Susan DeFreitas may live and write in beautiful Portland, Oregon, but she’s not afraid to hit the road to publicize her debut novel, Hot Season. The writer and editor found time in her touring schedule to chat with us about how she can both support and satirize leftist activism, what it means to live honestly, and why Patreon–the crowd-funding website for creatives–can be a godsend for working writers.

[Originally released on March 28, 2016 as ep. 14.] Leah Newsom’s own writing mixes just fine with any beverage, but her literary magazine Spilled Milk has your morning coffee reading habits squarely in its sights. Fresh off her Spillers № 3 reading that left audience members in a Zen state, Leah tells us why she likes her literature adventurous (not experimental), how would-be writers should trash their Apple employment application, and why her Vespa’s never met a gas station it didn’t pull in to.

[Originally released on Dec. 30, 2015 as ep. 5.] Ryan Myers is a versatile and funny writer, but don’t ask him to be organized. The man who read the wild sci-fi story “Out of Time” at Spillers No. 2 joins Brian & Robert to talk about the difference between performing stand-up comedy and reading prose, what it’s like to write video game storylines, and why there’s a fine line between proper punctuation and homicidal madness.