In this episode, Kate is joined by Dr. Matthew Delmont. Matt is a professor and associate dean at Dartmouth University, and he is the author of six books. His two most recent books are Half American: The Epic Story of American Americans Fighting World War II at Home and Abroad, which came out in 2022, and Until the Last Gun is Silent: A Story of Patriotism, the Vietnam War, and the Fight to Save America's Soul, which just came out this year. Matt has also worked on numerous digital history projects, and he is the winner of a Guggenheim Fellowship and National Endowment for the Humanities Public Scholar award.

In Until the Last Gun is Silent, Matt pairs the story of Coretta Scott King's antiwar activism during the Vietnam War with that of Dwight "Skip" Johnson, who received the Medal of Honor for his service in Vietnam before his life ended tragically after his return to Detroit. It's a combination that illuminates the meaning of the Vietnam War for Black Americans. We talked about how Matt has worked on his voice and narrative style to reach new audiences, as well as how the intriguing historical narrative pairing in this book came to be.

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Mentioned in this episode:

• Matthew F. Delmont, Until the Last Gun is Silent: A Story of Patriotism, the Vietnam War, and the Fight to Save America's Soul
• Matthew F. Delmont, Half American: The Epic Story of American Americans Fighting World War II at Home and Abroad
• Matthew F. Delmont, Black Quotidian: Everyday History in African American Newspapers
• Matthew F. Delmont, Making Roots: A Nation Captivated
• Matthew F. Delmont, Why Busing Failed: Race, Media, and the National Resistance to School Desegregation
• Matthew F. Delmont, The Nicest Kids in Town: American Bandstand, Rock 'n' Roll, and the Struggle for Civil Rights in 1950s Philadelphia
• Tiya Miles
• Annette Gordon Reed
• Jeanne Theoharis, The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks and King of the North: Martin Luther King Jr.'s Life of Struggle Outside the South
• Peggy Pascoe, What Comes Naturally: Miscegenation Law and the Making of Race in America

Note that bookshop.org links are affiliate links that generate a small commission to support the show if you purchase books using these links.

In this episode we're taking a look at another great new book on this history of the American Revolution: The American Revolution and the Fate of the World, by Richard Bell. In this book, we get to see how the revolution affected not only North America, but most of the world. To learn more about how you write a book that manages to cover such a massive subject with remarkable alacrity, I'm joined by the author of The American Revolution and the Fate of the World, Dr. Richard Bell.

Rick Bell is a professor of history at the University of Maryland and is the author of three books, as well as an edited collection. His first book was We Shall Be No More: Suicide and Self-Government in the Newly United States, which came out in 2012. He followed that up with Stolen: Five Free Boys Kidnapped Into Slavery and Their Astonishing Odyssey Home, an award-winning book that was published in 2019. The American Revolution and the Fate of the World came out at the end of last year. He has also created two streaming courses through the Great Courses series online, with a third on the way.

I have to tell you, I was a little surprised at how I absolutely devoured this book, and I was even more surprised to learn how it came together. I think you'll love learning about Rick's approach to writing, his thinking about structure and character, and his habit of wandering the halls of his department, talking to himself. Here's my interview with Dr. Rick Bell.

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Note that bookshop.org links are affiliate links that generate a small commission to support the show if you purchase books using these links.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Richard Bell, The American Revolution and the Fate of the World
• Richard Bell, Stolen: Five Free Boys Kidnapped Into Slavery and Their Astonishing Odyssey Home
• Richard Bell, We Shall Be No More: Suicide and Self-Government in the Newly United States
• Richard Bell on Great Courses Plus: "America's Long Struggle Against Slavery"
• Richard Bell on Great Courses Plus: "Ordinary Americans in the Revolution"
• Zotero
• Octet musical
• Alan Taylor
• Jill Lepore
• Eric Foner
• Ira Berlin
• Ilyon Woo, Master Slave Husband Wife: An Epic Journey from Slavery to Freedom
• Edward P. Jones, The Known World

In most episodes, I interview an author of nonfiction history about their research and writing process, but in today's episode we get to do something a little different. We're taking a closer look at how authors and presses get the word out about new books. And we're going to do that with an insider's perspective. I'm very excited to be joined in this episode by Sonya Bonczek, the director of publicity and communications for University of North Carolina Press.

I have exchanged many emails with Sonya over the past few years whenever I've had podcast guests who publish with UNC Press, and I've been impressed at the great publicity work that Sonya and her team are doing. So when I thought about who might be able to bring us a publicist's perspective, she was first on my list. I was eager to hear from Sonya about how book publicity has changed throughout her career, what works and what doesn't, what she wishes more authors know, and how she's feeling about the state of the book industry today, especially when it comes to nonfiction history.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Support Drafting the Past on Patreon
• Amanda Ice, Harvard University Press publicist, on Your Words Unleashed
• UNC Press on Instagram
• UNC Press on TikTok
• New York Magazine's 2008 article on whether book publishing would end
• The New York Times, "'Luddite' Teens Don't Want Your Likes", December 2022

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