Gays Reading

Latest Episodes:

What Are You Reading? feat. April Reynolds Feb 06, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman talks with author April Reynolds (The Shape of Dreams) about what she’s been reading lately and the joyful surprise of discovering just how many LGBTQIA+ authors have quietly shaped her reading life.

April Reynolds is the author of the novel Knee-Deep in Wonder, which won the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation Award and the PEN American Center: Beyond Margins Award. She co-wrote The Red Rooster Cookbook with Marcus Samuelson and is co-editor, with Henry Louis Gates Jr., of The Toni Morrison Reader and The Zora Neale Hurston Reader. Reynolds has taught creative writing at New York University and the 92nd Street Y, and currently teaches at Sarah Lawrence College. A former resident of East Harlem, she now lives in Astoria, Queens.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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Nikesha Elise Williams, The Seven Daughters of Dupree Feb 03, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman talks to author Nikesha Elise Williams about her new novel, The Seven Daughters of Dupree.

Conversation highlights include:

🎶 Janet Jackson choreography

💜 What it means to be "enough"

🙏 The sacred, intimate rituals of hair

Nikesha Elise Williams is a two-time Emmy Award–winning producer, an award-winning author, and producer and host of the Black and Published podcast. A narrative strategist by day and journalist always, her work has appeared in The Washington Post, Essence, and Vox. Nikesha is a Kimbilio Fiction Fellow and a DeGroot Foundation Writer of Note grantee. A Chicago native, she lives in Florida with her family.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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What Are You Reading feat. Brian Larson (@brian.reads) Jan 30, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman sits down with bookish-multihyphenate Brian Larson aka @brian.reads who shares what he's been reading and talks about his new podcast, The Shelf Care Society.

Brian Larson is the author of The Afterparty (publishing June 2027) a memoir that reframes sobriety not as loss but as liberation. Known as @brian.reads on social media, he is the founder of Shelf Care Society, a book club with RuPaul’s Allstora, and the host of Shelf Care Society: The Podcast, where he sits down with authors, activists, and cultural voices for candid, curious conversations. Brian blends humor, honesty, and literary love to explore identity, recovery, ambition, and reinvention.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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George Saunders, Vigil Jan 27, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman is joined by acclaimed author George Saunders who talks about his new novel, Vigil.

Conversation highlights include:

🎭 Comparisons to Shakespeare

🕯️ Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol

🍔 George's Last Meal

George Saunders is the author of nine books, including the novel Lincoln in the Bardo, which won the Man Booker Prize, and the story collections Pastoralia and Tenth of December, which was a finalist for the National Book Award. He has received fellowships from the Lannan Foundation, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Guggenheim Foundation. In 2006 he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. In 2013 he was awarded the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction and was included in Time’s list of the one hundred most influential people in the world. He teaches in the creative writing program at Syracuse University.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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What Are You Reading? feat. Nina McConigley Jan 23, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman sits down with author Nina McConigley (How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder) to talk about what she’s been reading lately—beyond Eric Carle’s The Very Lonely Firefly.

Plus: head to the Gays Reading Substack to hear Nina talk about adapting Cowboys and East Indians for the stage, now playing at the Denver Center through March 1, 2026.

NINA McCONIGLEY is the author of the story collection Cowboys and East Indians, which was the winner of the PEN/Open Book Award and the High Plains Book Award. She has received grants and fellowships from the NEA, the Radcliffe Institute, Bread Loaf, Vermont Studio Center, and the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. She was a recipient of the Wyoming Arts Council’s Frank Nelson Doubleday Memorial Writing Award and a finalist for a National Magazine Award for her columns in High Country News. Her work has also appeared in The New York Times, Orion, O: The Oprah Magazine, The Virginia Quarterly Review, Salon, among other outlets. Born in Singapore and raised in Wyoming, she now lives in Colorado.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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Gabriel Tallent, Crux Jan 20, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman talks to author Gabriel Tallent about his new book, Crux.

Conversation highlights include:

💈 The surprising number of hot gay barbers in Salt Lake

🧗🏼‍♂️ What drawing a climb looks like

⭐️ Ambition and legacy

Gabriel Tallent is the author of the New York Times-bestselling novel My Absolute Darling. He was born in New Mexico and raised on the Mendocino coast by two mothers. He received his B.A. from Willamette University in 2010, and after graduation spent two seasons leading youth trail crews in the backcountry of the Pacific Northwest. Tallent lives in Salt Lake City.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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What Are You Reading feat. Annie Summerlee Jan 16, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman talks to author Annie Summerlee about what she's been reading as she awaited the publication of her book: The Book of Blood and Roses.

Annie Summerlee lives in Spain with her partner, two cats, and a rescue dog. Her short stories have been featured in 404 Ink, Litro, and So To Speak, as well as other magazines and anthologies. She also writes in Catalan and Spanish.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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February Book Club: Thrity Umrigar, Missing Sam Jan 15, 2026

Show notes

Announcing the February Gays Reading Book Club Pick...

⭐️ MISSING SAM by Thrity Umrigar, the bestselling author of HONOR

At first glance, MISSING SAM looks like a classic thriller: a woman goes missing after a morning run and her wife is left behind to search for answers. But very quickly, this book becomes something much deeper. The book is about what happens when grief collides with prejudice. About how quickly suspicion attaches itself to certain bodies. About love, marriage, and what it means to feel unsafe not just in the world, but inside your own community.

New to the club? Get your first book for just $1!

When you join the Gays Reading Book Club with Allstora, here’s what you get:

A SIGNED copy of the book!
30% off everything on Allstora’s website
Access to our Book Club chat
Every subscription donates a children’s book to an LGBTQIA+ youth
A book club that exclusively supports LGBTQIA+ authors
And more along the way

Thrity Umrigar is the bestselling author of nine previous novels, including Honor, which was a Reese’s Book Club Pick, as well as four picture books and a memoir. Her books have been published in over twenty countries and in several languages. A former journalist, she has contributed to the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, the New York Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and other newspapers. She is a recipient of the Nieman Fellowship to Harvard, and winner of the Cleveland Arts Prize, the Seth Rosenberg prize and a Lambda Literary award. She is currently a Distinguished University Professor of English at Case Western Reserve University.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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Emily Austin, Is This a Cry for Help? Jan 13, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman chats with author Emily Austin about her latest novel, Is This a Cry for Help?

Conversation highlights include:

Emily’s habit of endlessly rewriting the pitch at the top of her manuscript
The ethics of librarianship and why access to information matters
Bug killing, sex dens, and everything in between

Emily Austin is the author of We Could Be Rats, Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead, Interesting Facts About Space, and the poetry collection Gay Girl Prayers. She was born in Ontario, Canada, and received two writing grants from the Canadian Council for the Arts. She studied English literature and library science at Western University. She currently lives in Ottawa, in the territory of the Anishinaabe Algonquin Nation.

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CONTACT! hello@gaysreading.com

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What Are You Reading? Feat. Sarah Dickinson (Sarah's Bookshelves Live) Jan 09, 2026

Show notes

Host Jason Blitman sits down with Sarah Dickinson, creator and host of popular podcast Sarah’s Bookshelves Live, to talk about the books she’s most excited to read in 2026.

Conversation highlights include: