Craig Laurance Gidney – The Virtual Memories Show

Sheesh! Only a week left in 2013? How’d that happen?

I went into 2013 with the goal of putting out a new podcast every other week. I managed to exceed that goal and even bumped up to a weekly schedule for the last quarter of the year. I’m pretty optimistic that I can sustain that in 2014, with an occasional week off.

I’ve got an extra-special (by my standards) episode of The Virtual Memories Show on tap for New Year’s Eve, but I thought we’d revisit the show’s most prolific year with a countdown of the top 10 most downloaded episodes.

I only had this countdown idea with 7 days left in the year, so let’s go with #s 8-10 in today’s post! I’ll post another top 10 episode each day until we reach Dec. 31:

#10 – The Importance of Being Out – It was our first double-episode of the year! First, Craig Gidney discussed his new YA/bullying novel, Bereft, which went on to be nominated for an NAACP Image Award, the Moonbeam Children’s Award and the Lambada Literary Award in YA. Then Ed Hermance talked about the history of Giovanni’s Room, his queer bookstore that’s celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2013. Later in the year, Ed looked to sell the store, but it looks like there are no takers, so this interview chronicles the end of an era. Lots of great conversation about writing, publishing and bookselling in this episode. (4/2/13) – mp3

#9 – Episode 21: The Guy Who Drew the Liver Spots – Drew Friedman, the Vermeer of the Borscht Belt, the great painter, cartoonist, and chronicler of modern fame (and infamy), invited me out to 2nd Ave. Deli in NYC one morning to record a conversation about art, show biz, R. Crumb, Joe Franklin, the Friars Club, Howard Stern, Abe Vigoda, the gallery show commemorating his books on Old Jewish Comedians, and more! It’s a fun conversation with someone who watched even more TV and read even more comic books as a kid than I did! (10/8/13) – mp3

#8 – Episode 9 – Putting the “Pro” in Profanity – Jesse Sheidlower, editor-at-large for the Oxford English Dictionary and author/editor of The F-Word, talks about the shifting idea of “offensive” language, how one becomes a lexicographer, the OED’s digital challenge, the history of Jesse’s Word, and more! (4/30/13) – mp3

Check back tomorrow for lucky #7! Thank you to all my guests for the great conversation, and thank you, dear listeners, for each and every download! And have a great Christmas, if that’s your thing!

You can find all our episodes at the podcast archive or by visiting iTunes!

Virtual Memories – season 3 episode 7 –
The Importance of Being Out

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It’s time for the first double-episode of the season!

“To me, there are two types of YA: one is fiction written with the kid in mind, and the other is where the characters happen to be that age. It’s a fascinating age-group, because that’s where the world is changing. I tend to write for the latter.”
–Craig Gidney

First, Craig Gidney, author of the new YA novel, Bereft, talks about bullying and how the internet has amplified it, his literary influences, his problems with “transparent” prose and Twilight, how his new book differs from his first collection, Sea, Swallow Me, and the joy of getting a blurb from one of his favorite authors.

“For the first 15 years or so, we’d occasionally get busted windows. It hasn’t happened in 10 or 15 years now, but in a period of two weeks, there were three windows smashed, and then we would go a few years without having any busted. It always struck me as interesting that these broken windows always came in the dead of night.”
–Ed Hermance

Then Ed Hermance talks to us about the history of his queer bookstore, Giovanni’s Room, the changing face of gay literature, the challenges of selling books in The Amazon Age, the historical creation of gay identity, why he was a little embarrassed by Obama’s Stonewall shout-out, and the most poignant story that the store has to tell.

Enjoy the conversation! Then check out our archives for more great talks!

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About our Guests

Craig Laurance Gidney writes both contemporary, young adult and genre fiction. Recipient of the 1996 Susan C. Petrey Scholarship to the Clarion West writer’s workshop, he has published works in the fantasy/science fiction, gay and young adult categories. His first collection, Sea, Swallow Me and Other Stories, was nominated for the 2009 Lambda Literary Award in the Science Fiction/Fantasy and Horror category. He lives and writes in his native Washington, DC. He is on Twitter as @ethereallad.

Ed Hermance is the owner of Giovanni’s Room, the longest-operating queer bookstore in America. Ed was born in Houston in 1940, graduated Dartmouth College (’62, BA, philosophy) and Indiana University, Bloomington (’65, MA, comparative literature), and taught at Auburn, Indiana State , and Tuebingen University in Germany. Fearing that he might never escape the closet as long as he remained a teacher, Ed abandoned academia and joined a hippie commune in the mountains of Southern Colorado (still a going concern with a long history of distinguished perennial guests, including Allen Ginsberg, Peter Orlovsky, and John Corso). Ed moved to Philadelphia in 1971 to manage Ecology Food Co-op, a natural foods outlet. He bought Giovanni’s Room from its founders with partner Arleen Olshan in 1976.

Credits: This episode’s music is Heaven or Las Vegas by Cocteau Twins. The conversation with Craig was recorded at the Doris-Mae Gallery in Washington, D.C., on a pair of Blue Encore 100 mics. The conversation with Ed was recorded at the Giovanni’s Room in Philadelphia, on a pair of AT2020 mics, feeding into a Zoom H4n recorder. I recorded the interstitial stuff on a Blue Yeti USB mic into Audacity. All editing and processing was done in Garage Band.

Tag: Craig Laurance Gidney

2013 Podcast Countdown: #10-8

Podcast: The Importance of Being Out