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    This Podcast Will Change Your Life.

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life is a long-form interview show hosted by writer, teacher, trainer, coach and content creator Ben Tanzer and housed at This Blog Will Change Your Life. The show focuses on conversations with authors, creatives and changemakers from around the world.
    enBen Tanzer364 Episodes

    Episodes (364)

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Sixteen - Goddess

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Sixteen - Goddess

    Goddess was published as part of the short story collection So Different Now, which was released by CCLaP in 2011. The collection represents Part Two of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Goddess is read by Glen Binger (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Glen Binger is an author, teacher, and coach from by-the-beach, New Jersey. He hosts the podcast Betterism and his most recent books are Head Games: The Novel and Darren's Journal

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Fifteen - Never Said

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Fifteen - Never Said

    Never Said was published as part of the short story collection So Different Now, which was released by CCLaP in 2011. The collection represents Part Two of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Never Said is read by Joseph G. Peterson (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Joseph G. Peterson is the author of the novel Memorandum from the Iowa Cloud Appreciation Society.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life, Episode Three Hundred and Three - I Made This Thing.

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life, Episode Three Hundred and Three - I Made This Thing.

    This episode stars Sari Botton (And You May Find Yourself..., Oldster Magazine, Memoir Monday, Adventures in Journalism). It was recorded over the Zoom between the This Podcast Will Change Your Life home studio in Chicago, IL and Botton's home somewhere outside of New York City in November 2022.

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Fourteen - Just Like That

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Fourteen - Just Like That

    Just Like That was published as part of the short story collection So Different Now, which was released by CCLaP in 2011. The collection represents Part Two of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Just Like That is read by Giano Cromley (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Giano Cromley's latest novel is The Prince of Infinite Space. He's twice been a finalist for the High Plains Book Award. He is the recipient of an Artists Fellowship from the Illinois Arts Council, and recently completed a BookEnds Fellowship with Stony Brook University. He's an English professor at Kennedy-King College in Chicago, where he is chair of the Communications Department, and sits on the committee for the Center of Equity for Creative Arts.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Thirteen - Panties

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Thirteen - Panties

    Panties was published as part of the short story collection So Different Now, which was released by CCLaP in 2011. The collection represents Part Two of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Panties is read by Debra Pritzker Tanzer (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Debra Pritzker Tanzer worked in advertising for 20+ years in New York and Chicago and has been married to the author for much longer than that. She somewhat grudgingly agreed to read this story, and is bemused by the author's claims that it was inspired by a date they went on to the long demolished Airport Drive-In in Johnson City, NY way back in the 1980s.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Twelve - Cool, Not Removed

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Twelve - Cool, Not Removed

    Cool, Not Removed was published as part of the short story collection So Different Now, which was released by CCLaP in 2011. The collection represents Part Two of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Cool, Not Removed is read by Patrick Wensink (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Patrick Wensink is the bestselling author of several books, including his last novel, "Fake Fruit Factory" which was named one of the best books of 2015 by NPR. His nonfiction appears in Esquire, New York Times, Oxford American and others. He has also penned two acclaimed children's books. He currently teaches creative writing in the Appalachian Mountains of Tennessee. 

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life is a most excellent Episode Three Hundred - Absolutely Literal.

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life is a most excellent Episode Three Hundred - Absolutely Literal.

    This most excellent 300th episode stars the most excellent Sara Lippmann (LECH, JERKS, Doll Palace). It was recorded over the Zoom between the This Podcast Will Change Your Life home studio in Chicago, IL and Lippmann's home office in the New York City borough known as Brooklyn in December 2022.

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Eleven - Stevey

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Eleven - Stevey

    Stevey was published as part of the short story collection So Different Now, which was released by CCLaP in 2011. The collection represents Part Two of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Stevey is read by David Masciotra (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    David Masciotra is the author of several books, including I Am Somebody: Why Jesse Jackson Matters (Bloomsbury, 2020), Mellencamp: American Troubadour (University Press of Kentucky, 2015), and a forthcoming examination of the politics of exurbia and suburbia for Melville House Publishing. He has written for the New Republic, the Progressive, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and many other publications on politics, music, and literature. He lives in Indiana, and teaches at Indiana University Northwest. 

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Ten - In A Single Bound

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Ten - In A Single Bound

    In A Single Bound was published as part of the short story collection So Different Now, which was released by CCLaP in 2011. The collection represents Part Two of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    In A Single Bound is read by Seth Berg (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Seth Berg is a hatchet-wielding forest-dweller who digs tasty hallucinatory literature. A hot-sauce-addicted pyromaniac with an MFA from Bowling Green State University, Berg fantasizes about flight without mechanisms, alien glyph systems, and snowshoeing through your nocturnal dreamscapes. He is a professor, poet, artifact-maker, and amateur astrophysicist whose mathematically coded collections of poetry will haunt, invigorate, provoke, and inspire you. Berg's first book, Muted Lines From Someone Else’s Memory won the Dark Sky Books 2009 book contest. His second book, Aviary, co-authored with Bradford K. Wolfenden II, won the 2015 Artistically Declined Twin Antlers Contest, and was released by Civil Coping Mechanisms in January of 2017. Other poems and short fiction can be found in Connecticut Review, 13th Warrior Review, Spittoon Literary Review, BlazeVOX, Heavy Feather Literary Review, The Montucky Review, Masque & Spectacle, and Lake Effect, among others. Recently, poems were anthologized in GTCPR Volume III and Daddy Cool. He lives in Minnesota with his two supernatural children, Oak and Sage, and his magical better half, Kori. He loves your face. YEE-HAW, Cletus!!!

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life, Episode Two Hundred and Ninety-Nine - I Want My Life To Be About Something Else.

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life, Episode Two Hundred and Ninety-Nine - I Want My Life To Be About Something Else.

    This episode stars Coco Picard (The Healing Circling, The Chronicles of Fortune, Green Lantern Press). It was recorded over the Zoom between the This Podcast Will Change Your Life home studio in Chicago, IL and Picard's former home somewhere off on the East coast of the United States in September 2022.

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Nine - So Different Now

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Nine - So Different Now

    So Different Now was published as part of the short story collection So Different Now, which was released by CCLaP in 2011. The collection represents Part Two of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    So Different Now is read by Donald Quist (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Donald Quist is author of two essay collections, Harbors, a Foreword INDIES Bronze Winner and International Book Awards Finalist, and TO THOSE BOUNDED. He has a linked story collection, For Other Ghosts. His writing has appeared in AGNI, North American Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Poets & Writers, The Rumpus, and was Notable in Best American Essays 2018. He is creator of the online nonfiction series PAST TEN. Donald has received fellowships from Sundress Academy for the Arts and Kimbilio Fiction. He has served as a Gus T. Ridgel fellow for the English PhD program at University of Missouri and Director of the MFA in Writing at Vermont College of Fine Arts.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Eight - Shooting Stick

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Eight - Shooting Stick

    Shooting Stick was published as part of the short story collection Repetition Patterns, which was released by CCLaP in 2008. The collection represents Part One of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Shooting Stick is read by Hosho McCreesh (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Hosho McCreesh is currently writing, painting, & making stuff in the gypsum & caliche badlands of the American Southwest. His work has appeared widely in print, audio, & online.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Seven - Life As He Had Known It

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Seven - Life As He Had Known It

    Life As He Had Known It was published as part of the short story collection Repetition Patterns, which was released by CCLaP in 2008. The collection represents Part One of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Life As He Had Known It is read by Alice Kaltman (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Alice Kaltman is the author of the story collection STAGGERWING, the novels WAVEHOUSE, THE TANTALIZING TALE OF GRACE MINNAUGH, and DAWG TOWNE. Her newest book ALMOST DEADLY, ALMOST GOOD,  a linked collection based on the Seven Deadly Sins and the Seven Heavenly Virtues, is out November 22, 2022. Alice's words appear in journals like Lost Balloon, The Pinch, Joyland, Hobart and BULL, and in numerous anthologies. She's not thrilled by the sound of her own voice, but you might like it. If so, you can hear her read her work at Micro Podcasts, Elevator Stories, and No Contact. Alice splits her time between Brooklyn and Montauk, NY where she lives, surfs, and swims with her husband the sculptor Daniel Wiener and Ollie the Wonder Dog.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Six - Pac-Man Fever

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Six - Pac-Man Fever

    Pac-Man Fever was published as part of the short story collection Repetition Patterns, which was released by CCLaP in 2008. The collection represents Part One of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Pac-Man Fever is read by Mark R. Brand (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Mark R. Brand is a Chicago-based fiction writer and English professor. His work includes both creative and critical writing and his courses have won awards for their focus on digital literacies as well as incorporating video games as texts and tackling subjects like virtual reality, augmented reality, and atmospheric media. His previous novels and fiction collections include Life After Sleep, The Damnation of Memory, and Long Live Us, and he is currently working on a nonfiction book examining narratives of parenting in the Great Recession.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Five - Change Of Plans

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Five - Change Of Plans

    Change Of Plans was published as part of the short story collection Repetition Patterns, which was released by CCLaP in 2008. The collection represents Part One of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    Change Of Plans is read by Christopher Bowen (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Christopher Bowen is the author of the chapbook We Were Giants, the novella When I Return to You, I Will Be Unfed, and the non-fiction Debt. He was a semi-finalist in the 2017 Faulkner-Wisdom Novella Competition and honorable mention in the 45th New Millennium Writing Awards in the non-fiction category.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Four - What We Thought We Knew

    This Podcast Will Change Your Life presents: UPSTATE: The Podcast | Chapter Four - What We Thought We Knew

    What We Thought We Knew was published as part of the short story collection Repetition Patterns, which was released by CCLaP in 2008. The collection represents Part One of the linked short story collection UPSTATE re-released in 2020 by Tortoise Books (and originally released under the title The New York Stories by CCLaP in 2015).

    What We Thought We Knew is read by Tom Williams (BIO below).

    INTRO/OUTRO music is Drinking of Me and was generously provided by Monkey Wrench.

    READER BIO
    Tom Williams has published three books of fiction: The Mimic’s Own Voice, Don’t Start Me Talkin’, and Among the Wild Mulattos and Other Tales. Tom is the Dean of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at the University of Central Arkansas. He lives in Conway, Arkansas with his wife and two children, but wishes he lived a little bit closer to Mr. Tanzer, as every time they’ve been together the fun did not stop.

    https://www.tanzerben.com/blog/upstate-the-podcast