This week we visit with Naomi Shihab Nye in San Antonio, Texas.

Naomi Shihab Nye describes herself as a “wandering poet.” She has spent more than 40 years traveling the country and the world to lead writing workshops and inspiring students of all ages. Nye was born to a Palestinian father and an American mother and grew up in St. Louis, Jerusalem, and San Antonio. Drawing on her Palestinian-American heritage, the cultural diversity of her home in Texas, and her experiences traveling in Asia, Europe, Canada, Mexico, and the Middle East, Nye uses her writing to attest to our shared humanity.

Naomi is the author and/or editor of more than 30 volumes of poetry, four novels, and an essay and short story collection.

Learn more about Naomi at the American Academy of Poets.

Naomi's Books on the Bed:

Garden Time by M.S. Merwin

Every War Has Two Losers by William Stafford

An Ordinary Woman by Lucille Clifton

Does the Land Remember Me? A Memoir of Palestine by Aziz Shihab

Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear: Poems from Gaza by Mosab Abu Toha

The Year I Stopped to Notice by Miranda Keeling

Matt's Gifts for Naomi:

The Listening Skin by Glenis Redmond

George Masa: A Life Reimagined by Janet McCue and Paul Bonesteel

Ways of Being Home by Cecilia Sotelo Cornejo (film)

Elizabeth Crook is the author of six novels: The Raven’s Bride and Promised Lands, The Night Journal, Monday, Monday, The Which Way Tree, and The Madstone. In 2023 Elizabeth received the prestigious Texas Writer Award from the Texas Book Festival and in 2025 the Texas Medal of Arts in Literary Arts and the Texas Institute of Letters' prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award.

Elizabeth lived in Nacogdoches, Texas and then San Marcos, Texas with her parents and brother and sister until age seven when the family moved to Washington D.C., where her father was director of Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA) for Lyndon Johnson. Two years later her father was appointed Ambassador to Australia and the family moved to Canberra. When they returned to Texas Elizabeth attended public schools in San Marcos, graduating from San Marcos High School. She attended Baylor University for two years and graduated from Rice University in 1982.

Elizabeth's Books on the Bed:

Silver Pennies (and More Silver Pennies) by Blanche Jennings Thompson

Precious Bane by Mary Webb

A Tale of Two Cities and A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

True Grit by Charles Portis

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

Now You Hear My Horn: The Journal of James Wilson Nichols, 1820-1887 by James Wilson Nichols

Matt's Gifts for Elizabeth:

The House Is on Fire by Rachel Beanland

Gorilla by Lee Stockdale

Call It Horses by Jessie van Eerden

This week we visit with Henry Wise in Staunton, Virginia.

Henry is a graduate of the Virginia Military Institute and the University of Mississippi MFA program. A writer across multiple genres, his poetry has been published in Shenandoah, Radar Poetry, Clackamas, Nixes Mate Review, and elsewhere. His nonfiction and photography have appeared in Southern Cultures. "Holy City" is his first novel.

For more on Henry: henrywise.com

Henry's Books on the Bed:

Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad

My Antonia by Willa Cather

Legends of the Fall by Jim Harrison

Go Down, Moses by William Faulkner

West with the Night by Beryl Markham

Joe by Larry Brown

Matt's Gifts for Henry:

Shutter and Exposure by Ramona Emerson

Honeybee by Naomi Shihab Nye

This week we visit with Glenn Taylor in Morgantown, West Virginia.

Glenn Taylor’s fourth novel, "The Songs of Betty Baach" won the 2023 Juniper Prize in Fiction. His first novel, "The Ballad of Trenchmouth Taggart" was a finalist for the 2008 National Book Critics Circle Award. Glenn’s work has appeared in such venues as the Oxford American, The Guardian, Gulf Coast, and Huizache. Born and raised in Huntington, West Virginia, he now resides with his family in Morgantown, where he is at work on a new novel.

For more on Glenn: glenntaylorbooks.org

Glenn's Books on the Bed:

The Milkweed Ladies by Louise McNeill

good woman: poems and a memoir by Lucille Clifton

Gringos by Charles Portis

Trampoline by Robert Gipe

Mirrors: Stories of Almost Everyone by Eduardo Galeano

Road-side Dog by Czeslaw Milosz

Matt's Gifts for Glenn:

God Bless You, Otis Spunkmeyer by Joseph Earl Thomas

The Way the Moon by Holly Haworth

This week we visit with Ann Pancake in Reedsville, West Virginia.

Ann Pancake grew up in Summersville and Romney, West Virginia and graduated from WVU with a Bachelor of Arts in English. After teaching English in Japan, American Samoa and Thailand, she earned a Masters degree in English from the University of North Carolina and a doctorate in English Literature from the University of Washington.

Pancake is—publicly and fervently—a West Virginia writer. She is the author of two story collections set in West Virginia: “Given Ground,” winner of the Bakeless Prize, and “Me and My Daddy Listen to Bob Marley,” a finalist for the Washington State Book Award. Her novel “Strange as This Weather Has Been” features a southern West Virginia family struggling with a mountaintop removal mine. It was named one of Kirkus Review’s Top Ten Fiction Books of the year, was a New York Times Editor’s Choice, won the 2007 Weatherford Prize and was a finalist for the 2008 Orion Book Award. “Strange as This Weather Has Been” is now cited and taught as a key piece of literature about Appalachian coal country.

Ann's Books on the Bed:

Braiding Sweetgrass and The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Deer Man: Seven Years of Living in the Wild by Geoffroy Delorme

The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our Mind and Our World by Max Fisher

Country Queers: A Love Letter by Rae Garringer

The Chaneysville Incident by David Bradley

Bloodroot by Bill King

Matt's Gifts for Ann:

Groundglass by Kathryn Savage

Trinity by Zelda Lockhart

This week we visit with Meredith McCarroll in Portland, Maine.

Meredith McCarroll was born and raised in Waynesville, North Carolina. She is the author of “Unwhite: Appalachia, Race, and Film” (2018) and co-editor of “Appalachian Reckoning: A Region Responds to Hillbilly Elegy” (2019). She graduated from Appalachian State University, and later earned a Masters from Simmons College and a PhD from University of Tennessee. She lives now in Portland, Maine where she writes and teaches writing.

For more on Meredith: meredithmccarroll.com

Meredith's Books on the Bed:

Heavy by Kiese Laymon

Sleepovers: Stories by Ashleigh Bryant Phillips

Cane by Jean Toomer

Trampoline by Robert Gipe

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers

The Laramie Project by Moises Kaufman and the Members of Tectonic Theater Project

Matt’s Gifts for Meredith:

The Optimist’s Daughter by Eudora Welty

Cinema Ann Arbor by Frank Uhle

Three Rivers Cornmeal Mix

This week we visit with Elizabeth Gonzalez James in Sharon, Massachusetts.

Elizabeth Gonzalez James is a screenwriter and bestselling author of the novels, The Bullet Swallower and Mona at Sea, as well as the chapbook, Five Conversations About Peter Sellers. The Bullet Swallower was named a best book of 2024 by NPR, Esquire, and elsewhere, was a Book of the Month Club pick, and was featured on “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” as one of their spring book club picks. Elizabeth was featured on the MSNBC documentary “My Generation” representing the Millennials. She has taught fiction writing at Grub Street, Pioneer Valley Writers Workshop, Story Studio, and elsewhere. Originally from South Texas, Elizabeth now lives with her family in Massachusetts.

Elizabeth’s Books on the Bed:

Jorge Luis Borges: Collected Fictions

Temporary by Hilary Leichter

The Dog of the South by Charles Portis

CivilWarLand in Bad Decline by George Saunders

Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

Mona by Pola Oloixarac

Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God

Matt’s gifts for Elizabeth:

Blood Test by Charles Baxter

Recollecting: Lives of Aboriginal Women of the Canadian Northwest and Borderlands by Sarah Carter and Patricia A. McCormack

This week we visit with Rachel Beanland in Richmond, Virginia.

Rachel is the author of two novels, The House Is On Fire (Simon & Schuster, 2023) and Florence Adler Swims Forever (Simon & Schuster, 2020).

The House Is On Fire was selected as an Indie Next pick by the American Booksellers Association, a ‘GMA Buzz Pick’ by Good Morning America, a “most anticipated” book by the Washington Post, and one of the best books of 2023 by NPR and The New Yorker.

Beanland’s debut novel, Florence Adler Swims Forever, was selected as a book club pick by Barnes & Noble, a featured debut by Amazon, an Indie Next pick by the ABA, and one of the best books of 2020 by USA Today. It was also named a New York Times Editors’ Choice and was recognized with the 2020 National Jewish Book Award for Debut Fiction.

Beanland attended the University of South Carolina and earned her MFA in creative writing from Virginia Commonwealth University. She has taught at the College of William & Mary, Virginia Commonwealth University, and the University of Richmond, where she was the 2023-24 Writer-in-Residence. Beanland lives in Richmond, Virginia with her family.

Rachel’s Books on the Bed:

The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan

Young Woman and the Sea: How Trudy Ederle Conquered the English Channel and Inspired the World by Glenn Stout

The Richmond Theater Fire: Early America’s First Great Disaster by Meredith Henne Baker

The Color of Water by James McBride

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl

Matt’s gifts for Rachel:

The Price of a Child by Lorene Cary

The Which Way Tree by Elizabeth Crook