Books on the Bed

This week we visit with Michael Amos Cody in Johnson City, Tennessee. 

Michael Amos Cody was born in the South Carolina Lowcountry and raised in the North Carolina highlands. He spent his twenties writing songs in Nashville and his thirties in school. He’s the author of the nov...

This week we visit with Nic Brown in Clemson, South Carolina. 

Nic Brown is a writer and a musician. He has published several books, including the memoir Bang Bang Crash (Counterpoint 2023), which was named a book of the year by Library Journal and Booklist, and the novels In Every Way (Counterpoint 2015), Doubles (Counterpoint 2010), and Floodmarkers (Counterpoint 2009), which was selected as an E...

This week we visit with Toni Jensen in Springdale, Arkansas. 

Toni Jensen’s Carry is a memoir-in-essays about gun violence, land and Indigenous women’s lives (Ballantine 2020). An NEA Creative Writing Fellowship recipient in 2020, Jensen's essays have appeared in Orion, Catapultand Ecotone. She is also the author of the short story collection From the Hilltop. She teaches at the University of Arkansas and the Institute of American ...

This week we visit with Damon Young in his hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Pittsburgh writer DAMON YOUNG’s debut memoir, What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker: A Memoir in Essays (Ecco), won the Thurber Prize for American Humor. His new book, That's How They Get You: An Unruly Anthology of Black American Humor released on June 3rd, 2025. A founder of the culture blog Very Smart Brothas and creator and host of the Crooked Me...

This week we visit with Kevin Brockmeier in his hometown of Little Rock, Arkansas. 

In addition to his latest book, The Ghost Variations: One Hundred Stories, Kevin Brockmeier is the author of the novels The Illumination, The Brief History of the Dead, and The Truth About Celia; the story collections Things That Fall from the Sky and The View from the Seventh Layer; the children’s novels City of Names and Grooves: A Kind of Mystery...

This week we visit with Jen Fawkes in her hometown of Little Rock, Arkansas. 

Jen Fawkes is the author of Daughters of Chaos, a literary alternate history in which a female Union spy discovers a secret society of magical women that spans millennia. Pulitzer Prize finalist Kelly Link called Daughters of Chaos "ferociously, radiantly compelling," and according to Publishers Weekly's starred rev...

This week we visit with Amy Le Ann Richardson in Carter County, Kentucky.

Amy Le Ann Richardson earned an MFA in Creative Writing from Spalding University (‘09) and is the author of two poetry chapbooks, Make Believe Worlds We Built Together (Bottlecap Press, 2023) and Who You Grow Into (Finishing Line Press, 2024), as well as a full collection, Out of Pl...

This week we visit with Kristen Renee Miller in Louisville, Kentucky.

KRISTEN RENEE MILLER is the director and editor-in-chief at Sarabande Books. An award-winning poet and translator, she is a 2023 NEA Fellow and the translator of two books from the French by Ilnu Nation poet Marie-Andrée Gill. She is the recipient of honors from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, AIGA, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Gu...

This week we visit with Isa Arsén in San Antonio, Texas.

Isa Arsén is a certified bleeding heart based in South Texas, where she lives with her spouse and a comically small dog.

Her work has been featured in Stone of Madness Press, The McNeese Review, and several independent anthologies and audiovisual projects. Her novels include SHOOT THE MOON (Putnam, 2023), and THE UNBECOMING OF MARGARET WOLF (Putnam, 2025). When not wrangling ...

This week we visit with Naomi Shihab Nye in San Antonio, Texas.

Naomi Shihab Nye describes herself as a “wandering poet.” She has spent more than 40 years traveling the country and the world to lead writing workshops and inspiring students of all ages. Nye was born to a Palestinian father and an American mother and grew up in St. Louis, Jerusalem, and San Antonio. Drawing on her Palestinian-American heritage, the cultural diversity...

This week we visit with Elizabeth Crook in Austin, Texas. 

Elizabeth Crook is the author of six novels: The Raven’s Bride and Promised Lands, The Night Journal, Monday, Monday, The Which Way Tree, and The Madstone. In 2023 Elizabeth received the prestigious Texas Writer Award from the Texas Book Festival and in 2025 the Texas Medal of Arts in Literary Arts and the Texas Institute of Letters' prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award.

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This week we visit with Henry Wise in Staunton, Virginia.

Henry is a graduate of the Virginia Military Institute and the University of Mississippi MFA program. A writer across multiple genres, his poetry has been published in Shenandoah, Radar Poetry, Clackamas, Nixes Mate Review, and elsewhere. His nonfiction and photography have appeared in Southern Cultures. "Holy City" is his first novel.

For more on Henry: henrywise.com

Henry'...

This week we visit with Glenn Taylor in Morgantown, West Virginia.

Glenn Taylor’s fourth novel, "The Songs of Betty Baach" won the 2023 Juniper Prize in Fiction. His first novel, "The Ballad of Trenchmouth Taggart" was a finalist for the 2008 National Book Critics Circle Award. Glenn’s work has appeared in such venues as the Oxford American, The Guardian, Gulf Coast, and Huizache. Born and raised in Huntington, West Virginia, he no...

This week we visit with Ann Pancake in Reedsville, West Virginia. 

Ann Pancake grew up in Summersville and Romney, West Virginia and graduated from WVU with a Bachelor of Arts in English. After teaching English in Japan, American Samoa and Thailand, she earned a Masters degree in English from the University of North Carolina and a doctorate in English Literature from the University of Washington.

Pancake is—publicly and fervently—a...

This week we visit with Meredith McCarroll in Portland, Maine. 

Meredith McCarroll was born and raised in Waynesville, North Carolina. She is the author of “Unwhite: Appalachia, Race, and Film” (2018) and co-editor of “Appalachian Reckoning: A Region Responds to Hillbilly Elegy” (2019). She graduated from Appalachian State University, and later earned a Masters from Simmons Colleg...

This week we visit with Elizabeth Gonzalez James in Sharon, Massachusetts. 

Elizabeth Gonzalez James is a screenwriter and bestselling author of the novels, The Bullet Swallower and Mona at Sea, as well as the chapbook, Five Conversations About Peter Sellers. The Bullet Swallower was named a best book of 2024 by NPR, Esquire, and elsewhere, was a Book of the Month Club pick, and was featured on “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” ...

This week we visit with Rachel Beanland in Richmond, Virginia.

Rachel is the author of two novels, The House Is On Fire (Simon & Schuster, 2023) and Florence Adler Swims Forever (Simon & Schuster, 2020).

The House Is On Fire was selected as an Indie Next pick by the American Booksellers Association, a ‘GMA Buzz Pick’ by Good Morning America, a “most anticipated” book by the Washington Post, and one of the best books of 2023...

This week we visit Kristen Gentry in Louisville, Kentucky.

Kristen is the author of Mama Said, longlisted for the 2024 PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection. She received her M.F.A. from Indiana University. Her award-winning fiction has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and appeared in Electric Literature, Crab Orchard Review, and other journals. She is a VONA and Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference alumna, form...

This week we visit Gerry Wilson in Jackson, Mississippi.

A seventh generation Mississippian, Gerry Wilson grew up in the red clay hills of the north that she writes about in her debut novel, THAT PINSON GIRL, released by Regal House Publishing in February 2024. A story, “Tell Me Anything,” appeared in Persimmon Tree in June 2024. Another story, “A Language of Their Own,” was runner-up for The Porch F...