Non-fiction writer Joshua Jelly-Schapiro joins co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Christian Barter to talk about the life of performer and activist Harry Belafonte, who died in 2023.

Houston-based poet Lupe Mendez joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and Jennifer Maritza McCauley to discuss ICE raids, the killing of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, and the political climate in Texas heading into the midterms. Mendez details the last few minutes of Araujo’s life and talks about the government’s altered story of Araujo’s death. Mendez also explains why he decided to write about the Mexican community’s boycott of racist integration practices in Houston during the 1970s and his compulsion to write poetry in Spanish and English. Inspired by Ebony Stewart, Mendez talks about how his “artivism” intersected with his role as Texas Poet Laureate. Mendez reads from We Exist in the Whisper: Huelga School Verses and Prayer Holding Night: New & Selected Works.To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/This podcast is produced by Jennifer Maritza McCauley and Whitney Terrell.Lupe MendezWe Exist in the Whisper: Huelga School VersesPrayer Holding Night: New & Selected WorksWhy I Am Like TequilaOthersEbony Stewart Jasminne Mendez Librotraficante Tintero ProjectsLorenzo Salgado Araujo Chased the American Dream for 35 Years See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Artist and writer Molly Crabapple joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about the Jewish Labor Bund and its socialist, secular, anti-Zionist principles.

MLS commentator Nate Bukaty joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about Kansas City’s influence on American soccer and how the city came to host the World Cup.

Acclaimed nonfiction writer Peter Hessler joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about his new memoir, Other Rivers: A Chinese Education. Hessler, a New Yorker staff writer who first went to China as a teacher in the 1990s, explains how education there shifted between that era and 2019, when he returned to Sichuan Province with his wife and daughters to teach English again. He discusses the impact of his students’ shift from rural to urban lives, unpacks the differences between his twins’ schooling in Colorado and in China, and the relationship, in both places, to memorization, creativity, and authority. He also talks about keeping in touch with his students from the 1990s, many of whom became teachers, over decades. Hessler reads from Other Rivers.This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell.Peter HesslerOther Rivers: A Chinese EducationThe Buried: An Archaeology of the Egyptian RevolutionStrange Stones: Dispatches from East and WestCountry Driving: A Chinese Road TripOracle Bones: A Journey Through Time in ChinaRiver TownPeter Hessler Latest Articles | The New YorkerA Teacher in China Learns the Limits of Free Expression The Double Education of My Twins’ Chinese SchoolChina’s Shifting Relationship to the CountrysideChina’s Reform Generation Adapts to Life in the Middle ClassOthersStoner by John WilliamsGossip GirlJohn McPheeThe Grapes of Wrath by John SteinbeckEast of Eden by John SteinbeckKaroline Leavitt: This is a full-blown communist revolutionFactory Girls by Leslie T. Chang See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Young adult novelist Soman Chainani joins co-hosts Christian Barter and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss the impact of age on politics.

Journalist Matthew Wolfe joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new book Fires in the Night: The Earth Liberation Front, the FBI, and a Secret History of Eco-Sabotage.

Writer Deb Olin Unferth joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and Christian Barter to discuss the enduring power of apocalyptic narratives and her new novel Earth 7. The novel follows the life of Dylan, the daughter of a researcher, cast adrift on an earth that has been depopulated by war and environmental collapse. As Dylan’s mother tries to replicate and preserve the DNA of the earth’s now extinct flora and fauna, Unferth examines how proposed scientific solutions to global warming–like carbon capture, building artificial reefs, or shooting precious metals and sulfur into the sky–may exacerbate the problems they are meant to solve. She talks about the role apocalyptic narrative plays in a world that is, in many ways, already experiencing the apocalypse. She also reflects on her decision to “lean in” to the possibility of love and hope in the last third of the novel and explains how her optimism stems from the amazing beauty of the earth that we are living on now, even as we destroy it. She reads from Earth 7.Subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/This podcast is produced by Christian Barter and Whitney Terrell.Deb Olin UnferthEarth 7Barn 8Wait Till You See Me DanceI, ParrotOthers“The Second Coming”|William Butler Yeats“September 1, 1939” |W. H. Auden“Waking Early Sunday Morning” |Robert Lowell See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Novelist Ben Fountain joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new book, Rasputin Swims the Potomac.

Historian Sarah Pearsall joins co-hosts Jennifer Maritza McCauley and Whitney Terrell to discuss her new book, Freedom Round the Globe: a World History of the American Revolution.