Monica Fernandez talks with Marivi Soliven about bringing Filipino culture to life in her new novel, Taxi Dancer. Marivi looks past the usual stereotypes of Filipino Americans to show what the early Filipino immigrants to America were really like. She also explains how she wove Tagalog into the book’s dialogue without translating it, and how she did it in a way that still welcomes readers who aren’t Filipino. Marivi is an author and teacher who loves sharing her culture through her writing.

Taxi Dancer is out now and available to order. - https://bit.ly/46NCvlI

Learn more about Red Hen Press

Join our substack - https://bit.ly/4AKIhCv

Find a Red Hen book you'll love! - https://bit.ly/4hvZJD3

CHAPTERS

00:00 – Introduction

02:24 – The True Story Behind Taxi Dancer

05:08 – Shaping the Novel

12:40 – Research and Historical Accuracy

16:35 – Filipino History and Identity

19:38 – Culture, Language, and Code-Switching

25:07 – Advice for Writers

26:29 – Where to Find Marivi

KEYWORDS

Marivi Soliven, Taxi Dancer, Red Hen Radio, Red Hen Press, Monica Fernandez, historical fiction, Filipino American history, Filipino literature, taxi dance halls, manongs, 1930s California, Depression era, anti-miscegenation laws, interracial marriage, San Diego history, Stingaree District, murder mystery, courtroom drama, historical romance, Tagalog, code-switching, immigrant stories, Filipino heritage, writing about your culture, writing advice, author interview

Kate Gale talks with Brian Sonia-Wallace, Poet Laureate of Los Angeles, about how poetry can help fight the literacy crisis. Brian shares his work with Get Lit, the youth nonprofit where students memorize a classic poem, teach it to their peers, and write their own poems in response. He explains why young people bring wisdom to the page, how memorizing a poem changes your relationship to it, and what he's learned from writing 15,000 poems for strangers on a typewriter.

Learn more about Brian Sonia-Wallace - https://rentpoet.com/

Learn more about Red Hen Press

Join our substack - https://bit.ly/4AKIhCv

Find a Red Hen book you'll love! - https://bit.ly/4hvZJD3

CHAPTERS

00:00 Making time to write

04:47 Is there a literacy crisis?

06:45 Our phones and our attention

09:43 Memorization and new forms of poetry

15:19 Inside Get Lit

21:44 Reading aloud as an act of love

26:45 Can publishing help?

33:31 Building community around a book

38:42 Finding your tribe

42:11 Brian's words for the year

KEYWORDS

Brian Sonia-Wallace, Los Angeles Poet Laureate, LA Poet Laureate, Kate Gale, Red Hen Press, Red Hen Radio, Get Lit, Rent Poet, typewriter poetry, poetry for strangers, literacy crisis, youth literacy, reading aloud, poetry memorization, classic response model, Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, The Great Gatsby, Instagram poetry, phone distraction, writing habits, making time to write, writing routine, Samuel Beckett, Endgame, Carolyn See, small press publishing, Moon Tide Press, poetry book sales, self-publishing, literary community, finding your writing community, West Hollywood Poet Laureate, Writing in the Schools, poetry podcast, literary podcast

Pre-Order Desire Lines, releasing Oct 6, 2026! - https://bit.ly/4xPjPNh

Kristen Millares Young, writer and journalist, shows us her writing process behind her first memoir, Desire Lines. Desire Lines is a forensic investigation into the emotional topography of being a woman, a writer and a mother. She traced her matrilineage from Cuba to Spain, and uncovered the remnants of a pagan cult whose mother goddess, Cybele, was erased to make way for the Virgin Mary. In this conversation, we get to learn how her experience as a journalist helped her write this fantastic memoir.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Cold open

00:51 Welcome, Kristen Millares Young

01:42 Cybele and her lions: how Rome tamed a goddess

05:04 Why Desire Lines had to be memoir, not fiction

08:01 Going into the dark: roots, soil, and joy

11:46 Where to draw the line: "the personal is structural"

15:12 How journalism shaped her writing

16:38 The collapse of book criticism and how authors can shape the conversation

20:12 Memoir vs. the novel, and what she's writing next

23:16 Who Desire Lines is for

26:11 Bringing the book to universities and students

29:26 Teaching craft: the hardest thing left unsaid

32:05 The Odyssey and the moral latitude we give male characters

37:18 Where to find Kristen

KEYWORDS

Kristen Millares Young, Desire Lines, Desire Lines memoir, Subduction novel, Red Hen Press, Red Hen Radio, Kate Gale, feminist memoir, creative nonfiction, Cybele goddess, Phrygian goddess, pagan goddess worship, goddess history, women's power, matrilineal storytelling, women's stories, memoir writing, writing memoir vs fiction, personal essay, Sara Ahmed, the personal is structural, Ursula K. Le Guin, Steering the Craft, Kahlil Gibran, Joy Harjo, journalist turned author, book criticism, literary criticism decline, book promotion, author book tour, Latina authors, women's studies, generative writing, writing prompts, Port Townsend Writers Conference, Hugo House, craft lectures, The Odyssey movie, Odysseus, male antiheroes, unlikable women characters, patriarchy in literature, midlife women, women writers, literary podcast, author interview