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In this episode Series Editor Nicole Lamy and featured author Jessica Treadway talk about the Best American Short Stories Anthology 2025. The episode covers:

Trends among the stories

Who reads the anthology in 2026 and how representation may show up differently

How to define a contemporary short story

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In this episode Pat Lipsky talks about her acclaimed new memoir Brightening Glance and covers:

What having a space means as an artist and the discipline necessary to endure

Her life in the New York City art scene from 1960s to present day, including accounts of experiences with Tony Smith and Pierre Rosenberg

The role Marcel Proust has played in her life and work

And the experience of entering the publishing world from the perspective of a seasoned painter

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In this episode Marguerite Sheffer talks about Iowa Short Fiction Prize winning collection The Man in the Banana Trees and covers:

the content of Marguerite's wide ranging speculative fiction stories that dive deeply into the practice of making art and some of our most critical justice issues in our culture

how design thinking helped Marguerite get to a place of wildness and fierce play and pleasure with these stories

what it was like to win the 2024 Iowa Short Fiction Prize and how it has changed her professional life

how writing groups and community played a role in completing this collection

what experimentation and sense of creative destruction can lead to in a creative practice

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In this episode T Clark talks about All This Want and I Can't Get None and covers:

the content of T's feverish and honest short stories about girlhood, shame, want, and choices

how T found an agent

what the path to a book deal looked like

how living in a certain place can foster a more balanced writing life

how writing collaborative plays has informed their fiction

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In this episode Samantha Browning Shea talks about MARROW and covers:

writing her own book as a literary agent for others

when her first novel didn't find a publisher

writing with small children

writing characters in the context of their relationships

worry over whether a book will work

find out more about Samantha here

pre-order Marrow here

Learn more about the upcoming host of Writing Stories Jessica Kinnison here

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Lorraine Russell tells the story of Love and Shadows. Along the way she covers:

Self-publishing on Amazon

Using Fiverr to find cover designers and editors

Fear of failure

Getting yourself into a flow state

Working with a writing coach

Writing as though telling a story around a campfire

Also in this episode:

The Long Road to Publishing with Eva Langston

Our upcoming new Writing Stories host, Jessica Kinnison (!!!)

Catherine Lacey (Catherine Lacey, if you are out there, we love you!)

Buy Love and Shadows here

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Danielle Teller tells the story of Forged and talks about:

success as a writer

rule-breaking

the pitfalls of newspaper articles in novels

Cassie Chadwick

All the Ever Afters

When your agent can't place your manuscript

How her work as a doctor has informed her writing process

Learn more about Danielle here

buy FORGED here

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Christine tells the story of FLOOD and talks about:

Westport Writers Workshop

Christine Pakkala

Copy editing your own work

Thinking about text structure like architecture

Agent shenanigans

Woodhall Press

Shampoo and sugar as essential writing tools

Combatting perfectionism

Jaclyn Gilbert and Drift(less) Literary

Poets and their memoirs

Learn more about Christine here

Buy FLOOD here