Burned By Books
Episodes
Rasheed Newson, "My Government Means to Kill Me: A Novel" (Flatiron Books, 2023)
31 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Earl "Trey" Singleton III arrives in New York City with only a few dollars in his pocket. Born into a wealthy Black Indianapolis family, at 17, he is ...
Jinwoo Chong, "Flux" (Melville House, 2023)
24 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Four days before Christmas, 8-year-old Bo loses his mother in a tragic accident, 28-year-old Brandon loses his job after a hostile takeover of his big...
Julia Langbein, "American Mermaid" (Doubleday, 2023)
21 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Broke English teacher Penelope Schleeman is as surprised as anyone when her feminist novel American Mermaid becomes a best-seller. Lured by the prom...
Kashana Cauley, "The Survivalists: A Novel" (Soft Skull Press, 2023)
07 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Kashana is the author of the novel The Survivalists, which was published in January 2023 by Soft Skull Press. She’s also a TV writer who has writte...
Priscilla Gilman, "The Critic's Daughter: A Memoir" (Norton, 2023)
03 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Growing up on the Upper West Side of New York City in the 1970s, in an apartment filled with dazzling literary and artistic characters, Priscilla Gilm...
Deepti Kapoor, "Age of Vice" (Riverhead Books, 2023)
21 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Today I talked to Deepti Kapoor about her new novel Age of Vice (Riverhead, 2023). Deepti Kapoor grew up in northern India and worked for several ...
Daisy Alpert Florin, "My Last Innocent Year" (Henry Holt, 2023)
17 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Today I talked to Daisy Alpert Florin about her new novel My Last Innocent Year (Henry Holt, 2023). Daisy Alpert Florin attended Dartmouth College ...
Christopher M. Hood, "The Revivalists" (Harper, 2022)
07 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Christopher M. Hood is the Director of the Creative Writing Program at the Dalton School in New York City and lives nearby with his wife and daughter....
Sanaë Lemoine, "The Margot Affair" (Hogarth, 2021)
30 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Sanaë Lemoine is the author of The Margot Affair and a 2022 National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow. She was born in Paris to a Jap...
Matthew Salesses, "The Sense of Wonder" (Little, Brown, 2023)
24 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
MATTHEW SALESSES is the author of eight books, including The Sense of Wonder, which comes out in January 2023 from Little, Brown. Most recent are the...
Dan Kois, "Vintage Contemporaries" (Harper, 2023)
11 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Dan Kois is the author of three nonfiction books: How to Be A Family, a memoir; The World Only Spins Foward, an oral history of Tony Kushner's Ange...
Vanessa A. Bee, "Home Bound: An Uprooted Daughter's Reflections on Belonging" (Astra, 2022)
04 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Vanessa A. Bee is a consumer protection lawyer with a freelancing habit. Primarily interested in inequality, corporate power, the American Left, and W...
Booksellers' Best of 2022
27 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Lisa Swayze is the General Manager and Buyer at Buffalo Street Books, Ithaca’s cooperatively owned independent bookstore. You’ve heard me mention...
Anna Hogeland, "The Long Answer" (Riverhead Books, 2022)
21 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Today I talked to Anna Hogeland about her new novel The Long Answer (Riverhead Books, 2022). Hogeland is a psychotherapist in private practice, wi...
Chrysta Bilton, "Normal Family: On Truth, Love, and How I Met My 35 Siblings" (Little, Brown, 2022)
09 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Chrysta Bilton is an American writer who lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two children. Her first book, the memoir Normal Family: On Truth,...
Jonathan Escoffery, "If I Survive You" (MCD, 2022)
06 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Jonathan Escoffery is the author of the linked story collection, If I Survive You, a New York Times Editor’s Choice and an Indie National Bestse...
Meg Howrey, "They're Going to Love You" (Doubleday Books, 2022)
02 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Meg Howrey is the author of the novels They're Going to Love You, The Cranes Dance, and Blind Sight. She is also the coauthor, writing under the pe...
Ursula Villarreal-Moura, "Math for the Self-Crippling" (Gold Line Press, 2022)
28 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Ursula Villarreal-Moura is the author of Math for the Self-Crippling (2022), selected by Zinzi Clemmons as the Gold Line Press fiction contest winne...
Amy Fusselman, "The Means" (Mariner Books, 2022)
21 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Amy Fusselman is the author of five books. Her latest, The Means (Mariner Books, 2022), is her first novel. Fusselman’s previous four books, all ...
Lynn Steger Strong, "Flight" (Mariner Books, 2022)
18 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Lynn Steger Strong is the author of the novels Hold Still, Want, and Flight (Mariner Books, 2022). Her non-fiction has appeared in The New York ...
Kayla Maiuri, "Mother In the Dark: A Novel" (Riverhead Books, 2022)
15 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Kayla Maiuri holds an MFA in fiction writing from Columbia University. Born in the greater Boston area, she now lives in Brooklyn. Mother in the Dark...
Kevin Wilson, "Now Is Not the Time to Panic" (Ecco Press, 2022)
09 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Today I talked to Kevin Wilson about his new novel Now Is Not the Time to Panic (Ecco Press, 2022). Kevin Wilson is the author of two collections, ...
Lydia Millet, "Dinosaurs" (Norton, 2022)
07 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Today I talked to Lydia Millet about her new novel Dinosaurs (Norton, 2022). Lydia Millet has written more than a dozen novels and story collections...
Matthew Delmont, "Half American: The Epic Story of African Americans Fighting World War II at Home and Abroad" (Viking, 2022)
02 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Today I talked to Matthew Delmont about his new book Half American: The Epic Story of African Americans Fighting World War II at Home and Abroad (V...
Tess Gunty, "The Rabbit Hutch: A Novel" (Knopf, 2022)
28 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Born and raised in South Bend, Indiana, Tess holds a B.A. in English with an Honor’s Concentration in Creative Writing from the University of Notre ...
Andrea Barrett, "Natural History: Stories" (Norton, 2022)
25 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Andrea Barrett began writing fiction seriously in her thirties and published her first novel, Lucid Stars, in 1988. She’s particularly well known a...
Chelsea Martin, "Tell Me I'm An Artist" (Soft Skull Press, 2022)
21 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Today I talked to Chelsea Martin's new book Tell Me I'm An Artist (Soft Skull Press, 2022). Martin's first novel, tell me i'm an artist, is publi...
A. M. Homes, "The Unfolding" (Viking, 2022)
07 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A. M. Homes most recent book is The Unfolding (Viking, 2022). Her previous work includes, This Book Will Save Your Life, which won the 2013 Orange...
Celeste Ng, "Our Missing Hearts: A Novel" (Penguin, 2022)
04 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Celeste Ng is the author of three novels, Everything I Never Told You, Little Fires Everywhere, and Our Missing Hearts. Her first novel, Everythi...
Andrew Sean Greer, "Less Is Lost" (Little Brown, 2022)
20 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Andrew Sean Greer is the Pulitzer Prize winning author of six works of fiction, including the bestsellers The Confessions of Max Tivoli and Less. G...
Courtney Zoffness, "Spilt Milk" (McSweeney's, 2021)
16 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Courtney Zoffness is the author of Spilt Milk, out now with McSweeney’s, and forthcoming in paperback in September 2022. Spilt Milk was named a ...
Vauhini Vara, "The Immortal King Rao" (Norton, 2022)
14 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Vauhini Vara was born in Saskatchewan, Canada, as a child of Indian immigrants, and grew up there and in Oklahoma and the Seattle suburbs. Her debut n...
Sarah Thankam Mathews, "All This Could Be Different" (Viking, 2022)
05 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Sarah Thankam Mathews grew up between Oman and India, immigrating to the United States at seventeen. She is a recipient of a Best American Short Sto...
Elaine Hsieh Chou, "Disorientation: A Novel" (Penguin, 2022)
15 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Elaine Hsieh Chou is a Taiwanese American writer from California. A 2017 Rona Jaffe Graduate Fellow at NYU and a 2021 NYSCA/NYFA Fellow, her short fic...
Julia May Jonas, "Vladimir: A Novel" (Simon & Schuster, 2022)
09 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Julia May Jonas is a writer, director, and the founder of theater company Nellie Tinder. She has taught at Skidmore College and NYU and lives in Br...
Mohsin Hamid, "The Last White Man" (Riverhead, 2022)
05 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Mohsin Hamid is the author of five novels -- The Last White Man, Exit West, How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia, The Reluctant Fundamentalist, and...
Alice Elliott Dark, "Fellowship Point: A Novel" (Simon and Schuster, 2022)
26 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Alice Elliott Dark is the author of the novels Fellowship Point and Think of England, and two collections of short stories, In The Gloaming and ...
Rachel Krantz, "Open: An Uncensored Memoir of Love, Liberation and Non-Monogamy" (Harmony, 2022)
19 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Rachel Krantz is the author of the reported memoir, Open: An Uncensored Memoir of Love, Liberation and Non-Monogamy (Harmony, 2022). She is the h...
Rebecca van Laer, "How to Adjust to the Dark" (Long Day, 2022) & Shannon McLeod, "Whimsy" (Long Day, 2021)
15 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Rebecca van Laer’s writing appears in TriQuarterly Review, joyland, Columbia journal, the Florida review, Salamander, Hobart, mokeybicycle, electric...
Julia Glass, "Vigil Harbor" (Pantheon, 2022)
05 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Julia and I discuss her latest novel, Vigil Harbor, a story of the near future in which many of our current crises are amplified in terrifying yet...
Elisabeth Anker, "Ugly Freedoms" (Duke UP, 2022)
24 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
With me on today’s show is Professor Elisabeth Anker, whose most recent book, Ugly Freedoms (Duke UP, 2022), works to understand how the idea of f...
Shelly Oria and Kirstin Valdez Quade, "I Know What's Best for You: Stories on Reproductive Freedom" (McSweeney’s Books, 2022)
21 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Shelly Oria has just produced an anthology of writings on reproductive freedom that is available now from McSweeney’s Books, in partnership with The...
Marcy Dermansky, "Hurricane Girl" (Knopf, 2022)
14 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with novelist Marcy Dermansky. Hurricane Girl (Knopf, 2022) brings us another unforgettable Dermansky-character, Allison Brody, whose ...
Peter C. Baker, "Planes" (Knopf, 2022)
01 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with debut novelist Peter C Baker. Planes (Knopf, 2022) is the story of a global crime unfolding principally in the domestic lives of ...
Elif Batuman, "Either/Or" (Penguin, 2022)
24 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with novelist Elif Batuman. The international bestseller and Pulitzer Prize finalist The Idiot now has a sequel. In Either/Or (Pengui...
Grant Ginder, "Let's Not Do That Again" (Henry Holt, 2022)
09 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with novelist Grant Ginder. In his latest dramady of familial disfunction, Let’s Not Do That Again (Henry Holt, 2022), Grant star...
Fernanda Melchor and Sophie Hughes, "Paradais" (New Directions, 2022)
27 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Fernanda Melchor, finalist for the International Booker Prize, and author most recently of Paradais (New Directions, 2022). And So...
Natasha Brown, "Assembly" (Little Brown, 2022)
18 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Natasha Brown, winner of the London Writers Award, and author of Assembly (Little Brown, 2021), the story of a young black British...
Jennifer Egan, "The Candy House" (Scribner, 2022)
05 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Jennifer Egan, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award, and author most recently of The Candy House...
Caitlin Barasch, "A Novel Obsession" (Dutton Book, 2022)
15 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Caitlin Barasch, author of A Novel Obsession (Dutton Books, 2022), a debut novel about a young woman convinced that she must be a...
Allegra Hyde, "Eleutheria" (Vintage, 2022)
08 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Allegra Hyde, author of Eleutheria (Vintage, 2020), a debut novel about an idealist who comes face to face with the allure and pit...
Jessamine Chan, "The School for Good Mothers: A Novel" (Simon and Schuster, 2022)
21 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Jessamine Chan, author of The School for Good Mothers (Simon and Schuster, 2022), a debut novel about the current and future terro...
Hillary Jordan and Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan, "Anonymous Sex" (Simon and Schuster, 2022)
14 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Hillary Jordan and Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan, editors of Anonymous Sex, a collection of 27 explicit sex stories unattributed to the 27 wri...
Andrew Lipstein, "Last Resort" (FSG, 2022)
11 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Andrew Lipstein, author of the debut novel, Last Resort. Andrew and I discuss ownership over stories, the blurring of the commercia...
Xochitl Gonzalez, "Olga Dies Dreaming" (Flatiron Books, 2022)
07 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Xochitl Gonzalez, author of the debut novel, Olga Dies Dreaming (Flatiron Books, 2022). Xochitl and I discuss the unique narrative...
Joanna Rakoff, "My Salinger Year" (Vintage, 2014)
31 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Joanna Rakoff, author of the memoir My Salinger Year (Vintage, 2014). Joanna and I discuss the power of a novelistic memoir, break...
Percival Everett, "The Trees: A Novel" (Graywolf Press, 2021)
17 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
If there is such a thing as the American literary canon, then Percival Everett (The Trees, 2021) is at the center of it. The author of over 30 novels,...
Cara Blue Adams, "You Never Get It Back" (U Iowa Press, 2021)
10 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Cara Blue Adams, author of You Never Get It Back (University of Iowa Press, 2021). Cara and I discuss the joys of linked short sto...
Kalani Pickhart, "I Will Die in a Foreign Land" (Two Dollar Radio, 2021)
31 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Kalani Pickhart, I Will Die in a Foreign Land (2021), a New York Public Library Best Book of 2021. Russia is again amassing troop...
Best Books of the Year 2021, Booksellers Edition
20 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
A conversation with booksellers from three of the most dynamic, exciting, and community-oriented independent bookstores in the country. Lisa Swayze of...
Benjamin Labatut, "When We Cease to Understand the World" (NYRB, 2021)
07 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Benjamín Labatut, author of When We Cease to Understand the World (2021), a New York Times Top Ten Book of the Year. Benjamin and...
Pola Oloixarac, "Mona" (Picador, 2021)
22 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Pola Oloixarac, Mona (2021). Pola and I get to talking about the failure of the US university to live up to its massive influence,...
Karina Lickorish Quinn, "The Dust Never Settles" (One World, 2021)
30 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Karina Lickorish Quinn, The Dust Never Settles (2021). Karina and I discuss the indigenous histories of Peru, the desire for more ...
Alexandra Kleeman, "Something New Under the Sun" (Hogarth, 2021)
28 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Alexandra Kleeman, Something New Under the Sun (2021). Alexandra and I discuss the need for a more fecund climate imagination, the...
Clare Sestanovich, "Objects of Desire" (Knopf, 2021)
18 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Clare Sestanovich, author of Objects of Desire (2021). Books Recommended in this episode: Clare Recommends: Alice Munroe, Runawa...
Dana Spiotta, "Wayward" (Knopf, 2021)
30 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Dana Spiotta, author of Wayward (2021). Dana and I talk about how memory is stored in the architecture of cities, the unlikely vil...
Eleanor Henderson, "Everything I Have is Yours" (Flatiron, 2021)
11 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Eleanor Henderson, author of Everything I Have is Yours (2021). Eleanor and I discuss the unforgivable failures of the American me...
Katie Kitamura, "Intimacies" (Riverhead, 2021)
05 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Katie Kitamura, author of Intimacies (2021), longlisted for the National Book Award. Katie and I discuss the International Crimina...
Brian Hall, "The Stone Loves the World" (Penguin Random House, 2021)
30 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Brian Hall, author of The Stone Loves the World (2021). Brian and I talk about blending science and math into the narrative of his...
Hermione Hoby, "Virtue" (Penguin Random House, 2021)
20 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Hermione Hoby, author of Virtue (2021). Hermione and I discuss not needing her characters to be ethical, the mysteries of beautifu...
Rebecca Makkai, "The Great Believers" (Penguin Random House, 2018)
10 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Rebecca Makkai, author of The Great Believers (2018), a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. Rebecca and I...
Jack Wang, "We Two Alone" (HarperCollins, 2021)
03 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Jack Wang, author of We Two Alone (2021). Jack and I discuss his debut story collection, We Two Alone, which Viet Thanh Nguyen ca...
Rumaan Alam, "Leave the World Behind" (Ecco, 2021)
07 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Rumaan Alam, author of Leave the World Behind (2020), a finalist for the National Book Award. Rumaan and I discuss how all fiction...
Miranda Popkey, "Topics of Conversation" (Knopf, 2020)
23 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Miranda Popkey, author of Topics of Conversation (2020). Books Recommended in this episode: Miranda Popkey Recommends: David Burr...
Gina Nutt, "Night Rooms" (Two Dollar Radio, 2021)
27 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Gina Nutt, author of Night Rooms (2021), a linked collection of essays that use the horror movie genre as a catalyst to cultural u...
Lauren Oyler, "Fake Accounts" (Catapult, 2021)
16 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In a live show, sponsored by Buffalo Street Books in Ithaca, NY, Lauren and I discuss the opiating allure of social media, the impossibility of authen...
Ellie Eaton, "The Divines" (William Morrow, 2021)
26 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with debut novelist, Ellie Eaton, author of The Divines (2021). Ellie and I talk about class and race at English public schools, the ge...
Valzhyna Mort, "Music for the Dead and Resurrected" (Macmillan, 2020)
21 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with celebrated Belarusian American poet, Valzhyna Mort. The publication of one of the collections poems, “Antigone, A Dispatch” in ...
Fascism and its Afterlives: An Interview with Alia Trabucco Zerán and Carl Fischer
03 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Alia Trabucco Zerán, author of Remainder (2019), and Carl Fischer, author of Queering the Chilean Way (2016). Alia and I discus...
Edan Lepucki, "Woman No. 17" (Penguin Random House, 2017)
24 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Edan Lepucki, author of California (2014), Woman No. 17 (2017). Edan and I talk about being on the bleeding edge of the violent ...
Kevin Wilson, "Nothing to See Here" (HarperCollins, 2020)
01 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Kevin Wilson, author of Nothing to See Here (2020). Kevin shares his recommendations for summer reading, including his votes for t...
Bob Proehl, "The Nobody People" (Penguin Random House, 2020)
24 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Interviews with Bob Proehl, author of A Hundred Thousand Worlds and The Nobody People, and Miller Susen, author, director, and Educational Director...
Alexandra Chang, "Days of Distraction" (HarperCollins, 2020)
24 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Alexandra Chang about her debut novel, Days of Distraction (2020). I introduce some distraction reads, some for when you want to w...
The Last Bookstore, Buffalo Street Books, Ithaca, NY
03 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Lisa Swayze, the General Manager of Buffalo Street Book in Ithaca, New York. Buffalo Street Books is one of a handful of community-o...
Eleanor Henderson, "The Twelve-Mile Straight" (Ecco/HarperCollins, 2017)
28 May 2019
Contributed by Lukas
An interview with Eleanor Henderson, author of Ten Thousand Saints and The Twelve-Mile Straight (Ecco, 2011, 2017). Books Recommended in this epis...