Authors Between the Covers: What It Takes to Write Your Heart Out

“Every month, 5 million people move from the past to the future,” writes Daniel Brook, author of the 2013 tome, “A History of Future Cities.” “Pouring into developing-world ‘instant cities’ like Dubai and Shenzhen, these urban newcomers confront a modern world cobbled together from fragments of a West they have never seen,” he explains, asking: “Do these fantastical boomtowns, where blueprints spring to life overnight on virgin land, represent the dawning of a brave new world? Or is their vauntedClick here to listen to the podcast!

Jim Barnes is a book editor and director of the IPPY Awards (shorthand for the Independent Publisher Book Awards) — which, for nearly two decades, have rewarded the creativity and innovation of independent authors and publishers who are “changing the face of publishing around the world.” With more than 75 subject categories, regional awards for eight US and two Canadian regions, and a spectacular awards ceremony in New York on the eve of BookExpo America, the IPPY Awards are oneClick here to listen to the podcast!

If you missed Anita Diamant’s “The Red Tent” — a book with such a strong woman protagonist and such a compelling plot that many of us devoured it — then you need to immediately add this title to your reading list. Published in 1997, it is Diamant’s first work of fiction. Inspired by a few lines from Genesis, the book became a word-of-mouth best-seller thanks to reader recommendations, book groups, and support from independent bookstores. In 2001, the Independent BooksellersClick here to listen to the podcast!

Gretchen Rubin was clerking for Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor when she realized that what she really wanted to be was a writer. Since then, she has written several books, including the best-selling “Forty Ways to Look at Winston Churchill,” and her uber-popular “The Happiness Project: Or, why I spent a year trying to sing in the morning, clean my closets, fight right, read Aristotle, and generally have more fun.” Best-selling author Dan Pink said of the book, “ThisClick here to listen to the podcast!

LSD? Ecstasy? Really? Yes, insists Tom Shroder, author of “Acid Test.” In his new book, he makes a convincing argument and encourages us to open our minds to the fact that lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) can heal. The former Washington Post Magazine editor Tom Shroder was a 21-year-old college journalist, when the idea started percolating. He had noticed an article about a charismatic hippie with a pet wolf who was building a house in the woods. His name was RickClick here to listen to the podcast!

Jim Barnes is a book editor and director of the IPPY Awards, shorthand for the Independent Publisher Book Awards. He has been involved with the program since 1997. What are the IPPY’s and why have hundreds of self-published authors applied to win the coveted medallion? We’ll learn all about it in this podcast, plus: Jim gives us the skinny on the independent book publishing world. He shares facts and figures on this growth industry, as well as the down sideClick here to listen to the podcast!

Journalist and author Meg Cox has been earning her living as a writer since graduating from Northwestern University in 1975. She was hired as a staff writer by the Wall Street Journal in 1977, at age 24, and worked at the WSJ in Chicago and New York for 17 years. Her beats included financial futures, agriculture, the business of the arts, and publishing. Since the birth of her son, Max, in 1994, Meg has written for many national magazines —Click here to listen to the podcast!

From a fatal car crash and the death of a parent, to the drama of comforting a sick child and coping with infidelity, life’s greatest emotional challenges play out in the pages of Caroline Leavitt’s books. These scenarios are the stuff of nightmares. But Leavitt’s engaging writing style, character development, and ability to write a book you can’t put down, make this title a must-read. “I’m always obsessed with what pulls people together, and what tugs them apart, particularly families,”Click here to listen to the podcast!

Do you want to get more of what you want, improve your relationships, and enjoy life’s deeper rewards? That’s the ambitious goal that Harvard lecturer Erica Ariel Fox achieves in her new book, Winning From Within: A breakthrough method for leading, living, and lasting change, “The goal of the book is to provide a map for understanding your inner world and a method for sorting yourself out,” explains Fox, who notes the principles of the book were developed from herClick here to listen to the podcast!