Helen Simpson Reads “Lub Dub Lub Dub Lub Dub”

Helen Simpson reads her story “Lub Dub Lub Dub Lub Dub,” from the September 7, 2026, issue of the magazine. A winner of the American Academy of Arts and Letters’s E. M. Forster Award, Simpson is the author of seven short-story collections, including “Four Bare Legs in a Bed,” which won the Somerset Maugham Award in 1990, and “Cockfosters,” which was published in 2025.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Madhuri Vijay reads her story “Hidden Life,” from the August 24 & 31, 2026, issue of the magazine. Vijay is the author of the novel “The Far Field,” which won India’s J.C.B. Prize for Literature in 2019. Her second novel, “The Festival,” will be published in 2028. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Rachel Yoder reads her story “The Promise,” from the August 10, 2026, issue of the magazine. Yoder is the author of the novel “Nightbitch,” which was published in 2021. A finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award for début fiction, it was adapted for the screen in 2024. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Sheila Heti reads her story “Earthly Delights,” from the August 3, 2026, issue of the magazine. Heti is the author of eleven books, including the novel “Pure Colour,” which won the Governor General’s Award in 2022, and “Alphabetical Diaries,” which was published in 2024. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Min Jin Lee reads her story “Testing,” from the July 27, 2026, issue of the magazine. Lee is the author of the novels “Free Food for Millionaires” and “Pachinko,” which was a National Book Award finalist in 2017. Her third novel, “American Hagwon,” from which this week’s story was adapted, will be published in September. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Bryan Washington reads his story “Gatekeeping,” from the July 20, 2026, issue of the magazine. Washington is the author of four works of fiction, including “Memorial,” “Family Meal,” and “Palaver,” which won the L.A. Times Book Prize in 2025. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Will Mackin reads his story “Pig Lab,” from the July 6 & 13, 2026, issue of the magazine. Mackin, a U.S. Navy veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, is the author of “Bring Out the Dog,” which won the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize as the best début short-story collection of 2018. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ben Lerner reads his story “The Readers,” from the June 29, 2026, issue of the magazine. Lerner is the author of nine books of poetry and fiction, including the novels “10:04,” “The Topeka School,” which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2020, and “Transcription,” which came out earlier this year. He was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2015. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Andrea Bajani reads his story “Constellation,” which was translated, from the Italian, by Geoffrey Brock, and appeared in the June 15, 2026, issue of the magazine. Bajani is a winner of the Bagutta Prize and the Strega Prize, among other awards, and the author of ten books of fiction, including “If You Kept a Record of Sins” and “Every Promise.” His most recent novel, “The Anniversary,” from which this story was adapted, is being translated into more than two dozen languages, and will be published in English in August. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Jamil Jan Kochai reads his story “The Twice-Widowed Khala Helai,” from the June 8, 2026, issue of the magazine. Kochai is the author of the novel “99 Nights in Logar” and the story collection “The Haunting of Hajji Hotak and Other Stories,” which was a finalist for the National Book Award in 2022 and won the 2023 Aspen Words Literary Prize. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices