In the fourth installment of their debut novelists series UPCOMING / UP & COMING, Jason and Brett talk to three new writers about their recently and soon-to-be released books. Zoë Bossiere (Cactus Country, May 21) talks about navigating identity growing up in a trailer park; Alan Murrin (The Coast Road, June 4) shares how short stories transformed into a novel; and Essie Chambers (Swift River, June 4) talks about how ancestral inheritance shaped her book, and also learns about the cootie shot.

Zoë Bossiere (they/she) is writer from Tucson, Arizona. They are the managing editor of Brevity: A Journal of Concise Literary Nonfiction. as well as the coeditor of two anthologies: The Best of Brevity (Rose Metal Press, 2020) and The Lyric Essay as Resistance: Truth from the Margins (Wayne State UP, 2023). Bossiere's debut, Cactus Country: A Boyhood Memoir, chronicles their experiences growing up as a trans boy in a Tucson, Arizona trailer park.

Alan Murrin is an Irish writer based in Berlin. His short story, “The Wake,” won the 2021 Bournemouth Writing Prize and was shortlisted for short story of the year at the Irish Book Awards. The Coast Road was shortlisted for the PFD Queer Fiction prize. Murrin is also the recipient of an Irish Arts Council Agility Award and an Arts Council Literature Bursary. He is a graduate of the prose fiction masters at the University of East Anglia, and writes for the Irish Times and the Times Literary Supplement, as well as Art Review and e-flux.

Essie Chambers earned her MFA in creative writing from Columbia University and has received fellowships from the MacDowell Vermont Studio Center, and Baldwin for the Arts. A former film and television executive, she was a producer on the documentary Descendant, which was released by the Obamas’ Higher Ground production company and Netflix in 2022. Swift River is her debut novel.

**BOOKS!**
Check out the list of books discussed on each episode on our Bookshop page:
https://bookshop.org/shop/gaysreading | By purchasing books through this Bookshop link, you can support both Gays Reading and an independent bookstore of your choice!

Join our Patreon for exclusive bonus content!

Purchase your Gays Reading podcast Merch!

Follow us on Instagram
@gaysreading | @bretts.book.stack | @jasonblitman

What are you reading?
Send us an email or a voice memo at gaysreading@gmail.com

Jason and Brett talk to Steven Rowley (The Guncle Abroad) about sea cave adventures in Capri, Varla Jean Merman's rendition of "Ring Them Bells," the best Wang Chung song, and obviously: Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again and Grease 2.

Steven Rowley is the bestselling author of five novels including, Lily and the Octopus, a Washington Post Notable Book; The Editor, an NPR Best Book of the Year; The Guncle, winner of the 22nd Thurber Prize for American Humor and Goodreads Choice Awards finalist for Novel of the Year; and The Celebrants. His fiction has been translated in twenty languages. He resides in Palm Springs, California.

Truffle hunt in Rome: https://matteo-truffles.com/

**BOOKS!**
Check out the list of books discussed on each episode on our Bookshop page:
https://bookshop.org/shop/gaysreading | By purchasing books through this Bookshop link, you can support both Gays Reading and an independent bookstore of your choice!

Join our Patreon for exclusive bonus content!

Purchase your Gays Reading podcast Merch!

Follow us on Instagram
@gaysreading | @bretts.book.stack | @jasonblitman

What are you reading?
Send us an email or a voice memo at gaysreading@gmail.com

Jason and Brett talk to Kaliane Bradley (The Ministry of Time) about transforming her once-serious novel about Cambodia and being mixed-race into the latest genre-defying Good Morning America book club pick. They learn how Kaliane was able to experience the 21st century as an adventure, gush over the only photo of a footnote of a historical figure, and debate about chilled red wine.

Kaliane Bradley is a British-Cambodian writer and editor based in London. Her short fiction has appeared in Somesuch Stories, The Willowherb Review, Electric Literature, Catapult, and Extra Teeth, among others. She was the winner of the 2022 Harper’s Bazaar Short Story Prize and the 2022 V.S. Pritchett Short Story Prize.

**BOOKS!**
Check out the list of books discussed on each episode on our Bookshop page:
https://bookshop.org/shop/gaysreading | By purchasing books through this Bookshop link, you can support both Gays Reading and an independent bookstore of your choice!

Join our Patreon for exclusive bonus content!

Purchase your Gays Reading podcast Merch!

Follow us on Instagram
@gaysreading | @bretts.book.stack | @jasonblitman

What are you reading?
Send us an email or a voice memo at gaysreading@gmail.com