Episode 391 – Christopher Brown

Virtual Memories Show 391:
Christopher Brown

“Utopia is not a place; it’s a decision. It’s a decision to try to live a better life, to craft a more wholesome community.”

Can there be economic justice without environmental justice? With his new novel, FAILED STATE (Harper Voyager), Christopher Brown returns to the alternate America of Tropic of Kansas (2017) and Rule of Capture (2019) to explore the possibility of utopia and the catastrophe of man’s disconnect from the land. We talk about how he reprised his great character Donny Kimoe (causing Amazon to categorize this book as “Dystopian Lawyer”), the roots of the world he built in these novels and his drive to publish 3 books in 4 years, and how the pandemic is influencing the choice of his next project, and how he’s been coping since our COVID Check-In a few months ago. We also get into the culture of undocumented people in his area of Texas, the documentary TV episode about his home in east Austin, his current binge of Latin American horror by women writers, the role of resistance when the law is being subverted by politics, the future of his wonderful Field Notes weekly e-mail, and more! Give it a listen! And go read Failed State!

“Decisions about accountability are in the hands of politicians, and politicians are all very terrified of the idea of people being held criminally accountable for things that are at the margins of politics and power.”

“I live in a Hobbit house of the future. It’s about the idea of bringing back the wild in the heart of the city.”

Enjoy the conversation! Then check out the archives for more great episodes!

Lots of ways to follow The Virtual Memories Show! iTunes, Spotify, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, TuneIn, Tumblr, and RSS!

About our Guest

Christopher Brown is the author of Tropic of Kansas, a finalist for the 2018 John W. Campbell Award for best science fiction novel of the year, and Rule of Capture, the beginning of a series of speculative legal thrillers. He was a World Fantasy Award nominee for the anthology Three Messages and a Warning: Contemporary Mexican Short Stories of the Fantastic. His short fiction and criticism has appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies, including MIT Technology Review, LitHib, Tor.com, and The Baffler. He lives in Austin, TX, where he also practices law. His new novel is Failed State, from Harper Voyager.

Follow Chris on Twitter and Instagram and subscribe to the weekly Field Notes e-mail.

(There’s a more comprehensive version at his website.)

Credits: This episode’s music is Fella by Hal Mayforth, used with permission from the artist. The conversation was recorded remotely via Zencastr. I used a Heil PR-40 Dynamic Studio Recording Microphone feeding into a Cloudlifter CL-1 and a Mackie Onyx Blackjack 2×2 USB Recording Interface. All processing and editing done in Adobe Audition CC. Photos of Chris by me, from 2018. It’s on my instagram.

Episode 355 – The Guest List 2019

Virtual Memories Show:
The Guest List 2019

It’s time for our year-end Virtual Memories Show tradition: The Guest List! I reached out to 2019’s pod-guests and asked them about the favorite book(s) they read in the past year, as well as the books or authors they’re hoping to read in 2020! More than two dozen responded with a dizzying array of books. (I participated, too!) The Virtual Memories Show offers up a huge list of books that you’re going to want to read in the new year! Give it a listen, and get ready to update your wish lists!

This year’s Guest List episode features selections from 25 of our recent guests (and one upcoming guest)! So go give it a listen, and then visit our special Guest List page where you can find links to the books and the guests who responded.

Also, check out the 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 editions of The Guest List for more great book ideas!

Follow The Virtual Memories Show on iTunes, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Tumblr, and RSS!

About our Guests

The guests who participated in this year’s Guest List are Christopher Brown, Nina Bunjevac, Caleb Crain, Joan Marans Dim (episode coming 2020), Boris Fishman, Katelan Foisy, Mort Gerberg, Eva Hagberg, Peter Kuper, Kate Lacour, Liniers, Kate Maruyama, Edie Nadelhaft, Sylvia Nickerson, James Oseland, Dawn Raffel, Witold Rybczynski, Frank Santoro, Ersi Sotiropoulos, Karl Stevens, James Sturm, Frederic Tuten, Chris Ware, and me, Gil Roth! Check out their episodes at our archives!

Credits: This episode’s music is Fella by Hal Mayforth, used with permission from the artist. The episode was recorded at stately Virtual Memories Manor on a Heil PR-40 Dynamic Studio Recording Microphone feeding into a Cloudlifter CL-1 and a Mackie Onyx Blackjack 2×2 USB Recording Interface. All processing and editing done in Adobe Audition CC. Photo of my 2019 books by me. It’s on my instagram.

Episode 332 – Christopher Brown

Virtual Memories Show 332:
Christopher Brown

“If you want to have a healthy society, people need to believe there is justice and accountability for people who do bad things. The problem in this society is that it’s a really bottom-heavy system.”

He wowed us last year with Tropic of Kansas, and now Christopher Brown is back to talk about his brand-new dystopian legal thriller, Rule of Capture (both from Harper Voyager)! We get into his grand jury stint a few years ago and how it brought home to him the inequality of the law and led to this new novel, why there are so few lawyers in science fiction (but so many in comic books), and the challenge of writing a novel about the law as opposed the facts of a legal case. Along the way, we get into his search for utopia and why he’s eschewing dystopia with this next novel, the phenomenon of Texan billboard-lawyers (like his novel’s protagonist, Donny Kimoe), his love of Njals saga, the Icelandic poem about a lawyer who’s ridiculed by other vikings because he can’t grow a beard, the little capitulations we make that lead to the domestication of evil, his unsung legal heroes, and what one should or shouldn’t do if one finds oneself on an escalator behind a certain Supreme Court Justice. Give it a listen! And go buy Rule of Capture! (and check out our 2018 episode)

“This book provided me an opportunity to do things with the character of the lawyer that my evil lawyer twin might wish to do in real life.”

“I want to write a science fiction that’s made up from the material of the observed world, that has a kind of naturalism to it.”

“So many of our social, political, economic and other problems and injustices are rooted in the damaged relationship we have with the land.”

“What astonishes me today, as someone who’s worked in Washington with people on both sides of aisle, is how malleable people’s principles are.”

Enjoy the conversation! Then check out the archives for more great episodes!

Lots of ways to follow The Virtual Memories Show! iTunes, Spotify, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, TuneIn, Tumblr, and RSS!

About our Guest

Christopher Brown is the author of Tropic of Kansas, a finalist for the 2018 John W. Campbell Award for best science fiction novel of the year. His new novel Rule of Capture, the beginning of a series of speculative legal thrillers, is out now from Harper Voyager. He was a World Fantasy Award nominee for the anthology Three Messages and a Warning: Contemporary Mexican Short Stories of the Fantastic. His short fiction and criticism has appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies, including MIT Technology Review, LitHib, Tor.com, and The Baffler. He lives in Austin, Texas, where he also practices law. He’s active on Twitter and Instagram.

(There’s a more comprehensive version at his website.)

Credits: This episode’s music is Fella by Hal Mayforth, used with permission from the artist. The conversation was recorded during Readercon at the Boston Marriott Quincy on a pair of Blue enCORE 200 Microphones feeding into a Zoom H5 digital recorder. I recorded the intro and outro on a Heil PR-40 Dynamic Studio Recording Microphone feeding into a Cloudlifter CL-1 and a Mackie Onyx Blackjack 2×2 USB Recording Interface. All processing and editing done in Adobe Audition CC. Photo of Mr. Brown probably by Mr. Brown, so it’s not on my instagram.

Episode 299 – The Guest List and Bill Kartalopoulos

Virtual Memories Show:
The Guest List 2018 and Bill Kartalopoulos

Comics scholar (and curator, and editor, and educator) Bill Kartalopoulos joins the show to talk about his role as the series editor of Best American Comics (HMH)! We get into the process of winnowing down the year’s best, working with a new guest editor each year, Bill’s history in comics, the challenges of fitting everything to a standard page size, programming festivals and his tricks for getting a weird mix of panelists, his upcoming general history of North American comics, and plenty more! Give it a listen (Bill’s conversation starts at 46:00) and pick up this year’s edition of The Best American Comics 2018!

But first, it’s time for our year-end Virtual Memories Show tradition: The Guest List! I reached out to 2018’s pod-guests and asked them about the favorite book(s) they read in the past year, as well as the books or authors they’re hoping to read in 2019! Nearly 3 dozen responded with a dizzying array of books. (I participated, too!) Just in time for you to make some Christmas purchases (or a belated Hanukkah gift), The Virtual Memories Show offers up a huge list of books that you’re going to want to read! Give it a listen, and get ready to update your wish lists!

This year’s Guest List episode features selections from nearly 3 dozen of our recent guests (and one bonus guest)! So go give it a listen, and then visit our special Guest List page where you can find links to the books and the guests who responded.

Also, check out the 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017 editions of The Guest List for more great book ideas!

Follow The Virtual Memories Show on iTunes, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, and RSS!

About our Guests

The guests who participated in this year’s Guest List are Jerry Beck, Christopher Brown, Dave Calver, Roz Chast, Mark Dery, Michael Gerber, Cathy B Graham, Dean Haspiel, Steven Heller, Richard Kadrey, Paul Karasik, Ken Krimstein, Nora Krug, John Leland, Alberto Manguel, Hal Mayforth, Dave McKean, Mark Newgarden, Audrey Niffenegger, Jim Ottaviani, Robert Andrew Parker, Shachar Pinsker, Nathaniel Popkin, Chris Reynolds, Lance Richardson, JJ Sedelmaier, David Small, Willard Spiegelman, Levi Stahl, Lavie Tidhar, Mark Ulriksen, Irvin Ungar, Henry Wessells . . . and me, Gil Roth! Check out their episodes at our archives!

About our Guest

Bill Kartalopoulos is a comics critic, educator, curator and editor. He is the Series Editor for the #1 New York Times best-selling Best American Comics series published annually by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. He teaches classes at Parsons and at SVA. He lives in Brooklyn, where he is writing a book about comics.

Credits: This episode’s music is Fella by Hal Mayforth, used with permission from the artist. The conversation was recorded at Bill Kartalopoulos’ home on a pair of Blue enCORE 200 Microphones feeding into a Zoom H5 digital recorder. I recorded the intro and outro on a Heil PR-40 Dynamic Studio Recording Microphone feeding into a Cloudlifter CL-1 and a Mackie Onyx Blackjack 2×2 USB Recording Interface. All processing and editing done in Adobe Audition CC. Photo of Bill by me. It’s on my instagram.

Episode 271 – Christopher Brown

Virtual Memories Show 271:
Christopher Brown

“I don’t think I would write the kind of science fiction I write if I hadn’t had the experience of eating deep-dish pizza with Strom Thurmond during the Clarence Thomas hearings.”

Science fiction author Christopher Brown joins the show to talk about his first novel, Tropic of Kansas (Harper Voyager), and the redemptive possibilities of dystopian fiction. We get into his SF pedigree, living in Austin and its influence on his ecological themes, the multivalence of Texas, his attempt at subverting the post-9/11 technothriller toward emancipatory ends, his background in business law and politics (and the role of power in both those milieux), his affinity for edgelands and the dysfunctions of time, the storytelling advantages of growing up in the midwest, his cynicism about humanity and optimism about nature, and working on Capitol Hill and realizing Ted Kennedy looked just like a certain Marvel character. Give it a listen! And go buy Tropic of Kansas!

“I’ve always been attracted to these little pockets of interstitial wilderness that still exist in the landscape.”

“Texas, more than any other part of the US, is manifestly colonized territory.”

Enjoy the conversation! Then check out the archives for more great episodes!

Lots of ways to follow The Virtual Memories Show! iTunes, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Tumblr, and RSS!

About our Guest

Christopher Brown was nominated for a World Fantasy Award for the anthology Three Messages and a Warning: Contemporary Mexican Short Stories of the Fantastic. His short fiction has appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies, including MIT Technology Review’s “Twelve Tomorrows,” The Baffler, and Stories for Chip. He lives in Austin, Texas. Tropic of Kansas is his first novel.

Credits: This episode’s music is Nothing’s Gonna Bring Me Down by David Baerwald, used with permission from the artist. The conversation was recorded at The Standard in Cooper Square on a pair of Blue enCORE 200 Microphones feeding into a Zoom H5 digital recorder. I recorded the intro and outro on a Heil PR-40 Dynamic Studio Recording Microphone feeding into a Cloudlifter CL-1 and a Mackie Onyx Blackjack 2×2 USB Recording Interface. All processing and editing done in Adobe Audition CC. Photos of Mr. Brown by me. It’s on my instagram.