Happy New Year to all of our listeners! This week, we’re here to help you get a jump start on your 2020 TBR list, with recommendations from our panel. Managing Editor Cody Sisco, along with Co-Hosts Rachelle Yousuf and Irene Yoon recap their year in reading and discuss what they’d like to see in the literary landscape next year.
Cody sits down with local LA author Carla Sameth to talk about her recent release, One Day on the Gold Line. They delve into religion, addiction, and the writing process, as well as their shared appreciation for the LA writing scene.
If your New Year’s Resolution is to attend more literary events, Shannon Eagen has you covered with events for the whole family in early January.
About Carla Sameth
Writer. Teacher. Mother. As a writer, Carla hopes to help readers feel less alone and more resilient. As a teacher, she strives to help others tell their stories and hone their craft while experimenting with new forms. The journey of motherhood informs much of her writing.
Carla’s memoir, One Day on the Gold Line, was published July 2019 by Black Rose.
Through meditations on race, culture, and family, One Day on the Gold Line tells the story of a lesbian Jewish single mother raising a black son in Los Angeles. A memoir-in-essays, it examines life’s surprising changes that come through choice or circumstance, often seemingly out of nowhere, and sometimes darkly humorous—even as the situations are dire.
While escaping from a burning boat, Carla realizes that if she died, her one regret would be not having children. She overcomes miscarriages to finally give birth to a son. Motherhood’s usual struggles are then complicated by identity, community, and the challenges of creating a blended family. The overarching theme of these loosely woven reflective tales is the storyteller’s dream of the “perfect” family, the pursuit of which hurls her from one crisis to the next, ultimately meeting its greatest challenge in the form of her teenage son’s struggle with drug addiction.
Learn more: https://carlasameth.com/books/
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Books Mentioned:
One Day on the Gold Line by Carla Sameth
Patron Saints of Nothing by Randy Ribay
Catch and Kill by Ronan Farrow
The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
Red, White, & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston
Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors by Sonali Dev
Homesick by Jennifer Croft
Trust Exercise by Susan Choi
Women Talking by Miriam Toews
The Power of Nunchi by Euny Hong
