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Ursa Short Fiction

Ursa Short Fiction

Ursa Story Company

We love short stories. Join authors Deesha Philyaw (The Secret Lives of Church Ladies) and Dawnie Walton (The Final Revival of Opal & Nev) for author interviews, book club discussions, and immersive short stories. We celebrate storytelling from some of today's most thrilling writers, with an emphasis on spotlighting underrepresented voices. (Photo credits: Vanessa German / Rayon Richards) Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://ursastory.com/join
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Top 10 Ursa Short Fiction Episodes

Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best Ursa Short Fiction episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to Ursa Short Fiction for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite Ursa Short Fiction episode by adding your comments to the episode page.

Ursa Short Fiction - The Life and Short Stories of Diane Oliver (Part One)
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08/09/22 • 65 min

Content advisory: This episode contains a mention of a racist slur.

Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton's two-part book club discussion on the life and work of Diane Oliver, who published six short stories before her life was tragically cut short in May 1966 at the age of 22.

Oliver was just a month away from graduating from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop when she was killed in a motorcycle accident in Iowa City, Iowa.

Philyaw and Walton first discovered Oliver’s stories from writer Michael A. Gonzales, who wrote an essay about Oliver for The Bitter Southerner. In part one of Ursa’s book club episode, they go in-depth on four of Oliver’s short stories: “Key to the City,” “Health Service,” “Traffic Jam,” and “Neighbors.”

Full episode transcript.

Episode Links and Reading List:

More from Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton:

Support Future Episodes of Ursa Short Fiction

Become a Member at ursastory.com/join.

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Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://ursastory.com/join

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Ursa Short Fiction - Introducing Ursa: Why We Love Short Fiction
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06/06/22 • 28 min

Acclaimed authors Deesha Philyaw (The Secret Lives of Church Ladies) and Dawnie Walton (The Final Revival of Opal & Nev) introduce Ursa Short Fiction, a new anthology podcast dedicated to celebrating short stories, with a spotlight on underrepresented voices. Join us for author interviews, book club chats, and audio stories from some of your favorite writers and emerging talent.

Transcript: https://ursastory.com/introducing-ursa-short-fiction-podcast/

Support Ursa: https://ursastory.com/join

Authors and Books Mentioned in This Episode

Heads of the Colored People, by Nafissa Thompson-Spires

How to Sit, by Tyrese Coleman

The World Doesn’t Require You, by Rion Amilcar Scott

Drinking Coffee Elsewhere, by ZZ Packer

The work of J. California Cooper

The Women of Brewster Place, by Gloria Naylor

12 Tribes of Hattie, by Ayana Mathis

The Travelers, by Regina Porter

Claire of the Sea Light, by Edwidge Danticat

You are Free, by Danzy Senna

The Office of Historical Corrections and Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self, by Danielle Evans

The work of Edward P.Jones

I’m Not Hungry But I Could Eat, by Christopher Gonzalez

Milk Blood Heat, by Dantiel W. Moniz

Writing from Dawnie and Deesha

Introducing Ursa: A Letter from Co-Founder and Editorial Director Dawnie Walton

A Love Letter to Short Stories, by Deesha Philyaw

The Final Revival of Opal & Nev, by Dawnie Walton

The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, by Deesha Philyaw

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Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://ursastory.com/join

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It’s a very special “Three Ds from Duval” episode of Ursa Short Fiction! Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton welcome fellow Jacksonville native Dantiel W. Moniz, author of the acclaimed 2021 short story collection MILK BLOOD HEAT.

Moniz talks about how growing up in Jacksonville informed the stories in MILK BLOOD HEAT, and how real-life experiences serve as a jumping-off point for the stories we tell.

“It’s always as a seed or a starting off point because the story is a thing that allows me to get past what actually happened or what I think actually happened, and then explore what could have happened.”

Reading List: Books, Stories, and Authors Mentioned

About the Author

Dantiel W. Moniz is the recipient of a National Book Foundation “5 Under 35” Award, a Pushcart Prize, a MacDowell Fellowship, and the Alice Hoffman Prize for Fiction. Her debut collection, Milk Blood Heat, is the winner of a Florida Book Award, and was a finalist for the PEN/ Jean Stein Award, the PEN/ Robert W. Bingham Prize, and the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award, as well as longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. Her writing has appeared in the Paris Review, Harper's Bazaar, American Short Fiction, Tin House, and elsewhere. Moniz is an Assistant Professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where she teaches fiction.

Read More from Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton:

***

Episode editor: Kelly Araja

Associate producer: Marina Leigh

Producer: Mark Armstrong

***

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Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton go in-depth with Rubén Degollado, author of the novel The Family Izquierdo, which started out as a short story collection about a single family.

Degollado's story “The Seven Songs” was featured on last week’s episode, and he discusses his journey to writing and publishing the book, as well as how he navigated his writing journey alongside his career as an educator. He first started writing the Izquierdo family stories in the late '90s, eventually developing the family curse and tensions, and playing with point of view to inhabit the lives of the many family members.

Support Ursa Short Fiction! Become a Member: https://ursastory.com/join/

Degollado aims to represent his own family, experiences, and community through The Family Izquierdo, and he quotes Toni Morrison, who said “if there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.”

“A lot of the stories I read were about immigrants, and I think those are great stories. I love immigrant stories, but that’s not what I wanted to write. I wanted to write about what happens after. What happens post immigration.”

If you haven't already, be sure to listen to last week's episode featuring Degollado's story, “The Seven Songs.”

Reading ListAbout the Author

Rubén Degollado’s work has recently appeared in Literary Hub, CRAFT, The Common, and elsewhere. His novel Throw won the Texas Institute of Letters Best Young Adult book for 2020. His debut literary novel The Family Izquierdo is a long list title for the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award. Rubén lives and writes along the southern border, in the Río Grande Valley of Texas.

More from Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton:

***

Episode editor: Kelly Araja

Associate producer: Marina Leigh

Producer: Mark Armstrong

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://ursastory.com/join

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Ursa Short Fiction - Shows We Love: Black & Published
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01/31/24 • 46 min

While we put the final touches on Season Three, we wanted to share an episode from another podcast that we think you’ll love: Black & Published, hosted by Nikesha Elise Williams.

On today’s episode, Nikesha’s guest is Dolen Perkins-Valdez, author of the historical fiction novel TAKE MY HAND. It's a story based on the real-life Relf sisters of Montgomery, Alabama, who were forcibly sterilized by the workers of a federal family planning clinic in 1973.

Subscribe to listen to more episodes from the latest season of Black & Published:

https://blackpublished.buzzsprout.com/

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Dawnie Walton and Deesha Philyaw introduce us to Reckon True Stories, a brand new podcast hosted by Deesha and acclaimed author Kiese Laymon, dedicated to all things nonfiction.

Listen, then follow the show in your favorite podcast so you don't miss an episode: https://link.chtbl.com/truestories

Guests for Season One include writers Roxane Gay, Imani Perry, Alexander Chee, Minda Honey, Hanif Abdurraqib, and Samantha Irby. Produced in partnership with Reckon.

We'll also have more episodes of Ursa Short Fiction coming this fall! Sign up for email updates: https://ursastory.com

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Ursa Short Fiction - Season 3 Sneak Preview!

Season 3 Sneak Preview!

Ursa Short Fiction

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10/24/24 • 10 min

We're back! Dawnie Walton and Deesha Philyaw give us a special sneak preview of what's in store for Season Three.

Show notes:

Produced by: Dawnie Walton, Deesha Philyaw, and Mark Armstrong

Associate Producer: Marina Leigh

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Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://ursastory.com/join

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Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton go deep with Nafissa Thompson-Spires, author of the beloved 2018 collection Heads of the Colored People, to discuss Heads’ origin, the texts and other media that influenced Thompson-Spires, inspirations for her stories and characters in the collection, and their shared love for the Notes app.

Thompson-Spires is candid about her upbringing in California and her own family, and how those experiences have shaped her work in terms of characters, autobiographical-leaning-but-fictionalized events, and even her ideas of place and the ways that racism persists in different ways in different parts of the country.

Support this show by becoming an Ursa Member: https://ursastory.com/join/

Reading List: Authors, Stories, and Books Mentioned

About the Author

Nafissa Thompson-Spires wrote Heads of the Colored People, which won the PEN Open Book Award, the Hurston/Wright Award for Fiction, and the Los Angeles Times’s Art Siedenbaum Award for First Fiction. Her collection was longlisted for the National Book Award, the PEN/ Robert W. Bingham Award, and several other prizes. She also won a 2019 Whiting Award.

She earned a PhD in English from ­­­­Vanderbilt University and an MFA in Creative Writing from ­­­­­­the University of Illinois. Her work has appeared in The Paris Review Daily, The Cut, The Root, Ploughshares, 400 Souls , and The 1619 Project, among other publications. New writing is forthcoming in Fourteen Days, edited by Margaret Atwood.

She’s currently the Richards Family Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Cornell University.

More from Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton:

***

Episode editor: Kelly Araja

Associate producer: Marina Leigh

Producer: Mark Armstrong

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://ursastory.com/join

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Co-hosts Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton speak with writer William Pei Shih, author of the Ursa Original “Happy Family,” a story about a lost childhood, a struggling restaurant, and a bygone era of Chinatown. (Warning: This episode contains “Happy Family” spoilers.)

Read the transcript.

“Your character has to fail in telling their story,” Shih says. “I think that's one of the beautiful things about fiction. It truly is the messiness of life.”

Shih’s stories have been published or are forthcoming in The Best American Short Stories 2020, VQR, McSweeney’s, and The Southern Review, among many other publications. He spoke with Philyaw and Walton about his approach to writing and developing characters, how “Happy Family” first came to life, and how hearing the audio version changed his storytelling approach.

This episode is sponsored by Catapult: Award-winning classes by writers, for writers. Ursa listeners get 20% off upcoming online classes with the coupon code URSA20. Go to catapult.co/classes.

Additional production support for this episode by Veronica Smith.

Episode Links and Reading List:

More from William Pei Shih:

  • "The Golden Arowana" (The Masters Review), about a precious and rare fish, a young man and his grandmother from China, and the road trip of a lifetime—to Pittsburgh, and what happens when one finds more than they bargained for.
  • "My Son," (F(r)iction, Spring 2021), a story focusing on father/son cross-generational and cross-cultural struggles and miscommunications.
  • More stories: https://williampeishih.com/home/publications/

More from Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton:

Support Ursa by becoming a Member in Apple Podcasts, or by going to ursastory.com/join

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On the Season One finale of Ursa Short Fiction, co-hosts Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton talk to Nana Nkweti, author of the acclaimed short story collection, Walking on Cowrie Shells (Graywolf Press).

Nkweti’s story “Dance the Fiya Dance,” performed by Enih Agwe, was featured in Episode 15.

Read the full transcript.

Support Future Episodes of Ursa Short Fiction

Become a Member at ursastory.com/join.

About the Author

Nana Nkweti is a Cameroonian-American writer, Whiting Award winner, and AKO Caine Prize finalist whose work has garnered fellowships from MacDowell, Vermont Studio Center, Ucross, Byrdcliffe, Kimbilio, Hub City Writers, the Stadler Center for Poetry, the Wurlitzer Foundation, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and Clarion West Writers Workshop. Her first book, Walking on Cowrie Shells, was hailed by The New York Times review as a “raucous and thoroughly impressive debut” with "stories to get lost in again and again." The collection is also a New York Times Editor's Choice, Indie Next pick, recipient of starred reviews from Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, and BookPage; and has been featured in The New Yorker, Harper's Bazaar, Oprah Daily, The Root, NPR, Buzzfeed, and Thrillist; amongst others. The work features elements of mystery, horror, myth, and graphic novels to showcase the complexity and vibrance of African diaspora cultures and identities. She is a professor of English at the University of Alabama where she teaches creative writing courses that explore her eclectic literary interests: ranging from graphic novels to medical humanities onto exploring works by female authors in genres such as horror, Afrofuturism, and mystery.

Episode Links and Reading List:

More from Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton:

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Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://ursastory.com/join

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FAQ

How many episodes does Ursa Short Fiction have?

Ursa Short Fiction currently has 41 episodes available.

What topics does Ursa Short Fiction cover?

The podcast is about Podcasts, Books and Arts.

What is the most popular episode on Ursa Short Fiction?

The episode title 'The Life and Short Stories of Diane Oliver (Part One)' is the most popular.

What is the average episode length on Ursa Short Fiction?

The average episode length on Ursa Short Fiction is 46 minutes.

How often are episodes of Ursa Short Fiction released?

Episodes of Ursa Short Fiction are typically released every 14 days.

When was the first episode of Ursa Short Fiction?

The first episode of Ursa Short Fiction was released on Jun 6, 2022.

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