Playwright and performer Sandra Tsing Loh returns to the podcast (after four years!) to discuss her surprise hit play Madwomen of the West, which featured a superstar cast including Caroline Aaron, Marilu Henner, Melanie Mayron, and JoBeth Williams. After the Los Angeles theater establishment deemed the show too woman-centric, Sandra mounted an independent production, which she eventually took to New York and London. She now has a new one-woman show — a 70-minute "You’ll Never Eat Lunch In This Town Again”-style rant — about the “journey” of that production called I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get To It.

I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get To It will be performed for just two nights at the Odyssey Theater in Los Angeles. November 16 and November 23. Info and tickets here.

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Sandra Tsing Loh is the author of several books, including "The Madwoman in the Volvo: My Year of Raging Hormones," which was selected as one of the New York Times' 100 Most Notable Books. Her previous book, "Mother on Fire," was inspired by her hit solo show about Los Angeles public education.

Her off-Broadway solo shows include "Aliens in America" and "Bad Sex With Bud Kemp." Her comic memoirs include The New York Times New and Noteworthy "Madwoman and the Roomba"; The New York Times 100 Notable Books "Madwoman in the Volvo"; "Mother on Fire"; "A Year in Van Nuys"; and "Depth Takes a Holiday." The Los Angeles Times named her 1998 novel "If You Lived Here, You'd Be Home By Now" a 100 Best Fiction Book. An Atlantic contributing editor, Loh has been heard on NPR's Morning Edition, PRI's Marketplace and This American Life. She currently hosts the LAist/NPR daily radio science minute “The Loh Down on Science.”

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For this first post-election episode, Meghan welcomes back author Lionel Shriver, who is arguably America’s (and the U.K.’s) most controversial woman of letters. They talk about the over/under on the end of democracy, whether J.D. Vance is following a Trump-mandated script, how trans issues replaced abortion rights as a priority for many female voters, and whether Kamala Harris is secretly relieved that she doesn’t have to be President of the United States. They also discuss why writers must oppose Israel to remain in good standing in the literary world and how they feel about the current pronatalism movement with respect to their own reproductive choices.

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Lionel Shriver is a columnist for The Spectator and the author, most recently, of Mania, a novel. Her fiction includes The Mandibles, Property, So Much For That, the New York Times bestseller The Post-Birthday World, and the international bestseller We Need to Talk About Kevin. Her journalism has appeared in The Guardian, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Harper's, and the London Times, and she currently writes a regular column for The Spectator in the UK. A longtime American expat in the U.K, she now lives in Portugal.

Hundreds Of Authors Pledge To Boycott Israeli Institutions: https://bit.ly/40EBf2r

Lionel Shriver contributed an essay to Meghan’s 2015 anthology “Selfish, Shallow and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers On The Decision Not To Have Kids”: https://amzn.to/40MHC3F

Lionel’s previous interviews on The Unspeakable: https://bit.ly/3O66FHu and https://bit.ly/3YOgNcC

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In this premium episode, writer, editor, and friend of the pod Leigh Stein returns to talk about the state of book publishing, including the importance of promotion via digital platforms like YouTube and TikTok. Leigh may be the Jane Goodall of BookTok. She has spent countless hours in the wild, studying the platform’s users and creators for insights into its addictive magic. As a book coach who helps authors sell their manuscripts to publishers and then (hopefully) sell lots of copies, she understands the changing landscape of publishing and sees endless potential and opportunity. Where many authors and editors feel only fear and dread, Leigh feels joy. Recently, she helped literary agent turned novelist Betsy Lerner become an unlikely TikTok star.

Want in on more of Leigh’s secrets? On November 14, The Unspeakeasy is offering a one-time webinar with Leigh called How To Get A Book Deal The Easy Way. It’s open to everyone (not just ladies) and may change your life. And it’s only $150! Visit the course page in The Unspeakeasy for more details and to sign up.

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Leigh Stein is a writer exploring the impact of the internet on our identities, relationships, and politics. She has written five books, including the satirical novel Self Care (Penguin, 2020) and the poetry collection What to Miss When (Soft Skull Press, 2021). Her non-fiction work has been featured in publications such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, the New Yorker, Allure, ELLE, Poets & Writers, BuzzFeed, The Cut, Salon, and Slate.

Leigh founded Out of the Binders/BinderCon, a feminist literary nonprofit organization that supported women and gender variant writers. BinderCon events in NYC and LA welcomed nearly 2,000 writers to hear speakers such as Lisa Kudrow, Anna Quindlen, Claudia Rankine, Jill Abramson, Elif Batuman, Effie Brown, Leslie Jamison, Suki Kim, and Adrian Nicole LeBlanc. Leigh also moderated a Facebook community of 40,000 writers. She is no longer on Facebook.

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📺 Visit The Unspeakable on YouTube!

✈️ The Unspeakeasy has new retreats for 2025. See where we'll be!

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