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Caleb Baldwin Podcasts

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fiction/non/fiction

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Hosted by Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan, fiction/non/fiction interprets current events through the lens of literature, and features conversations with writers of all stripes, from novelists and poets to journalists and essayists.
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Graphic novelist Ben Passmore joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new graphic novel Black Arms To Hold You Up: A History of Black Resistance. Passmore explains the mix of personal reflection and historical storytelling in the book which follows the main character, a version of himself, time-traveling through a cent…
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New Yorker staff writer Jelani Cobb joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new essay collection, Three or More is a Riot: Notes on How We Got Here: 2012-2025. Cobb recalls how he began the project by trying to understand how George Zimmerman’s killing of unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in 2012 set the tone for t…
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Acclaimed fiction writer and essayist Edwidge Danticat joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss her new essay collection We’re Alone. Danticat reflects on misinformation and xenophobic rhetoric, such as Trump’s false 2024 debate claim about Haitian immigrants eating pets in Springfield, Ohio, and how that type of language a…
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Fiction writer Yiming Ma joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new novel These Memories Do Not Belong To Us. Ma, who was born in Shanghai and visited China frequently after immigrating to the U.S. and Canada, talks about how terrifyingly easy it can be to live in a society in which censorship is the default, and the …
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Journalist Caleb Gayle joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new book Black Moses: A Saga of Ambition and the Fight for a Black State, which recounts the efforts of Edward McCabe, a Black settler who became a prominent politician in the late 1800s and spearheaded a mission to establish a majority-Black state in the A…
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Writer Omar El Akkad joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his recent nonfiction book, One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, which was just nominated for the National Book Award in nonfiction. El Akkad talks about developing the arc of the book, which addresses how Israel’s genocide in Gaza led to his “br…
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Novelist Jessica Francis Kane joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss her new novel Fonseca, which fictionalizes writer Penelope Fitzgerald’s 1952 trip to Mexico. Kane talks about imagining Fitzgerald in her mid-thirties, before she had become a novelist, when she was living a financially precarious life and editing a jour…
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Fiction writer and editor Patrick Ryan joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his debut novel, Buckeye, which traces two generations of two Midwestern families connected by a secret. Ryan recalls the coincidental conversation that informed his portrayal of one character’s experiences with disability in World War II-era Oh…
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New York Times book critics Jennifer Szalai and Alexandra Jacobs join co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss their recent article, “Love Jack Kerouac? Read These Great American Road Trip Books Next,” which they co-authored with their fellow critic Dwight Garner, and which includes books published after Kerouac's On the Road. Th…
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Biographer Nicholas Boggs joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his groundbreaking new book, Baldwin: A Love Story, the first major biography of James Baldwin to be published in three decades. Boggs recalls how finding Baldwin’s only children’s book in a Yale library as a college student led him to track down the volume’…
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Journalist Will Bardenwerper joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new book, Homestand: Small Town Baseball and the Fight for the Soul of America, which explores the consequences of Major League Baseball cutting 40 affiliated minor league teams, each one only as expensive as an average Major League salary. He explain…
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Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Barbara Kingsolver joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss her support of Higher Ground, a long-term residence for women recovering from addiction. Kingsolver talks about Lee County, Virginia, which is both Higher Ground’s location and the setting for her wildly successful novel Demon Copper…
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Vanity Fair journalist Dan Adler joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his coverage of Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted in 2021 of facilitating Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse of minors. Adler explains how Maxwell, who is currently serving a 20-year sentence and was just interviewed by the Department of Justice, has r…
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Acclaimed novelist Gary Shteyngart joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new novel, Vera, or Faith, which explores American identity, politics, and immigrant experiences in the near future through the eyes of the eponymous 10-year-old protagonist. Shteyngart talks about the novel’s speculative “Five-Three” amendment,…
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Pulitzer Prize finalist Ed Park joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his debut short story collection, An Oral History of Atlantis. Park talks about writing the stories in the book over a period of about 25 years, during which he was frequently asked to read in New York and crafted work for specific venues, audiences, a…
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Writer Raina Lipsitz joins co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss Zohran Mamdani’s surprise win in the Democratic primary for New York City mayor. Lipsitz explains how Mamdani, a 33-year-old Muslim politician supported by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), appealed to a wide swath of voters to upset three-term governor…
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Prize-winning Iranian American author Dina Nayeri joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss the complicated reality of survival on the ground during Israel’s recent bombing of Iran. Nayeri talks about the destruction leveled on Ardestoon, where her father’s family lives; her memories of running for bomb shelters during the I…
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New York Times reporter Ernesto Londoño joins co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss the recent murder of Minnesota state representative Melissa Hortman, which has made headlines as local politicians in the U.S. are rarely targeted for assassination. Londoño describes how a gunman posing as law enforcement went to the homes of …
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Writer Geoff Dyer joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new memoir Homework, which covers Dyer’s working-class youth in England during the 1960s and ’70s. He recollects his early passion for reading and film and reflects on writing about his parents, as well as the intensity of childhood play and collecting in the wa…
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Fiction writer Jess Walter joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new novel So Far Gone, in which a former environmental reporter living off the grid is jolted back onto it by the surprise arrival of his two grandchildren and news of his missing daughter. Walter talks about developing the character of his protagonist’…
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Acclaimed fiction writer Susan Choi joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss her new novel, Flashlight. Choi talks about the opening incident, in which a girl goes for a walk on the beach in Japan with her father only for him to disappear, presumably drowned. Choi explains the novel’s relationship to a short story she publi…
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Nonfiction writer Paul Elie joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to discuss his new book The Last Supper: Art, Faith, Sex, and Controversy in the 1980s and Pope Leo XIV. Elie compares the new pope to John Paul II, whose conservative views shaped the 1980s. He explains how and why ’80s artists like Andy Warhol, U2, and Bob Dylan pr…
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Fiction writer Julia Elliott joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V Ganeshananthan to talk about why President Trump’s tariff policy appeals to voters in small towns in the Midwest and South, which have been economically devastated for the past couple of decades following the North American Free Trade Agreement. Elliott considers Democrats’ failure…
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Novelist and journalist Mirza Waheed joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V Ganeshananthan to talk about brewing tensions between two nuclear powers: India and Pakistan. Waheed, who was born in Kashmir and previously worked as a journalist, explains how the recent massacre of Indian tourists there at the hands of militants connects to a broader con…
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Writer Hamilton Nolan joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V Ganeshananthan to talk about opinion journalism. Nolan, who writes frequently about labor and politics, discusses how and why he entered journalism, the myth of objectivity, and how he views the relationship between activism and journalism. He explains how long it took for him to make mon…
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South African writer Rešoketšwe Manenzhe joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about the influence that wealthy South African immigrants like Elon Musk and Peter Thiel are having on the Trump administration and conservative U.S. politics in general. Manenzhe talks about how growing up under apartheid may have shaped these m…
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Following Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s widely publicized and false claims about autism, writer Jodie Hare joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V Ganeshananthan to talk about the politics of neurodiversity and the importance of autistic communities. Hare, who was diagnosed as autistic in adulthood, explains how the …
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Acclaimed novelist and journalist Vauhini Vara joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V Ganeshananthan to discuss her new essay collection, Searches: Selfhood in the Digital Age. Vara talks about the rise of the loser tech bro, internet privacy, Google search logs, the power and limits of turning one’s collected personal data into art, and whether a …
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Following ICE’s detention of Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil and the sudden revocation of hundreds of student visas across the country, professor and novelist Sheila Sundar joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about the targeting of international university students, especially those involved in pro-Pal…
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Essayist, poet, and Yale Review editor Meghan O’Rourke joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about her recent New York Times piece, “The End of the University as We Know It.” O’Rourke discusses the situation at Columbia University; the Trump administration’s attacks on other universities, including the threats to deport int…
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Novelist Alex Higley joins host V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about his new novel, True Failure, in which a man fired from his job decides not to tell his wife what happened and attempts to change his fortunes by applying to join the cast of a Shark Tank-like show. Higley discusses how he experiences the news in Trump 2.0; lying as avoidance and as e…
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Novelist, memoirist and biographer Edmund White joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about his recent book, The Loves of My Life: A Sex Memoir. White talks about the changes he has witnessed the LGBTQ+ community go through over the years and the hostility the transgender population faces under the Trump-Vance regime. He di…
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Bestselling fiction writer Curtis Sittenfeld joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about her new collection of stories, Show Don’t Tell. Sittenfeld discusses the title story, which depicts graduate students in creative writing competing for funding, and its connections to her time at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, when that pr…
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Professor Karen Weingarten joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about a new anthology she has edited, Abortion Stories: American Literature Before Roe v. Wade. Weingarten reflects on the complicated history of abortion, the varied use of abortifacients, abortion’s ties to eugenics and state control of bodies, and the rise …
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Canadian authors Suzette Mayr and Kai Thomas join co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss the repercussions of President Trump’s recent threats to annex and tax Canada. They talk about the possible empowerment of the Canadian right as a result of Trump’s extreme remarks, as well as measures their communities are taking to unify …
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New York Times reporter Nicholas Fandos, author of a recent article titled “An Emboldened Trump Seeks to Bend New York City to His Will,” joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about why President Trump wants to dismiss corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams. Officials in Trump’s Department of Justice say …
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New Atlantic staff writers Ashley Parker and Michael Scherer, authors of a recent article called “The Tech Oligarchy Arrives,” join host Whitney Terrell to talk about tech oligarchs’ influence over President Trump’s administration. They discuss the significance of prominent billionaires like Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos attending Trump’s inaugura…
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Essayist Thomas Dai joins co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss his new collection, Take My Name But Say It Slow, in which he writes about place and identity. Dai talks about the imperialist impulse behind Trump’s attempt to turn the Gulf of Mexico into the “Gulf of America,” the power of naming, and the appeal and uncertainty…
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Acclaimed novelist and Director of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop Lan Samantha Chang joins Fiction/Non/Fiction hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss the role that literary personas may–or may not–have played in recent revelations about Alice Munro, Neil Gaiman, and Cormac McCarthy. Chang discusses how writers often develop literary p…
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Novelist and former Huffington Post climate reporter Sarah S. Grossman joins Fiction/Non/Fiction co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to talk about the Los Angeles wildfires. Grossman, who lives in Los Angeles and whose 2024 novel A Fire So Wild centers on a wildfire in Northern California, discusses how communities are coming together …
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Acclaimed novelist Charles Baxter joins Fiction/Non/Fiction hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss his recent novel Blood Test: A Comedy. Baxter talks about turning to humor in dark times, the burden of expectations, and writing a protagonist, Brock Hobson, who some readers love and others detest. He discusses how seeing websites …
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Following the ouster of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, novelist Ream Shukairy joins Fiction/Non/Fiction co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss the country’s future. Shukairy, who grew up in California and spent summers in Syria, reflects on the long history of Syrian resistance to oppression, as well as how parts of h…
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Novelist Jacinda Townsend and writer James Bernard Short join co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about the movie American Fiction, which is based on the novel Erasure by Percival Everett. Townsend and Short discuss how the film addresses race in the publishing industry via its central character, Black author Thelonious “Monk” …
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In this holiday re-broadcast, Romance novelists Elle Everhart and Ellie Palmer join co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to talk about the genre’s increasing popularity. Everhart, the London-based author of the new book Hot Summer, featuring a protagonist who joins the cast of a reality show only to realize she’s interested in a fellow …
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Nearly three years after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, journalists and podcasters Tetyana Ogarkova and Volodymyr Yermolenko return to Fiction/Non/Fiction to tell hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell how Ukrainians view Donald Trump’s return to power in the U.S. They talk about the situation at the frontlines, the consequences of delayed ai…
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ProPublica reporter Molly Redden joins co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss her recent piece on impoundment, Donald Trump’s strategy to thwart Congressional spending priorities. Redden talks about how the presidential budget and Congressional appropriations work now, Trump’s claim that he has the authority to ignore what Cong…
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Writer and podcaster Carvell Wallace joins co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss finding his way to the understanding that life is lived on a continuum and is not made up of neat endings and beginnings. He talks about how his childhood experiences with poverty, housing insecurity, and a frustrated creative genius of a single m…
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Following Donald Trump’s dinner at Mar-A-Lago with Ye (formerly Kanye West) and white supremacist Nick Fuentes, novelist Michael Knight joins hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to talk about the best and worst dinner parties in literature. They discuss the pressures of hosting, what makes someone a great guest, signature dishes, post-par…
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Writer Ruben Reyes Jr. joins co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss the Trump administration’s plans for mass deportation. Reyes explains how deportation could affect families or households with different immigration statuses, including those here through Deferred Action Childhood Arrival (commonly known as DACA) and with Tempo…
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In the wake of the election, writer Maggie Tokuda-Hall joins co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss what Project 2025 has in store for authors and book bans. Tokuda-Hall explains Project 2025’s misuse of terms like “critical race theory” and “pornography” and how these will be used to attack mainstream content, especially mater…
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