A Novel Idea

Risky authors play with form and defy easy description, and this is the case with two authors who through their radical storytelling take us on a good ride, but with something sound and poignant underlying. The Seep is an alien life form that comes to inhabit humanity in Chana Porter’s quasi-utopian, surreal fantasy, The Seep. Thomas E. Cochrane, a noted geologist has taken a turn into fiction with his twisted detective novel, Entwined.  Join Suzanne M Lang in conversation with playwright and novelist Chana Porter, as well as Thomas E. Cochrane, Sunday, August 2nd at 10 am PT. It’s A Novel Idea on KRCB Northern California Public Media, streaming at undefined.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

(Photos: Courtesy of the author)

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Food and family sustain us, especially during trying times. We celebrate this with two award-winning authors in conversation with Suzanne M. Lang.  Meera Ekkanath Klein has just released “Seeing Ceremony -A Novel in Recipes”, a follow-up to “My Mother’s Kitchen -A Novel in Recipes”, both coming of age novels set in Southern India featuring its climate, color, traditions, and recipes!

Carole Bumpus takes us to another continent in “Searching for Family and Traditions at the French Table, Book Two”, a companion to Book One, and a memoir (with recipes) of her travels that were the basis of her awarding winning novel “A Cup of Redemption”. Exotic places and good food, it’s A Novel Idea.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

(Photos: Courtesy of the authors)

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Our stories are important. It is our stories that connect us. So says Caitlin Hamilton Summie, author of To Lay to Rest our Ghosts, a remarkable and moving collection of 10 stories that reveal the complexity of our families and relationships, and the influence of place -all with finely rendered prose that stirs and lingers. Caitlin has a full literary life as an author and as co-owner of Caitlin Hamilton Marketing & Publicity. She has represented many authors over her long career and her book is a revelation. Caitlin joins Suzanne M. Lang in conversation, Sunday, June 7th, 10 am PT.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

(Photo: Courtesy of the author)

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White people kill black people. Despite Emancipation, despite the Civil Rights movement of now over fifty years ago, white people still kill African Americans in cold blood. In 1919 in the state of Arkansas in the fertile area of the Mississippi River, in a town called Elaine over the course of a couple of days, over 100 African Americans were slaughtered, as well as five white men in what came to be known as the Elaine Race Massacre.  Damaged Heritage: the Elaine Race Massacre and a Story of Reconciliation is J. Chester Johnson’s historical memoir that tells of that ugly spell of history and takes us further on his own journey of reconciliation with his own family’s participation in those events of a century ago. Suzanne M. Lang talks with Johnson on KRCB’s A Novel Idea.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

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Suzanne M. Lang welcomes Barbara L. Baer in conversation on her latest novel, The Ice Palace Waltz, the multi-generational saga of two Jewish immigrant families—the western pioneers of Leadville Colorado and the smooth ‘our crowd’ New Yorkers, who come together amid the financial and social turmoil of early 20th Century America. Barbara is a journalist, a book publisher (Floreant Press), and author of three previous novels. It’s KRCB’s A Novel Idea, Sunday, May 3rd, at 10am.

www.barbarlbaer.com

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

(Photos courtesy of the author)

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Namwali Serpell is an Associate Professor at UC Berkeley and a well-published cultural critic who has now released an epic novel of Zambia; it is sweeping in scope, wildly imaginative, and grounded in the place along the Zambezi River called The Old Drift Suzanne M. Lang talks with Namwali about it all.

Also featured is Martin Puchner, Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Harvard University, a Guggenheim Fellow, and literary scholar takes us from Homer to Harry Potter in his exciting look at how the written word has created us, socially, spiritually, and economically in his book The Written World, The Power of Stories to Shape People, History, and Civilization.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

(All photos courtesy of authors)

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Suzanne M. Lang talks with two authors whose novels reflect on gender and family, race and ethnicity, and the effects of heritage on American culture

Margaret Wilkerson Sexton talks about her NAACP Image Award-winning novel The Revisioners, a multi-generational story set in Louisiana that is real and magical all at once. Suzanne also talks with Jessica Winters Mireles, author of Lost in Oaxaca, a novel of cross-cultural identity and discovery.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

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Try to Get Lost!  We continue celebrating the work of Joan Frank. We recently featured her book of four novellas, Where You’re All Going. Now we travel with her in Try to Get Lost, Essays on Travel and Place. This is no ordinary “travel writing”, but a journey into who Joan is and who we are as travelers in space and time. Joan Frank joins Suzanne M. Lang in conversation.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

(Photo: Try to Get Lost, cover art – Courtesy of the author)

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This week on A Novel Idea, richly drawn characters, vivid language, and compelling pace and story create the most satisfying literary experience for readers, and this is what Joan Frank always delivers. Suzanne M. Lang welcomes Joan’s wit and insight, and her luscious conversation on her recent book, Where You’re All Going -Four Novellas.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

(Photos: Courtesy of the author)

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Death and dementia aren’t all that funny, but really, sometimes they are, especially when we open ourselves up to the conversation.  Journalist Susan Swartz has published her first novel, Laughing in the Dark, that is all about navigating life’s challenges in the company of friends and family. Suzanne Lang talks with Swartz and also talks with Tess Lorraine, a Death Dula who facilitates the Speaking of Death Cafes in Sonoma County.  Sunday at 10am. It’s a Novel Idea.

A Novel Idea airs on the first and fifth Sundays of every month at 10:00 am on KRCB-FM Radio 91 / streaming @ norcalpublicmedia.org /Download the FREE KRCB mobile app @ iTunes & Google Play!

(Photo: Courtesy of the author)

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