05-03-14 UPDATE:Podcast Update: Time to Read Episode 160: Ben Tarnoff, 'The Bohemians: Mark Twain and the San Francisco Writers Who Reinvented American Literature'
Click image for audio link.
Here's the one-hundred sixtyth episode of my series of podcasts, which I'm calling Time to Read. Hitting the two-year mark, I'm going to make an effort to stay ahead, so that podcast listeners can get the same sort of "sneak preview" effect that radio listeners get each Friday morning. This week, I seem to be on top of the game, but who knows what the hell might happen. I am hoping to stay back up and stumbling.
My hope is that in under four minutes I can offer readers a concise review and an opportunity to hear the author read from or speak about the work. I'm hoping to offer a new one every week.
"...I was a kid in a candy store coming up with these characters..."
— Ayelet Waldman
When you hear Ayelet Waldman speak you'll quickly understand why you should make a point of seeing her if she's in town. The verve and enthusiasm she has in person comes across on the page in 'Love & Treasure,' with an attention to detail, a passion for the prose and a fantastic sense of story. This is a novel like the movies, but far better than the movies.
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A book like 'Love & Treasure' is especially nice to talk about because Ayelet and I could discuss some of the factual backgrounds behind the various sections of the novel without ever really getting too far into the plot. There are really three novels' worth of story and characters in this relatively short novel, and skimming the surface of the research managed to be fascinating conversation that never steered into dust-jacket flap material.
But we also went beyond this novel and talked about writing in general, and some of her other project in particular her work for TV — none of it produced as yet. No matter what she does, Ayalet has this incredible sense of enthusiasm. It's impossible to listen to her speak and not want to read everything she's written; she even has a very nice bit about the heroin high of writing.
Ayelet Waldman's enthusiasm for writing is tempered by an incredible talent and precision. When we spoke, she talked quite a bit about how the novel was influenced by her understanding of the Holocaust, and how she wanted to approach the subject but craft her own perspective. The novel i9s a superb example of this and hearing her talking about the substructure is just as entertaining
04-29-14 UPDATE:Podcast Update: Time to Read Episode 159: Ayelet Waldman, 'Love & Treasure'
Click image for audio link.
Here's the one-hundred fifty-ninth episode of my series of podcasts, which I'm calling Time to Read. Hitting the two-year mark, I'm going to make an effort to stay ahead, so that podcast listeners can get the same sort of "sneak preview" effect that radio listeners get each Friday morning. This week, I'm way behind, but who knows what the hell might happen. I am hoping to get back up and stumbling. I have lots of great books in the hopper to review and lots of great interviews to podcast.
My hope is that in under four minutes I can offer readers a concise review and an opportunity to hear the author read from or speak about the work. I'm hoping to offer a new one every week.
The one-hundred fifty-ninth episode is a look at Ayelet Waldman and 'Love & Treasure.'
08-21-15: Agony Column Podcast News Report : Senator Claire McCaskill is 'Plenty Ladylike' : Internalizing Determination to Overcome Sexism [Incudes Time to Read EP 211: Claire McCaskill, Plenty Ladylike, plus A 2015 Interview with Senator Claire McCaskill]
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Emily Schultz Unleashes 'The Blondes' : A Cure by Color [Incudes Time to Read EP 210: Emily Schultz, The Blondes, plus A 2015 Interview with Emily Schultz]
07-05-15: Commentary : Dr. Michael Gazzaniga Tells Tales from Both Sides of the Brain : A Life in Neuroscience Reveals the Life of Science
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2015 Interview with Michael Gazzaniga : "We made the first observation and BAM there was the disconnection effect..."
04-21-15: Commentary : Kazuo Ishiguro Unearths 'The Buried Giant' : The Mist of Myth and Memory
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2015 Interview with Kazuo Ishiguro : ".... by the time I was writing this novel, the lines between what was fantasy and what was real had blurred for me..."
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2015 Interview with Marc Goodman : "...every physical object around us is being transformed, one way or another, into an information technology..."
Agony Column Podcast News Report UPDATE: Time to Read Episode 199: Marc Goodman : Future Crimes: Everything Is Connected, Everyone Is Vulnerable and What We Can Do About It
