Episódios
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This week I am talking with Julie Gerstenblatt, whose debut novel, “Daughters of Nantucket,” came out last year and was included in several most anticipated lists for 2023. Prior to writing novels, Julie was a middle school English teacher and earned her PhD so that she could teach at the college level, but she ended up leaving teaching because she wanted to be a novelist. (Her story of how she admitted this desire to herself–and her advisors–during her PhD dissertation is incredible!)
We covered:
The many contemporary novel manuscripts she wrote but could not sell
How combining something new (historical fiction) with something she knew well and loved (Nantucket) led to selling her book to a publisher
How she kept writing “Daughters of Nantucket” even after her agent broke up with her
Making time to write amidst teaching middle school, writing a PhD dissertation, and having three young kids
The specifics of her morning routine and how she gets warmed up to write
How she gets herself to leave the house
For full show notes with links to everything we discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com.
Thanks to this week’s sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save 30% off an amazing indoor air filter *and* receive a free three-year warranty (an $84 value).
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In this final installment of my conversation with award-winning book coach (who has helped dozens and dozens and dozens of experts get five- and six-figure book deals) and author of the brand-new book “Breathe. Write. Breathe.” Lisa Tener, we get a look at what’s coming up for her, and she answers my fast five final questions.
Wa talked about:
The trippy experience of re-reading something you first encountered years ago and having a completely new and different take on it
How discovering Sark’s books felt like a gift from the universe
Using Human Design as a tool to help you figure out what to do next
Manifesting teaching a retreat at place like Kripalu, Omega, or Esalen
The shift she’s working that “makes life juicier”
Why she’s feeling drawn to write more poetry
Lisa’s recipe for her all-time favorite tea
Her favorite dish at her favorite restaurant that sounds so good it inspired us to make a dinner date to go get it
Visit Lisa at listener.com.
For full show notes with links to everything we discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com.
Thanks to this week’s sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save 30% off an amazing indoor air filter *and* receive a free three-year warranty (an $84 value).
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In this second part of my interview with Lisa Tener–award-winning book coach and author of the brand-new “Breath. Write. Breathe.”--we get into the squishier parts of writing.
Warning, this part of our conversation is super juicy! Not in a sexy way, but in a “wow I’m really thinking differently about stuff that’s been plaguing me forever” kind of way.
You’ll learn:
Her least favorite part about promoting her work, and how she works with that resistance
Finding the right balance between taking on work for clients to pay the bills and saving time and energy for your own work
Practical ways to get out of the fear of not making or having enough money
Tipping your internal scale to be more weighted toward surrender, and less weight toward trying to control everything
Her ninja trick for dealing with difficult people
How she’s used Family Systems Constellation Work to work through blockages both in life and in her mind
Visit Lisa at listener.com.
For full show notes with links to everything we discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com.
Thanks to this week’s sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save 30% off an amazing indoor air filter *and* receive a free three-year warranty (an $84 value).
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This week I am talking with award-winning book coach and award-winning author–of the books The Joy of Writing Journal and the brand-new Breathe.Write. Breathe.--Lisa Tener.
Lisa served on the faculty of the Harvard Medical School’s continuing education course on writing and publishing books for over a dozen years. And she has helped hundreds of experts and thought leaders write and publish their books and secure five and six figure book deals.
I was so happy and honored to write the foreword for Lisa's new book, which draws a lot on Lisa's in-depth studies and practice of qigong. And if you've been with me since the “How to Be a Better Person” days, you may remember Lisa when she came on as a guest and walked me through her “meet your muse” exercise, which helps you get in touch with your intuition and receive messages from your subconscious that can help you move forward in your creative work or get insight into anything you may be facing, where you could use a little guidance.
And lest you think Lisa is all about the woo, she also, I just found out while researching her for this episode, has her bachelor's and master's degree from MIT.
We covered:
How getting sick put her on the path to becoming a writer
How writing down her dreams helps fuel her writing
Working with the difficulty of earning a living from your writing
A peek inside the small village of people it takes to publish a book
The easy but powerful qigong move Lisa teaches to get you loosened up and ready to write
A look at the tools, places, and times of day that help Lisa get her writing done.
Visit Lisa at listener.com.
For full show notes with links to everything we discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com.
Thanks to this week’s sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save 30% off an amazing indoor air filter *and* receive a free three-year warranty (an $84 value).
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In this third and final installment of my interview with Donna Russo, author of “Vincent's Women, the Untold Story of the Loves of Vincent Van Gogh,” as well as 10 other award-winning and internationally bestselling historical novels, we get a peek at what’s coming up next for her and she answers my fast five questions about what she’s stayed up too late reading and watching.
How she’s feeling now that she’s on the verge of becoming a grandmother
A sneak peek at her next book, which is already in the works–as well as how she’s challenging herself in new ways with this project
The great authors she learned the importance of descriptive settings from
The screen play she wrote that got tabled by COVID and the writer’s strike, despite winning awards
The music that gets her going when she needs a boost
Visit Donna at donnarusso.com.
For full show notes with links to everything we discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com.
Thanks to this week’s sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save up to 30% off an amazing indoor air filter, and get a free 3-year warranty (and $84 value).
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In this second part of my conversation with Donna Russo, author of “Vincent's Women: the Untold Story of the Loves of Vincent van Gogh, as well as 10 other award winning and internationally best selling historical novels, we explore the thoughts, ideas, and attitudes that influence her work.
We talked about:
Why the time period just before your book comes out is the most nerve-wracking, “like walking out naked and the world gets to comment”
The thrill of being in the same room as a group of your readers
How she takes her mind off the anxiety that comes pre-book release
Her biggest fears as a writer
Why being 66 is an asset to her writing
Her best advice for young writers
How historical fiction reminds us that there are always multiple points of view to every story
Visit Donna at donnarusso.com.
For full show notes with links to everything we discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com.
Thanks to this week’s sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save up to 30% off an amazing indoor air filter, and get a free 3-year warranty (and $84 value).
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Up this week is Donna Russo, an internationally best-selling author of 11 multiple award winning historical novels, including “Gilded Dreams” and “Gilded Summers”, a trio of books about Leonardo da Vinci, including “Portrait of a Conspiracy,” “The Competition,” and “The Flames of Florence.” Her newest book, “Vincent’s Women” is just out, and tells the story of everyone's favorite tortured artist through the lens of the women in his life.
(I have to point out Vincent's women managed to get 4. 3 stars on Goodreads, which is not easy to do. Goodreads readers are very sparing with their five star ratings.)
Donna is also an award winning screenwriter, a ghostwriter, and an editor. And she's an actor who appeared in Martin Scorsese's “The Departed,” as well as Showtime's “Brotherhood.” And, she's a painter” I’m so thankful she joined us, because she clearly has a lot of things that take up her time!
We covered:
How reading “Gone with the Wind” and “The Thorn Birds” as a kid sparked a devotion to historical fiction
How a ‘grand pity party’ after yet another bad date led to the idea for “Vincent’s Women”
How meeting Diana Gabaldon (author of The Outlander series and historical fiction OG!) at a conference spurred Donna on
Her first gig as a writer–that happened in sixth grade
How she sold her first book quickly and easily–and pretty much everything since then has been a struggle
The truth about why she does so many different things
The brass tacks of how she writes her book, from which chapter she writes first to how she lays out her computer monitor so that her research is always right at hand
How she wrote her friends into one of her books
The food and drink the fuels her writing
Visit Donna at donnarusso.com.
For full show notes with links to everything we discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com.
Thanks to this week’s sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save up to 30% off an amazing indoor air filter, and get a free 3-year warranty (and $84 value).
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices -
In part three of my interview with Marlon Weems, author of the prize-winning essay "How Starting an Investment Business Almost Landed Me in Federal Prison" and founder of The Journeyman Substack, where he covers American culture and anti-Black racism, we get a peek at where his throughline is leading him next.
I had to leave out the meandering and enlightening and fun conversation we had about the upcoming presidential election, but now we're thinking about starting a separate podcast on that! Who knows if anything will come of it, but all I can say for sure is, I loved chatting with Marlon and know you will love hearing him, too.
We covered:
- Marlon's unexpected detour into becoming a voice actor in his 60s
- Being your own role model
- Manifesting an appearance on "Good Morning America"
- The AMC TV series Marlon's currently bingeing, based on books by one of his favorite authors (that he listens to as audiobooks because they are read by his favorite voice actor)
- The two songs from wildly different genres that get Marlon going when he needs a pick-me-up
Visit Marlon at thejourneyman.substack.com.
Thanks to this week's sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save up to 30% off an amazing indoor air filter and get a free 3-year warranty ($84 value).
For full show notes, visit katehanley.substack.com.
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In this second part of my interview with Marlon Weems, founder of The Journeyman newsletter on Substack, where he covers American culture, anti-Black racism, and growing up Black in the Deep South, we talk about the mindset side of writing, including:
- The best place to look for your closing paragraph
- How having to make cold calls for a living is excellent training for dealing with (read: ignoring) trolls
- The story of how he almost went to federal prison after getting entangled with some primo money launderers
- The story of how THAT story became one of Medium's best articles of the year (and has inspired Marlon to start writing a book)
- Why he has 50+ drafts of articles in his Notes app at any given time, and how he decides it's time for a particular article to see the light of day
- Writing to leave a legacy, and hearing the clock ticking as a motivator to keep going
- The myth that if you just work hard enough, anything is possible
- The difference between anti-Black racism in the North and in the South
Visit Marlon at thejourneyman.substack.com.
Thanks to this week's sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save up to 30% off an amazing indoor air filter and get a free 3-year warranty ($84 value).
For full show notes, visit katehanley.substack.com.
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This week I am talking with Marlon Weems, a former Wall Street trader who started his career in finance in Little Rock, Arkansas, where he founded the first Black-owned asset management firm and the first Black-owned venture capital firm in the state.
Since leaving the industry in 2012, Marlon has transitioned to writing. His essay, "How Starting an Investment Firm Almost Landed Me in Federal Prison, was named one of the best stories of 2023 on Medium.
Marlon now writes about American culture, anti Black racism, and growing up Black in the Deep South in The Journeyman, his Substack newsletter, which is where I discovered him. He is currently writing a memoir about his experiences in finance and, fun fact, Marlon recently made his theatrical debut in the role of Uncle Ben in a local production of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman.
We covered:
- How he made the transition from Wall Street trader to full-time writer
- The freedom in being close enough to retirement that you're not worried that something you write might prevent you from getting another job
- Being friends with people whose political views differ from your own
- How most of his articles he writes on his phone at 3 am--the others he writes either in his car or at a bar
Visit Marlon at thejourneyman.substack.com.
Thanks to this week's sponsor, Air Doctor Pro. Visit airdoctorpro.com and use code KATE to save up to 30% off an amazing indoor air filter and get a free 3-year warranty ($84 value).
For full show notes, visit katehanley.substack.com.
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In this final part of my interview with Moms Demand Action founder Shannon Watts, we get a look at what's coming up for her--and how that might not involve being in the public eye at all after 11 years of being 'the tip of the spear' as a common sense gun law advocate. I also ask her what's she's reading, watching, listening to, drinking in her morning cup, and what she'd have for dinner tonight if she could have anything in the world.
We talked about:
- Her voracious love of podcasts (including a shortlist of her faves)
- Knowing that it's time to shift into a different way of being, but not yet knowing exactly what that looks like
- The reality show she watches until the wee hours whenever her husband is out of town
Visit Shannon at shannonwatts.substack.com.
For full show notes (including bonus photos!) visit katehanley.substack.com.
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In the second part of my interview with Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action, author of "Fight Like a Mother, and host of the Substack newsletter "Playing with Fire" (where she addresses overlooked topics head on, such as ADHD in women and girls and the benefits of hormone therapy for relief of menopause symptoms), we get into the mindset side of writing.
We covered:
- Reckoning with the enormity of needing to produce 60,000+ words for a book
- The "small miracle" or crystallizing a thought in a way you hadn't been able to articulate before
- How getting reiki helps her write
- Shifting out of perfectionism and into flow
- The huge difference in the lived experience between Gen X women and their mothers
- Taking aim at mom guilt
- The woo woo retreat that almost made her run for the door, but turned out to be a much-needed entryway to being playful
Visit Shannon at shannonwatts.substack.com.
For full show notes (including bonus photos!) visit katehanley.substack.com.
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This week I am talking with badass advocate, author, Substacker, and "summoner of women's audacity," Shannon Watts.
Shannon is the founder of Moms Demand Action, the grassroots movement for common sense gun reform that grew to include more than 10 million members who have helped pass over 500 gun safety laws across the country. She's also the author of "Fight Like a Mother", and her opinion pieces have been published in the Washington Post, Elle, Time, and more.
Shannon has also been named Glamour's Woman of the Year and one of Time's 100 Most Influential People. And she's working on a new book about women in leadership that'll be out in the summer of 2025.
It was an honor to talk with her and we really broke it down, covering:
- Knowing when it's time to transition out of what you've been doing
- ADHD and how its effects have changed as she's gotten older
- Switching gears from being a very public person who had to keep her private life private (to not feed the trolls) to a private person who talks about private things (menopause, ADHD) publicly
- Honoring the desire to have more information (and to share that information once you find it)
- The incredible origin story of Moms Demand Action (or what I call, "the Facebook post heard 'round the world)
- Her standing desk fail
Visit Shannon at shannonwatts.substack.com.
For full show notes (including bonus photos!) visit katehanley.substack.com.
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In the final part of my interview with maritime history author Eric Jay Dolin, we get a tantalizing look at his next book, which he's working on now, about a shipwreck in the Pacific that involves a clash of East and West.
We also covered:
- Why his kids hate going to museums with him
- Using a desire to travel as motivation for selling more books
- The PBS show Eric considers comfort viewing
- Why Friday is the perfect day
- The bachelor meal he makes whenever his wife is out of town
Visit Eric at ericjaydolin.com.
For full show notes, visit katehanley.substack.com.
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In the second part of my conversation with Eric Jay Dolin, (author of "Left for Dead," a true story about a captain of a sealing ship who was marooned on the Falkland Islands for 18 months in the early 1800s), we talk about the squishier side of writing, including dealing with your inner critic, getting through the parts of sharing your work that you'd really rather avoid, and managing your own expectations for how many copies your book will sell while also doing what you can to sell as many as possible.
We talked about:
- Getting geared up for giving talks as an introvert who grew up painfully shy (and the speaking tip that helps)
- The appeal of writing a book that will still be relevant in 30, 40, or more years
- How being in his 60s has affected his writing schedule, and his stress levels
- How being a writer can put you out of step with your friends once they start to hit retirement age, and you are still plugging along
- Taking aim at the belief that if you work hard, everything will work out
- The mystery and serendipity that impact how well your book sells
- The difference between wanting your book to sell well and expecting it to
Visit Eric at ericjaydolin.com.
For full show notes, visit katehanley.substack.com.
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Calling all lovers of true tales about the sea! This week I'm talking with Eric J. Dolin, bestselling author of numerous books that explore some aspect of American history, generally as it relates to the sea. His latest book is "Left for Dead: Shipwreck, Treachery, and Survival at the Edge of the World." Eric has a really interesting through line that started with him studying to be a marine biologist, then morphed into studying environmental policy, and includes a big list of cool, interesting jobs, including curatorial assistant in the mollusk department at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology.
We covered:
- Eric's winding path to writing, which started with wanting to be Jacques Costeau as a kid, wended through getting three degrees in marine biologist, and ended with him working in government jobs (managing a fishery, for example) while saving up to make the leap to writing full-time
- How winning awards can keep you going, even when you're not selling as many books as you'd like
- HOT TIP: Eric's new book, "Left for Dead," would make a great Father's Day gift!
- How "people are overly impressed with writers", and that recognition can also keep you going
- The skills he developed as a student that help him write books
- How researching his current book generally leads to the idea for his next book
- The secret cove in Marblehead where Eric gets his reading done during the summer
- How reading books from the 1800s and early 1900s (as part of his research) changes his language
Visit Eric at ericjaydolin.com.
For full show notes, visit katehanley.substack.com.
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In this final section of my conversation with "Lessons from the Climate Anxiety Counseling Booth," Kate Schapira, we cover:
- Finding ways to bring her work to groups that are already gathering for another reason (hint: need to a professional development speaker or workshop leader to talk on working with climate anxiety?)
- Using the concept of cross-pollenization as a guiding principle
- The writers whose work has changed Kate's life
- The books, beverage, and songs that Kate can't get enough of
For full show notes, with links to everything Kate and I discuss, visit katehanley.substack.com. And to get each interview in one ad-free episode delivered straight to your inbox or podcast feed, visit katehanley.substack.com and become a paid subscriber.
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In this second part of my conversation with Kate Schapira, author of "Lessons from the Climate Anxiety Counseling Booth," we cover the squishier parts of writing, including:
- The process of deciding just how vulnerable to be in your writing
- The emotional difference between writing poetry and writing prescriptive non-fiction
- How her inner critic is a salty SOB
- How a writing group holds you accountable to write despite what your inner critic is telling you
- A peek inside the mechanics and beauties of Kate's writing group
- The illusion of innocence (WOW this really blew my mind open)
- Trying to be a good person vs. trying to have a good effect
For full show notes, with links to everything Kate and I discuss, visit katehanley.substack.com. And to get each interview in one ad-free episode delivered straight to your inbox or podcast feed, visit katehanley.substack.com and become a paid subscriber.
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This week I'm talking with Kate Schapira, author of "Lessons from the Climate Anxiety Counseling Booth," which takes readers through the practical skills and emotional shifts needed to navigate our way to a more livable future.
Kate is also the author of six books of poetry, and her prose has appeared in The Rumpus, The Toast, and other places. She lives in Providence, Rhode Island, where she teaches nonfiction writing at Brown University. And fun fact about Kate, she has never met a tide pool that she didn't like.
In this episode we covered:
- How her grief over climate change inspired her to set up a table at a park in downtown Providence with a sign that said "Climate Anxiety Counseling Booth" and start talking to folks
- How that act of inspiration/desperation became a book
- The kinds of things people talked to her about at the booth
- Why she consciously chose NOT to pursue writing as a career path (it's her...side hustle? side passion that sometimes pays a little?)
- How to create a little more space when it feels like the walls of worry about the future are closing in
- The four-word mantra that helps her stay creative
- The genius (and new-to-me) concept of 'productive dissociation'
For full show notes, with links to everything Kate and I discuss, visit katehanley.substack.com. And to get each interview in one ad-free episode delivered straight to your inbox or podcast feed, visit katehanley.substack.com and become a paid subscriber.
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In part three of my conversation with multiple New York Times bestselling author Jacquelyn Mitchard, author of "A Very Inconvenient Scandal" and "The Deep End of the Ocean," among many other titles, we talk about how having writer friends is so important, even if you "jealous them", the vision of the future that's fueling her to keep writing, and the recent books that made her swoon.
- The writers--and books--that make Jacquelyn jealous (a word that she uses as a verb, as in, "I'm jealousing her."
- Her love for British crime shows, including the ones that are currently keeping her up way too late
- The BBC podcast she's addicted to
- The beauty of enjoying nature--through a window
- The saying on the mug that she brought home from the Erma Bombeck conference that is her current motto
- The songs Jacquelyn listens to when she needs a pick-me-up
- The meal "that's probably 2,000 calories per bite" that she would ask for if someone said they would make her anything she wanted
For full show notes, with links to everything Jacquelyn and I discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com. And if you'd like to receive these episodes ad-free, become a paid subscriber at katehanley.substack.com.
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