"The book opens with stories of new love—crushes, first dates.  There is a longer story tracing a relationship from beginning to end, followed by stories about breaking up and then starting over, finding just the right person to fall in love with again."

"As a parent, you can’t help but wonder if you’re doing it right, where you’re falling behind, is everyone having more fun than you, do these kids even like me??? I think that way as a parent and a Dungeon Master."

"The stories are completely unlinked, and encompass a mix of genres: there’s horror, science fiction, historical fiction, and a ghost story or two, alongside quite a bit of flash fiction."

Lila Byock stops by the studio to talk about her time writing for the acclaimed series Watchmen and her current projects. We discuss growing up in Missoula, Montana, fact-checking at The New Yorker, the magical powers of Cheerios, her transition to TV writing and the collaborative nature of a writers' room. 

"I wrote a lot of novels on my iPhone while riding the subway or bus. I write on my iPhone while preparing meals in the kitchen."

"...so far, I'm liking Iowa City a lot: I've been cycling all over it, and the amount of writers you find per square meter is exciting."

"At some point around 2018, I spontaneously started writing pieces that I trusted in a way I hadn't for a long time."

"Language acquisition is something I’ve thought about a great deal in my life—my parents learning English, my navigating English and Cantonese, and various language extinctions in my life."

"I generally write for about three hours and then panic about the things on my to-do list."

While contemporary attention often centers on urban life, I want to explore and illuminate the hidden narratives and solitary lives in rural settings.

Bret Anthony Johnston joins us to talk about his new book We Burn Daylight, his time as a graduate student at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and what he’s working on now. For his piece from the past, Bret shares one of the many stories he published in Chicken Soup for the Soul years ago (they paid!).

"Right now, I'm still dreaming about that something, something that is neither a novel nor a poem."