Upstart Crow

Zach Powers -The Migraine Diaries: A singular, first-person novel.

Zach Powers – The Migraine Diaries: A singular, first-person novel. This story goes into the interior life of a thirty-something man who has just lost the best friend he ever had, a man he has known for ten years, a man he has seen most every day of those ten years as they pursued their separate creative projects and shared a social life, a man who knew to kick the narrator’s butt when it needed kicking and offer the right encouraging words when it was words and not a kick the narrator needed. All of that, suddenly gone. Told in the form of a headache journal, the novel renders the first year of loss starting with the beachside funeral/ash spreading of the friend’s remains, and captures the mix of headache hopelessness with the need to carry on, building to the final resolve. In this way, it is like life itself. Not all bleak. Filled with humor. Even offering moments of weirdness. Zach Powers is the author of the short story collection Gravity Changes, winner of the BOA Short Fiction Prize; and also a prior novel, First Cosmic Velocity, which combines history and fiction to look at the sham of the Soviet space program in 1964 and earlier. His writing also has appeared in American Short Fiction, Lit Hub, and other publications. He is the executive and artistic director of The Writer’s Center in Bethesda, Maryland, and Poet Lore, the nation’s oldest poetry journal. He is originally from Savannah, Georgia, and now lives in Arlington, Virginia. Hosted by William Miller EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS * Zach Powers discusses how The Migraine Diaries functions not just as a grief novel, but also as a chronic illness narrative and, most importantly, a story about friendship and surviving loss together. * The conversation explores the ethics of writing chronic illness narratives, especially avoiding the traditional “everything gets resolved” story arc that doesn’t reflect real-life experiences with migraines or grief. * Zach shares deeply personal inspirations behind the novel, including the deaths of close friends and his own struggles with chronic migraines, while emphasizing the book is fiction rather than autobiography. * A major theme of the interview is how friendship can become the emotional anchor of a story, sometimes even more powerful than romance. * Zach explains his fascination with experimental storytelling, layered narratives, fragmented structure, and allowing readers to interpret meaning rather than over-explaining themes. * The discussion dives into the surreal “corgi” sequences in The Migraine Diaries, which blend grief, hallucination, memory, and imagination into symbolic emotional journeys. * Zach reflects on his earlier novel First Cosmic Velocity and how his writing evolved from more traditional narrative structures into more expansive and unconventional literary forms. * The episode also explores Zach’s acclaimed short story collection Gravity Changes, including his philosophy that fiction does not need to explain every surreal or impossible element to the reader. “You don’t have to explain the sheep.” — Zach Powers on discovering the freedom of literary fiction and surreal storytelling. “The friendship aspect is the actual thing driving everything in the background — how to be a good friend and maintain that in the face of adversity.” Find out more about Zach Powers on his website [https://zachpowers.com]. This entire interview is also available to watch on our YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/@upstartcrowpodcast] channel. --- Recorded & Produced by Jon D PodCom Be sure to check out our website for more information about our hosts, guests, and ways you can support the show: UpstartCrow.org [https://upstartcrow.org/] Follow us on Facebook here [https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583417271723]. Thank you for listening to Upstart Crow, a part of Watershed Lit Radio. © 2026 - Upstart Crow Podcast – All Rights Reserved #LiteraryFiction #WritingCommunity #BookPodcast #AuthorInterview

Caroline Bicks – Monsters in the Archive: My Year of Fear with Stephen King

Caroline Bicks – Monsters in the Archive: My Year of Fear with Stephen King Monsters in the Archives – that’s the main title of Caroline Bicks’ latest book, which is based on her experience digging through the archives of manuscripts and margin notes, plus her own interviews and emails with him, to gather insights into the workings of the creative soul behind all those scary works. In the book, she paints a detailed portrait of Stephen King, how he has grown up as a person and as a writer, and how those two relate to each other; and how he sees not only his work but also himself. Here, she shares some of those insights in conversation with Upstart Crow host William Miller. Caroline Bicks studied Renaissance poetry as an undergrad at Harvard and then at Stanford she earned her Ph.D. in English literature. She was a tenured professor at Boston College when the Harold Alfond Foundation created the Stephen E. King Chair in Literature at the University of Maine. King, an alum of UMaine, was not part of creating the chair or scoping its mission, except he agreed to lend his name to it and, by doing so, he signaled support for its mission. The occupant of the King Chair is to support the public humanities. After Caroline Bicks became the inaugural occupant of the King chair, she moved from Boston to Maine, and began to bring award-winning writers and journalists, educators, and activists to speak and work with Maine communities. She also began to support the work of students in internships and research projects, to give talks around the state, and, of course, in more recent years, to spend time in King’s private archives looking at early drafts of some of his most iconic works and distill her take-aways into Monsters in the Archives: My Year of Fear with Stephen King. Her earlier books are Cognition and Girlhood in Shakespeare’s World and Midwiving Subjects in Shakespeare’s England. She co-authored Shakespeare Not Stirred: Cocktails for Your Everyday Dramas. She co-hosts the Everyday Shakespeare podcast. Her essays and humor have appeared in the Modern Love column of the New York Times, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency and the show Afterbirth. She lives in Blue Hill, Maine, with her family. “Present fears are less than horrible imaginings.” — Macbeth, explored here as the key to understanding why Stephen King’s stories stay with us. “It’s not really a vampire story. It’s about vulnerability.” — Caroline Bicks on the deeper emotional truth inside horror fiction. Stephen King calls Monsters in the Archive: My Year of Fear with Stephen King “the best book about my process that I have ever read.” Hosted by William Miller You can purchase a copy of Caroline's book, Monsters in the Archives: My Year of Fear with Stephen King and find out more information about her other writings at CarolineBicks.com [https://carolinebicks.com] EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS * Stephen King’s stories resonate because they tap into real human fears like grief, loss, and helplessness. * Horror works best when it reveals emotional truth, not just monsters or gore. * King is a meticulous reviser who carefully crafts language, sound, and pacing. * Shakespeare and King both explore ambition, trauma, fear, and the darkness within people. * Reading horror gives audiences a safer, more personal way to confront fear than film often can. * Vulnerability is at the heart of all great literature. * Caroline Bicks’ access to King’s archives reveals the serious craftsmanship behind his success. * Stephen King and Tabitha King are known for generosity and philanthropy beyond their literary legacy. #StephenKing #CarolineBicks #WritingCraft #LiteraryPodcast #UpstartCrow #WritersInterview This entire episode is also available for viewing on our YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/@upstartcrowpodcast] channel. --- Recorded & Produced by Jon D PodCom Be sure to check out our website for more information about our hosts, guests, and ways you can support the show: UpstartCrow.org [https://upstartcrow.org/] Follow us on Facebook here [https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583417271723]. Thank you for listening to Upstart Crow, a part of Watershed Lit Radio. © 2026 Upstart Crow Podcast – All Rights Reserved

Olufunke Grace Bankole - The Edge of Water

Olufunke Grace Bankole – The Edge of Water In an immigration novel not like others, a Nigerian daughter wants to try life in America, and so once more she enters the visa sweepstakes. Her mother says nothing, though she has been forewarned by a conduit of the oracle, “this time, the order of things will be shaken. The souls will lose their own way.” These are the tensions within Olfunke Grace Bankole’s first novel, The Edge of Water. There are matters here of faith in self and faith in matters larger than the self, as well as events that outstrip all planning and vision—including the failure to envision some real possibilities. What comes from this is a novel with a linear narrative constructed across an arc whose parts are anything but linear—where the whole is much greater than the sum of the parts. The Edge of Water was a finalist for the New American Voices Award given by the Institute for Immigration Research, which is presented at the Fall for the Book festival. Olufunke Grace Bankole is a Harvard-educated lawyer and recipient of the Soros Justice Advocacy Fellowship, and her original writing has appeared in Ploughshares, Glimmer Train, AGNI, Michigan Quarterly Review, New Letters, the Antioch Review and Stand. Her work won first place in the Glimmer Train Short Story Award for New Writers, and she was a Bread Loaf-Rona Jaffe Scholar in Fiction at the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. She also has been awarded an Oregon Literary Fellowship in Fiction, a Ludwig Vogelstein Foundation grant, a residency-fellowship from the Anderson Center at Tower View, and a Pushcart Special Mention for her writing. She lives in Portland, Oregon. Find out more about Grace on her website [https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=http://olufunkegracebankole.com/&ved=2ahUKEwiU0YTDm8uTAxV9EFkFHW1TMTIQFnoECCUQAQ&usg=AOvVaw0GDr027D5VKV2hWSwwItWQ]. Connect with Grace on Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/olufunke.grace.bankole/]. Purchase a copy of The Edge of Water on Bookshop.org [https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-edge-of-water-olufunke-grace-bankole/616533037d8b68f9?ean=9781963108057&next=t]. * A powerful exploration of fate vs free will, and how belief systems shape the choices we make. * Redefines “home” in immigrant stories—less about place, more about identity, community, and peace. * Moves beyond the typical American Dream narrative, showing the emotional and psychological realities of immigration. * Highlights women’s resilience and agency, especially within patriarchal and cultural expectations. * Examines how generational trauma and relationships between mothers and daughters shape identity. * Shows how small decisions during major life moments can completely alter someone’s path. * Blends spirituality, Yoruba tradition, and modern life, creating a layered, immersive world. “We like to think we’re in control—until life reminds us how much of it was never ours to decide.” - Olufunke Grace Bankole #UpstartCrowPodcast #BookPodcast #AuthorInterview #OlufunkeGraceBankole #TheEdgeOfWater #ImmigrantExperience #AfricanAuthors #WomenWriters #LiteraryFiction #BookRecommendations #ReadersOfInstagram #WritersOfInstagram #Storytelling #FateVsFreeWill #MotherDaughterStories This episode is also available for viewing on our YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/@upstartcrowpodcast] channel. --- Recorded & Produced by Jon D PodCom Be sure to check out our website for more information about our hosts, guests, and ways you can support the show: UpstartCrow.org [https://upstartcrow.org/] Follow us on Facebook here [https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583417271723]. Thank you for listening to Upstart Crow, a part of Watershed Lit Radio. © 2026 Upstart Crow Podcast – All Rights Reserved

Jung Yun - All the World Can Hold

Jung Yun – All the World Can Hold It is Sunday, Sept. 16, 2001. The Sunday after 9/11. Five days after the Tuesday when hijacked planes are flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon in DC, and a field in Pennsylvania. As searchers still comb through smoldering wreckage, a cruise ship that should have left from New York’s Passenger Ship Terminal in Manhattan instead sets off from Boston for a cruise to Bermuda. Aboard are more than 600 passengers, and in Jung Yun’s new novel, All the World Can Hold, we follow three passengers in particular. Three who, as they travel on this voyage that is anything but mundane, undergo experiences that will leave them never the same again. Jung Yun joins host William Miller to talk about the origins of the novel, her writing of it, her own insights into the characters, and how the book is different from yet similar to her previous two novels. Jung Yun was born in Seoul, Korea, and grew up in Fargo, North Dakota. Prior to All the World Can Hold, she published Shelter (2016) a finalist for the Barnes & Noble Great New Writers Award and also long-listed for the Center for Fiction’s First-Novel Prize; and O Beautiful (2021), a New York Times Editor’s Choice book as well as a Times Group Read book, and a San Francisco Chronicle Book of the Year choice. Currently, Jung Yun lives in Maryland and teaches in the George Washington University creative writing program. KEY TAKEAWAYS 1. Turning personal history into fiction Author Jung Yun discusses how her novel All the World Can Hold was inspired by her own experience taking a cruise shortly after the September 11 attacks. Rather than focusing directly on the tragedy, the novel explores how ordinary people process and move forward after a world-altering event. 2. A cruise ship as a literary “crucible” The story follows three strangers whose lives intersect aboard a cruise ship headed to Bermuda. By placing characters in an enclosed environment where they cannot escape their pasts or their choices, Yun builds tension and explores how people confront regret, ambition, and unresolved relationships. 3. Characters shaped by their own flaws and decisions Yun explains her fascination with flawed characters who carry the seeds of their own undoing. Across her novels—from Shelter to O Beautiful—she often writes about disasters people create for themselves and how those pressures reveal their deepest motivations. 4. Writing about disasters—personal and societal A recurring theme in Yun’s work is how individuals react when systems or circumstances collapse, whether it’s the housing crisis, an oil boom, or national trauma. Her stories focus less on the event itself and more on the human responses that follow. “I’m always writing about disaster… the disasters we create for ourselves and how people respond when you put them into these pressurized situations.” - Jung Yun #JungYun #AllTheWorldCanHold #AuthorInterview #LiteraryFiction #UpstartCrowPodcast Learn more about Jung Yun and her books here [https://jungyun.com]. Purchase a copy of All the World Can Hold or any of Jung's other books here [https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/All-the-World-Can-Hold/Jung-Yun/9781668200599]. This entire episode is available to view on our YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/@upstartcrowpodcast] channel. --- Recorded & Produced by Jon D PodCom Be sure to check out our website for more information about our hosts, guests, and ways you can support the show: UpstartCrow.org [https://upstartcrow.org/] Follow us on Facebook here [https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583417271723]. Thank you for listening to Upstart Crow, a part of Watershed Lit Radio. © 2026 Upstart Crow Podcast – All Rights Reserved

Cristina Jimenez - Dreaming of Home

Cristina Jimenez – Dreaming of Home The subtitle of Cristina Jimenez’s memoir is, “How we turn fear into pride, power, and real change.” In the book, she defines “home” as a place of self-acceptance, which was not an easy place for her to find after she, her parents and her brother, fled the chaos of her hometown in Ecuador and settled in New York in 1998. She tried to be a “good” immigrant, but because she was undocumented, what is sometimes called an “illegal” immigrant, it didn’t matter how hard she worked, how much she studied, how well she did in school, how observant she was about rules and regulations, she was not accepted, not acceptable. But she kept at it. She endured. She persevered. Dreaming of Home tells the story. Cristina Jimenez is the cofounder and, for a time, was executive director of United We Dream, the largest immigrant-youth-led organization in the country. She played a leading role in getting approval of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. She also received a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, was named to Time’s annual list of the 100 most influential people, and became a distinguished lecturer at City University of New York. With host William Miller, she discusses her memoir and the life experiences that led her to write it, including what it’s like to be an unwelcome immigrant, and what compelled her family to go to such a length. Find out more about Cristina Jimenez on her website [https://cristinajimenez.us]. This entire episode is also available to watch on our YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/@upstartcrowpodcast] channel. KEY TAKEAWAYS 1. The meaning of “home” goes beyond geography. Cristina Jimenez reflects on how immigrating from Ecuador forced her to rethink the concept of home. Over time she came to see home not just as a place, but as a sense of belonging found in community, self-acceptance, and the people who make you feel seen and valued. UC - Christina Jimenez 2. Personal stories are central to social movements. Cristina discusses how undocumented immigrant youth built a powerful movement by sharing their stories publicly, organizing together, and advocating for policy change—including helping push forward protections like DACA. 3. Economic and political forces often drive migration. Her family’s journey from Ecuador was shaped by poverty, political instability, and the influence of international corporate and political decisions that affected working-class families and forced many to leave their homes. 4. The U.S. economy relies heavily on immigrant labor. The conversation highlights the contradiction of industries depending on undocumented workers while those same workers face exploitation, wage theft, and the threat of deportation. #ImmigrantStories #ImmigrationPolicy #DreamingOfHome #SocialJusticeVoices #UpstartCrow #Author Podcast “HOME IS THE PLACE WHERE YOU CAN LOOK IN THE MIRROR AND LIKE WHAT YOU SEE.” --- Recorded & Produced by Jon D PodCom Be sure to check out our website for more information about our hosts, guests, and ways you can support the show: UpstartCrow.org [https://upstartcrow.org/] Follow us on Facebook here [https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583417271723]. Thank you for listening to Upstart Crow, a part of Watershed Lit Radio. © 2026 Upstart Crow Podcast – All Rights Reserved