The Creative Nonfiction Podcast with Brendan O'Meara

"There are a lot of stories that I come across that almost work or that don't quite work. And early in my career, I think I'd try and chase stories or force them to fit or force them to be a story when they don't...

"Sometimes you swing and a miss on a story, or you get scooped by someone, and I think there's a constant feeling of like you're only as good as your last story, as the last thing you published, and it's hard to shake...

"I think it's a great point with writing. You know early on you realize like putting pen to paper or starting to type early on was a massive achievement. There were huge gains, and now you're still grinding to figure...

"Our our first job, job one, for anybody writing a book, for anybody writing a story of any kind, any length, is to get the reader to that last word. If you don't do that, it doesn't matter what pretty words you drop in...

"I applaud anyone out there who's done the book circuit and trying to reach readers, because I'm not in this to make a lot of money, not at all. I just want people to read the story. I kind of felt like I owed it to the...

"You have to remember to slow things down. In this world where there's this fast-paced news cycle, and everybody wants to get it out first, this is a different genre, so to speak. You have to slow down. You have to...

"We probably have some sense of what narrative is. So when your brain starts turning into the little movie camera because this is a juicy scene, then it's like, well, what would I want to show? What what would I want to...

"My career is not a straight path; it's a lot of happenstance where I just sort of somehow get a job and then figure out how to do it once I'm there," says Rachel Hartigan, author of Lost: Amelia Earhart's Three...

"I feel like before I have the confidence to write in the way that I want to write, where I really own the material, I have to spend so much time with people. I will say at the outset, once I walk someone through what...

"I love talking with people. I also like that process of trying to shape messy reality into some kind of story, or that moment when you're alone with your notes, and you're trying to figure out how to organize it, and...

"One of the things that Patrick Radden Keefe told me was, when I'm doing interviews, I'm always thinking about the anecdote that I will tell someone later at a bar, this is the thing I talk about. That's helpful because...

"The mission of a nonfiction writer is to get the damn thing done," says Wil Haygood, author of several books, including his latest The War Within A War: The Black Struggle in Vietnam and at Home. I’m so thrilled to...

"You don't have to go to the far ends of the earth, but I'm willing to do that for you, and tell you what I found," says Susan Orlean, bestselling author of several books, including her latest, Joyride: A Memoir. Look...

"You never know what insight or information you're going to glean from someone, and so I want to be open to surprises. And not have any preconceived notions of what, who this person is, what they're going to tell me...

<p>"I always think, 'Jesus, this person could be reading War and Peace, and they picked up this dopey little book.' You know what I mean? So the best thing I could do is be interesting or helpful. I can't be boring, and...