Advertise on podcast: Emerging Form

Sometimes a poet can hide inside their work, choosing metaphor over facts. In this episode of Emerging Form, we talk with poet and essayist Wendy Videlock about how writing essays invited a more autobiographical approach–and how that stretched her as a writer and as a person. We talk about Desert Kin: Speaking Animal in the Southwest, Essays and Poems, as well as how using a mythological approach helped her to write about her family members. We also talk about writing from the body and the mind, how her creative practice has deepened as she ages, how to write a good invocation poem, and much more. Wendy Videlock lives on the edge of a mesa in western Colorado. Her poems and essays appear in Dark Horse, Best American Poetry, Poetry Magazine, The New York Times, Rattle, O Magazine, Hudson Review and elsewhere. Wendy is the two-time recipient of the Keats Soul Making Award, and the winner of the Cantor Poetry Prize, The Fischer Prize, the PbtS Sonnet Prize and the Rattle Ekphrastic Prize. Wendy is a syndicated columnist for newspapers across the Four Corner States. Her books are available wherever books are sold. Her book, Desert Kin: Speaking Animal in the Southwest, Essays and Poems just came out. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“The problem with heroes, of course, is that no one is perfect, says Heather Hansman, author of Fierce Country. “Mine aren’t. They bumbled and lied and burned bridges and screwed up. They were often egotistical and angry, driven by an obsessive kind of love.” In this episode of Emerging Form, we talk with Heather about how her new book explores new kinds of heroes–specifically women in the outdoors–and why these voices have not been heard much in the past and why it’s important that we do hear about more women. In addition we talk about how hard it is to be honest about our heroes–to present them with all their flaws and struggles as well as their triumphs. We talk about researching real people after they’ve died, the importance of walking away from a project, and obsession. Heather Hansman is an award-winning freelance writer and the celebrated author of Fierce Country: The Untold Story of Three Women Who Ignited America’s Love for the Wild, Powder Days: Ski Bums, Ski Towns and the Future of Chasing Snow and Downriver: Into the Future of Water in the West. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Outside, among others. She lives in Durango, Colorado, right by the river. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“I feel like these two questions are at the heart of all creative process: What is here? What else is here?” In this episode, Rosemerry and Christie talk about Rosemerry’s new book, The Wonderment, and the four questions that are at the heart of it. How do questions drive a creative practice? We also talk about how to create art out of what is familiar and common, how paradox and metaphor work to create a larger lens for re-seeing the world, how sometimes we swing between loving and hating what we’ve written, and how to write poems about injustice and what is happening in the world without making them overtly polemic or divisively political. Poet and teacher Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer is co-host of this podcast. She lives with her family on the banks of the wild San Miguel River in southwest Colorado. Her daily audio series, The Poetic Path, is on the Ritual app. Her poems have appeared on Prairie Home Companion, PBS News Hour, O Magazine, Washington Post’s Book Club, and Carnegie Hall stage. Her recent collections: The Unfolding and The Wonderment. As poet laureate for Evermore, she helps others explore grief and love through poetry. Since 2006, she’s written a daily poem, sharing them on A Hundred Falling Veils. Rosemerry and Christie will be giving the closing keynote at the Grand Mesa Writer’s Symposium this weekend! Come join them as they talk about how to nurture a creative practice in the midst of everyday chaos. The Wonderment Rosemerry’s Website This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“Make this your worst draft.” That’s what Craig Childs will often say to students when they first sit down to write. “We’re creating stuff out of nowhere, so we’re lucky to get a word down on a page. We’re exploring options.” In this episode of Emerging Form, we talk with the popular creative non-fiction author about his own unusual path to a writing career. Our conversation includes: * How to invite intuition and surprise into your writing, * How teaching writing changes and enhances our understanding of our own process, * How a thesaurus, used unconventionally, can be a great tool for when you’re stuck, * Creative ways to take words from a page and bring them to life, * And how a journaling practice helps inform a writing practice. Craig will be a keynote speaker at the 2026 Grand Mesa Writers’s Symposium in Cedaredge on September 11-13. CRAIG CHILDS is an explorer who brings tales of deserts and ice caps to the page. He has published more than a dozen critically acclaimed books, including The Secret Knowledge of Water, Atlas of a Lost World, Stone Desert, Virga & Bone, Tracing Time, and The Wild Dark. His books have won numerous honors including the Reading the West Book Award, Southwest Book of the Year, a Foreword INDIES medal, and the Orion Book Award. His nonfiction narratives and journalism have appeared in The Atlantic, Outside, High Country News, The New York Times, The Sun, the Los Angeles Times, NPR, and Radiolab. He blogs at Last Word On Nothing. Childs lives in southwest Colorado. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“My writing often comes to me that way–something that interests me in the real life world, something kind of political and thorny, something I don’t entirely totally know how I think about it, something I’m interested in exploring.” These words from short story writer and novelist Claire Boyles are at the heart of this episode on the relationship between fiction and real life. How might having personal experience in a certain arena both help and hinder our ability to use it as material for fiction? How can characters drive the way opinions are explored in a book? How do we create more compelling characters? What must be let go as we create a fictional realm? How can fiction help us explore “thorny” political themes? And how might our past lives help us in practical ways as we move forward in our creative lives? Claire Boyles (she/her) is a writer and former farmer. Her debut novel, Appraisals, is forthcoming in August 2026. A 2022 Whiting Award winner in fiction, she is the author of Site Fidelity, which won the High Plains Book Award and was longlisted for the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Award, the Colorado Book Award, and the Reading the West Award. Her nonfiction has appeared in Sierra Magazine and Virginia Quarterly Review, among other journals, and she is a screenwriter with multiple credits on the Hallmark Channel. She splits time between Loveland, Colorado and Ames, Iowa, where she is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing and the Environment at Iowa State University. Claire will be a speaker at the Grand Mesa Writer’s Symposium in Cedaredge on September 12. Details here: https://www.grandmesawriters.org/schedule This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“Sometimes I let the subconscious deal with it,” says science writer Elizabeth Preston, author of the new book The Creature’s Guide to Caring, How animal parents teach us that humans were born to care. In this interview, we talk about the evolution of a manuscript–how she went from the “Big Idea” to the actual book. Other threads include the importance of walking away, balancing parenting with a writing life, why humor helps, the invitation to be bold, and how the “gnomes in the back of my head” have helped Elizabeth solve structural problems with her creative projects. Elizabeth Preston is a science journalist who contributes regularly to The New York Times and has written for Science, The Boston Globe, The Atlantic, Orion, Slate, Audubon, Discover, National Geographic, and others. She is a winner of the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Kavli Science Journalism Gold Award. Preston is also a humor writer whose work has appeared in outlets such as McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Parents, and Real Simple, and was the editor of Muse, a magazine about science and ideas for kids. She lives in Massachusetts. Her new book is The Creature’s Guide to Caring: How animal parents teach us that humans were born to care This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“The book is about the opposite of the eureka moment,” says science writer Roberta Kwok about her new book, LOST IN CURIOSITY: Field Notes From Scientists’ Adventures into the Unknown. Join us in a conversation about the difficulties and gifts of showing up day after day. We talk about patience, wrestling with process, and the long slow path to epiphany–in science and in creative endeavors. We talk, too, about how to choose the right people to interview for a book based on research, how the body may or may not be a part of creative process, the possibility that walking is not the most important tool in a writer’s toolbox, and the thrill of collaboration. Roberta Kwok is a science writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times, NewYorker.com, Nature, New Scientist, Audubon, and other publications. She has received a fellowship from the Knight Science Journalism Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and awards from the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Geophysical Union. Before becoming a journalist, Kwok worked in a genetics lab at Stanford University. She lives in the Seattle area and is originally from Canada. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“One of my superpowers is I see the nuance in everything,” says podcast host and author Eric Zimmer. “That is also sometimes my greatest weakness because I want to caveat the living heck out of everything that I say.” In this episode of Emerging Form, we talk with Eric about the process of writing his book How a Little Becomes a Lot: The Art of Small Changes for a More Meaningful Life. We cover · how the stages of change relate to creative process,· why dedicating time is an essential part of setting ourselves up for creative success,· how to support our expectations of wanting to create something really good,· how the hardest parts of our process teach us the most,· why asking for help can help build our trust in our selves as creatives,· why it helps to identify our motivations and intentions for our creative endeavors,· the importance of trust in the evolution of our creativity, and· how the advice to “spend what’s in your pocket” can help shape a book. Eric Zimmer is an author, teacher, speaker, and the creator of The One You Feed podcast—an award-winning show with over 50 million downloads across 800+ conversations exploring meaningful living. At 24, Eric was homeless, addicted to heroin, and facing prison. His journey from those depths sparked his lifelong inquiry into human transformation and resilience. Through his behavior coaching, workshops, and mentorship, he has guided thousands worldwide in creating sustainable habits that last—not through willpower or epiphany, but through steady change. His approach combines cutting-edge science with timeless wisdom, providing practical pathways to greater integrity and deeper meaning. His story and his work have been featured in the media, including TedX, Mind Body Green, Elephant Journal, the BBC and Brain Pickings. His new book is How a Little Becomes a Lot: The Art of Small Changes for a More Meaningful Life. The One You Feed Website How a Little Becomes a Lot: The Art of Small Changes for a More Meaningful Life Instagram LinkedIn This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“I didn’t know I enjoyed thinking so much,” says science writer Roxanne Khamsi when asked what surprised her most about writing her first book Beyond Inheritance. “I thought I enjoyed interviewing people and reading research papers and the process of finding the right verb in a sentence. What’s hard for me is once I get into that thinking space, I can’t let go of it.” In this episode we talk about how she made the leap from writing articles to writing a book—and why they are so different. We talk about creating an arc for a book of essays, what to do when the structure for your book isn’t working, letting go of a project once its over, meeting our self critic, the role of obsession in writing a book, the art of going for “the big idea” and how to carry that in a nonfiction book, how writing reflects the author’s personality. Roxanne Khamsi is the author of Beyond Inheritance: Our Ever-Mutating Cells and a New Understanding of Health and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. Her articles on genetics have appeared in a wide range of publications, including The New York Times, Scientific American, Nature magazine and Wired. Roxanne served as chief news editor for the international research journal Nature Medicine for more than a decade. She is based in Montreal. Author photos credit: Brian Friedman This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“I use play as kind of a backdoor to talk about tougher subjects,” says poet Kelli Russell Agodon, “but also as a front door for the reader to be able to listen.” Her most recent book, Accidental Devotions, blends humor, vulnerability, aging, the chaos of relationships, and the art of humaning. In this episode, of Emerging form we talk with Kelli about * Writing in service to “The Quiet Rebels” * Finding the form for a poem or book at the end of the project * Where to put the most vulnerable content in a book * Learning to trust the reader * The importance of vulnerability * Value of human connection through the arts * The role of obsession in art * Creating touchstones for the reader * The role of play in poetry * How do we know if what we write is successful? Plus, Kelli reads “Alexa, Why Am I Falling Apart” and we converse about the role of human-made art in an increasingly technological world. Kelli Russell Agodon’s most recent book is Accidental Devotions (Copper Canyon Press, 2026). She is the author of five poetry collections. Her work has received numerous honors, including the Dorothy Rosenberg Poetry Prize, a Poetry Society of America Prize, the Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award in Poetry, and three Washington State Book Award finalist selections. She is the cofounder of Two Sylvias Press, teaches in Pacific Lutheran University’s Rainier Writing Workshop MFA program, and cohosts the poetry series Poems You Need with Melissa Studdard. She lives in a sleepy seaside town in Washington State. Postcards from a Poet newsletter: https://kelliagodon.substack.com/subscribe Kelli’s website Kelli’s YouTube channel This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

Everyone gets stuck. And in this interview with writer and teacher Ramona Ausubel, we talk about why this is normal and practical, usable ways to meet a page when we don’t think we can go on. Drawing from her newest book, Unstuck:101 Doorways leading from the Blank Page to the Last Page, Ramona shares with us why certain strategies work only at certain stages of creative projects. We talk about finding patterns, ways to develop characters and create scenes, different ways to approach different drafts, the half-draft approach, finding opposition and so much more. Ramona Ausubel is the national bestselling author of Unstuck: 101 Doorways Leading From the Blank Page to the Last Page, The Last Animal, Awayland: stories, Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty, A Guide to Being Born and No One is Here Except All of Us. She is the recipient of the National Book Foundation Science + Literature Prize, the PEN/USA Fiction Award, the Cabell First Novelist Award and has been a finalist for both the California and Colorado Book Awards and the New York Public Library Young Lions Award. Her work has been published in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Paris Review daily, One Story, Tin House, The Oxford American, Ploughshares and elsewhere. She is a professor at Colorado State University and lives in Boulder, Colorado with her family. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

A poet and a science writer walk into a podcast—and laugh, tease, joke, uplift, and ask each other tough questions about creative process. In this episode of Emerging Form, the hosts Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer and Christie Aschwanden ask each other some of the questions they like to ask their guests. It’s a raucous, fun episode in which they rib each other as only best friends can do, taking turns being in the hot seat to talk about ambition, how getting older has affected creative practice, sincerity, empathy, curiosity and, of course, wine. Christie Aschwanden is the author of the New York Times bestseller, Good to Go, What the Athlete in All of Us Can Learn from the Strange Science of Recovery. She’s also host and producer of Uncertain, a podcast from Scientific American. She’s the former lead science writer at FiveThirtyEight and was previously a health columnist for The Washington Post. Her work has appeared in dozens of publications, including New York Times, Wired, Smithsonian, Slate, Popular Science, Discover, Science and Nature, and she’s received fellowships from the Santa Fe Institute, the Carter Center, and the Pulitzer Center for Crisis Reporting. She lives on a small farm in western Colorado. Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer is a poet, teacher, speaker, and writing facilitator. Her daily audio series, The Poetic Path, is on the Ritual app. Her poems have appeared on A Prairie Home Companion, PBS NewsHour, O Magazine, Washington Post Book Club, and Carnegie Hall Stage. Her recent collections are All the Honey and The Unfolding. In 2024, she became Poet Laureate for Evermore, helping others explore grief and love through poetry. Since 2006, she’s written a poem a day, sharing them on her blog, A Hundred Falling Veils. Her one-word mantra is adjust. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

“It feels like a radical practice not to be productive, to allow the space to guide what comes next,” says prolific poet and beloved writing teacher James Crews. “I have tendencies toward control.” In this episode, we talk about the importance of slowing down and doing less, and why a creative practice depends on this. James reads several poems from his new collection, Breathing Room: Poems of Rest and Retreat, and we talk about creating healthy boundaries around productivity, embodiment in a creative practice, and poetry as a spiritual practice. James Crews lives on forty rocky acres in Southern Vermont, on the unceded lands of the Abenaki people, with his husband Brad Peacock, with whom he co-edited Love Is for All of Us: Poems of Tenderness & Belonging from the LGBTQ+ Community & Friends (Storey Publishing). Crews is the author of several collections of poems, including Unlocking the Heart, Turning Toward Grief and Breathing Room. To sign up for free weekly poems and for more info, visit: jamescrews.net. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe

For thirty years, Dimity McDowelll made a life–and a living–with running and writing about running. Then, for health reasons, she had to stop. In this episode of Emerging Form, we talk with Dimity about how our creative identity is linked with other identities and what to do when that radically changes. We discuss her new book The Twenty-Seventh Mile: How to Smooth the Rough Transition out of Your Running Years, and the difference between writing a book with a partner and writing alone. We talk about embodied writing, the importance of empathy when incorporating other people’s stories, and the challenges of writing about loss. Before focusing her career on running, Dimity McDowell was a sports journalist, holding staff positions at Self, ESPN: The Magazine, and Sports Illustrated for Women. She co-authored three running books (Run Like a Mother, Train Like a Mother, and Tales from Another Mother Runner) and co-founded Another Mother Runner, an inclusive community for all female runners, with Sarah Bowen Shea. A personal trainer and running coach, she has finished countless races, including Ironman Coeur d’Alene and the Pike’s Peak Half Marathon. Dimity is the mother of two adult children, and lives in Denver with her husband and two dogs. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe