25 A Polyamorous Commune

Autumn is here and I’m fully immersed my normal work and family routine, ready for the half-term break. How about you?📚 Recommendation for ravenous readersThe Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett (Riverhead Books, 2020)The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it's not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it's everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Many years later, one sister lives with her black daughter in the same southern town she once tried to escape. The other secretly passes for white, and her white husband knows nothing of her past. Still, even separated by so many miles and just as many lies, the fates of the twins remain intertwined. What will happen to the next generation, when their own daughters' storylines intersect?👣 My moseyingI’m still in the three-month The Big Write phase of The Novelry course. It’s going really well. The Big Idea phase strengthened my concept and the coaching is invaluable in dialing everything up, to find ever-bigger rocks to throw at the main character. Apparently there’s no identified source for the playwriting adage: in the first act, get your character up in a tree; in the second, throw stones at them; in the third, get them down.🎙️ Interview with Lucas FothergillI think I came across Lucas Fothergill in an Unbound newsletter. Lucas is a writer and documentary filmmaker. His work has appeared in national newspapers and magazines, and he has developed and helped produce documentaries for the BBC, Sky, Netflix, and others. Everyone Everywhere: 21 Stories of Mixed Race Britain is his first book. He lives with his wife, son, and dog.Books mentioned:No One Belongs Here More Than You by Miranda JulyIt Chooses You by Miranda JulyThe Castle: Adventures in a World of Unraveling Men by Jon RonsonLondon Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family’s Search for Truth by Patrick Radden KeefeEmpire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden KeefeThe Things We Never Say by Elizabeth StroutWhite Teeth by Zadie SmithPassing by Nella LarsenDocumentary:Stories We Tell by Sarah PolleyYou can find Lucas at lucasfothergill.co.uk, on Instagram @lucas_fothergill, and on LinkedIn.Please listen to the audio for the full interview, on Substack or wherever you listen to podcasts.Share The Spark📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun 🇺🇸 US Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🇬🇧 UK Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🎧 Audiobook on all platforms except Audible, for now (produced by Mercury Calling)“Things My Dad Told Me” in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by Mercury Calling.Thanks for reading The Spark! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Share The Spark This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

It really feels like the start of a new year, with kids in school and most people back from their summer vacations and now in the office. Lots of energy in the air!📚 Recommendations for ravenous readersThe Heatwave by Kate Riordan (Grand Central Publishing, 2021)Elodie was beautiful. Elodie was smart. Elodie was manipulative. Elodie is dead.When Sylvie Durand receives a letter calling her back to her crumbling family home in the South of France, she knows she has to go. In the middle of a sweltering 1990’s summer marked by unusual fires across the countryside, she returns to La Reverie with her youngest daughter Emma in tow, ignoring the deep sense of dread she feels for this place she’s long tried to forget.As memories of the events that shattered their family a decade earlier threaten to come to the surface, Sylvie struggles to shield Emma from the truth of what really happened all those years ago. In every corner of the house, Sylvie can’t escape the specter of Elodie, her first child. Elodie, born amid the ‘68 Paris riots with one blue eye and one brown, and mysteriously dead by fourteen. Elodie, who reminded the small village of one those Manson girls. Elodie who knew exactly how to get what she wanted. As the fires creep towards the villa, it’s clear to Sylvie that something isn’t quite right at La Reverie…And there is a much greater threat closer to home.And: back to plural “recommendations”—watch or listen to the Freakonomics Better in Person interview with James Daunt. “Amazon Was Supposed to Kill the Bookstore. James Daunt Had Other Plans.”👣 My moseyingI’m still absolutely loving The Novelry course. I’ve progressed from the month-long The Big Idea to the three-month-or-so The Big Write. And I’m actually writing now, the recommended one hour per day, no more, no less. Plus a lesson a day, which can be relatively short and done on the Tube or in those little time gaps during the day. I particularly like writing notes longhand in my notebook. For the novel writing, I am now using Dabble instead of Scrivener. It’s simpler and easier to use. Staying off Instagram is still wonderful too. I’ve only downloaded it to post about the occasional event like the London Book and Poetry Fair at Conway Hall, where I had a table, and World Suicide Prevention Day on September 10.My T-shirt always gets a lot of comments. It says, “Yes, one of my characters is based on you. No, I’m not telling you which one.” I find it hilarious for nonfiction especially since I didn’t use any pseudonyms. You can find it and browse others in The Failing Writers Podcast merch store.🎙️ Interview with Helen CroydonI met Helen Croydon at the Society of Authors summer party this past June.Helen is an author, ghostwriter and book development coach. Her specialism is memoir and narrative non-fiction, having written three of her own books and ghostwritten two others in this genre.Helen honed her storytelling skills through a 15-year journalism career. She learned from the best editors in the business by writing or broadcasting for titles such as The Times, The Telegraph, The Independent, ITN, BBC and more.Her first book was a dating memoir called Sugar Daddy Diaries, which became a WHSmith top 10 title in 2011. Her third book was another memoir about endurance sport, called This Girl Ran, which was longlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year in 2018.Her other books include Screw the Fairytale, which explores modern relationships; and most recently, a ghostwritten memoir, Forbidden Love, about a romantic relationship between an adoptee and her long-lost birth father.She also ran a PR business for five years, specialising in helping thought leaders develop and amplify their expertise. But a calling back to writing three years ago led her to scale her business down, and return to writing, but this time by helping others to articulate stories that need to be told, which she does through ghostwriting or book development coaching.Books mentioned:Don’t Call This Fiction by Cindy EthertonNobody’s Girl by Virginia Roberts GiuffreFour Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals by Oliver BurkemanThe Midnight Library by Matt HaigEcho Boy by Matt HaigThe Eights by Joanna MillerYou can find Helen at helencroydon.com, on Instagram @helencroydon and on LinkedIn.Please listen to the audio for the full interview, on Substack or wherever you listen to podcasts.Share The Spark📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun 🇺🇸 US Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🇬🇧 UK Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🎧 Audiobook on all platforms except Audible, for now (produced by Mercury Calling)“Things My Dad Told Me” in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by Mercury Calling.Thanks for reading The Spark! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Share The Spark This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

Hello from a very hot UK, in the middle of our fifth heat wave of the year. Yesterday, a national alert came through on everyone’s mobile phones warning of wildfire risk and to not use disposable barbecues or set off fireworks. In these scary times, I’m grateful more than ever to lose myself in fiction—with the exception of this month’s nonfiction reading recommendation, which happens to feature some very cold weather.📚 Recommendation for ravenous readersNorth to the Future: An Offline Adventure Through the Changing Wilds of Alaska by Ben Weissenbach (Grand Central Publishing, 2025)At the age of twenty, college student Ben Weissenbach went north to Arctic Alaska armed with little more than inspiration from his literary heroes and a growing interest in climate change. What met him there was a world utterly unlike the 21st century Los Angeles in which he grew up—a land of ice, rock, and grizzlies seen by few outside a small contingent of scientists with big personalities.There’s Roman Dial, the larger-than-life ecologist with whom Ben walks and rafts a thousand miles across Alaska’s Brooks Range. There’s Kenji Yoshikawa, the reindeer-herding permafrost expert who leaves Ben alone for eleven days to care for his off-grid homestead, where temperatures drop to -49 degrees Fahrenheit. And there’s Matt Nolan, the independent glaciologist who flies him to the largest glaciers in the American Arctic.As these scientists teach Ben to read Alaska’s warming landscape, he confronts the limits of digital life and the complexity of the world beyond his screens. He emerges from each adventure with a new perspective on our modern relationship to technology and a growing wonder for our fast-changing—ever-changing—natural world.Winner of the 2025 National Outdoor Book Award (NOBA)One of Smithsonian Magazine's Top Ten Books of 2025Also mentioned: Looking for a Story: A Complete Guide to the Writings of John McPhee by Noel Rubinton👣 My moseyingMy big update is that I have signed up for The Finished Novel Course with The Novelry. A couple of weeks in and I am absolutely loving it. It starts with The Big Idea, then The Big Write, then The Big Edit. It’s self-paced and I’ve been doing the recommended one lesson per day, which fosters a consistent writing practice. And there are coaching sessions, a ton of live and recorded classes, and a whole community which I haven’t even started interacting with yet.Though I already had my idea and outline for my novel, and had written about a quarter of it (20,000 words), The Big Idea is already strengthening it.Also, I’ve offloaded Instagram from my phone, only occasionally checking messages using my laptop browser. I’ll download it once a month to post there when The Spark is published. The amount of time and headspace this has freed up is remarkable.One other way I’ve freed up time and mental energy is by not checking my work emails on my phone. I’ve gotten a lot better at reviewing them on my work laptop during working hours, which allows me to process them more efficiently too.These three things—doing The Novelry course, not being on Instagram, and being more focused with my work emails—are already accelerating my progress with my second book. Whoop whoop!🎙️ Interview with Genevieve MarenghiI met Genevieve Marenghi at the Alliance of Independent Authors stand at the London Book Fair in March 2026.With a BA in English and Philosophy, Genevieve worked for eleven years at the Weekend FT, where she helped create and launch How To Spend It magazine.She volunteered for years as a National Trust guide at Ham House. This became the setting for her debut art heist novel, No Oil Painting. Inspired by a recovered stolen Titian, No Oil Painting was listed for the inaugural Women’s Prize Trust and Curtis Brown Discoveries Award. It’s the first contemporary novel to be set at a National Trust property.Genevieve’s writing has also been listed for the Writers’ & Artists’ Short Story Competition and has featured several times on the award-winning Failing Writers podcast. In addition, she’s been interviewed on BBC London Radio and more recently, by bestselling author and Founder Director of the Women’s Prize, Kate Mosse, at the 2026 Women’s Prize Live event.Her writing uses dark humour to probe the difference between our perception of people and their true selves. The gulf between what is said and what is meant. Public transport is a writer’s goldmine and she shamelessly earwigs on juicy conversations. Women aged over fifty are essentially invisible and she views this as a kind of superpower. Unlike her protagonist Maureen, she hasn’t used this to commit art theft. Yet.Fueled mainly by chocolate, crisps and Prosecco, Genevieve values live music and laughing with friends. She has also developed an alarming fondness for museum shops and fridge magnets.Books mentioned:No Oil Painting by Genevieve MarenghiHunger and Thirst by Claire FullerLondon Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family’s Search for Truth by Patrick Radden KeefeMy Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante, translated by MS Ann GoldsteinSwing Time by Zadie SmithCountry Girl by Edna O’BrienThe Mercy Step by Marcia HutchinsonBeyond Black by Hilary MantelYou can find Genevieve at genevievemarenghi.com, on Instagram @genevievemarenghi, Bluesky @stgenevieve, Facebook, and Threads.Please listen to the audio for the full interview, on Substack or wherever you listen to podcasts.Share The Spark📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun 🇺🇸 US Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🇬🇧 UK Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🎧 Audiobook on all platforms (produced by Mercury Calling)“Things My Dad Told Me” in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by Mercury Calling.Thanks for reading The Spark! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Share The Spark This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

Welcome back to The Spark as you know it, featuring a reading recommendation, updates on my moseying, and an author interview.📚 Recommendation for ravenous readersFallout by Eleanor Anstruther (Empress Editions, 2026)Bridget is fifteen and already tired of being told how the world works. Her father is building a fallout shelter in the garden. Her mother is holding the family together with routines and silence. And at school, no one is saying anything that feels true. So when Bridget hears about the women camped outside a military base at Greenham Common—protesting nuclear missiles, refusing to leave, she goes. At first, it’s just curiosity.Then it’s something else.Because Greenham isn’t what she expected. It’s chaotic, alive, and full of women who don’t ask permission. They argue, organise, clash, and care for each other in ways Bridget has never seen before. Here, the rules feel different. Looser. Sharper.And the longer she stays, the harder it is to imagine going home.But nothing at Greenham is simple. Beneath the solidarity, tensions simmer. Voices collide. Loyalties shift. And as Bridget is pulled deeper into this volatile, exhilarating world, she begins to see cracks—not just in the movement, but in everything she thought she understood about family, power, and herself.👣 My moseyingThe pace of life feels very different on the other side of my Staring into the Sun US and UK book tour. I have more creative headspace and am looking forward to getting back to my work in progress, a novel. I’ve already written about a quarter of it (20,000 words) but haven’t worked on it since the end of last year. So I sent it to my Kindle and re-read what I’d written, straight through, no edits or notes. The next step is getting back to the actual writing!🎙️ Interview with M. Leona GodinLeona with her portrait by Roy Nachum. Photo by Alabaster Rhumb.Leona is a classmate of mine from grade school in San Francisco. We recently reconnected through group emails ahead of our 40th (!) reunion, which neither of us was able to attend. But we did meet up in New York at the Museum of Chinese in America, where I had a book event on June 3.M. Leona Godin is the 2025-26 Jean Strouse Fellow at the New York Public Library Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers and the author of There Plant Eyes: A Personal and Cultural History of Blindness. Her writing on art, technology, and disability culture has appeared in The New York Times, Art in America, ARTnews, Literary Hub, O Magazine, and elsewhere. She’s received support from MacDowell, Yaddo, and the New York Public Library’s Diamonstein-Spielvogel Fellowship. She is the founding editor of Aromatica Poetica, an arts and culture laboratory for the advancement of smell and taste. Godin lectures widely on multisensory culture and access, and her experimental performances use scent and touch to explore sensory translation and blindness as a creative force.Please listen to the audio for the full interview.Books mentioned:How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York by Jacob A. RiisThe Waterworks by E. L. DoctorowCrip Authority: Disability and the Art of Consolation in the Renaissance by Elizabeth BeardenRiverwork by Lisa RobertsonYou can find Leona at drmlgodin.com and on Instagram at @drmlgodin. Aromatica Poetica is currently open for submissions.Share The Spark📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun 🇺🇸 US Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🇬🇧 UK Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🎧 Audiobook on all platforms (produced by Mercury Calling)“Things My Dad Told Me” in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by Mercury Calling. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

News flash: I’m not taking a break from The Spark after all. I am, however, streamlining the format slightly. There will be one reading recommendation every month and I’m dropping the writing tips and resources. Updates on my moseying will continue, as will the mainstay of the podcast: the author interviews.On my US book tour for Staring into the Sun, a friend from primary school suggested that I be the next interview subject. The first conversation partner I thought of was Jason Buchholz, author of A Paper Son and The Cartographer of Sands, and the co-founder and co-owner of writing consultancy Collaborist. I hope that you enjoy the interview as much as I did!📚 Recommendation for ravenous readersInterior Chinatown: A Novel by Charles Yu (Pantheon, 2020)Willis Wu doesn’t perceive himself as the protagonist in his own life: he’s merely Generic Asian Man. Sometimes he gets to be Background Oriental Making a Weird Face or even Disgraced Son, but always he is relegated to a prop. Yet every day, he leaves his tiny room in a Chinatown SRO (single-room occupancy) and enters the Golden Palace restaurant, where Black and White, a procedural cop show, is in perpetual production. He’s a bit player here, too, but he dreams of being Kung Fu Guy—the most respected role that anyone who looks like him can attain. Or is it?After stumbling into the spotlight, Willis finds himself launched into a wider world than he’s ever known, discovering not only the secret history of Chinatown, but the buried legacy of his own family.👣 My moseyingAs of today, I’ve had nine Staring into the Sun events between the UK and the US. These have been incredible, each one unique and special. I’ve discovered that I can talk endlessly about my book, which is not a surprise to anyone I’ve come across in the last decade.It’s been fun as the events have progressed to have more and more people attending who have read the book. Their questions are consequently much more specific, either about writing process or particular people.Huge thanks to the people and organizations who have helped put together these magical events, and to everyone who attended. The next reading is on Saturday, June 20, 11am-12:30pm at my local Amersham Library.If you would like to get your hands on a copy, see the links below.🇺🇸 US Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🇬🇧 UK Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🎧 Audiobook on all platforms (produced by Mercury Calling)🎙️ Interview with Madelyn PostmanIn conversation with Jason Buchholz. Please listen to the audio for the full interview.Books mentioned:Fifth Chinese Daughter by Jade Snow WongIf on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo CalvinoThe Overstory by Richard PowersAlso mentioned:Shoong Family Chinese Cultural Center in Oakland, CaliforniaMuseum of Chinese in America, New York CityShare The Spark📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun 🇺🇸 US Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🇬🇧 UK Buy paperback | ebook (published by Ten16 Press)🎧 Audiobook on all platforms (produced by Mercury Calling)“Things My Dad Told Me” in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by Mercury Calling.Thanks for reading The Spark! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Share The Spark This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

Staring into the Sun is out in the wild! The paperback and ebook are published by Ten16 Press. The audiobook, available soon, is read by Kate Hammer, Anthony Postman, and myself and it’s produced by Mercury Calling.🇺🇸 US Buy paperback | ebook🇬🇧 UK Buy paperback | ebook☕️ A break from The SparkAs I had announced in January before giving into the temptation of releasing some audiobook teasers in February, March, and April, I’m going to take a break from The Spark. I may come back to it later in the summer or autumn, or I may not. Working four days a week plus current book stuff and wanting to continue writing my second book doesn’t leave a lot of time for the podcast and newsletter, much as I love it. But (on the other hand—which hand am I on now?) I truly value the community The Spark creates with authors, readers, publishers, bookshop owners, and other “literary citizens.” So watch this space!🗓️ Book tour datesI’ve already had three incredible launch events in the UK. Check out Instagram for photos. Next stop: Reno and Carson City, Nevada! Then it’s the San Francisco Bay Area and finally, New York Chinatown.Weds, May 27 — Brewery Arts Center, Carson City, NV (info here)Thurs, May 28 — The Radical Cat, Reno, NV (free tickets here)Sat, May 30 — Shoong Family Chinese Cultural Center, Oakland (free tickets here)Sun, May 31 — The Pearl, Locke, CA with the kind support of the Locke Foundation and the 1882 Foundation (free tickets here)Weds, June 3 — Museum of Chinese in America, New York (tickets here)Back in London, join me at The RSA in June.Fri, June 12 — The Royal Society of Arts, London (free tickets here)Huge thanks to the people and organizations who have helped put together these magical events. It’s a dream come true for me. See you on the flip side!Share The Spark📙 Where to find my writing"Things My Dad Told Me" in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK“His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by [email protected] for reading The Spark! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Share The Spark This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

Ahead of the publication of my debut, Staring into the Sun, in May, I hope you enjoy this excerpt from the third chapter, “An Upright Man.” It’s about my great-grandfather, Henri Wu.Staring into the Sun can be pre-ordered in the US with Ten16 Press and it’s already available for purchase in the UK. The audio book is read by Kate Hammer, Anthony Postman, and myself and it’s produced by Mercury Calling.🗓️ Book tour datesFriday-Sunday, April 17-19 — Outland Publishing Fair, Peckham, LondonFriday, May 1 — Season’s Cafe, Amersham, UK (let me know if you want an invite)Tues, May 5 — Queen’s Park Books, London (let me know if you want an invite)Mon, May 11 — Brown Club of the UK, Castiglione, London (for Brown University and Phillips Exeter Academy alumni)Weds, May 27 — Brewery Arts Center, Carson City, NVThurs, May 28 — The Radical Cat, Reno, NVSat, May 30 — Shoong Family Chinese Cultural Center, OaklandSun, May 31 — The Pearl, Locke, CA with the kind support of the Locke Foundation and the 1882 FoundationWeds, June 3 — Museum of Chinese in America, New YorkShare The Spark📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun will be published by Ten16 Press in May 2026 in paperback and ebook. The audio book is read by Kate Hammer, Anthony Postman, and myself and it is produced by Mercury Calling. The book can be pre-ordered in the US with Ten16 Press and it’s already available for purchase in the UK."Things My Dad Told Me" in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by [email protected] for reading The Spark! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Share The Spark This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

Last month, I announced that I would stop The Spark newsletter and podcast indefinitely. But then, chatting with a friend, I asked myself: why don’t I use this platform to share an audio excerpt of my debut, Staring into the Sun? So please enjoy the beginning of the first story, “Things My Dad Told Me.” This story was shortlisted in The Hope Prize and published by Simon & Schuster Australia in the anthology, Tomorrow There Will Be Sun.🗓️ Book tour datesHere are my planned tour dates. Specific event details coming soon!Sat & Sun, May 23 & 24 — New YorkTues-Thurs, May 26-28 — RenoFri, May 29 — Locke, CASat-Sun, May 30-31 — San Francisco Bay AreaShare The Spark📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun will be published by Ten16 Press in May 2026 in paperback and ebook. The audio book will be produced by Mercury Calling. 👉 Preorder links coming soon! 👈"Things My Dad Told Me" in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by [email protected] for reading The Spark! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Share The Spark This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

Last month, I announced that I would stop The Spark newsletter and podcast indefinitely. But then, chatting with a friend, I asked myself: why don’t I use this platform to share an audio excerpt of my debut, Staring into the Sun? So please enjoy the beginning of the first story, “Things My Dad Told Me.” This story was shortlisted in The Hope Prize and published by Simon & Schuster Australia in the anthology, Tomorrow There Will Be Sun.🗓️ Book tour datesHere are my planned tour dates. Specific event details coming soon!Sat & Sun, May 23 & 24 — New YorkTues-Thurs, May 26-28 — RenoFri, May 29 — Locke, CASat-Sun, May 30-31 — San Francisco Bay AreaShare The Spark📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun will be published by Ten16 Press in May 2026 in paperback and ebook. The audio book will be produced by Mercury Calling. 👉 Preorder links coming soon! 👈"Things My Dad Told Me" in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by [email protected] for reading The Spark! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Share The Spark This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com

This will be the last edition of The Spark podcast and newsletter, maybe for a while, maybe ever. I will be using the time freed up to focus on my short story collection, Staring into the Sun. I do love The Spark as a means to connect to other writers, so we’ll see what happens to it.For the full interview with Teresa Wong, tune in to The Spark wherever you listen to podcasts.📚 Recommendations for ravenous readersHere are the recommended reads for January.Dear Scarlet by Teresa Wong (2019)In this intimate and moving graphic memoir, Teresa Wong writes and illustrates the story of her struggle with postpartum depression in the form of a letter to her daughter Scarlet. Equal parts heartbreaking and funny, Dear Scarlet perfectly captures the quiet desperation of those suffering from postpartum depression and the profound feelings of inadequacy and loss. As Teresa grapples with her fears and anxieties and grasps at potential remedies, coping mechanisms, and her mother's Chinese elixirs, we come to understand one woman's battle against the cruel dynamics of postpartum depression.There There by Tommy Orange (2018)This novel follows twelve characters from Native communities: all traveling to the Big Oakland Powwow, all connected to one another in ways they may not yet realize. Among them is Jacquie Red Feather, newly sober and trying to make it back to the family she left behind. Dene Oxendene, pulling his life together after his uncle’s death and working at the powwow to honor his memory. Fourteen-year-old Orvil, coming to perform traditional dance for the very first time. They converge and collide on one fateful day at the Big Oakland Powwow and together this chorus of voices tells of the plight of the urban Native American—grappling with a complex and painful history, with an inheritance of beauty and spirituality, with communion and sacrifice and heroism.Share The Spark✏️ Resources for wonderful writersMy Instagram feed shared a couple of upcoming book festivals on both sides of the pond.Milton Keynes Literary Festival, April 9-12, 2026. “A fabulous festival of books, words, writers, and ideas.”Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, University of Southern California, April 18-19, 2026. “Many stories. One weekend.”👣 My moseyingThis is the year that Staring into the Sun will be published. It’s nearly ready to go to print. I finally finished the endnotes and the acknowledgments. Professor emeritus Robert G. Lee of Brown University wrote an afterword that places Joe Shoong’s story in historical context. Ten16 Press is publishing the paperback and ebook in May 2026. Mercury Calling will produce the audio book.It’s full speed ahead with marketing now!🎙️ Interview with Teresa WongI came across Teresa Wong when fellow 1% for the Planet business member Tinu Mathur of Mathur & Co gave me All Our Ordinary Stories: A Multigenerational Family Odyssey.Teresa Wong is the author of the acclaimed graphic memoirs All Our Ordinary Stories and Dear Scarlet, both longlisted for CBC Canada Reads and finalists for the W.O. Mitchell Book Prize. All Our Ordinary Stories received two Alberta Literary Awards and was also a finalist for the 2025 Governor General’s Literary Award in nonfiction. Her comics and writing have appeared in The Believer, The New Yorker, McSweeney’s and The Walrus. She teaches graphic narrative through Gotham Writers Workshop and was also the 2021–22 Canadian Writer-in-Residence at the University of Calgary.Books and authors mentioned:Raina Telgemeier wrote “How Do You Make a Graphic Novel (and, Why Do They Take So Long?)”Will There Ever Be Another You and Priestdaddy by Patricia LockwoodThe Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Tova BaileyLa Mennulara by Simonetta Agnello Hornby and Massimo FenatiTeresa can be found on Instagram @by_teresawong and at her website byteresawong.com.Tune in to the The Spark podcast for the full interview.📙 Where to find my writingStaring into the Sun in May 2026, published by Ten16 Press in paperback and ebook, audio produced by Mercury Calling."Things My Dad Told Me" in Tomorrow There Will Be Sun, The Hope Prize anthology published by Simon & Schuster Australia.Buy in US | Buy in UK“Gold Mountain Diggers” in Issue 10 of Livina Press.Buy in US | Buy in UK “His Bones” in Transformations, the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize anthology.Buy in US | Buy in UKFind out more about me and my writing, including press coverage, on my website: madelynpostman.com.Most book links go to my Bookshop.org page, where sales are win-win-win, benefiting the authors, local bookstores, and my own writing—unlike using A-you-know-who.You can listen to The Spark on your favorite podcast platform. On Substack, you can listen to the podcast and subscribe to the newsletter. Please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify—it would mean the world to me. And please share it with your reading and writing friends!Music and mixing by [email protected]. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit madelynpostman.substack.com