Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Lester Brown of the Earth Policy Institute talks about the latest edition of his book PLAN B. It’s updated to PLAN B 4.0. And social change expert David Gershon talks about how to create the social and political will to do something about climate change in his book, SOCIAL CHANGE 2.0. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Writers Voice talks with Sasha Polakow-Suransky about his book, THE UNSPOKEN ALLIANCE. And, in an excerpt from our 2009 interview, Israeli journalist Amira Hass talks about her Holocaust survivor parents’ involvement in the Israeli peace movement. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Writers Voice spends the hour with fiction writer Marisa Silver, talking about the craft of writing, her new collection of short stories ALONE WITH YOU and her 2008 novel, GOD OF WAR. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
With the firing this week of Stanley McChrystal as commander of the US-led forces in Iraq, it’s a good time to be reminded of the impact of the war on the civilian population — and especially on Afghani women.
In this archived show from March, 2010, journalist Ann Jones talks about women, the war in Afghanistan, and whether life is any better for its people since the US invaded their country. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Host Francesca Rheannon talks with journalist David Shenk about THE GENIUS IN ALL OF US: Why Everything We’ve Been Told About Genetics, Talent, and IQ Are Wrong. It’s about what the science of epigenetics is telling us us about the potential for human achievement. And David Chura talks about his memoir of teaching incarcerated adolescents, I DON’T WISH NOBODY TO HAVE A LIFE LIKE MINE: Tales of Kids in Adult Lockup. He says the War on Crime is a war on kids. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Amanda Little talks about her book POWER TRIP: From Oil Wells to Solar Cells. It’s about our addiction to fossil fuels and how to get off them. And Anna LappÁ© tells us about her new book, DIET FOR A HOT PLANET: The Climate Crisis At the End of Your Fork and What You Can Do About It. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
We spend the hour with journalist David Grann, talking about his latest book THE DEVIL AND SHERLOCK HOLMES: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession and his first book, THE LOST CITY OF Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Roy Morris, Jr. talks about LIGHTING OUT FOR THE TERRITORY: How Samuel Clemens Headed West and Became Mark Twain. And Diane Wilson talks about AN UNREASONABLE WOMAN: A True Story of Shrimpers, Politicos, Polluters, and the Fight for Seadrift, Texas. A shrimp boat captain turned environmental warrior, she went up against one of the biggest polluters in America to save the waters of the Gulf. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Hampton Sides talks about HELLHOUND ON HIS TRAIL: The Stalking of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the International Hunt for His Assassin. And Steven Church tells us about THE DAY AFTER THE DAY AFTER. It’s a memoir about growing up in the shadow of apocalyptic visions, including the making of THE DAY AFTER in his home town of Lawrence, Kansas.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Nancy Rappaport  talks about her haunting memoir, IN HER WAKE: A Child Psychiatrist Explores the Mystery of Her Mother’s Suicide. It’s about her mother’s suicide, how it affected her family, and how she came to terms with her loss. And Joan Wickersham tells us about her memoir of her father’s suicide, THE SUICIDE INDEX, in this 2008 interview she gave Writers Voice. The memoir was a National Book Award finalist. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Author Isabel Allende talks about her new novel, ISLAND BENEATH THE SEA. It tells the story of a remarkable woman, the slave TÁ©tÁ©, during the Haitian revolution against French rule. And we talk with Dr. Derva Davis about her book THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE WAR ON CANCER. It’s about environmental causes of cancer and industry and government cover-ups of the issue. A presidential panel has just come out with a new report about it. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Sadie Jones talks about her new novel, SMALL WARS. Set in war torn Cyprus in 1956, it tells the story of a young British solider, and the effects of that war on him, his wife and their family. And we hear from Fernanda Eberstadt about her acclaimed new novel RAT. It’s about a girl of extraordinary courage who travels from a hardscrabble region of France to London in search of her father. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Host Francesca Rheannon talks with David Bollier about his latest book, VIRAL SPIRAL. It’s about how the Internet is building a new digital republic. And Cory Doctorow tells us about his science fiction novel, MAKERS. It imagines the birth pangs of a new remix culture. Continue reading
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Host Francesca Rheannon talks with author and climate activist Bill McKibben about his new book, EAARTH. It’s about adapting to a planet already transformed by global warming. Then James Hoggan exposes the lies of the climate denial industry — and who’s behind them. And we air a clip from an archived interview with George Monbiot, author of HEAT.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
Poet Diane Gilliam Fisher talks about her book, KETTLE BOTTOM. It’s about the Mine Wars of the 1920’s and the people who fought them. And we talk with Ted Nace about the movement to stop new coal plants from being built. His book is CLIMATE HOPE: On the Front Lines of the Fight Against Coal.
The Massey Energy Company mine disaster in West Virginia is but the latest in a long and bitter history of the exploitation of the people and the land of Appalachia’s coal country. The other side of that story is how the miners fought back to win better wages and working conditions by organizing the UMWU.
[amazon-product align=”right”]0966045971[/amazon-product]
Looking at the Upper Big Branch mine, one fact stands out for those who know enough about how important that union history is. The mine was non-union. Far more coal mine fatalities happen in non-union mines than those where the workers are unionized.
Poet Diane Gilliam Fisher’s 2004 book KETTLE BOTTOM uses verse to tell the story of the West Virginia Mine Wars of 1920—21. That’s when the United Mine Workers union went up against the coal operators and their hired thugs. Many people died — mostly miners — and President Harding sent in troops to quell the rebellion. The southern coal fields didn’t win union recognition until 1933.
KETTLE BOTTOM won the 2004 Perigia Press Award, and was listed in the 2005 top ten list for poetry by the American Booksellers Association. In addition to KETTLE BOTTOM, Fisher is also the author of ONE OF EVERYTHING and RECIPE FOR BLACKBERRY CAKE. Writers Voice spoke to her in 2004.
Read Diane Gilliam Fisher’s poem Explosion at Winco No. 9.
Coal is most carbon intense fuel, according to climate scientist James Hansen. With climate chaos happening at a faster pace than even the most pessimistic scientists predicted, many are saying we should just leave the coal in the hole.
[amazon-product align=”left”]0615314384[/amazon-product]
Ted Nace is one of them. His new book, CLIMATE HOPE: On the Front Lines of the Fight Against Coal, tells the remarkable story of the movement to stop the building of any new coal power plants in the US. In just 2 years, between 2007 and 2009, it managed to stop plans nearly a hundred coal plants from being built, out of 151 proposed. The loosely organized grass roots movement brought a burgeoning coal boom largely to a halt.
Ted Nace is the founder of CoalSwarm, a web based wiki that currently has over 2,000 articles and has become an online hub for the anti coal movement.