Dave Itzkoff: "Robin" - A Biography of Robin Willams

This is the fifty-third episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is journalist, broadcaster, and New York Times Best Selling writer Joan Lunden. We spoke with her via Zoom in October of 2020 about her newest book "Why Did I Come Into This Room?: A Candid Conversation about Aging" by publisher Forefront Books.

Joan Lunden was a co-host on Good Morning America for 17 years in the 80s and 90s and is currently a special correspondent at NBC. And among many other things, she’s written eight books as well. In her most recent book, “Why Did I Come Into This Room,” she takes on the subject of aging, specifically in women, and how the seldom discussed issues associated with getting older leaves so many women feeling isolated.

However, from minor aches and pains, to major health issues, this new book reflects many of the issues that she’s dealt with...but handled with a sense of humor. We’ll hear more about the book and life experience of journalist, broadcaster, and best selling writer Joan Lunden on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

Our interviewer this time is Victoria Babu.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Interviewer and producer for this episode - Victoria Babu
Video Editor - Greg Kopp
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Paul Langdon
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
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This is the fifty-second episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is journalist Connor Towne O'Neill. We spoke with him via Zoom in October of 2020 about his book "Down Along with That Devil's Bones: A Reckoning with Monuments, Memory, and the Legacy of White Supremacy" by publisher Algonquin Books.

Writer Connor Towne O’Neill is a Pennsylvania born journalist that has had work in thoroughly northern publications like New York Magazine, and has been a producer on the Southern history based NPR podcast, “White Lies”. He’s a in instructor at Auburn University in Alabama now and researched and penned the book “Down Along with That Devil’s Bones” after more than 5 years of trying to pick apart some of the reasons why monuments to Confederates are still so common, like ones to the slave-owning, Southern General Nathan Bedford Forrest, the first head of the Ku Klux Klan. In the book he explores not just the odes to Forrest, but to other racist and problematic figures from Southern history. And he digs into how even those from the North, like himself, that wish they were absolved from the current presence of the memorials, could and should feel otherwise.  We’ll explore more details of the book and of the life experience of journalist and writer Connor Towne O’Neill on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

Our host and interviewer this time is Paul Schankman.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Interviewer, producer, and editor for this episode - Paul Schankman
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Ben Smith
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors

This is the fifty-first episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is journalist and sports writer Reid Forgrave. We spoke with him via Zoom in October of 2020 about his book “Love, Zac” by publisher Algonquin Books.

Writer Reid Forgrave has spent most of his career covering sports. He’s done long form reporting on the Olympics, basketball, and the NFL, and worked with the New York Times, CBS Sports and other organizations. But in his book, “Love, Zac”, he takes on the real life tragic death of a small town, high school football player that was ultimately found to have died from the effects of CTE, or Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy.

Zac Easter took his own life, but left behind enough clues to what he thought was wrong with him so that he would feel like his life had meaning. We’ll find out the impact that Zac’s death had on his family, his home town, the sports community, and our guest as well, writer Reid Forgrave on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

Our host and interviewer this time is Victoria Babu.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Interviewer for this episode - Victoria Babu
Video Editor - Kerry Marks
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Paul Langdon
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors

This is the fiftieth episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is a Pulitzer Prize finalist and best selling author, Laila Lalami. We spoke with her via Zoom in October of 2020 about her newest book “Conditional Citizens” by publisher Pantheon Books.

Laila Lalami is a naturalized US citizen of Arab descent born in Morocco. The professor of linguistics’ pathway to citizenship lasted from 1992 to 2000 and she experienced a wide range of contradictions along the way. She notes in “Conditional Citizens” that she realized while she had to declare herself as ethnically “white” on official paperwork…she didn’t see Arabs existing the same way as other “white” people in the real world.

In her memoir that consists of her essays she’s written over the years, she breaks down how “accidents of birth” such as national origin, race, or gender play a large role in shaping the experience of what it means to be “American” to this day. We’ll learn more about this book, other best sellers, and the life of professor and writer Laila Lalami on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

Our interviewer this time is Anna Crosslin.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Interviewer for this episode - Anna Crosslin
Video Editor - Peter Foggy
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Ben Smith
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors

This is the forty-ninth episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

The now celebrated and respected lawyer Jill Wine-Banks was a young prosecutor and only woman on the team during the Nixon impeachment hearings. In “The Watergate Girl”, she tells how she elicited this testimony and exchange from the president’s secretary about the missing audio from the famous taped recordings. 

from that famous revelation, she moved along as a trailblazer throughout her career in law at the US Army, for the state of Illinois, and the American Bar Association. The memoir of the status quo breaking jurist, writer Jill Wine-Banks is our guest on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

A side note and another reminder for context…this conversation was recorded on November 6, 2020…which was just after the 2020 presidential election. It was also after the first impeachment of former President Donald Trump in December of 2019, but before the events around the insurrection at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021…and subsequent second impeachment of Trump.

Our host and interviewer this time is Kathy Bratkowski.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Host and video producer of this episode - Kathy Bratkowski
Video Editor - Peter Foggy
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Paul Langon
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

Special thanks to The Jewish Book Festival.

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors

This is the forty-eighth episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is the Best Selling author Jan Greenberg. We spoke with her in St. Louis in  November of 2020 about her newest book “World of Glass: The Art of Dale Chihuly” by publisher Abrams Books. The award winning writer Jan Greenberg has penned books for adults and children about art of all types. From poetry to pottery…ballet to van Gogh, she’s been able to break down interpretations of all of the forms for readers to make the works more accessible to all that encounter them. This time she went into the “World of Glass”, which she wrote with her frequent collaborator Sandra Jordan, and artist Dale Chihuly because of the transformative nature of his work.

We’ll hear about her visits to Chihuly’s studio for research on this book, how and why she got started writing about art, how she works with her collaborator and more.  Best selling writer Jan Greenberg is our guest on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

Our host and interviewer this time is Angie Weidinger.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Host and video producer of this episode - Angie Weidinger
Video Editor - Greg Kopp
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Ben Smith
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

Special thanks to Left Bank Books and the St. Louis County Library.

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors

This is the forty-fifth episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is New York Times Best Selling author Jasper Fforde. We spoke with him via Zoom in October of 2020 about his newest book "The Constant Rabbit" by publisher Viking Books.

The British novelist Jasper Fforde writes works of fantasy in what’s been called an “absurdist reality” style.  He uses concepts and situations that are grounded in real life, but then he gives himself a “narrative dare” when composing the work, and fuses the two together. The original spark this time produced the book “The Constant Rabbit”. It’s our world, but one with anthropomorphic bunnies that speaks to how humans relate to others…and themselves. We’ll hear about this book, the “Thursday Next” book series and more of the creative life of New York Times Best Seller Jasper Fforde on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

Our host and interviewer this time is Angie Weidinger.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Host and video producer of this episode - Angie Weidinger
Video Editor - Greg Kopp
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Ben Smith
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

Special thanks to Left Bank Books and the St. Louis County Library.

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors

This is the forty-fourth episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is the Sunday Times best selling and award winning author Matt Haig. We spoke with him via Zoom in October of 2020 about his newest book “The Midnight Library" by publisher Viking Books.

English writer Matt Haig has penned two dozen works…both children’s and adult…fiction and non-fiction in his career as a novelist.  He’s worked as a journalist as well. But what he likes to infuse his work with is from a career path he didn’t take. we’ll certainly hear about different philosophies in his book “The Midnight Library”, along with a look into his love of science, libraries, and screen adaptations of his pieces. Award winning author Matt Haig is our guest today on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

Our host and interviewer this time is Carrie Robb.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Host of this episode - Carrie Robb
Video Producer - Christina Chastain
Video Editor - Kerry Marks
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Paul Langdon
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

Special thanks to The Novel Neighbor.

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors

This is the forty-third episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is Rachel Howzell Hall. We spoke with her via Zoom in September of 2020 about her newest book "And Now She's Gone" by publisher Macmillan.

Rachel Howzell Hall is based in Los Angles and the author of 9 novels and many short stories and essays.  She’s written science fiction, mystery, and crime stories featuring the character Lou Norton. But the story in “And Now She’s Gone” is one that really began a long time ago for her. We’ll find out more about the mix of magic, intrigue, and abuse in this latest work. And we’ll her about the literary volunteer efforts and very busy life outside of the page of  author Rachel Howzell Hall on this edition of Talking With Authors from HEC Media and HEC Books.

Our host and interviewer this time, Heather Ash.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Host of this episode - Heather Ash
Video Editor - Kerry Marks
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Ben Smith
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors

This is the forty-second episode of "Talking with Authors" by HEC Media and HEC Books. We're a program dedicated to speaking with some of the best selling authors around, covering many different genres.

Today, our guest is New York Times Best Selling British crime novelist Ann Cleeves. We spoke with her via Zoom in September of 2020 about her newest book “The Darkest Evening" by publisher Macmillan.

Ann Cleeves is the author of more than 30 books, some of which have spawned two TV series with a third on the way.   The BBC has the show “Shetland”, and the station ITV has the very popular show “Vera” based off of Cleeves’ character from her novels, Detective Vera Stanhope. Why does the author think “Vera” has caught on so well with audiences?

Our host and interviewer this time, Angie Weidinger.

HEC Media is a production company out of St. Louis, Missouri.  With the help of independent bookstore Left Bank Books and St. Louis County Library, we are able to sit down with these amazing writers and thought leaders to discuss their work, their inspiration, and what makes them special. You can watch video versions of most of our interviews at hecmedia.org.

Host  and producer of the video version of this episode - Angie Weidinger
Video Editor - Greg Kopp
Supervising Producer - Julie Winkle
Production Support - Jayne Ballew & Christina Chastain
HEC Media Executive Director - Dennis Riggs
Talking with Authors Podcast Executive Producer - Christina Chastain
Podcast Audio Editing - Paul Langdon
Podcast Producer - Rod Milam
Podcast Host - Rod Milam

You can follow us on all social media platforms. Just search for "Talking with Authors":

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/talkingwithauthors
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/talkingwithauthors
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TalkingwAuthors