Brooke Champagne (@champagne_brooke) is a writer in the thick of it: the grind of it, the messiness of it, the working-out-of-it. One minute with Brooke and you know you're in for rollicking fun conversation about the essay, about writing, and about Nola Face: A Latina's Life in the Big Easy (University of Georgia Press). Pre-order The Front Runner…

Harrison Scott Key knows how to write a funny book, and he did it again, this time with How to Stay Married: The Most Insane Love Story Ever Told (Avid Reader Press). Only this time, he found a way to find the funny as his marriage was under duress. Pre-order The Front Runner Sponsor: The Power of Narrative Conference. Use CNF15 at checkout for a 1…

For Andrew Dubbins, stories of this nature are resource intensive, so he’s always seeking the story engine, what drives the narrative forward. In this case, it’s a cops-and-robbers story with sibling discord at the center. It’s that Atavisitan time of the month and we have Andrew Dubbins, a journalist based out of L.A. who tells the tale about the …

Stephanie Gorton once fretted over her not-neat process of writing books and soon came to embrace her messiness as a feature, not a bug, while she wrote The Icon & the Idealist: Margaret Sanger, Mary Ware Dennett, and the Rivalry That Brought Birth Control to America (Ecco). (Photo credit Sasha Israel) Pre-order The Front Runner Sponsor: The Power …

Jared Sullivan got his start primarily editing and admired the kinds of writers and reporters who do both well, like a David Remnick. Valley So Low is Jared's new book, and it is along the lines of Jonathan Harr’s A Civil Action and illustrates the toll that greed and negligence exert on the people exposed to toxins and the cost cases of this natur…

Steven Hyden (@steven_hydenwriter) is a music critic for Uproxx, producer of Break Stuff, the podcast about Woodstock 99, story producer for the the documentary Yacht Rock, and the author of Twilight of the Gods, This Isn’t Happening, Hard to Handle, and Long Road. His latest is There Was Nothing You Could Do: Bruce Springtseen’s ‘Born in the USA’ …

Seth Wickersham (@seth.wickersham on IG) didn't always want to be a sports writer, but he found his way to it by being a high school quarterback, covering the University of Missouri Tigers, and "crashing the party" at the Super Bowl with fellow writers Wright Thompson and Justin Heckert. This episode was a chance to revisit his amazing story on its…

Kate McQueen is the editorial director for the Pollen Initiative and a literary journalist whose work is featured this month for The Atavist Magazine. The story chronicles the story of Carl von Ossietzky, a German journalist imprisoned for his dissent at the start of Hitler's rise to power. A cohort of fellow journalists sought a means to break him…

Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz and Paul Peart-Smith talk about how and why graphic interpretations are such a powerful vector for storytelling. Roxanne's An Indigenous People's History of the United States is a must-read and Paul's rendering is the perfect gateway in. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/c…

Taiyon J. Coleman a professor and the author of Traveling without Moving: Essays from a Black Woman Trying to Survive in America (Univ. of Minnesota Press). Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpodPor Brendan O'Meara

Wudan Yan (@wudanyan) is a freelancer writer and founder of Factual, a one-of-a-kind agency committed to fact-checking. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpodPor Brendan O'Meara

Mira Ptacin (@miramptacin) is a writer and journalist who story, The Crash of the Hammer, ran in The Atavist Magazine. She's also the author of Poor Your Soul and The In-Betweens. Visit magazine.atavist.com to read her story about how a small town in Maine drove out a Neo-Nazi. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Su…

Seth Godin is the best-selling author of more than twenty books and his latest is This is Strategy: Make Better Plans. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpodPor Brendan O'Meara

Mirin Fader is a staff writer for The Ringer and the author of Dream: The Life and Legacy of Hakeem Olajuwon. The book chronicles the personal and professional transformation of a transformational figure in wonderful, lucid detail. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpod…

Chase Jarvis is the author of Never Play it Safe: A Practical Guide to Freedom, Creativity, and a Life You Love (Harper Business). Chase was writing a completely different book, was almost done with it, then scrapped it altogether to write what became Never Play it Safe in, oh, about two months. We talk about intuition, why volume/quantity matters,…

Betsy Golden Kellem (@bgkellem on IG) is a lawyer and historian whose "City on Fire" appears in The Atavist Magazine and chronicles a conspiracy in 1864 by northern Confederate sympathizers to burn Manhattan to the ground. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpod…

Sean Enfield (@seanseanclan on IG) is an essayist, education, gardener, bassist, and author of the collection Holy American Burnout (Split/Lip Press). Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpodPor Brendan O'Meara

Louisa Thomas is a staff writer for The New Yorker and the author Louisa: The Extraordinary Life of Mrs. Adams and Mind and Matter. We talk about a profile she wrote on Nikola Jokic as well as her incredible knack for a great kicker. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpod…

Liz Morrow (@liz_morrow) and Ariel Curry (@arielkcurry) are the co-authors of Hungry Authors (@hungryauthors): The Indispensable Guide to Planning, Writing, and Publishing a Nonfiction Book (Rowman & Littlefield). They are a special team and — with their powers combined — created a wonderful guide that is tactical, practical, and informative about …

Brin-Jonathan Butler is a journalist and author of The Grandmaster and The Domino Diaries. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpodPor Brendan O'Meara

Kelsey Rexroat is a freelance journalist and copy editor who recently reported and wrote a brilliant love story for The Atavist Magazine. Visit magazine.atavist.com to read it. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpodPor Brendan O'Meara

Ian O'Connor (@Ian_OConnor) is the author of several best-selling books. His latest is Out of the Darkness: The Mystery of Aaron Rodgers (Mariner Books). Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpodPor Brendan O'Meara

Madeleine Blais is the author of several books, her latest being Queen of the Court: The Many Lives of Tennis Legend Alice Marble (Grove Press), now out in paperback. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpod In the parting shot, I made an error in math referring to the number of hypothetical M…

Tommy Tomlinson is a journalist and author of Dogland: Passion, Glory, and Lots of Slobber at the Westminster Dog Show (Avid Reader Press). Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpodPor Brendan O'Meara

Rhana Natour (@rnatourious) and Eman Mohammed (@emanit) collaborated for their Atavist story "Coming to America" about a teenage girl from Gaza who lost her legs in an Israeli airstrike and the journey she's on to walk again. Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm Show notes: brendanomeara.com Support: Patreon.com/cnfpod…