Episode 52: Adeena Sussman

11/21/23 • 63 min

1 Listener

“If I’m developing a recipe for a client, or for my own books, I’m all about people telling me what they think about it, what it invokes for them, what they would do differently,” notes New York Times best-selling cookbook author Adeena Sussman about the collaborative nature of preparing recipes for readers.

If there’s anybody who knows what it means work in partnership in the kitchen, it’s Adeena Sussman—the co-author of 15 books, including the best-selling Cravings series written in collaboration with model and television personality Chrissy Teigen. Adeena is also the co-author of The Sprinkles Baking Book, written with Candace Nelson, the noted pastry chef and founder of Sprinkles cupcakes.

Adeena’s latest solo book, Shabbat: Recipes and Rituals from My Table to Yours, celebrating (and reimagining!) the traditional foods that have long graced her family’s Shabbat table, became an immediate best-seller upon publication in September 2023. The book is a follow-up to Adeena’s 2019 cookbook Sababa, named one of the best cookbooks of the year by The New York Times, Bon Appetit, and Food & Wine.

A lifelong visitor to Israel who has been writing about that country’s food culture for almost twenty years, Adeena lives, cooks, and writes in Tel Aviv, in the shadow of that city’s famed Carmel Market.

Learn more about Adeena Sussman:

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Learn more about Adeena Sussman:

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Previous Episode

Episode 51: Rennie Dyball

Rennie Dyball is an award-winning journalist, ghostwriter, middle-grade novelist and children’s book author who’s found a way to marry her lifelong interest in horses with her many and varied talents as a writer. Together with her co-author Piper Klemm, she created the popular Show Strides series of equestrian-themed novels for middle grade readers—originally published by The Plaid Horse and soon to be reissued by Andrews McMeel Universal. Rennie’s standalone novel for children, Good Boy, Eddie, was published by The Plaid Horse earlier this year.

As a ghostwriter, Rennie has helped to give voice to a number of celebrity-driven autobiographies and memoirs, including the Audible Original memoir, Stronger Together, with Terry Crews and Rebecca King Crews; Full Circle, with Andrea Barber (Kimmy Gibler from “Full House”); A Famous Dog’s Life, with Hollywood animal trainer Sue Chipperton; and, Fierce Style, with fashion designer Christian Siriano. An accomplished equestrian, Rennie has also drawn on her love of horses to collaborate on With Purpose: The Balmoral Standard, with top trainers Carleton and Traci Brooks.

Her most recent book, B Is For Bellies, a picture book celebration of body positivity, with illustrations by Mia Saine, was published by Clarion Books in July.

Rennie was a reporter and writer at People for over 15 years, before retiring from the magazine in 2017, and she continues to write for People.com as a freelance book critic.

“People was the best training ground I could imagine,” she says of her development as a writer. “More than anything, I took away the importance of making every word count.”

Join us for a winning conversation on what it takes to build a life and career out of two abiding passions—in Rennie’s case, riding and writing.

Learn more about Rennie Dyball:

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Next Episode

Episode 53: Rob Kutner

George McFly’s A Match Made in Space, from “Back to the Future”...

Hank Moody’s God Hates Us All,” from “Californication”...

Dr. Frederick Frankenstein’s How I Did It, from “Young Frankenstein”...

Some of our best-loved movies and television shows feature books written by one of the lead characters. In many cases, the publication of those “books” becomes a central plot point or a running gag. (Think Handbook for the Recently Deceased, from “Beetlejuice.”) In other cases, those books leap from the screen and onto our bookshelves—IRL, as the kids like to say.

That’s the case with Look Out for the Little Guy, the in-movie memoir by Scott Lang, also known as Ant-Man, as seen on screen in the Marvel Studios blockbuster, “Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania.” The book was published by Hyperion Avenue in September and became an immediate New York Times best-seller, but here’s a news flash: it wasn’t really written by Scott Lang, the “Everyman Avenger” played in the movie by actor Paul Rudd. And no, it wasn’t really written by Paul Rudd, whose face graces the front cover of the book in stores and online, and as it appears as a prop in the movie.

In fact, the book was really written by our guest Rob Kutner, a veteran comedy writer who has collected five Emmys, a Peabody and a Grammy writing for such shows as “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” on Comedy Central, and “Conan,” on TBS. Rob’s other television writing credits include “Teen Titans Go,” “Angry Birds: Summer Madness” and “Dennis Miller Live,” and he has also written material for the Oscars, Emmys, and MTV Movie Awards broadcasts, as well as for two White House Correspondents Dinners.

He is also the author of Apocalypse How: Turn the End-Times into the Best of Times! and the just-published Snot Goblins and Other Tasteless Tales, with illustrations by David DeGrand.

Join us as Rob shares what it was like to channel the voice of a fictional character to craft a page-turning memoir of an ex-con turned world-saving superhero, and to be tasked with the caretaking of the life and legacy of one of the most beloved characters in the Marvel Universe.

Learn more about Rob Kutner:

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