What do YOU want? Give us YOUR feedback & win free books!
On May 20, I launched my new live podcast show, Writers Revealed. I was terrified. What if I sounded like a complete idiot? What if I loused up the interviews? What if no one listened? What if no one cared? As my friend drove me to the Valley for my first studio show, I almost had a panic attack in the car. I gave serious consideration to jumping out of said car and walking down PCH, all the way home to New York. But after some stammering, some lame questions, some incessant use of “sort of” and “you know”, two months later I’m at the point where I feel comfortable on the radio and even more excited to spread the word on the books for which I’m most passionate.
In late August of 2000, I sat on a lawn with a crop of writers talking about our favorite books and authors. We were first year graduate students in the Columbia Writing program attending an incredibly awkward social mixer. I had come from a world of investment banking and corporate finance, and for me, literature was all about the dead. No Moodys, Minots, Fords or Cunnighams. These were not names in my vocabulary. So when I prattled off my list of favorite authors: Virginia Woolf, John Cheever, Ernest Hemingway, etc, etc, some bespeckled, unshaven idiot smirked. But what about authors now? Contemporary authors. He said these words to me as if I were a small retarded child. I stammered and replied Bret Easton Ellis.
Crickets. Tumbleweed. A lone fiddle.
Since then I vowed to never make anyone feel like an idiot because they’re not familiar with X hot author or Y hot book. Because on that day, on that wide expanse of green, I felt like a fool and considered taking my deposit and bolting to the 116th Street train station. But that is a whole other lamentation for another time.
A few years later, I had dinner with a group of friends and the subject drifted to The Hours (the film adaptation of Michael Cunningham’s novel), and one of my friends, a brilliant pediatrician, confessed she didn’t know of this Virginia Woolf. I started to do that twitching thing with my brow - shocked. The words how do you not know… started to pour out until a collective sea of hands were raised. Don’t go there, Felicia, they all said. I was a specialist who became an asshole for judging a friend who didn’t know about a writer I assumed the whole world should have heard of, should have consumed such an important body of work. Then my friends asked if I knew about this important court decision, or that tort law or that landmark article in the Harvard Medical Review and whatnot, and I shook my head no, of course not, and they said exactly. We don’t judge you because you don’t know about our field so don’t judge us.
And suddenly I made my friend feel like that girl on the lawn. That girl who was intimidated when she walked into a bookstore, who feared overly verbose ivy league hipsters who studied 14th century Peruvian poets in their spare time.
So I asked my friends why they don’t read literary fiction and some of them responded with the time issue - they have none of it - while others said that they were overwhelmed upon walking into Barnes and Noble and only picked up books that were recommended by friends or the safe staff picks. And a few others said candidly, you writers take yourselves way too seriously. They felt literary fiction was an exclusive club for which they were denied entrance. And after a conversation with a friend, an idea for a show started to brew.
And after having an incoherent phone conversation (me causing the incoherence) with another friend, my friend paused me mid-rant and said you want to do for books what Julia Child did for French cooking and I said YES! YES! YES!
So Writers Revealed was borne. Anyone who is remotely interested in picking up a book could learn about great stories, participate in virtual book clubs and score some free books - all from the convenience of their home.
And I’m continually challenged. I continually have to remind myself of the audience and create an environment where I’m serious about books but I don’t take them and myself too seriously. I’m conscious about the authors I book and the books I want to promote. I want to get the word out all over the web about what I’m trying to do. What I’ve been doing the past six years with my literary journal, but now with the volume turned way up and for a wider audience.
So this is where you come in. This is my show schedule. I’m booking a monthly virtual book club. I’m contacting all sorts of bloggers. But what do you want?! What’s missing? What needs to be done? How could I make the experience of sharing my favorite books with you that much more exciting? What’s your feedback? What do you want to hear? What kinds of authors do you want on the show? Do you want live chats? More book clubs? More interviews, articles, etc?
Be candid, honest, because this show is for you! Leave your feedback in the comments section and five winners will score 20 NEW BOOKS! Literary fiction, non fiction, design, cookbooks, etc. Primo books, great authors. You will not be disappointed.
Winners will be selected on August 1, 2007
I think more interviews and more books!
three cheers!
i’d love to get inside jonathan franzen’s head.
The more interviews and live chats the better IMHO. Avoid pretensions and when reviewing fiction please remember to always lead off with a medium length plot summary.
Hey Felicia - it’s Poet from the NowLive chat
When it comes to suggestions, I have a couple:
1) Usually, you talk with more than one author at a time. While this format works in person, I think it can get a bit confusing when everyone’s on the phone or on GoogleTalk. So, maybe you should just talk one on one with each author for an allotted period of time for each show? Example: 2 authors, 30 mins each.
2) Speaking of how long the show is, I really think that it would be fun to have the show be either two hours long, or have one show on Sunday and another show on another day of the week, which is what some of the other NowLive hosts do. That way, there won’t be that sense of having to rush through interviews, and it allows more opportunity for listeners to call in.
3) I think it would be interesting to have authors on who have done biographies on famous people. It really could lead to an interesting discussion in regard to how the public and private lives of a famous person result in a written biography, and how literature cements public perceptions of famous people.
I love your show, it’s my favorite one on NowLive! Keep up the excellent work
I would definitely like more chats with the authors. A fun format might be an interview with the author and then an open Q&A. Usually when I listen to podcasts/calls my attention span wanes after about 30 mins. I think a chat would allow us more interaction with the author. More virtual book clubs goes in line with the chats too–either more virtual book clubs or more slots I guess.
I’m fairly new to your site and haven’t explored everything yet.
Great comments, everyone! Much appreciated.
Alison, I agree with you 100%. Having multiple guests are confusing and taxing on me. If you look at the schedule, it’s pretty much one author/chat, and if not, I’m giving the author a 1/2 hr slot.
Re: more air dates. I’m working on that
As the show grows, I’ll feel comfortable taking on more folks to help out with content. As it might be difficult to balance a full-time job with reading all of these amazing books. But I hear you. More chats!!!
Thanks, everyone! Keep ‘em coming!
Cheers, Felicia
What do I want? The best of everything for everybody.
What do I want in the realm of the literary? More literary and less anti-intellectualism. More novels and fewer memoirs. More poetry and less politics. More discussion and less ranting.
Amen.
Great idea. Demystifying how stories are created is a good way to get more people excited about books. I’d love lots of interviews with writers which focus on the writing process. It’s unimportant whether or not the writers are famous, or whether or not they have many years of experience–it’s their thinking that’s interesting.
What would be interesting to hear about is the process writers went through after college, in that murky period before being published or deciding on grad school or deciding to give it a go. There are so many different paths one can take to become a hip modern writer, and it would be something really helpful to hear for recent college grads like myself.
What a great idea. I love the Julia Child analogy. Why expect Public Radio to do all the heavy lifting? As a reader, I love hearing this sort of expansive and focused and smart conversation. As a writer, I recognize what a wonderful opportunity you are creating to introduce books and authors to potential readers like your friends — people who are smart, educated, and probably receptive, but for all kinds of reasons (and that’s a worthy ongoing conversation in itself), they’re not contemporarily literate people.
A few suggestions:
1) Invite ethnic authors i.e. Indian, Asian, African-American etc. I would like to hear from a diverse group of authors.
2) Make up a newsletter that can be sent through an email list. It can detail upcoming events, books, new releases etc.
3) Invite indie authors-the writers who publish their own zine, book or magazine.
4) Keep the monthly virtual book club, live chats during the show and giving the audience a chance to ask questions. You are definitely keeping your audience involved with the show and I love that.
Your doing a great job!! I listen every Sunday, keep up the good work!
LaToya,
I couldn’t agree with you more on point #1 and I am definitely working on it!!! Thanks for the great feedback!
Cheers, Felicia
I listen every Sunday and I love the show. It might be nice to also interview authors that have written books on writing too. I just finished a book by Ariel Gore that was called How to Become a Famous Writer Before You’re Dead: Your Words in Print and Your Name in Lights. Also, maybe interview people with zines such as yourself.
I want you to have *me* on your show.
Also, as one who has always been interested in world lit, it’d be interesting to hear from some translators, perhaps along with the authors whose work they translated.
Love the site so far! I think more info for aspiring writers would be wonderful. Also, do you think you would ever do anything aimed at young adults / teens wanting to be writers? Alot of us homeschool or do young adult creative writing classes, and it would be great to have a special segment geared at young adults entering the great big world of authoring. I would surely know of some up-and-coming young authors who would listen in!
The site looks great — I LOVE the pear-lightbulb and I love the show. My only suggestion that’s not simply a copy of what’s been said before is to give the readers notice. That is, maybe tell the audience via the show and the website who is coming in and when, and provide a place on the website for readers to suggest questions. It’d give people and even better reason to tune in and if a reader had a burning question for a particular author…
no fresh ideas here — just a “hooray!” for such a nifty blog/podcast concept.
Karen,
on the website. When we introduce next week’s guests on the website, we ask for comments or questions in the blog post (giving an incentive of winning a copy of the book). Hope that clarifies!
Thanks for the comments!! We actually do alert folks on upcoming authors. Every monday we announce next week’s guests (here on the blog), we also announce the following week’s guests live on the show and we also have the schedule posted
Cheers, Felicia
I think this is brilliant and I will support your efforts every way I can by listening, reading, and telling everyone I know about this. My feedback? I think you need to bear down as hard as possible on the question of who you which to reach and how you can best serve them. Who is your audience? Are you really trying to reach people like the brilliant pediatrician friend you mention above? Then I agree with Katharine Weber–this is a much-needed enterprise. In order to do this, I think you have to focus on what those sorts of people are really interested in learning about books and authors–and I’m not sure many of us inside this business always have a very good grasp on that question. But I do believe that this broader audience’s interests–whatever they are–are not necessarily always the same as the interests of people who themselves are writers, or aspiring writers. However, it’s more than likely that those latter groups might comprise a more impassioned potential core audience for this effort. If you are serious about reaching the increasing numbers of intelligent/serious people who don’t read as much as those of us in this business wish they did, then you may have to steer away from some of the suggestions offered here that, to my eyes at least, appear more focused on serving the interests and curiosity of the zealous few–such as devoting more bandwidth to things like zines, getting published, writers’ careers, writers’ bios, etc. To me, the success of this effort depends on everyone involved acknowledging that a different sort of effort may now be required to reach potential readers who, for now at least, are not sufficiently compelled to look into contemporary writing. I think this likely means overcoming traditional squeamishness about courting audience. I’d like to see/hear writers and interviewers directly engaging the subject of how writers’ work addresses the broader world (that world in which those potential readers reside)–why they do the work they do, what they’re trying to do with their work, and how they’re trying to do it. And why it matters to all of us.
I would like every show to be a theme show. For example, this week, we’re gonna go literary. Now, this week, we’ll do chick lit. The next week, YA books, etc. etc.
Also, learning more about how the writers write is endlessly fascinating to me, especially how they get through bumpy parts of the road.
Hearing their publisher talk about what made them want to sign on that particular writer.
Though the interviews should be different, every writer should be asked some of the same questions on every show, like “What was the moment that made you decide you had to be a writer?” “Most rewarding fan mail?” etc, etc.
Previews of new work would be nice. Like they can read something they are working on, which no one else has gotten to hear yet. Or we can read an excerpt of it online.
And fans should get a chance to come up with some questions for the writers.
That’s all I have, off the top of my head. Hope it helps.
Oh, I’m gonna add one more thing. It’s sometimes a bit intimidating for someone who has dial-up–*cough* me *cough*–to download a whole hour of show. Breaking it up into five minute highlights might bring more listeners in who have dial up.
Doug,
Fantastic point - one to which I’ve given a great deal of thought. Although I love writers (I am one!), the show is primarily positioned to the reader (of course that’s not to say that writers aren’t readers, but I’m looking to capture the attention of my pediatrician friend). There are so many wonderful and informative magazines, zines, blogs, websites, books, etc, geared towards writers (anything from instructional information to interviews that would interest the more “inner” circle) and while I love those sites and conversations and feel they are critical for a particular kind of audience, the primary audience and the show I want to produce for that audience is a bit different.
But since I’m chatting with authors, my hope is that writers will listen in as well, but it’ll be a different kind of conversation - one geared towards the story and bringing it into a larger context rather than the mechanics of writing and storytelling (again, something as a writer I’m incredibly interested in, but for this particular venture, not something I’m aiming to pursue).
Again, what I’m aiming for is my pediatrician friend. How do i get her and the vast amount of other folks who are not up on the minutia of the publishing industry and all the books of the moment and key players - how do I get them just as passionate about the books and stories that excite me?
Great comments, everyone! Much, much appreciated.
Cheers, Felicia
Gena,
Thanks for the note! Fans are actually encouraged to submit questions. When the show material for the following week is posted, readers are invited to submit their questions (it’s on the bottom of each week’s post) or share their experiences. I usually offer up a free book if I use their question on the show.
On air, we also encourage folks to phone in with their question or chat with us on the Now Live chat boards.
Thanks for the wonderful input, however!!!
Cheers, Felicia
Well, this is my first visit here… but I have been really happy to recieve books to review on my blog from you. I think it’s a wonderful way to get the word out about new books, and it has certainly given me a chance to read things I may have not picked up otherwise.
So, in short, I think that you are doing great!
I love the idea of having a publisher’s perspective included in the mix. Oh and live chats just make my heart flutter.
I think the whole idea is amazing, and I’m interested in the books you’ve profiled so far - basically just keep up the good work! My only suggestion (and not much of one, at that, since it’s basically what you’re already doing!) would be that I am utterly nosy and love hearing about how authors write (in spurts, on a schedule, knowing the ending already, etc.), what they read, what they do when they aren’t writing - I love to peel back and see the private life and what makes them tick.
Hi Felicia–
I like the book club idea. I might jump in! As far as genre, I enjoy non-fiction, especially memoir and interesting history (I liked the Worst Hard Time and am contemplating 1776). I also like self-helpish type books on women’s issues and parenting and marriage.
Interviews are good, especially if the insight with the author leads me to get more info on the book.
I am not as widely read in fiction, but always enjoy hearing about what’s hot or new.
yeah, just one author would be less confusing.
Sophie should guest interview! (Kidding. Maybe)
Well, I also love hearing how/why/when/where authors write…I think this also appeals to the non-writers, as it takes some of the mystery or the feeling of something being “too literary” out of the equation. I love bio info on the authors, how their life has influenced their work, etc.
Thanks for the great show!
Jasmin,
Don’t you dare think that the thought of little Sophie as a co-host hasn’t crossed my mind!
Cheers, f.
Tara,
Great point!
Cheers, f.
I’d like to see interviews and feature that challenge the way books are typically categorized: chick lit, African-American fiction, sci-fi, etc. There are so many authosrs who routinely cross these “bounderies” but marketing often doesn’t acknowledge this and readers miss out on titles they might really enjoy.
I have to agree with Doug Seibold 100%. I’ve been in almost the reverse position to yours with regard to my knowledge of great fiction. I’ve been fairly diligent in keeping up with newer fiction, but my exposure to and understanding of some of the older works falls short. To Doug’s point, if you stick with your pediatrician as your target audience, you can’t go wrong. Aspiring novelists (myself included) have plenty of places to look to for publishing business insight, but to my knowledge, the only place to go for a deeper understanding of, exposure to and appreciation of fiction is the Lit Blogs. As great a source of information as they are, and as much as many of them bemoan the fate of literary fiction, not a few are written in a way that feels pretty exclusionary to the non-critic. Creating a forum to demystify and expose readers to great fiction and fiction writers and make it as accessible to everyone as it really should be is the best idea for a blog I’ve seen — ever. The only additional suggestion I have is with regard to fiction that’s not new. Interviewing a reviewer/essayist like Scott Esposito from Conversational Reading (or any of them) would be a great way to introduce contemporary fiction readers to writers like Virginia Woolf, William Gaddis, John Gardner, William Faulkner and others. This is a wonderful idea and I’m glad I found you.
Writers Revealed sounds wonderful! I’m new to your site but I always enjoy hearing about the process of writing and how writers deal with success and failure and the struggle of publication. I’d also enjoy YA and children’s authors and I prefer fiction and poetry over non-fiction. Great idea - hope it catches on.
More interviews would be great.
[…] when I posted a call for suggestions on how Writers Revealed can be even better? Well, you responded! Thank you for your advice, candor and suggestions. The winners of the contest […]