What Happened Next: a podcast about newish books (Nathan Whitlock)

My guest on the episode is Jowita Bydlowska. Jowita is the author of four books, including the bestselling memoir Drunk Mom, and the novels GUY and Possessed. She is a journalist, and teaches at the Creative School at Toronto Metropolitan University. Her most recent book is the novel Monster, which was published by Anvil Press in 2024. Author Barbara Gowdy said about Monster: “that a book with almost pornographic sexual scenes should be so humane and polished, so well written, is astonishing.”

Jowita and I talk about the identity crisis she is currently undergoing as a writer, about the weirdly personal criticism she received for the revelations in her debut memoir, and about why she doesn’t expect the same reaction when she publishes her next book, also a memoir.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Evan Munday. Evan is the author and illustrator of the Silver Birch-shortlisted Dead Kid Detective Agency series, the fourth and most recent volume of which, Connect the Scotts, was published by ECW Press in 2018. Munday works as publicity manager for children’s books at Penguin Random House Canada. In its review of Connect the Scotts, the School Library Journal wrote that “fans of the series will be thrilled with another spectral mystery glinting with subtle mirth.”

Evan and I talk about the days when he was very frequently spotted at Toronto book events, and why those days are mostly over. (Spoiler: it’s age and kids; it’s almost always age and kids.) We talk about the as-yet unpublished fifth instalment of the Dead Kid Detective Agency Series, and why it is as yet unpublished, and why being a full-time writer simply does not fit Evan’s guilt-ridden  personality.

Evan Munday's Dead Kid Detective Agency series: ecwpress.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Cary Fagan. Cary is the author of many novels and collections of short stories. He has won the Toronto Book Award and the Canadian Jewish Book Award for Fiction, and has been nominated for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, the Writers’ Trust Fiction Award, the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction. He is also an acclaimed writer of books for children, having won the Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award, the IODE Jean Throop Book Award, a Mr. Christie Silver Medal, the Vicky Metcalf Award for Literature for Young People, and the Joan Betty Stuchner—Oy Vey!—Funniest Children’s Book Award.

Cary’s most recent books are Boney, a picture book for children, published in 2022 by Groundwood Books, and The Animals, also published in 2022, by Book*hug press. The Vancouver Sun called The Animals “Funny, provocative, magical, and warmly engaging.” Publishers Weekly, in a starred review of Boney, called it “a poetic volume that raises keen questions about ephemerality, connection, and regard across the natural world.”

Cary and I talk about his dual role as a writer for children and a writer for adults, about how his feelings about his own career has shifted over the years, including a period in which he contemplated giving up writing for adults altogether, about the chapbook press he runs with Bernard Kelly and his wife, Rebecca Comay, and why he feels publishing chapbooks is something maybe a lot of writers ought to do.

Cary Fagan: caryfagan.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this first episode of The Walrus era is John Vaillant. John is a Vancouver author and journalist whose acclaimed, award-winning nonfiction books, The Golden Spruce and The Tiger, were national bestsellers. His debut novel, The Jaguar’s Children, was a finalist for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and the International Dublin Literary Award. John has written for, among others, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, National Geographic, and... The Walrus. John’s most recent book is Fire Weather: The Making of a Beast, which was published by Knopf Canada in 2023. Fire Weather was a national bestseller, and won the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize For Political Writing, the Baillie Gifford Prize For Nonfiction, and the 2024 J.W. Dafoe Book Prize, in addition to being a finalist for the Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize, a National Book Award, the Hubert Evans Prize, and a Pulitzer Prize. The Guardian called the book “an urgent warning—and an all-consuming read.”

John and I talk about how the devastating things he writes about in Fire Weather really are our new reality, about the fact that he is still talking publicly about the book almost every single day—even a year after it was published—and about why the novel he had been planning to write instead of Fire Weather will probably remain unwritten.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Wayne Johnston. Wayne is the author of nearly a dozen celebrated novels, including The Colony of Unrequited Dreams and The Mystery of Right and Wrong. He has also published a pair of memoirs, including his most recent book, Jennie’s Boy: A Newfoundland Childhood, about his own childhood in the 1960s. It was published in 2022 in Canada by Knopf Canada, and won the Stephen Leacock memorial award for humour. The Toronto Star,  in its review of the book, said: “Never overblown or sentimental, Jennie’s Boy is as vivid as one’s own memories, a glimpse into a past of pain and wonder, of loss and joy.”

Wayne and I talk about his nocturnal writing and living habits, and how he is slowly shifting his schedule to become more of a day person, why he has never suffered from writer’s block, and how, as someone who has been nominated for many many writing prizes, as well as winning a few, he deals with the happiness and agony of waiting to hear them call the name of the winner.

Wayne Johnston: waynejohnston.ca

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Jen Sookfong Lee. Jen is the author of three acclaimed novels, four works for children, a collection of poetry, and two works of non-fiction, including Gentlemen Of The Shade, about the movie My Own Private Idaho, and her most recent book, Superfan: How Pop Culture Broke my Heart, which was published by McClelland and Stewart in 2023. Jen is also works as an acquiring editor for ECW Press, and is the co-editor, with Stacey May Fowles, of two essay anthologies, Whatever Gets You Through and Good Mom on Paper.

Superfan is finalist for the 2024 Forest of Reading Evergreen Book Award, was named a Best Book of 2023 by the Globe and Mail and Apple Books Canada, and was a TODAY Show Recommended Read. The Toronto Star called Superfan “heady, thought-provoking, and emotionally fraught stuff, and a singular reading experience.”

Jen and I talk about how she had never intended Superfan to be a personal memoir, how the relative failure of her second novel almost made her stop writing altogether, why you should never wear faux leather pants while appearing on TV, and why she is still just a little bit disappointed to have never been crowned Miss Chinese Vancouver.

Jen Sookfong Lee: sookfong.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Casey Plett. Casey is the author of A Dream of a Woman, Little Fish, and A Safe Girl to Love, and the co-editor of Meanwhile, Elsewhere: Science Fiction and Fantasy From Transgender Writers. She is also the publisher at LittlePuss Press. Casey’s most recent book is On Community, published in 2023 by Biblioasis. That book was a Finalist for the Firecracker Award in Creative Nonfiction, the Lambda Literary Award for Transgender Nonfiction, and  the Leslie Feinberg Award for Trans and Gender-Variant Literature. Geist magazine called On Community  “a heartfelt, funny, wistful read—just conceptually rigorous enough to provoke thought, but without difficult theory or jargon.”

Casey and I talk about her terrible author signature, surviving the first days of the new Trump regime, and the shift in approach she is taking with her novel-in-progress.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Anna Fitzpatrick. Anna has written for The New York Times Magazine, Rookie, Vice, Rolling Stone, The New Yorker, The Hairpin, Hazlitt, The Believer, The Village Voice, Refinery29, the National Post, the Globe and Mail and many more. She is the author of the children’s picture book Margot and the Moon Landing, illustrated by Erika Medina, which was published by Annick Press in 2020. Her most recent book is the novel Good Girl, published by Flying Books in 2022. Writing about Good Girl, Buzzfeed said that “Fitzpatrick takes romance tropes and flips them on their head — then slaps them.”

Anna and I talk about the mix of luck, hard work, and privilege that defines her writing career, and about how her next book began life as a sequel to Good Girl, before her agent advised her to scrap the idea, and about how strange and often unhelpful it is that certain kinds of writers get lumped together as part of a literary trends.

Anna Fitzpatrick: bananafitz.ca

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My very special guest on this one-year-anniversary episode is Meaghan Strimas. Meaghan is the author of three collections of poetry, including Junkman's Daughter and A Good Time Had By All, which was shortlisted for the 2011 ReLit Award. She the editor of The Selected Gwendolyn MacEwen and co-edited Another Dysfunctional Cancer Poem Anthology with the late Priscila Uppal. She is a professor in the Faculty of Media and Creative Arts at Humber College, where she runs the Bachelor of Creative and Professional Writing degree. (She is also married... to me.) Meaghan’s most recent book is Yes or Nope, which was published by Mansfield Press in 2016 and was awarded the Trillium Book Award for Poetry in the following year. Author Zoe Whittall said of that book that “the poetry in Yes or Nope is whip-smart and tenderhearted, funny and alive.”

Meaghan and I talk about the shift that happened in her writing that allowed her to write Yes Or Nope under some difficult circumstances and time constraints, about working on the final books by her friends Priscila Uppal and Teva Harrison, books that, in both cases, were published posthumously, and about her new work, which she says further develops the stylistic freedoms she discovered in Yes or Nope and which will pay tribute to some of the writers who have inspired her.

Meaghan Strimas: notesandqueries.ca/meaghan-strimas

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Charlene Carr. Charlene is the author of 10 self-published works of fiction, as well as the novel Hold My Girl, which was published by HarperCollins Canada in 2023 and was shortlisted for the Dartmouth Book Award for Fiction and the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award. Her most recent book, the novel We Rip the World Apart, was published at the start of this year by HarperCollins Canada, and will be published in the US in January. Author Marisa Stapley called We Rip the World Apart “both a charged emotional epic and a gentle exploration of the nuances of love.”

 Charlene and I talk about manifesting her first traditionally published novel into being, working on marketing plans while in a maternity ward, and deciding to put some temporary limits on the amount of time and mental space she can give her career.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guests on this episode are Moe and Laura Berg. Moe Berg is a musician, songwriter, and producer best known as the frontman for the band The Pursuit of Happiness. Moe’s first book, a short story collection called The Green Room, was published by Gutter Press in 2000. Laura Berg is a college professor, professional speaker, trained therapist. She has been named one of the Top 10 Mom Entrepreneurs, Savvy Mom of the Year, and was awarded YouTube’s Silver Play Button. Laura’s first book, The Baby Signing Bible, was published by Avery in 2012. Her most recent book, Thriving Life: How to Live Your Best Life No Matter the Cards You're Dealt was published by Health Communications Inc in 2021.

In its review of The Green Room, the Globe and Mail said “the stories… take the edgy, easy cynicism of Berg's songs and build from it some fascinating glimpses into young urban lives grappling with love and lust, flirting with fame and confronting the prospect of abject failure.”

In its review of Thriving Life, the Wisconsin Bookwatch said that “Laura Berg deftly draws upon her years of experience and expertise to create an ideal DIY instructional guide that is as practical and effective as it is inspired and inspiring.”

Moe and Laura and I talk about how moving into the publishing world after achieving success in another creative field can open doors, but can also create unrealistic expectations, how unforeseen problems—like, say, a breakdown in the distribution chain or a global pandemic—can mess up book release plans, and how an unexpected collaboration with their daughter has brought new life to an in-progress book project.

Moe Berg: moeberg.ca

Laura Berg: lauraberginc.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Joe Ollmann. Joe is an artist and writer from Hamilton, Ontario, and the author of more than a half-dozen acclaimed graphic novels and collections of graphic stories. His book This Will All End in Tears, published by Insomniac Press, won the 2007 Doug Wright Award for best book.

Joe’s most recent graphic novel is Fictional Father, published in 2022 by Drawn & Quarterly. In a starred review of Fiction Father, Publishers Weekly wrote that "Ollmann’s funny, faux-meta memoir… is a complex look at an artist’s evolving relationship to the past." 

The book won the 2022 Hamilton Literary Award for fiction, and was nominated for a Governor General’s Literary Award.

Joe and I talk about his creative process—specifically how that process becomes less creative and more mechanical the closer a book gets to being finished—about how he is much more mellow and zen than he was when he wrote his visceral and emotionally raw early books, and about the time he successfully argued with a former Ontario premier over the work of fellow graphic novelist Kate Beaton.

Joe Ollman: wagpress.net

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Ken McGoogan. Ken is the author of sixteen books—most of them nonfiction narratives, but also a few novels. His books include Fatal Passage, Lady Franklin’s Revenge, and Canada’s Undeclared War: Fighting Words from the Literary Trenches. Ken has won the Pierre Berton Award for Popular History and the University of British Columbia Medal for Canadian Biography. A fellow of the Explorers Club and the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, McGoogan sails as a resource historian with Adventure Canada. Ken’s most recent book is Searching for Franklin: New Answers to the Great Arctic Mystery, which was published by Douglas & McIntyre in 2023. The Vancouver Sun wrote about that book, that “there's a raw immediacy, a forceful current of white-knuckle suspense, to McGoogan's recreation of events."

Ken and I talk about his brief time as a firewatcher and how that directly inspired at least one of his books, about whether Searching for Franklin really is his last book about the search for the Northwest Passage (short answer: probably, but it depends), and about his upcoming book, in which he shifts his subject from the Franklin expedition to fascism.

Ken McGoogan: kenmcgoogan.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Victoria Hetherington. Victoria is an author and professional ghostwriter whose first book was the novel Mooncalves, published by Now or Never in 2019. Victoria’s most recent books are Into the Mist: Finding CF-JDO, a non-fiction book published by Kestrel Publication, and Autonomy, published by the Rare Machines imprint of Dundurn Press. Both books were published in 2022.

Author Liz Harmer said about Autonomy that "Hetherington's vision is bleak, but their glittering prose gives even the most monstrous realities of late-capitalism an unsettling glimmer."

Victoria and I talk about her ghostwriting career (and why the professional pitch for her services sounds a little Philip K Dick-esque), about the difficulty that some sci-fi fans have had with Autonomy, and about the complicated reality of literary books being treats as aesthetic class signifiers online.

NB: Victoria and I will be appearing alongside three other great Rare Machines authors—and our editor, Russell Smith—at the Book Drunkard Festival hosted by Blue Heron books in Uxbridge, Ontario, on Thursday, October 19. Find info at bookdrunkard.com.

Victoria Hetherington: vhetherington.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Laurie Petrou. Laurie is the author of four books, including the short story collection Between, and the novels Sister of Mine and Love, Heather. She is an Associate Professor at the RTA School of Media at Toronto Metropolitan University.

Laurie’s most recent book is Stargazer, published in 2022 by Verve Books. Author Marissa Stapley called Stargazer "a sinuous, captivating exploration of the mysterious depths of female friendship.”

Laurie and I talk about the lessons she has learned since her first book about what to say no to and what to yes to, about the skills she has acquired while collaborating with a TV writer for her next book, and how she handles getting identified as a writer by people in her neighbourhood.

Laurie Petrou: lauriepetrou.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this Halloween-themed episode is Ainslie Hogarth. Ainslie is the author of two YA horror novels, The Lonely and The Boy Meets Girl Massacre (Annotated), and the adult novel Motherthing, which was a New York Times Best Book of the Year and was included in Cosmopolitan’s list of Best Horror Books of All Time. Her short fiction has been published in Hazlitt, Black Static, and elsewhere. Her most recent book is the novel Normal Women, published by Strange Light in 2023. In its review of the book, Booklist said that “Hogarth has a talent for writing depth and invoking lavish mental pictures.”

Ainslie and talk about Halloween, provoking readers, and the perils of trying to remake yourself as a writer.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

On this episode of What Happened Next, I speak with Alix Ohlin. Alix is the author of three novels and three short story collections. Alix as been shortlisted twice for the Giller Prize, among many other award nominations, and she chairs the creative writing program at the University of British Columbia. Alix’s most recent book is the collection We Want What We Want, published by House of Anansi in 2021. Esquire said that We Want What We Want is “Shot through with dark humour and keen powers of observation.” The Toronto Star called the stories in the collection “stunning” and said that “Alix Ohlin is a magician.”

Alix and I talk about the culture shock she experienced when she first became part of the Canadian literary world, the weird and intense experience of launching her career by publishing two books simultaneously, and why, if she were absolutely forced to do so, she would say she is a short-story writer first.

Alix Ohlin: alixohlinauthor.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Naseem Hrab. Naseem is the author of many stories for children, which have been translated into several languages. Her book The Sour Cherry Tree, published by OwlKids Books, won a Governor General’s Literary Award in 2022. Naseem’s most recent book, Otis & Peanut, illustrated by Kelly Collier, was also published by OwlKids Books earlier this year.

 Kirkus Reviews called Otis and Peanut “a tender friendship story for the ages.” The New York Times said that its main characters “bravely follow in the footsteps of Frog and Toad and George and Martha."

(Also relevant to this conversation: Naseem’s day job is as an Associate Publisher at Kids Can Press.)

Naseem and I talk about her seeming inability to take any time off from writing stories, about why she tries very hard to ignore prize culture, and about her plans to do something she has never done before: write a book for grown ups.

Naseem Hrab: naseemhrab.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Jackie Khalilieh. Jackie is a writer and former teacher whose first book, the YA novel Something More, was published by Tundra Books in 2023. That novel was shortlisted for the Ruth & Sylvia Shwartz Award, as well as the Snow Willow Award, and was selected for several Best of the year lists, including by the New York Public Library and Audible Books Canada. Publishers Weekly called Something More a “thought-provoking and thoroughly entertaining debut that centers questions of identity via a fresh lens."

Jackie and I talk about how her identities as a person with autism and a Palestinian-Canadian inform the kinds of stories she wants to tell, about some of the negative response her book has received from readers who perhaps wanted its autistic main character to conform to a particular ideal, and about how she can’t on GoodReads without stripmining the site for data and projections about her own writing career.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

On this episode of What Happened Next, I speak with Andrew Pyper. Andrew is the author of a dozen bestselling books, including the novels The Homecoming, The Residence, and many others. His most recent project is Oracle, an audio-only book he created for Audible that was narrated by Joshua Jackson (Yes, Dawson's Creek’s Joshua Jackson.) Andrew also created a kind of sequel for Oracle in the form of an original audio drama called Oracle 2: the Dreamland Murders, also starring Mr Jackson. That was released by Audible in 2022.

In our conversation, Andrew talks about the strange experience of being part of the major promotional effort put behind Oracle and its sequel, the odd career he has created for himself as a writer with one foot in the literary world and one in the worlds of horror, thrillers, and suspense, and about his connection to the late Steven Heighton.

Andrew Pyper: andrewpyper.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode of WHAT HAPPENED NEXT is Ann Douglas. Ann is the bestselling author of 26 works of non-fiction — yes, that is correct — and creator of the Mother of All Books series, which have sold over half a million copies in North America.

Her most recent book is Navigating the Messy Middle: A Fiercely Honest and Wildly Encouraging Guide for Midlife Women, published by Douglas & McIntyre in 2022. Kim Shiffman, the Editor-in-Chief of Today's Parent, says that Ann's book "made me feel seen, understood and empowered.”

Ann and I talk about what it’s like to write 26 books, a feat that included writing her first book in less than two months, while pregnant, and then later writing 5 books in one year. We also talk about the years of emotional and physical burnout that followed that particular stunt, and how she has found a new sense joy and balance by tackling the least emotionally taxing writing project of them all... a novel.

Ann Douglas: anndouglas.ca

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Ali Bryan. Ali is the author six novels, including Roost, which was a One Book Nova Scotia selection, The Figgs and The Hill. Her work has won and been nominated for multiple awards, including the Leacock Prize, the Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize, the Pushcart Prize, a Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Award, a Commonwealth Short Story Prize, and the BPAA Trade Fiction Book of the Year. Her most recent books are the novels Coq, shortlisted for the Leacock Award for Humour, and The Crow Valley Karaoke Championships—both published in 2023, by Freehand and Henry Holt, respectively—and the young adult novel Takedown, published earlier this year by DCB Young Readers. Kirkus Reviews called Takedown “visceral and violent yet ultimately hopeful.”

Ali and I talk about our mutual dislike of aspirational novels, the current literary trend against ambiguity in literary fiction, and the elements of a successful and enjoyable book launch. (Spoiler: a 90-minute reading is not one of those elements.)

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

No new episode this week - regular Monday episodes begin again on January 8. In the meantime, here's a very short preview of that episode.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Leigh Nash. Leigh has worked as the publisher at House of Anansi Press and Invisible Publishing, and is now the co-publisher at Assembly Press, a brand-new independent literary press. She also helps run the PEP Rally Reading Series out of Books & Company in Picton and co-founded The Emergency Response Unit, a chapbook press. Her most recent book was also her debut: the collection Goodbye, Ukulele, published by Mansfield Press in 2010. The scholarly journal Canadian Literature said Leigh “has an eye for unsettling images” and praised Goodbye, Ukulele as “a compelling read.”

Leigh and I talk about the founding of Assembly Press, about her ongoing love for her debut collection, and about how the world of books has changed in the quarter-century since its publication.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Amy Jones. Amy is the author of What Boys Like, a collection of stories published in 2009 by Biblioasis, and the novels We're All in This Together and Every Little Piece of Me, published in 2016 and 2019, respectively, by McClelland & Stewart. A film version of We’re All In this Together, directed by and starring Kate Boland, was released in 2021. Amy’s most recent book, Pebble and Dove, was published by McClelland and Stewart in 2023. The Toronto Star called Pebble and Dove “a rollicking read” and said that “as we bid goodbye to Jones’ vividly imagined creatures, their weirdly endearing humanity lingers in our minds long after the final page.”

Amy and I talk about how her parallel life as a dancer connects with her writing, about the writing career she thought she was going to have after the success of her first novel, and about the fake reality show that keeps making cameos in her novels and that she might one day write a whole book about.

Amy Jones: amyjonesauthor.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Emily Austin. Emily is the author of Everyone In This Room Will Someday Be Dead, which was published in 2022 by Simon & Schuster Canada, and has been published in multiple other countries and in many other languages. Everyone In This Room Will Someday Be Dead was long listed for The Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour, shortlisted for the Amazon First Novel Award, and a finalist for the Ottawa Book Awards.

Buzzfeed called the book “the perfect blend of macabre and funny.”

Emily and I talk about how studying library science helped her avoid some of the cliches of LGBTQ+ fiction, the disassociation she feels about her book’s success, and how having a readership has makes her feel some responsibility when it comes to writing narratives about queerness and mental health issues. I also take a moment to scare Emily a little about coming out as a poet.

Emily Austin: emilyaustinauthor.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Gil Adamson. Gil is a Toronto author whose first novel, The Outlander, won the Dashiell Hammett Prize for Literary Excellence in Crime Writing, the Amazon.ca First Novel Award, the ReLit Award, and the Drummer General’s Award. She is also the author of a collection of linked stories, Help Me, Jacques Cousteau, and two poetry collections, Primitive and Ashland. (She is also the co-author of one celebrity biography, which we discuss in the episode.)

Gil and I talk about nearly passing out the first time she ever read from one of her books in public, about her ongoing discomfort with discussing her work in the abstract, and about her occasional urges to abandon historical fiction altogether.

Ridgerunner by Gil Adamson: houseofanansi.com/products/ridgerunner

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Amber Cowie. Amber is the author of a number of bestselling novels, starting with Rapid Falls, which was published in 2018 by Lake Union Publishing, an imprint of Amazon Publishing and was a Whistler Book Awards nominee. Her essays have been published in the New York Times, Salon, the Globe and Mail, and Scary Mommy. Amber’s most recent novel, Last One Alive, was published here by Simon & Schuster Canada in 2022. The Globe and Mail said Last One Alive contains “as clever a twist as Agatha Christie ever envisioned.” Unusual for this podcast, Amber has a new book coming out very soon: The Off Season will be released by Simon and Schuster Canada in spring 2024. (We talk about that.)

Amber and I also talk about her love of TikTok, about selling a novel based on a one-sentence pitch – and why that ended up being way more stressful than if it had gone the usual way – and about why she feels she could easily be publishing a book a year.

Amber Cowie: ambercowie.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Sheima Benembarek. Sheima is a journalist who’s written for The Walrus, Broadview, Maisonneuve, and the Literary Review of Canada. She has worked as special reports editor at Strategy, a senior editor for Toronto Life, an events manager for The Walrus, a business development and brand communications lead at Corporate Knights, and as an associate editor at Broadview. Currently, she is a contributing writer for The Walrus. In 2020, she was chosen as one of the five RBC Taylor Prize Emerging Writers of the year.

Sheima’s first book is Halal Sex: The Intimate Lives of Muslim Women in North America, published by Viking Canada in 2023. The book was shortlisted for the QWF Concordia University First Book Prize. Journalist Robyn Doolittle said about Halal Sex that it “pulls vital conversations into the open. I loved every minute I spent reading this book.”

Sheima and I talk about the why she chose to include intimate details about her own life in her book, about the reaction she had been anticipating to the book, and about her new work-in-progress, which extends the work she did in Halal Sex.

Sheima Benembarek: sheimabenembarek.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Dan Werb. Dan is an author, epidemiologist and policy analyst whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Salon, and elsewhere. His first book, City of Omens: A Search for the Missing Women of the Borderlands, was published by Bloomsbury Publishing in 2019 and was a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award for nonfiction. He holds faculty appointments at the University of California San Diego and the University of Toronto, and was the inaugural winner of the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse Avenir Award. He is also the recipient of a Traiblazer Award from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. In addition to that, Dan is a musician and composer who has performed and recorded as part of various groups and has written music for film. 

Dan’s most recent book The Invisible Siege: The Rise of Coronaviruses and the Search for a Cure, was published by Crown Publishing in 2022. That book won the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize. In its starred review of the book, Publishers Weekly called The Invisible Siege “a page-turning and unsettling look at the history of coronaviruses” and a “unique and valuable addition to the expanding body of work on COVID-19.”

Dan and I talk about how his musical career does, and doesn’t, connect with his scientific one, about the accelerating threat from strange and destructive new viruses, and about why the joy of winning a major non-fiction book award lasted... about a day and a half.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Lynn Coady. Lynn is the author of eight books, including the novel The Antagonist, which was shortlisted for the 2011 Giller Prize, and the short-story collection Hellgoing, which won the Giller Prize in 2013. Her most recent novel novel is Watching You Without Me, which was published by House of Anansi  2019 and Knopf US in 2020.

Publishers Weekly said that Watching You Without Me “stands out for its incisive, bleakly humorous look at gullibility and the complexities of guilt.”

Lynn is also an accomplished TV writer who has worked on shows like Diggstown and Orphan Black.

Lynn and I talk about how winning the Giller did, and didn’t, change her career and her perspective on her own writing, how writing for TV has become her main creative outlet, and is in many ways a healthier and more rewarding one, and why she isn’t 100% sure she will ever write another novel. We also talk very, very briefly about the scandal that her book Hellgoing played a very minor part in.

Lynn Coady: lynncoady.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Natalie MacLean. Natalie is a journalist and wine writer whose first book, Red, White and Drunk All Over, was published in 2006. Her second, Unquenchable, was published by in 2011. Her most recent book, the memoir Wine Witch on Fire: Rising from the Ashes of Divorce, Defamation, and Drinking Too Much, was published in 2023 by Dundurn Press and was a national bestseller. Natalie is the wine expert on CTV's The Social, has been named the World's Best Drinks Writer at the World Food Media Awards, and won four James Beard Foundation Journalism Awards. She is also the host of the Unreserved Wine Talk Podcast.

Natalie and I talk about her knack for self-promotion and the team that helps keep her many, many projects going, about her fundamental shyness, and how that contrasts with the fact that she is hardly ever not speaking publicly about wine in one format or another, and about how, despite being very proud of Wine Witch on Fire and all its success, she has no interest in writing something so raw and personal again.

Natalie MacLean: nataliemaclean.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Sheila Murray. Sheila’s short fiction has been published in many literary journals including Descant, The Dalhousie Review, and The New Quarterly. Murray is an advocate for social justice and currently leads a grassroots, volunteer-driven initiative that engages urban residents in adapting to local climate change impacts.

Sheila’s first novel, Finding Edward,  was published in 2022 by Cormorant Books. Finding Edward has been shortlisted for a Governor General’s Literary Award, longlisted for Canada Reads, and selected as the One Book One Aurora book for 2023. The novel is also finalist for the 2023 Toronto Book Award, the winner of which will be announced at a ceremony on October 10th.

Sheila and I talk about her extensive advocacy and community work, about how she says yes to every invitation to read or speak as a writer, and about how, despite the ongoing success of her first novel, she’s not getting approached by big-time agents and editors at multinational publishers—and why she’s kinda okay with that.

Sheila Murray: sheilamurray.ca

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Stuart Ross. Stuart is a writer, editor, teacher, and self-described "small press guerrilla." Stuart is the author of over twenty books of poetry, fiction, and essays. He is the recipient of the 2019 Harbourfront Festival Prize and the 2010 Relit Prize for Short Fiction. His most recent works are The Book of Grief and Hamburgers, published by ECW Press in Spring 2022, and I Am Claude François and You Are a Bathtub, published by Anvil Press in the fall of 2022.

The Book of Grief and Hamburgers recently won the Trillium Book Award, and Ross himself was the subject of a special tribute night put on by his adopted town of Cobourg, Ontario.

Stuart and I talk about that tribute night, and the mix of delight and embarrassment he felt around the whole event, about what he calls his "neurotic" drive to keep starting new writing projects, and about how he identifies with the students he teaches in his poetry workshops.

Stuart Ross's author page at Anvil Press: anvilpress.com/authors/stuart-ross

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Waubgeshig Rice. Waubgeshig is the Anishinaabe author of four books, including the short story collection Midnight Sweatlodge (2011), and the novels Legacy (2014) and Moon of the Crusted Snow (2018). As a journalist, he has worked for various outlets, including CBC Radio One. He also hosted, along Jennifer David, the Storykeepers podcast, which focused on Indigenous writing. He has won the Independent Publishers Book Award, the Northern 'lit' Award, and the Debwewin Citation for Excellence in First Nation Storytelling. Waubgeshig’s most recent book is Moon of the Turning Leaves, published in 2023 by Random House Canada. That novel was a #1 national bestseller and a finalist for the Aurora Award for Best Novel. Book Riot said that Moon of the Turning Leaves is “gripping, to say the least, and it’s a haunting read that’ll linger in the recesses of your mind for quite some time.”

Waubgeshig and I talk about how being a very in-demand author is a little bit like touring in a rock band, about the pleasures of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, which he was introduced to by his friend (and the current premier of Manitoba) Wab Kinew, and about how he is not yet closing the door on a possible third book in the series that began with Moon of the Crusted Snow.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest in this episode is Alicia Elliott. Alicia is a Mohawk writer living in Brantford, Ontario, whose essays have been nominated for multiple National Magazine Awards. She is also a recipient of the RBC Taylor Emerging Writer Award. Alicia’s first book, the essay collection A Mind Spread Out On The Ground, was a national bestseller, and was nominated for the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction. It also won the Forest of Reading Evergreen Award.

The New York Times Book Review called that collection “raw” and “unflinching”, the Globe and Mail called it “a tour de force” and Booklist called it "required reading.”

Alicia and talk about her upcoming first novel, about the slightly unreal-sounding process of writing and publishing her first book, and about how she has handled the occasionally complicated reality of being a high-profile Indigenous writer. (We also talk very briefly about the Vanderpump Rules reunion.)

Alicia Elliott's author page at Penguin Random House Canada.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Alissa York. Alissa is the author of the novels Mercy, Effigy (which was shortlisted for the Giller Prize), Fauna and The Naturalist (which was winner of the Canadian Author’s Association Fiction Award, and the  short fiction collection, Any Given Power.  Alissa’s essays and articles have appeared in The Guardian, The Globe and Mail, Brick magazine and elsewhere, and she teaches at Humber College, where she is the coordinator for the Creative Writing program. Full disclosure, we used to have offices right across the hall from each other at Humber.

Alissa’s most recent book is Far Cry, which was published by TK in 2023 by Random House Canada. The Toronto Star said Far Cry is “dazzling and brilliant” and called it “a transfixing, glorious novel.”

Alissa and I talk about the Humber Creative Writing program, how she makes herself disconnect from social media, and most other social things, when she is working on a book, and where she begins when she is starting a new novel.

Alissa York: alissayork.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is francesca ekwuyasi. francesca is a writer, artist, and filmmaker whose first book, the novel Butter Honey Pig Bread, was published in 2020 by Arsenal Pulp. That book won the Writers' Trust of Canada Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ2S+ Emerging Writers; was shortlisted for the Governor General's Literary Award, the Amazon Canada First Novel Award, and a Lambda Literary Award, and was longlisted for the Giller Prize. In 2021, it was a runner-up on the CBC's Canada Reads competition. Her most recent book is Curious Sounds: A Dialogue in Three Movements, a collaboration with celebrity chef, restaurateur, cookbook author, and visual and recording artist Roger Mooking. That book was published in 2023, also by Arsenal Pulp. Publishers Weekly said about Curious Sounds that “there's a sense of a mind spilled onto the page, with sharp insights scattered throughout. The results are both odd and enchanting.”

francesca and I talk about how having her first book on Canada Reads was directly responsible for her second, about how writers should let themselves explore whatever theme or territory has them in its grip, and about how, having written her first novel all over the place and on whatever materials were handy, she has finally discovered the joy of writing at an actual desk.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Lisa Whittington-Hill. Lisa is a writer whose work has appeared in Longreads, Hazlitt, Catapult, The Walrus, and more. She is the publisher of This Magazine and teaches in the publishing program at Centennial College. Lisa’s most recent two books are The Go-Go's Beauty and the Beat, part of the 33 1/3 series published by Bloomsbury, and the essay collection Girls, Interrupted: How Pop Culture Is Failing Women, published by Véhicule Press. Both books were published in the fall of 2023. Lauren McKeon, author of No More Nice Girls, called Girls, Interrupted “brilliantly considered, meticulously researched, and laugh-out-loud funny.”

Lisa and I talk about the gender gap in celebrity redemption arcs, the inadvertent marketing boost Britney Spears gave to Girls, Interrupted, and the magazine about the pets in her neighbourhood she made when she was seven years old.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Kelly S. Thompson. Kelly is a former Logistics Officer in the Canadian Armed Forces who began writing about her military experiences in a blog for Chatelaine magazine. She wrote about those experiences again in her debut book, Girls Need Not Apply, which was published in 2019 by McClelland & Stewart, named a Globe and Mail Top 100 Book, and became an instant bestseller. Kelly teaches Creative Nonfiction at the University of King’s College. Her most recent book, the memoir Still, I Cannot Save You, was published by McClelland & Stewart in 2023, and was also an instant bestseller. It was shortlisted for the 2024 Evelyn Richardson Non-Fiction Award. Rachel Matlow, author of Dead Mom Walking, wrote that “with this heartwrenching yet hopeful book, Kelly has turned her loss and grief into something beautiful.”

Kelly and I talk about how her current writing practice is informed by her years in the military and by her experiences with chronic illness, about the worst response to her writing she has ever received, and about how publishing Still, I Cannot Save You has led to some expected, but no less agonizing difficulties with her extended family.

A quick warning: this conversation covers some very difficult and traumatic territory, such as addiction and domestic abuse.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Erin Pepler. Erin is a freelance writer whose work has appeared in Today’s Parent, Parents Canada, SavvyMom, Romper, Scary Mommy, MoneySense, Broadview Magazine and more. Her first book, Send Me Into the Woods Alone: Essays on Motherhood, was published by Invisible Publishing in 2022.

Writing about the book in the Globe and Mail, Marsha Lederman said that Send Me Into the Woods Alone “is the book I wish I had had as a companion during those early, difficult months and early, difficult years. Because this book is not just instructive and insightful, it is great company. And hilarious.”

Erin and I talk about the tricky business of writing a book with two kids underfoot, how her Covid-aware book launch was almost derailed by her getting Covid right before it, and about the messages she receives every day from readers who want to share their own stories.

Erin Pepler: erinpepler.wordpress.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Claire Cameron. Claire is the kind of person who has led canoe trips in Algonquin Park and worked as an instructor for Outward Bound. She has taught mountaineering, climbing, and whitewater rafting in Oregon and beyond. But also the kind of person whose writing has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, the Globe and Mail, the Guardian, Lenny Letter, and Salon. Claire is the author of three novels, the most recent of which is The Last Neanderthal, which was published in 2017 by Doubleday Canada, and went on to be published in a dozen other countries. It was a bestseller in Canada, and was a finalist for the 2017 Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize.

The Los Angeles Review of Books said about The Last Neanderthal that "Cameron pulls out all the literary stops in giving Neanderthals as much free rein, agency and authenticity as possible. . . . This could easily be the best book that shakes up the classic Neanderthal tropes in science fiction and fantasy."

Claire and I talk about how she does her best writing when is able to write from inside out, rather than the outside in, how being diagnosed with a form of skin cancer after the publication of The Last Neanderthal changed not only what she wrote about next but how she engages with the outside world, and about how the idea of taking a dump in the woods is kind of central to the way her imagination works.

Claire Cameron: claire-cameron.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

On this episode of What Happened Next, I speak with Jason McBride about his book Eat Your Mind: The Radical Life and Work of Kathy Acker, published in Fall 2022 by Simon & Schuster. We talk about the book's decade-long route to publication, how he found himself getting a little addicted to good reviews, and the difficulty he's had finding another book project that will engage him as much as this one did.

Jason McBride: simonandschuster.ca/authors/Jason-McBride/

Simon & Schuster Canada: simonandschuster.ca

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Jamie Tennant. Jamie’s debut novel The Captain of Kinnoull Hill was published by Palimpsest Press in 2016. His second novel, River Diverted, also published by Palimpsest Press, was published in the fall of 2022. Jamie also hosts the weekly books and literature program/podcast Get Lit on CFMU, where he is also the Program Director.

Author Emily Saso said about River Diverted: “Nobody writes a charming monster quite like Jamie does.   Highly recommend if you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to chuck your North American life and move to Japan.”

Jamie and I talk about his early days as a theatre kid and as the singer in a band, about his relatively late start as a novelist, and about the kinds of lessons he has learned from interviewing authors every week on his show — which is something I can very much relate to.

Jamie Tennant: jamietennant.ca

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Susan Musgrave. Susan is the author of nineteen books of poetry, numerous works of fiction and non-fiction, and several books for children. In 2023, she was recognized with the George Woodcock Award for Outstanding Literary Achievement in British Columbia. Susan also teaches poetry in the University of British Columbia’s Creative Writing school, where I was lucky enough to be her student – twice – while completing my MFA degree.

Susan’s most recent book of poetry, Exculpatory Lilies, was published in 2022 by McClelland & Stewart, and was shortlisted for the 2023 Griffin Poetry Prize.

Susan and I talk about the literally sensational nature of her life story, about the loss of her husband Stephen Reid and her daughter Sophie, which inspired many of the poems in Exculpatory Lillies, and about her dislike of the easy and clichéd healing narrative that ends with her starting to write poetry again. (Though she is totally doing that.)

Susan Musgrave: susanmusgrave.com/biography

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Stephen Maher. Stephen has been writing about Canadian politics for decades as a columnist and investigative reporter at Postmedia News, iPolitics, and Maclean’s. His work has won numerous awards, including the Nieman Fellowship at Harvard University, the Michener Award for meritorious public service journalism, a National Newspaper Award, two Canadian Association of Journalism Awards, and a Canadian Hillman Prize, and has been nominated for several National Magazine Awards. He is also the author of a handful of thriller novels, which we talk about briefly in this episode. Stephen’s most recent book is The Prince: The Turbulent Reign of Justin Trudeau, was published in May 2024 by Simon & Schuster Canada. The Globe & Mail called the book “a thoroughly researched and fair-minded accounting of Justin Trudeau’s accomplishments and failings.”

Stephen and I talk about the very recent and ongoing chaos surrounding Trudeau and his government, the particular stresses of researching and writing a biography of an acting political figure whose fortunes could change at any moment, and the book he is currently working on, about another Canadian icon with a very tarnished brand: the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Tamara Faith Berger. Tamara is an author and screenwriter whose books include Lie With Me, which she helped adapt into a feature film, The Way of the Whore (later republished by Coach House Books as Little Cat), Maidenhead, Kuntalini and Queen Solomon. She has been nominated for the Trillium Book Award and won the Believer Book Award. Two films for which she wrote the screenplays will be premiering in 2025. Tamara’s most recent book is the novel Yara, published in 2023 by Coach House Books. The Toronto Star and the Globe & Mail selected it as one of the best books of that year. Publishers Weekly said that “this provocative coming-of-age story … raises questions about sexuality, power, and the intersection of the personal and the political."

Tamara and I talk about mainstream Canadian literary culture’s discomfort with her work’s signature combination of deep ideas and frank sexuality, about the complicated experience of publishing a novel that explores Jewish identity and its relationship to Israel in the fall of 2023, and the total coincidence that led to her having two films appearing in one year.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Rob Benvie. Rob is the author of three novels, including Safety of War and Maintenance, both published by Coach House Books. His writing has appeared in McSweeney’s, Dazed, Vice, Joyland, The Puritan, CNQ, and Best Canadian Essays. He also co-wrote the screenplay for the 2021 film Stanleyville. Rob was a founding member of the band Thrush Hermit, and performs and records solo as Tigre Benvie. Rob’s most recent novel, Bleeding Light, was published in 2021 by Invisible Press. Author Liz Harmer called Bleeding Light "bizarre, terrifying, and wise." Rob’s upcoming novel, Book of the Flock, will be published by Knopf Canada in 2025.

Rob and I talk about how doing novel revisions can be a little bit like a band reunion, how, despite having a successful career as a musician and songwriter, it might be the case that he was a writer all along, and how being published by a multinational is not quite the same as a band signing with a major label (he hopes).

Rob Benvie: robbenvie.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Nina Dunic. Nina is writer, editor, and journalist whose has done work for the Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, CBC Docs and others. After winning a number of short story contests less than a decade ago, Nina turned to writing fiction. Nina’s first book is the novel The Clarion, which was published by Invisible Publishing in 2023. The Clarion was longlisted for the Giller Prize and just last week, it won the Trillium Prize. It was also named one of the Globe and Mail's Best Books of 2023, and the Best Canadian Debut of 2023 by Apple Books. It also appeared on the CBC'S list of Best Canadian Fiction of 2023.

The Toronto Star called The Clarion “a wonderful, and promising, debut.”

Nina and I talk about her how she has dealt with nervousness around getting interviewed – it involves cognac – about maintaining distance between her fiction writing self and her real self, and about the surreal feeling she gets watching her debut book, which she was certain would disappear without a trace, get all of this recognition from critics, readers, and award juries. (We recorded this conversation shortly before she won Trillium Prize, but we talk about that, too.)

Nina Dunic: https: ninadunic.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Joyce Grant. Joyce is an award-winning children’s author, a freelance journalist, an editor, and an educator. She is the author of a trio of picture books published by Fitzhenry & Whiteside, and a pair of middle-grade novels published by Lorimer. Joyce’s most recent book is Can You Believe It? How to Spot Fake News and Find the Facts, published by Kids Can Press in 2022. Can you Believe it? won two Hamilton Literary Awards, in the categories of children’s book and non-fiction, as well as a Press Freedom Teaching Award. The book was also nominated for Ontario Library Association’s Yellow Cedar Award and the Hackmatack Children’s Choice Book Award. Kirkus Reviews called Can You Believe It? “a valuable—and entertaining—guide to an important subject.”

Joyce and I talk about her writing process, which she admits is a little more chaotic than she’d like, about why it took her until her sixth book to write about a subject she has been working on and teaching for decades, and about the multiple books she has on the go—including one for which she has a contract from a publisher sitting unsigned in her email inbox, a situation I believe our conversation guilted her into remedying.

Joyce Grant: joycegrantauthor.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this special holiday episode is Louis Strimas. Louis is currently in Grade 4. He loves reading, making crafts, eating Cheerios, and playing video games, even though he only really gets to do that when he’s at a friend’s house, because his parents are mean.  Louis’s most recent two books are The Demon: A Horrer Story and its sequel, The Demon 2: Kingshard: A Horrer. Both books were self-published in the fall of 2023.

Lou and I talk about the books that have inspired him and why he enjoys reading so much. He also offers some advice for other people who might want to write their own books.

Happy holidays.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Carl Wilson. Carl is the music critic at Slate and also writes for The Globe and Mail, Hazlitt, The New York Times Magazine and many other online and print publications. His work has been included in two of Da Capo Books' annual Best Music Writing collections. Carl’s first book was Let’s Talk about Love: A Journey to the End of Taste, which Carl himself describes as being about “aesthetic conflict, class, and Céline Dion.” That book was originally published in 2007 by Bloomsbury as part of the 33 1/3 series of books about popular music. An expanded edition was published in 2014 that included essays by  Nick Hornby, Krist Novoselic, Ann Powers, Mary Gaitskill, Sheila Heti and others, as well as a new afterword by Carl.

The LA Review of Books said that  "Let's Talk About Love...is not just a critical study of one Céline Dion album, but an engaging discussion of pop criticism itself."

Carl and I, of course, talk about Céline’s recent performance at the Paris Olympics, about the unlikely popular and academic success of Let’s Talk About Love, and about the two book-length works he wants to complete—one a biography of a beloved writer and singer-songwriter, the other an argument for the legitimacy of crying as a critical response to great art.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Carleigh Baker. Carleigh’s debut story collection, Bad Endings, published by Anvil Press in 2017, won the City of Vancouver Book Award, and was also a finalist for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and the Emerging Indigenous Voices Award for fiction. Foreword magazine said, about Bad Endings, “Baker is a skillful, sensitive writer with an uncanny gift for subtle, dark humor and the ability to assume the viewpoint of her characters […] There is no judgment or condemnation in these stories, but a tender, deep savoring of the quirks that make us human.”

Carleigh and I talk about how winning a major award was both a shock and the occasion for some private head-swelling, about the experience (so far) of moving from a small independent press to McClelland & Stewart, and about how she keeps forgetting the very lessons she emphasizes when she is teaching creative writing.

Carleigh Baker: carleighbaker.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Paige Maylott. Paige is a writer and gamer who works as an accessibility expert at McMaster University. Her first book, the memoir My Body Is Distant, was published by ECW Press in 2023. That book won an Independent Publisher Book Award for LGBTQ+ Non-Fiction, and was shortlisted for the Rakuten KOBO Emerging Writer Prize in the nonfiction category. Publishers Weekly said that “Maylott’s gripping debut memoir covers her gender transition, divorce, and experiments with online relationships in thrillingly nonlinear fashion.”

Paige and I talk about the cultural and personal importance of the early 80s video game Zork, about the decision she made, while writing her memoir, to always show herself in a worse light than anyone else, and about how she struggled with the idea of writing a second memoir—but why she is doing it anyway.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

On this episode, I speak with Farzana Doctor about her first poetry collection You Still Look the Same, published by Freehand Books in 2022*. We talk about the how she learned to market herself, how publishing a collection of poetry was a surprisingly relaxing experience (at least compared to publishing her four previous novels), and how the messes of her forties have broadened her ambitions as a writer.

Listen for a chance to win a copy of You Still Look the Same, courtesy of Freehand Books.

* In the introduction, I say 2021 by mistake.

Farzana Doctor: farzanadoctor.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Ron Sexsmith. Ron is an award-winning singer songwriter who has earned praised from people like Elvis Costello, Elton John, Ray Davies of the Kinks, John Prine, Gordon Lightfoot, Leonard Cohen, and Paul McCartney. His songs have been covered by Rod Stewart, Nick Lowe, Emmy Lou Harris, Feist, and Michael Bublé, among many others. His most recent album is The Vivian Line.

Ron’s first book, Deer Life: A Fairy Tale, was published in 2017 by Dundurn Press. In its review of the book, Publishers Weekly said that “Sexsmith’s novel has much the same effect as his music, conveying uncertainty with fearlessness and heart.”

Ron and I talk about the odd start of his artistic career, about the intense feeling of imposter syndrome he had when Deer Life first came out, his aborted attempt to write a prequel to the book, and about his plans to write and record songs to accompany the book, which he hopes will one day form the basis of a musical or even a film.

Ron Sexsmith: ronsexsmith.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is David Bergen. David is the author of numerous acclaimed novels and short-story collections, including The Case of Lena S, which won the 2002 Carol Shields Winnipeg Book Award, and The Time In Between, winner of the 2005 Giller Prize. Four of his books have won the McNally Robinson Book of the Year Award. David’s work has also won the Margaret Laurence Award for Fiction and the John Hirsch Award, and been nominated for the Manitoba Book of the Year, the Relit Prize, and the International Dublin Literary Award. Four of his books have won the McNally Robinson Book of the Year Award. He himself was awarded the Matt Cohen Award in 2018, in honour of a distinguished lifetime contribution to Canadian literature.

His most recent novel is Away from the Dead, published in 2023 by Goose Lane Editions. Author and former What Happened Next guest Omar El Akkad called Away from the Dead “a deceptively stunning novel… written by one of Canada’s best.”

David and I talk about adding his name to the opposition to the Giller Prize’s association with Scotiabank, about the crime novel he wrote a decade ago that will finally get published next year, and about the advice he wishes he’d given Ron McLean when Ron defended one of David’s books on Canada Reads. (David and I also bond over not yet having read Middlemarch.)

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode Kamal Al-Solaylee. Kamal is the author of the bestselling memoir Intolerable: A Memoir of Extremes, published in 2012 by HarperCollins Canada, which has published all of his books to date. His second book, Brown: What Being Brown in the World Today Means (to Everyone) was published in 2016. His most recent book, Return: Why We Go Back to Where We Come From, was published in 2021, and was a Book of the year for the Globe and Mail, the Hill Times and the CBC.  Author Esi Edugyan called Return “an urgent, thought-provoking read with much to say about our future." Kamal is currently the Director of the School of Journalism, Writing, and Media at the University of British Columbia.

Kamal and I talk about how his career as a journalist and theatre critic informs his books, how he feels both privileged and compelled to write books that address difficult and serious topics, and how he owes much of his career success to a chance encounter with me about a decade and a half ago. (That’s a joke.)

Kamal Al-Solaylee's Return: Why We Go Back to Where We Come From (HarperCollins Canada).

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Elyse Friedman, the author of a whole bunch of things, including a number of screenplays, a collection of poetry, a collection of short stories, and a few novels, the most recent of which is The Opportunist, which was published by HarperCollins Canada in 2022. The Toronto Star review of The Opportunist said that “In exciting, page-turning prose, Friedman’s brilliant plotting and wonderfully devious characters act out scenes of mayhem and power struggles.”

Elyse and I talk about how Anne of Green Gables inspired her early shift into novel-writing, why she thinks her career makes no sense, and why she thinks struggling screenwriters should just write novels.

The Opportunist at HarperCollins Canada.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

This episode was originally uploaded in June 2023. It is a conversation with Andrew Pyper, who died just a few days ago at the age of 56. Andrew was the author of more than a dozen books, including The Homecoming, The Residence, and many others. In our conversation, Andrew talks about the odd career he has created for himself as a writer with one foot in the literary world and one in the worlds of horror and suspense and thrillers. We also talk about Andrew’s connection to the late Steve Heighton. I have not re-edited the conversation itself, except to lop off the original intro and outro.

Andrew’s family has posted a link where people can donate to Trees Canada in his name: https://justgiving.com/campaign/andrewpyper

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

On this episode of What Happened Next, I speak with Elisabeth de Mariaffi about her experiences publishing four books over 10 years, including her most recent novel, The Retreat, published in 2021 by HarperCollins Canada. We talk about the advantages of working in and around book publishing when you are publishing a book, the dangers of letting people see your works-in-progress too early, and a problematic new demand of authors trying to promote their books: video content.

Listen for a chance to win a copy of The Retreat, courtesy of HarperCollins Canada.

Elisabeth de Mariaffi: elisabethdemariaffi.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Martha Baillie. Martha is the author of multiple works of fiction, including the novel The Incident Report, published by Coach House Books in 2009 and longlisted for the Giller Prize. Darkest Miriam, a feature film based on that novel, premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival this year and had its Canadian premiere at the Fantasia International Film Festival, where it won the DGC Best Director prize. Her most recent book is the memoir There Is No Blue, which was published in 2023, yet again by Coach House, and recently won the Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize For Nonfiction. The Guardian called the book “tough, tender, and compelling."

Martha and I talk about her continuing post-award high, about strangers sharing with her their stories of mental health struggles, and about the oddity—but also delight!—of relatively late-career success.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Bob McDonald. Bob has been the host of CBC Radio’s Quirks and Quarks since 1992 and is a regular science commentator on the CBC News Network and a science correspondent for The National. He is the author of multiple books, including The Earthling’s Guide to Outer Space, Canadian Spacewalkers, and The Future is Now. He has been honoured with the Michael Smith Award for science promotion from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the Sandford Fleming Medal from the Royal Canadian Institute for Science, and the McNeil Medal for the public awareness of science from the Royal Society of Canada. He has also been made an Officer of the Order of Canada and has an asteroid named after him. Bob’s most recent book is the memoir Just Say Yes, which was published in 2024 by Douglas & McIntyre. Astronaut and author Chris Hadfield says about Just Say Yes that “Bob takes his rare ability to explain the world to us all and applies it to himself in this delightful, often surprising and ever-insightful autobiography.”

Bob and I talk about the importance of promoting and communicating real science amid the proliferation of misinformation and conspiracy theories (and why the closing of the Ontario Science Centre doesn’t exactly help with that goal), about his initial reluctance to include the story of his childhood sexual abuse in his memoir (but why he is proud that he did), and about his work-in-progress, a book for kids that focuses on—surprise!—science.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

On this episode of What Happened Next, I speak with Dawn Promislow. Dawn is the author of the short story collection Jewels, published in 2010, and the novel Wan, published by Freehand Books in May 2022. Author Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer has called Wan “a masterpiece” and said that this “beautiful, painterly, sublime, and sonically exquisite novel … is a work of utter genius.”

Dawn and I talk about the long stretch of time between her first and second book (and how that is only partly her fault), the astonishingly short time it took her to write the first draft of Wan when she finally did so, and how a work by JM Coetzee opened her creative imagination and helped her realize she could write fiction in the first place.

Dawn Promislow: dawnpromislow.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Lawrence Hill. Lawrence is the author of eleven books including the novels The Book of Negroes and The Illegal, and the memoir Black Berry Sweet Juice: On Being Black and White in Canada and Blood: The Stuff of Life, which was the CBC Massey Lecture in 2013. Lawrence is the winner of the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Book, and both CBC Radio’s Canada Reads and Radio-Canada’s Combat des livres. Lawrence’s most recent book, his first YA novel, is Beatrice and Croc Harry, which was published in 2022 by HarperCollins Canada. The French version of Beatrice and Croc Harry is about to be published in Quebec by Mémoire d'encrier. It will come out in Europe in the fall. Author David Chariandy called Beatrice and Croc Harry “A modern fable of great beauty and sophistication.”

Lawrence and I talk about some peculiarities concerning his author name, about the grief that helped compel him to write his first book for children, and about the one disappointment he had when he met Queen Elizabeth II.

Lawrence Hill: lawrencehill.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

On this episode of What Happened Next, I speak with Nicola Winstanley, the author of six picture books, including her most recent, How to Teach Your Cat a Trick: In Five Easy Steps, published by Tundra Books in 2022. Nicola’s books have received numerous award nominations, including the Marylin Bailie Picture book award and the Governor General’s Award. CM Reviews called How to Teach Your Cat a Trick a “funny, sweet story that highlights what all cat owners know: cats will do what they want, when they want."

In our conversation, Nicola talks about the long gestation period of picture books, the social anxiety that makes her dislike making in-person author appearances, and her shift away from writing for children.

Nicola Winstanley: nicolawinstanley.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Cody Caetano. Cody is a writer and an off-reserve member of Pinaymootang First Nation. He also works as a literary agent at CookeMcDermid. Cody’s debut memoir, Half-Bads in White Regalia, was published Penguin Canada’s Hamish Hamilton imprint in 2023 and was a national bestseller. It won the 2023 Indigenous Voices Award for Best Published Prose, was shortlisted for the 2023 Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction, and was longlisted for the Toronto Book Award, the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour, and Canada Reads. It was named one of the best books of the year by The Globe and Mail and CBC Books.

The Toronto Star said about Half-Bads in White Regalia that “Caetano’s voice leaps off the page with a rhythmic, hip-hop style right from the first page.”

Cody and I talk about some of his pre-publishing jobs, and how they relate to his current ones, about how he handles being someone from a very different background than most people in the book world, and what it’s like to be a writer who is also an agent—someone who knows how the sausage gets made. 

Cody Caetano: codycaetano.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Claire Ross Dunn. Claire is not only a novelist, whose first book, At Last Count, was published in 2022 by Invisible Publishing, but also a story editor and producer for television, where she has worked on obscure little shows like Little Mosque on the Prairie and Degrassi: The Next Generation.

At Last Count was named a Best Book of 2022 by the Globe and Mail.

Claire and I talk about how she felt like a complete newbie shifting from the film-and-TV world to that of books, how she discovered many of the skills she learned in the former were transferable to the latter, and how an early success at getting Devo to play her high school pretty much set the pattern for her entire creative career.

Claire Ross Dunn: clairerossdunn.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode us Meg Remy. Meg is a multi-disciplinary artist and performer, primarily known as the creative force behind U.S. Girls. Her most recent album as U.S. Girls was Lives, a live record released in November 2023. Her first book, Begin By Telling, a kind of fragmentary and poetic memoir about abuse and trauma and sexual politics, was published by Book*Hug Press in 2021. In its review of Begin By Telling, Quill & Quire said the book “reminds us that the very act of telling one’s story can change one’s life.”

Meg and I talk about her love of collaboration, even in writing, about how, unlike with her albums as U.S. Girls, she wanted her book to go into the world on its own, and how the best reader response she got to the book was, by far, from her own mother.

Begin by Telling by Meg Remy (Book*Hug Press)

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Alison McCreesh. Alison is a writer, visual artist, and the creator of the graphic novels Ramshackle: A Yellowknife Story, which won the NorthWords Best Book Award, and Norths: Two Suitcases and a Stroller Around the Circumpolar World. Both books were published by Conundrum Press. Alison’s most recent book is the graphic memoir Degrees of Separation: A Decade North of 60, published by Conundrum earlier this year. Joe Sacco called Degrees of Separation a “tender and loving ode to the people and landscapes of the Far North.”

Alison and I talk about mostly eliding her artistic career in her own memoir, the miracle of family-friendly artist residencies, and the new graphic novel project she isn’t entirely sure she’ll ever complete.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Omar El Akkad. Omar is an author and celebrated journalist whose debut novel, American War, was published in 2017. It was an international bestseller, was translated into thirteen languages, and won the Pacific Northwest Booksellers’ Award, the Oregon Book Award for fiction, the Kobo Emerging Writer Prize as well as being nominated for nearly a dozen other awards. It was also a finalist on Canada Reads. His second and most recent novel, What Strange Paradise, was published in 2021 by McClelland & Stewart in Canada. It won the Giller Prize, The Pacific Northwest Book Award, and landed on the shortlist for many other awards. It, too, was a finalist on Canada Reads. In its review, which Omar mentions in our conversation, the New York Times Book Review said that What Strange Paradise “deserves to be an instant classic.”

Omar and I talk about the three unpublished novels he wrote before American War, about the fact that, though he is very grateful for the success he has had so far, he still feels some nostalgic for the years he spent writing those unpublished novels, and about a recent creative writing retreat, his first, that was a disaster of nearly novelistic proportions.

Omar El Akkad: omarelakkad.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer. Kathryn is the author of the novels All the Broken Things, Perfecting, and The Nettle Spinner, as well as the story collection, Way Up, which won the Danuta Gleed Award. Her work has been published in Granta Magazine, Maclean’s Magazine, The Walrus, Joyland, This Magazine, and elsewhere. Her fiction has won a Danuta Gleed Award and been nominated for The Amazon First Novel Award, the Toronto Book Award, CBC Canada Reads, and the Relit Award. 

Kathryn’s most recent book is Wait Softly Brother, which was published by Wolsak & Wynn in 2023 and was longlisted for the Giller Prize. The Toronto Star said that Wait Softly Brother is “rich with the true stuff of imagined lives, and the imagined stuff of true lives,” and “is a glorious enchantment indeed.”

Kathryn and I talk about how the enormous emotional, existential, and even geographic changes she has gone through in past decade have impacted her writing—for the better—about how Wait Softly Brother came out of a very public writing experiment after she started to think her career was over, and about her compulsive need to transform every experience into the seed for more writing.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Scott Chantler. Scott is the creator of multiple graphic novels for both adults and young readers, including Northwest Passage, Two Generals, which was voted by CBC's Canada Reads as one of the 40 best Canadian non-fiction books of all time, the Three Thieves series (winner of the Joe Shuster Award for Best Comic for Kids), and Bix. He has been the illustrator for many other graphic novels and comic books, and has served as Cartoonist-in-Residence at the University of Windsor, the first cartoonist to be appointed to such a position by a Canadian university. Scott’s most recent book is Squire & Knight, published by First Second in 2023. Kirkus Reviews said that Squire & Knight "subverts typical fairy-tale tropes with dry humour” and says the book is “compelling and full of adventure, with a plot as clever as its main character."

Scott and I talk about bringing Three Thieves back into print after falling out with that series’s original publisher, about how the upcoming sequel to Squire & Knight might be the end of that series, unless he changes his mind—he also talks about how he’s not great at longterm career planning—and about how he want to focus on work that is darker and more adult than what he is best known for.

Scott Chantler: scottchantler.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Harley Rustad. Harley is an award-winning and bestselling author, journalist, and a senior editor at The Walrus magazine. Harley’s first book was Big Lonely Doug: The Story of One of Canada’s Last Great Trees, published by House of Anansi in 2018. His most recent book is Lost in the Valley of Death: A Story of Obsession and Danger in the Himalayas, published in 2022 by Knopf Canada and by Harper US. Lost in the Valley of Death won the 2023 Poland Mountain Literature Festival Award for Best Non-Fiction Book and the 2023 Religion News Association Award for Nonfiction Books. The CBC named it one of the best Canadian nonfiction books of 2022. In its feature review of the book, the New York Times said that “In prose that moves like a clear river... Rustad has done what the best storytellers do: tried to track the story to its last twig and then stepped aside.”

Harley and I talk about why he chose to narrate the audiobook for Lost in the Valley of Death himself, what it was like to find himself on the cover over the New York Times Book Review, and why he has had such a hard time letting go of this story and starting a new book.

Harley Rustad: harleyrustad.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is... me. That’s because my most recent novel, Lump, was published exactly one year ago this week by the Rare Machines imprint of Dundurn Press, so I am officially in WHAT HAPPENED NEXT territory.

My guest interviewer on this episode is Julie S. Lalonde. Julie is an internationally recognized women’s rights advocate and public educator. Her book Resilience is Futile: The Life and Death and Life of Julie S. Lalonde was published by Between the Lines in 2020. It was named one of the best books of the year by CBC Books and the Hill Times and won the 2020 Ontario Speaker’s award. It also won an Independent Publisher Book Award in 2021. (In addition to all that, Julie was the very first guest I had on this podcast.)

Julie and I talk about the differences between publishing your first book and publishing your third, how to deal with other authors sucking up all the sales and attention, and the author I consider my dream-get for this podcast.

Julie S. Lalonde: yellowmanteau.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Rollie Pemberton. Rollie is a writer, rapper, producer, poet and activist who performs under the name Cadence Weapon. His album Parallel World won the 2021 Polaris Music Prize and his writing has been published in Pitchfork, The Guardian, Wired, Toronto Life, and Hazlitt. Rollie has also acted as Poet Laureate for his hometown of Edmonton, Alberta. He also recently released a song and a video celebrating that city’s hockey team and its run for the Stanley Cup. Rollie’s debut book is the memoir Bedroom Rapper: Cadence Weapon on Hip-Hop, Resistance and Surviving the Music Industry, which was published by McClelland & Stewart in 2022.

The Toronto Star called Bedroom Rapper “an intriguing window into a creative mind that takes creativity and the constant betterment of that creativity very seriously.”

Rollie and I talk about his relentlessly curatorial approach to art and the world, about the need for more and better artistic criticism, and about why he thinks books and writing will soon eclipse music as his central creative pursuit.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Hannah Green. Hannah is a writer as well as the poetry editor at the literary journal CV2. Her debut collection, Xanax Cowboy, was published by House of Anansi in 2023 and won the Governor General's Literary Award for Poetry. In its starred review of the book, Quill & Quire called the book “timely and witty” and said “it leaves nothing off stage, hides nothing.”

Hannah and I take about a photo from her book launch that went viral, about writing poetry before and after getting sober, and about the unexpectedly long break from writing she took after finishing Xanax Cowboy.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guests on this episode are Daniel Innes and Christina Wong. Daniel is an artist whose work includes painting, art installation, graphic and textile design, and illustration. He currently divides his time between Toronto and an artist residency in Hyōgo, Japan. Christina is an author, playwright, and multidisciplinary artist whose plays have been performed at Factory Studio, Theatre Passe Muraille Backspace, and the Palmerston Library Theatre, and whose writing has appeared in TOK Magazine and the Toronto Star. Daniel and Christina’s first book collaboration is the graphic novel Denison Avenue, which was published by ECW Press in 2023 and was a finalist on Canada Reads and for a Carnegie Medal for Excellence through the American Library Association. In its review of the book, The New York Journal of Books said that “as Chinatowns all over the country become gentrified and disappear, Denison Avenue provides an important reminder of what is being lost.” 

Daniel and Christina and I talk about the shock of their book’s success, about getting advice on surviving the Canada Reads experience from former Calgary mayor Naheed Nenshi, and about changing up their creative process for their next collaboration, currently in the works.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Denise Da Costa. Denise is an author and visual artist who studied Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia and is an alumna of the Humber School of Writers and the Diaspora Dialogues mentorship program. Her debut novel, And the Walls Came Down, was published in 2023 by Dundurn Press. Author Zalika Reid-Benta called And the Walls Came Down  “a beautiful exploration of memory and perception and will linger in the minds of readers long after they’ve finished."

Denise and I talk about how she learned the public side of being a writer reciting poetry in church as a child, how her colleagues in the corporate sales world reacted to the launch of her first book, and how she is looking forward to having written and published enough books that she starts to forget what’s in each of them.

Denise Da Costa: denisedacostaauthor.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Anuja Varghese. Anuja is a writer whose debut book, the short-story collection Chrysalis, was published by House of Anansi Press in 2023. That book won the Writers Trust of Canada Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ2S+ Emerging Writers, the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction, and the Hamilton Literary Award for Fiction. It was also nominated for a Rakuten Kobo Emerging Writer Prize and the Carol Shields Prize for Fiction. Quill & Quire said that “every piece in Chrysalis is as subtle and punchy as the eponymous final story. Varghese’s women are like her words: brutal, elegant, and resonant."

Anuja and I talk about Hamilton, Ontario’s weirdly tight-knit literary scene, about the manuscript for Chrysalis initially meeting with only rejection and silence from publishers, and about dealing with audiences and readers who have trouble with some of the more graphic material in that book.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Mark Pupo. Mark is a writer and editor who was a senior editor at Toronto Life magazine, and was their food writer for many years. Mark has also served as a senior editor at Chatelaine magazine, the director of Special Projects at Macleans magazine, and was the editor in chief at Reader’s Digest Canada. Mark’s first book is Sundays: A Celebration of Breakfast and Family in 52 Essential Recipes, which is both a cookbook and a memoir about Mark’s life with his neurodivergent son, Sam. It was published in 2023 by the Appetite by Random House imprint of Penguin Random House of Canada. Author John Birdsall called Sundays ”a quietly powerful testament to the power of a chosen family.”

Mark and I talk about how the book that he, his agent, and his publisher thought he was going to write was not a memoir at all, about how he, a lifelong words-on-a-page person, found he kind of enjoyed doing the rounds of morning TV, and about the oddest promotion he did for the book, which involved Wonder bread and the set of the show Reacher.

Mark Pupo: markpupo.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Derek McCormack. Derek is the author of more than a dozen books, including Dark Rides, The Haunted Hillbilly, and The Well-Dressed Wound. He has written frequently about fashion and art for places like Artforum and The Believer, and was a regular fashion writer for the National Post. His most recent book is Judy Blame’s Obituary: Writings on Fashion and Death, a collection of his fashion writing published in 2022 by Pilot Press. The Heavy Feather Review called Judy Blame’s Obituary “a furious haberdashery of [McCormack’s] own shining and ghostly obsessions. When writing about fashion, McCormack is writing about his life.”

Derek and I talk about his complicated literary reputation, about writers needing to fight against their natural desire for attention and acceptance, and, not uncoincidentally, about publishing a novel with a title I am too boring and polite to say out loud on a podcast.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Anita Lahey. Anita is the author of six books, including The Mystery Shopping Cart: Essays on Poetry and Culture and two poetry collections: Spinning Side Kick and Out to Dry in Cape Breton and a the memoir The Last Goldfish, which was a finalist for the Ottawa Book Award. She is also an award-winning magazine journalist, and she serves as the series editor of the annual Best Canadian Poetry anthology. Anita’s most recent two books were both published in 2023: Fire Monster, a poetic graphic novel collaboration with artist Pauline Conley, was published by Palimpsest Press. And While Supplies Last, a poetry collection published by the Signal Editions imprint of Véhicule Press. Author Luke Hathaway called Fire Monster “a gift of storytelling” and a “work of grace,” while poet Molly Peacock called While Supplies Last "capacious, generous, and gently funny.”

Anita and I talk about why she maintains a very limited online presence these days, how her journalistic instincts intersect with her poetic impulses, and, on that topic, how she turned a series of COVID-era radio traffic reports into verse.

Anita Lahey: anitalahey.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Randy Boyagoda. Randy is the author of six books, including the novels Governor of the Northern Province, Beggar’s Feast, and Original Prin, and a scholarly biography of Richard John Neuhaus. His work has been nominated for the Giller Prize and for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Prize. He frequently writes for the New York Times, the Atlantic, the Walrus, Financial Times and Guardian, as well as many other places. He is former President of PEN Canada and is currently a member of The Walrus Educational Review Committee and a professor at the University of Toronto, where he is also a Vice-Dean in the Faculty of Arts and Science

Randy’s most recent novel, Dante’s Indiana, was published by Biblioasis in 2021. The Wall Street Journal said that the novel “juxtaposes the ridiculous and the sublime—fitting as both an homage to Dante and a portrayal of America.”

Randy and I talk about why he consciously shifted his fiction away from sprawling, multi-generational novels of immigration toward more pointed social satire, why he had to take time off from his day job, during a critical time at work, in order to complete the edits on Dante’s Indiana, even though he knew that meant it would be published in the middle of a pandemic, and why he has no real plans – yet - to complete the trilogy that began with Original Prin and Dante’s Indiana. We also talk about the cultural and social significance of... pickleball.

Dante's Indiana at Biblioasis.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Terry Fallis. Terry’s first novel, The Best Laid Plans, which began as a podcast and was initially self-published, won the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour and was re-published by McClelland & Stewart in 2008. That book went on to win the 2011 edition of Canada Reads and was adapted as a CBC Television series and a stage musical. His next two novels, The High Road and Up and Down, were finalists for the Leacock Medal. And In 2015, he won the prize a second time, for his fourth book, No Relation. His other novels include Poles Apart, One Brother Shy, Albatross, and Operation Angus, and were all national bestsellers. Terry’s most recent novel is A New Season, which was published by McClelland & Stewart in 2023. In its review of A New Season, The Winnipeg Free Press said, “It’s about grief, friendship, family and, most of all, love, with humour taking a backseat for a change.”

Terry and I talk about those early days of podcasting, about why, given all his success, he only recently retired from his day job to focus on writing full time, and about how readers and critics very often mistake comic novels for frivolous ones.

Terry Fallis: terryfallis.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Ivan Lesay. Ivan is a senior climate finance advisor at the National Bank of Slovakia and has served as the State Secretary of that country’s Finance Ministry. In addition to his policy work, he has published two children’s books, and writes lyrics for a hardcore band. His debut novel for adults, Topografia bolesti, was published in 2020, and was shortlisted for the Slovak National Book of the Year award. An English translation of the novel, The Topography of Pain, translated by Jonathan Gresty, was published by Canada’s Guernica Editions in 2024. In its review of The Topography of Pain, The Miramichi Reader said that “Lesay is comfortable with data and figures, no doubt; he’s also gifted with words.”

Ivan and I talk about the (mostly) friendly rivalry between Slovaks and Czechs, and how that parallels Canada’s relationship with the US, about suddenly adding a side-career as a novelist to his distinguished work in economic policy, and about how, thanks to COVID, his novel never got a proper launch event until the publication of the translated version last year.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Peter Darbyshire. Peter is an author, journalist, and communications professional whose debut novel, Please, won the KM Hunter Award for Best Emerging Artist and the ReLit Award for Best Novel. He is also the author of the novel The Warhol Gang and the story collection Has the World Ended Yet? He works as Communications Officer for BC’s Provincial Health Services Authority.

I’m doing something slightly different in this episode, because Peter actually has three books that are about to be published: The Mona Lisa Sacrifice, The Dead Hamlets and The Apocalypse Ark, which are all part of his Cross series of supernatural thrillers. All three books are being published in October by Wolsak & Wynn. However, all three were previously published by another indie press in 2013, 2015, and 2016, respectively. The Vancouver Sun said, in its review of the Cross series, that Darbyshire “writes with the unfettered delight of a gluttonous reader trapped in a library in his own mind, drawing promiscuously from myth, folk tale, religious texts and apocrypha, literature, music and philosophy.”

Peter and I talk about how running the COVID-19 social media response for a provincial health authority gave him a new perspective on the apocalypse, about the process of getting the Cross series reprinted—and why it needed to be—and about how the stretch of time since his last new work of fiction speaks to something of a crisis of faith when it comes to his own writing‑but also a sense of liberation.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Sheung-King. Sheung-King’s debut novel, You Are Eating an Orange. You Are Naked, was published by Book*Hug Press in 2021, and was a finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award for Fiction and the Amazon Canada First Novel Award. It was longlisted for Canada Reads and named one of the best book debuts by the Globe and Mail. His most recent book is the novel Batshit Seven, published by Penguin Canada in 2024. That book was named a book of the year by the Globe and Mail and by the CBC, and was the winner of the Writers' Trust Atwood Gibson Fiction Prize. The Toronto Star called Batshit Seven “a highly unusual, highly effective examination of both contemporary society and the quest for identity.”

Sheung-King and I talk about his state of mind the morning after winning the Atwood-Gibson prize, about some of the best writing advice he ever got, and about living in both Canada and China, and always feeling like a returnee no matter which country he is in.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Shashi Bhat. Shashi the author of the novels The Most Precious Substance on Earth, a finalist for the Governor General's Award, and The Family Took Shape, a finalist for the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award. Her fiction has won the Writers’ Trust/McClelland & Stewart Journey Prize and been shortlisted for a National Magazine Award and the RBC Bronwen Wallace Award for Emerging Writers. She is the editor-in-chief of EVENT magazine and teaches creative writing at Douglas College. Shashi’s most recent book is the story collection Death by a Thousand Cuts, published by McClelland & Stewart in 2024. That book was longlisted for the  Giller Prize and was named a book of the year by the Globe and Mail, Apple Canada, and the CBC. Author Liz Harmer said about the book that “Shashi Bhat writes scenes of contemporary life with such wit and aplomb you almost don’t realize they’ve also broken your heart.”

Shashi and I talk about how her writing style has grown both darker and more overtly humorous, the pressures she has felt about the kinds of stories that she, as a woman from a South Asian family, was supposed to write, and about her enduring love for short fiction.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Amy Stuart. Amy is the author of four bestselling novels, including her first, Still Mine, and her most recent, A Death at the Party, which was published in 2023. Her most recent book is Home and Away, a memoir by former Toronto Maple Leafs captain Mats Sundin, which she co-wrote with Sundin. That book was published by Simon & Schuster Canada in 2024, and was an instant #1 bestseller. Sundin’s fellow player Tie Domi said about the book that “it’s a treat to hear Mats tell his story after all these years.”

Amy and I talk about the very out-of-character way she landed the job of co-writing the Mats Sundin book, about the newfound attention it has brought her when she coaches hockey, and about the impact it has had on the way she thinks about her career as a thriller writer.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Andrew F Sullivan. Andrew is the author of the novel WASTE, a Globe & Mail Best Book of the Year, and the short story collection All We Want is Everything, also a Globe & Mail Best Book of the Year and finalist for the ReLit Award. Andrew’s most recent two books are the novels The Marigold, published by ECW Press in Spring 2023, a finalist for the Aurora Awards and the Locus Awards, and named a Best Book of the Year by Esquire, The Verge, Book Riot and the Winnipeg Free Press, and The Handyman Method, which he cowrote with Nick Cutter, and which was published by Simon & Schuster in Fall 2023.

Book List called The Handyman Method “a terrific horror novel, with a spellbinding story full of surprises and superb writing that is vivid, visceral, and, at times, darkly beautiful.” Publishers Weekly said about The Marigold that “this impressively bleak vision of the near future is as grotesquely amusing as it is grim.” 

Andrew and I talk about how grateful he is for the amount of attention The Marigold has received, but also how he worked his ass off and was very strategic about ensuring it had a chance to get that attention, also the enormous difference between publishing with an indie press like ECW and with a multinational like Simon & Schuster, and how nearly burnt himself out promoting two novels in one year.

Andrew F. Sullivan: andrewfsullivan.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Liz Harmer. Liz is a writer, editor, and teacher whose first novel, The Amateurs was published in 2018 by Knopf Canada and was a finalist for the Amazon First Novel Award. In 2019, Liz was a Bread Loaf fellow and the runner-up to the Mitchell Prize in Poetry. She has won a National Magazine Award in Personal Journalism, was a finalist for the Journey Prize, and has been shortlisted for the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction. Her work has also been included in the annual Best Canadian Stories anthology. She currently teaches Creative Writing at Chapman University in California. Her most recent novel, Strange Loops, was published by Knopf Canada in 2023. Author Iain Reid called Strange Loops "Lean and enthralling,” and "a story that burns with intensity and daring."

Liz and I talk about the strangeness of being a Canadian writer in the US, about the occasional conflicts between her literary life and her academic life—but also where those two nourish each other—and about the novel she wrote in the third grade.

Liz Harmer: lizharmer.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Hiromi Goto. Hiromi’s first novel, Chorus of Mushrooms, won the 1995 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book, was the co-winner of the Canada-Japan Book Award. Her second adult novel, The Kappa Child, won the 2001 James Tiptree Jr. Memorial Award. She has published multiple novels for adults and children, as well as a book of poetry, and a collection of short stories. She has also won The Sunburst Award and the Carl Brandon Parallax Award.

Hiromi's most recent book, Shadow Life—her first graphic novel, created with artist Ann Xu—was published by First Second Books in 2021. Shadow Life won the 2022 Asian/Pacific American Literature Award for Adult Fiction and was nominated for a 2022 GLAAD Media Award and an LA Times Book Prize. The New York Public Library also declared it one of the best books of 2021. Publishers Weekly, in its review of Shadow Life, said: “this wry genre-bending graphic novel …delves into aging, independence, lost love, and mortality with a whimsy that doesn’t undercut its literary heft.”

Hiromi and I talk about her current situation in which she finds herself unable to read and write barely at all, and about the work she is doing as a part-time farmhand that, even if it doesn’t help her get writing again, is doing some good and necessary things for her soul.

Hiromi Goto: hiromigoto.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Dimitri Nasrallah. Dimitri is the author of four novels, which have received nominations for multiple awards and have won the Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction and the McAuslan First Book Prize. His most recent book is the novel Hotline, published in 2022 by Véhicule Press, where Dimitri also serves as the fiction editor. Hotline was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and was a Canada Reads selection in 2023. In its review of Hotline, Quill & Quire said the the novel “intertwines hope and sorrow to create a moving story that sears the heart.”

Dimitri and I talk about how working as an editor changed the way he writes novels, and how his plan to keep Hotline alive in readers’ minds beyond the usual 5 or 6 weeks after publication got blown up, in a good way, by Canada Reads. We also talk about some of the frustrations he felt about how Hotline was discussed on Canada Reads, and how he is in no rush to complete the follow up to that novel.

Dimitri Nasrallah: vehiculepress.com

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Jordan Abel. Jordan is the author of The Place of Scraps (which won the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize), Un/inhabited, Injun (winner of the Griffin Poetry Prize) and NISHGA, which won the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize and the VMI Betsy Warland Between Genres award and was a finalist for the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction, the Wilfrid Eggleston Award for Nonfiction, and the Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize. Jordan is an Associate Professor in the Department of English and Film Studies at the University of Alberta where he teaches Indigenous Literatures, Research-Creation, and Creative Writing.

Jordan’s most recent book is Empty Spaces, which was published by McClelland & Stewart in 2023, and was shortlisted for the Amazon First Novel Award. In its review of Empty Spaces, the Boston Globe called it “a singular, incantatory work.”

Jordan and I talk about how being in academia has enriched his creative work, and why, all the same, he doesn’t always feel he belongs there, and about how he was shocked that his agent and publisher would take a chance on a book as strange and difficult as Empty Spaces, and about how odd it is that his published work to date has been so dark and serious, when he doesn’t see himself that way at all. (We do a lot of laughing in this episode, FYI.)

Empty Spaces by Jordan Abel at Penguin Random House Canada.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

Contact Nathan Whitlock at nathanwhitlock.ca/contact

My guest on this episode is Margaret MacMillan. Margaret is a historian and author whose bestselling books include The War That Ended Peace; Nixon and Mao; Women of the Raj; and Paris 1919. She is emeritus professor of History at the University of Toronto, where she served as Provost of Trinity College, and an emeritus professor of International History at Oxford University, where she served as Warden of St Antony’s College. Her work has won numerous awards, including the Samuel Johnson Prize, the PEN Hessell-Tiltman Prize, a Governor General's Literary Award, and the Duff Cooper Prize. In 2015 she was made a Companion of the Order of Canada. Her most recent book, War: How Conflict Shaped Us, was published by Allen Lane in 2020 and was a finalist for the Lionel Gelber Prize. The Guardian called War a “hugely readable chronicle of conflict.”

Margaret and I talk about the current alarming state of international relations, about her drive to write historical works that can be read and understood by non-historians, and about the Canadian short-story writer whose biography she would love to write.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Deborah Dundas. Deborah is a writer and journalist who has worked as a television producer and as the Books Editor for the Toronto Star, where she is currently an opinion editor. Her work has appeared in numerous publications, including Maclean’s, the Globe and Mail, the National Post, Canadian Notes and Queries, the Belfast Telegraph, and the Sunday Independent. She also teaches Creative Non-Fiction at the University of Toronto School of Continuing Studies. Deborah’s first book is On Class, which was published by Biblioasis Books in 2023. That book was A Hamilton Review of Books Best Book of 2023 and was shortlisted for the 2024 Speaker’s Book Award. The Winnipeg Free Press called On Class “a nifty, provocative little book.”

Deborah and I talk about her work on the most picked-over and discussed literary story of the decade, which are the revelations about the late Alice Munro and her family, and about how she initially wanted to say no to working on that story. We talk about some of the progress and great conversations about class she has seen witnessed publishing her book, and how she feels just a little less like an outsider in Canada’s literary culture.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Josh O’Kane. Josh is a reporter at the Globe and Mail whose first book, Nowhere With You: The East Coast Anthems of Joel Plaskett, The Emergency and Thrush Hermit was published by ECW Press and was a Canadian bestseller. Josh’s most recent book, Sideways: The City Google Couldn’t Buy, was published by Random House Canada in 2022. It was a national bestseller and a finalist for numerous Canadian and international literary awards, including the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing, the National Business Book Award, the Ontario Speaker’s Book Award, the Heritage Toronto Book Award, and the Best in Business Book Award from the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing. It was named one of the best books of 2022 by The Globe and Mail, CBC, The Hill Times and more. The book was also adapted for the stage by Toronto’s Crow’s Theatre and Michael Healey as The Master Plan. Margaret O’Mara, author of The Code, called Sideways “a thrill ride of a book, revealing what really happened when Google tried to build a city and Silicon Valley’s magical thinking fell to earth.”

Josh and I talk about the extremely unequal distribution of wealth in arts and culture (one his main beats as a reporter), the strangeness of seeing your deeply reported journalistic work become a hit play that features a talking tree, and the wait for the next big book-worthy idea.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Michael Christie. Michael is the author of the 2012 story collection, The Beggar's Garden, which was longlisted for the Giller Prize, shortlisted for the Writers' Trust Prize for Fiction, and won the Vancouver Book Award. His 2015 novel If I Fall, If I Die was also longlisted for the Giller Prize, as well as the Kirkus Prize, and was selected as a New York Times Editors' Choice Pick, and was on numerous best-of-the-year lists. His essays and book reviews have appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Globe & Mail. Michael’s most recent novel is Greenwood, which was published in 2019 by McClelland & Stewart. That books was a national bestseller and won the Le Prix du Livre de Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines and the 2020 Arthur Ellis Award for Excellence in Canadian Crime Writing. It was also shortlisted for the 2020 Forest of Reading Evergreen Award, the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize, and the Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize, and longlisted for the Giller Prize, and was a 2023 Canada Reads Finalist. The New York Times Book Review called Greenwood “superb” and said it “penetrates to the core of things.”

Michael and I talk about how his writing career has been influenced by his previous semi-pro skateboarding career, about converting Greenwood into a TV series, and about how while working on his new novel, he had to resist the temptation to copy the narrative formula that had worked so well in Greenwood.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

My guest on this episode is Christine Estima. Christine is a journalist, author, and performer whose work has appeared in the New York Times, the Walrus, VICE, the Globe and Mail, Chatelaine, Maisonneuve, and elsewhere. She was shortlisted for the 2018 Allan Slaight Prize for Journalism, longlisted for the 2015 CBC Canada Writes Creative Nonfiction prize, and was a finalist for the 2011 Writers’ Union of Canada short prose competition. She’s also been a contestant on reality TV competition… twice!

Christine’s debut book is The Syrian Ladies Benevolent Society, published by House of Anansi Press in 2023 and included in the CBC’s list of Best Canadian Fiction for that year. Maisonneuve said that the book “weaves a haunting tale of how the pain of loss … reverberates across generations."

Christine and I talk about dealing with sexist idiots, about how she uses moments of rejection to propel her forward in her writing and her career, and about her new book, a fictional take on a notorious and tragic literary relationship.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.