owner of a Lonely Heart (Scribner, July 2023) is a memoir about parenthood, absence, and the condition of being a refugee: the story of Beth’s relationship with her mother. At the end of the Vietnam War, when Beth Nguyen was eight months old, she and her family fled Saigon for America. Only Beth’s mother sta…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with poet Daniel Khalastchi about hist new collection The Story of Your Obstinate Survival (2024, University of Wisconsin Press). The Story of Your Obstinate Survival is a propulsive collection. It’s very funny, uncannily mundane and starkly surreal. The poems are a collision of juxtap…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Lisa Malawski talks with Angela Trudell Vasquez, who until recently, was the City of Madison Poet Laureate. Trudell Vasquez is a poet, writer, performer, and activist. Her most recent chapbook, My People Redux (2022, Finishing Line Press) honors her heritage, contending with generational hardships immigran…

Cynthia Marie Hoffman’s latest book of prose poetry, Exploding Head (Persea Books, February 2024) is described as an OCD memoir in prose poems. It chronicles her childhood onset and adult journey through obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), which manifests in fearful obsessions and counting compulsions that impact her relationship to motherhood, re…

How do you make change at organizations that resemble hard granite, and aren’t designed to bend? Only by patiently and persistently nudging them forward day-by-day, one improvement at a time, according to the authors of Bending Granite: 30+ true stories of leading change (Acta Publications, 2022). It’s a compilation of stories from leaders, mostly …

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Lisa Malawski talks with local Madison author Ann Garvin. Ann Garvin became an author at age fifty. She has now written five books. Ann Garvin is a nurse, a professor, and USA Today Bestselling Author. She thinks everything is funny and a little bit sad. Ann writes stories about women with a good sense of …

Hallie Linden yearns to write for the New York Times. At the moment, she’s stuck at a daily newspaper in tiny Green Meadow, Indiana, a town known for its amusement park and nothing else. It’s 1989, and juicy reporting jobs are hard to find. She resolves to work hard, win a few awards, and then welcome the job offers. In this edition of Madison Book…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with journalists Shibani Mahtani and Timothy McLaughlin for a conversation on their book Among the Braves: Hope, Struggle, and Exile in the Battle for Hong Kong and the Future of Global Democracy (2023, Hachette Books). Among the Braves is a narrative history of the 2019 pro-democracy …

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Lisa Malawski talks with prolific author Jacquelyn Mitchard. Mitchard is now a frequent lecturer and professor of fiction and creative nonfiction at the Vermont College of Fine Arts in Montpellier. She once worked as a journalist at several Wisconsin newspapers, including the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and…

For more than a decade, Greg Mickells led the Madison Public Library. He's responsible for a significant transformation of the Madison library system. His tenure as Director took him to three continents, and to the White House in 2016, when Madison Public Library was recognized with a National Medal for Museum and Library Service. Additional awards…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with Peter Coviello on his book of essays Is There God After Prince? Dispatches from an Age of Last Things (2023, University of Chicago Press). Exuberant, effusive, rye, and incisive, this collection of essays analyze a wide range of cultural objects in order to shore up some modicum o…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Lisa Malawski talks with local poet Shoshauna Shy. Shoshauna Shy has been involved in local poetry and literary events for decades. She founded the Poetry Jumps Off the Shelf program in 2004, a project with the mission of placing poetry in public places where it isn't expected. She's previously worked for …

On this edition of Madison BookBeat, host Cole Erickson interviews Heather Swan about her latest book Dandelion, a collection of poetry which explores our uniquely human relationship with this natural world, not only in its wondrous beauty, but also in its devastation and fragility. About the guest: Heather Swan is a poet, non-fiction writer, and e…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host David Ahrens talks with with Thomas Pearson. Thomas Pearson is a professor of anthropology at UW-Stout, where he also leads the social science department. As a cultural anthropologist, he understands and appreciates the diversity of cultures and expressions of a common humanity. After the birth of his daug…

The Dane County Farmers' Market is the largest producers-only farmers market in the nation. Last year, it celebrated its 50th anniversary. In celebration of that significant milestone, the DCFM has released a hardcover, full-color, 258-page cookbook. The Dane County Farmers' Market Cookbook (published this year by Little Creek Press) features 125 r…

Stu Levitan’s guest is UW history professor Stephen Kantrowitz, whose new book should be of special interest to those of us here in Teejop. It’s Citizens of a Stolen Land: A Ho-Chunk History of the 19th Century United States from the good people at the University of North Carolina Press. If you are like most Americans with an immigrant background, …

Al Jarreau is one of the most beloved musical artists to come out of Milwaukee, and his music – from jazz to pop to R&B – defies easy classification. He performed with a bevy of jazz musicians, and blended an eclectic mix of other styles into his work. But Jarreau is perhaps best known for his live performances and expressive vocal improvisation. W…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with Tacey M. Atsitty about her poetry collection (At) Wrist, (2023, The University of Wisconsin Press Press). In a fever dream of metaphor and image, Atsitty explores themes of loss, romantic love, and faith. Drawing on the familiar poetic form of the sonnet, Atsitty demonstrates how …

Stu Levitan welcomes UW history professor Stephen Kantrowitz, whose new book should be of special interest to those of us here in Teejop, it’s Citizens of a Stolen Land: A Ho-Chunk History of the 19th Century United States from the good people at the University of North Carolina Press. If you are like most Americans with an immigrant background, yo…

On this edition of Madison BookBeat, host Cole Erickson interviews author Alison Townsend. Alison is an award-winning author of two poetry collections, The Blue Dress & Persephone in America, and a volume of prose, The Persistence of Rivers. She is also a professor emerita of English at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. She joined us in the s…

On Madison Book Beat, we aim to highlight local authors and book events. And sometimes, we hope that you just might learn about the next book on your to-read pile. On this pledge drive edition of Madison Book Beat, we flip the table, asking YOU: what’re you reading? What book should we add to our reading list? David Ahrens hosts today’s open line. …

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with musician and scholar Jérôme Camal on his monography Creolized Aurality: Guadeloupean Gwoka and Postcolonial Politics (2019, University of Chicago Press). Jérôme Camal is assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and his research and teaching focus…

Stu Levitan welcomes to Madison BookBeat one of our greatest living writers, perhaps the preeminent American writer, Joyce Carol Oates. She holds a master’s degree and an honorary doctorate from the University of Wisconsin, but of greater immediate interest is that she’s coming back to Madison for an appearance at the Wisconsin Book Festival this T…

On this edition of Madison BookBeat, host Cole Erickson interviews author Ben Pladek about his debut novel Dry Land. It is 1917, and a young forester in the north woods of Wisconsin has just discovered he has a magical gift: his touch can grow any plant in minutes. Through this thought-provoking novel, Pladek brings us on a eloquent journey that ex…

This week on Madison Book Beat, host David Ahrens speaks with Jonathan Melrod, a prominent radical, political activist, labor organizer, human rights lawyer and pancreatic cancer survivor, now out with a memoir: "Fighting Times: Organizing on the Front Lines of the Class War" (September 2022, PM Press). Melrod's memoir highlights his time as a stud…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with novelist, poet and playwright Quan Barry about her novel When I’m Gone, Look for Me in the East (2022, Vintage) and her forthcoming collection of poetry Auction (2023, University of Pittsburgh Press). “Why do we need to believe our lives must add up to some grand narrative, and wh…

On this edition of Madison BookBeat, host Cole Erickson interviews poet Deshawn McKinney. The Milwaukee poet is out with his debut chapbook father forgive me (Black Sunflowers Poetry Press, 2021). It’s a collection described as “an acerbic hip hop hymnal” filled with “fearless, wounding and tender” poems. About the guest: Deshawn McKinney is a writ…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with Nicole Fox about her monograph, After Genocide: Memory and Reconciliation in Rwanda (2021, The University of Wisconsin Press Press). How does a society move forward after the mass violence of genocide? What role do public memorials play in creating healing narratives ? Whose exper…

Part two of Stu Levitan’s conversation with his friend and former newspaper colleague Michael Dorgan, about his new book No Fight, No Blame: A Journalist’s Life in Martial Arts. It is an absorbing read about a fascinating life which both general readers and martial arts aficionados will enjoy. And quite a life it has been in both those fields for M…

The stories included in Steve Fox’s new collection “traverse a tapestry of tenderness, dissonance, indifference, dystopia, and charm.” They frequently feature Midwest settings, along with motifs centering trauma, loss, class, and politics. The collection, titled Sometimes Creek, was published earlier this year by Cornerstone Press, and won the 2022…

The Palestinian city of Jenin, in the West Bank, is in international headlines after several were killed and dozens injured in an Israel raid. The city is a significant symbol of Palestinian resistance — and it figures heavily in Christa Bruhn's new memoir, Crossing Borders: The Search for Dignity in Palestine. The memoir, ten years in the making a…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with JK Cheema on her new memoir, The Black Attache: Vignettes from a Life (2023, Calumet Editions). Born in 1942 to a Sikh family in Lahore, Cheema witnessed history in the making as the subcontinent of India was being divided into the separate countries of India and Pakistan. After m…

The US education system has been sold as the solution for individual success and economic security. Should that still be the model? Our guest, Jonathan Shelton, questions the idea that education should be the main way to access economic opportunity - especially when pitted against other social democratic alternatives. That's the starting point to h…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with John West about his genre-bending memoir, Lessons and Carols: A Meditation on Recovery (2023, Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Co.). Lesson and Carols takes its shape from the Christian liturgical practice of the same name, often celebrated on Christmas eve. The service consists of nin…

Stu Levitan welcomes Mark Borthwick, here to talk about his new biography of his second cousin thrice removed, A Brave and Lovely Woman: Mamah Borthwick and Frank Lloyd Wright, from the good people at the University of Wisconsin Press. Mamah Borthwick was a highly educated, charismatic young woman from Oak Park Illinois at the turn of the 20th cent…

How should reporters consider their ethical responsibilities to the public? That's a question studied through a historical lens in a new book by UW-Madison journalism professor Kathryn J. McGarr. In City of Newsmen, McGarr explores how how the midcentury national press corps kept quiet about their skepticism in the first decades of the Cold War. Na…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with Sami Schalk about her book, Black Disability Politics (2022, Duke University Press). Across six tightly-argued chapters and two praxis-focused interludes, Black Disability Politics explores how Black cultural workers have engaged disability as a social and political issue differen…

In Scott Mitchel May’s latest novel, a serial killer who believes he’s possessed by an Irish demi-god haunts Madison while a city detective tracks his patterns for years. A former Capitol intern becomes a separationist working to retake the American Southwest. The US is led by a President who speaks gibberish except when on the air, and a Wisconsin…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with Jeff Sharlet about his new collection of essays, The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War (2023, W.W. Norton). The Undertow is an incisive and at times foreboding collection. It is made up of ten interrelated essays that map the social, cultural and religious geographies of the …

Jonas Gomez Tijerino welcomes Anisa Yudawanti and Amy Wilson to discuss "What Does it Mean to Tell the Truth", written by Ms. Yudawanti’s 9th grade History students and illustrated by Ms. Wilson’s 2nd and 3rd grade Art students. This is a project which collects the musings of Madison high school students regarding the manner by which history is rec…

Madison Book Beat host Gil Halsted sits down in the studio with Nick Vander Puy, journalist and author of the recent book “Water Protectors: The H.E.L.P Campaign to Save the Penokees” (Strong Dog Press, July 2022). It’s a book that details the Harvest Educational Learning Project, or H.E.L.P. campaign, a coalition of tribal citizens, environmentali…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with Jameka Williams about her Brittingham Prize-winning debut poetry collection, American Sex Tape™ (2022, The University of Wisconsin Press). Brittingham Prize judge and poet Brian Teare describes American Sex Tape™ as a collection “[s]plit between a love of watching and the fear cre…

Stu Levitan welcomes WORT’S own Frank Emspak for a special pledge drive conversation about his new memoir Troublemaker: Saying No to Power. You may know Frank most recently as Professor Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin School for Workers, and the co-founder and co-producer of Madison Labor News and the Workers Independent News Services. Thos…

For more than a dozen years, Rebecca Webster served as an attorney for the Oneida Nation, at a time when the nation was defending itself against threats to its land and sovereignty. Her experience working on those lawsuits, combined with a history of the Oneida over centuries and cultural teachings from the Nation, along with the changing policy on…

In this edition of Madison Book Beat, host Andrew Thomas speaks with Kathryn Harlan about her book of short stories, Fruiting Bodies (2022, W.W. Norton & Co.). Across Fruiting Bodies’ eight stories, Harlan deftly blends the fantastic, weird, and macabre with the sensual, tender, and mundane as we follow a cast of characters–mostly queer and mostly …

Stu Levitan welcomes Brian J Kramp, author of a book about a world-famous band that is technically from Rockford IL, but which owes a lot of its success to Madison. That band of course is Cheap Trick, the book is This Band Has No Past: How Cheap Trick Became Cheap Trick, from the good people at Jawbone Press. The book’s title notwithstanding, the b…

Angie Trudell Vasquez interviews Ron Czerwien on his new collection of poetry, 100 Umbrellas, published by Bent Paddle Press.By Stu Levitan, Andrew Thomas, David Ahrens, Cole Erickson, Lisa Malawski

Stu Levitan welcomes back to the show the award-winning journalist, music critic and author Joel Selvin for a conversation about his classic book Sly and the Family Stone: An Oral History, out of print for many years but just reissued by the good people at Permuted Press. It is the story of the rise and fall of one of the most important figures in …