Share sushi with Philip K. Dick Award-winning writer Meg Elison as we discuss her pre-pandemic prediction for the kind of year 2020 was then shaping up to be, how reading Terry Bisson's "They're Made Out of Meat" changed her life, using tabletop RPGs to deal with the powerlessness felt during recent times, the way rereading taught her to be a writer, our dual fascination with diaries, when she realized her first novel was actually the start of a trilogy (and the songs which helped her better understand each installment), why she followed that post-apocalyptic trilogy with a contemporary YA novel, and much more.
Share shahi korma with writer Karen Osborne as we discuss her biggest surprise after signing with an agent for her first novel, how she was able to celebrate the launch of that debut book <em>and</em> a Nebula nomination during the COVID-19 lockdown, what you need to keep in your head to never go wrong about a character's motivations, how the Viable Paradise writing workshop taught her to lean in on her weird, the favorite line she's ever written, how she wrote fanfic of her own characters to better understand them, why she doesn't want her daughter to read her second novel until she's 13, the way <em>Star Trek: The Next Generation</em> changed her life, how the Clarion workshop taught her to let go of caring what other people think of her writing, what Levar Burton means to her childhood, and much more.