Episode 102 — Alix Ohlin




Other People with Brad Listi show

Summary: Alix Ohlin is the guest. She's the author of several books, the most recent of which are the story collection SIGNS AND WONDERS, available now from Vintage, and a novel called INSIDE, available Knopf. Both were published in June of this year. Jane Ciabattari of The Boston Globe raves "Alix Ohlin’s wondrously engrossing INSIDE and SIGNS AND WONDERS display her characteristic strengths—dynamic plots, keenly observed settings, and characters so idiosyncratic, ambivalent, and contradictory they could be your family, your neighbors, people you work with…..She has a rare gift for examining the confusions of the 21st century, exploring the ways in which addictions, afflictions, attractions, and random impulses shape our lives. Her intense and beautifully shaped new novel and stories offer tentative yet illuminating answers." And The New Yorker says "Spanning a twelve-year period, [INSIDE] moves briskly between New York, Los Angeles, Montreal, Kigali, and the Inuit community of Iqaluit. As the protagonists try, and fail, to establish connections with other human beings, Ohlin charts their small victories and larger disappointments. She is skilled at making her chilly cast of characters accessible, and even their most unlikely actions make sense, thanks to her tightly drawn portraits. And, while the novel’s premise is hardly comic, its Hollywood scenes show off the author’s satiric flair." Monologue topics: air travel, Israel, Ambien, The Wailing Wall, socio-spiritual faux pas.