Uncorking a Story

Michael Carlon
  • 4.9 (67)
  • Books
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Listen in to Uncorking a Story, where we pop the cork on hidden narratives and delve deep into the brilliant minds of your favorite authors. Get ready to unlock the magic behind your favorite books, one unforgettable story at a time. Hit that subscribe button and never miss a sip of inspiration!

  1. 1d ago

    Everyone is Creative, with Zara Marielle

    "Everyone has that thing inside of them that they could nurture, but maybe some people have been taught that they can't or they shouldn't because it's not valuable in society. But to me, everyone has that." - Zara Marielle Zara Marielle was the kind of introverted kid who wrote plays and then talked everyone she knew into performing them. She'll tell you those plays were bad. What stuck was the impulse. After undergrad she cycled through three barista jobs and a stint as an assistant talent agent for film and TV in San Francisco - a job that sounded cooler on paper than it felt in the chair - before deciding she could be writing in Scotland instead, and going. A one-year master's at the University of Edinburgh gave her twelve months with no excuse not to write, and she has arranged her life around the work ever since. In this conversation, Zara and Mike talk about her debut, an empowering portal fantasy about a trapped housewife who takes a secret job in a magical cafe; how the eclectic cafe she grew up above became the one in the book; why improv made her braver on the page and off it; and her conviction that creativity is in everyone and only needs the will to nurture it. Key Takeaways: 1. Creativity isn't a gift you're issued at birth. Zara doesn't believe some people are simply good at it and others aren't. What separates people is the willingness to work, and the work never finishes - there's no point where you've reached peak ability and can stop. 2. Her debut is the third novel she finished. The first she never queried; she just needed to prove she could complete a book. The second went nowhere. The third got the deal. Her verdict: always be improving. 3. Braided storylines keep a draft moving. Zara writes multiple interwoven strands on purpose. When one stalls she hops to another, and the stuck one untangles itself while she's away. 4. "Strong female character" can mean starting small and claiming your power. She's less interested in a sword-swinging badass than in a woman blooming into herself. She notes the odd double standard too: readers flinch at a story about a toxic marriage, then happily read about murder. 5. Improv teaches you that people will say yes. Built on "yes, and," it forces everyone to get on board with your idea - transformative if you grew up shy and braced for people to think your ideas were dumb. It shows up in her drafting: she resists locking a plot's trajectory. 6. Life becomes material, usually without asking. The magical cafe borrows from her parents' cafe, the one she grew up in a loft above. The protagonist's escape from a controlling marriage draws on a relationship Zara got out of. 7. A book deal is a beginning, not an arrival. Her agent ended their relationship twenty-four hours after the publisher contract was signed, leaving her seven months with an editor and no advocate. Getting new representation meant rewriting an entirely different novel from scratch. Buy The Cafe of Infinite Doors: Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1454961279?linkCode=ll2&tag=rettocasgra-20 Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/a/54587/9781454961277 Support your local indie bookstore - if it's not on the shelf, ask them to order it. Connect with Zara: Website: https://zaramarielle.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zaramarielle/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ZaraMarielleAuthor TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@zaramarielle Connect with Mike: Website: https://uncorkingastory.com/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@uncorkingastory Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uncorkingastory/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uncorkingastory TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@uncorkingastory Twitter: https://twitter.com/uncorkingastory If you like this episode, please share it with a friend. If you have not done so already, please rate and review Uncorking a Story on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Everyone is Creative, with Zara Marielle

  2. Sep 8

    The Search for Self, with Margaret Eastman Smith

    "It's not selfish to want to find a sense of self. It's not selfish to really be pushing the question of what is deeply etched in my heart that leads me to take the decisions I take." — Margaret Eastman Smith ABOUT THIS EPISODE Margaret Eastman Smith was born into a remarkable and complicated inheritance. Her parents met inside Moral Re-Armament — the Christian-based global movement once known as the Oxford Group — and Margaret grew up with no home of her own, moving between continents, living in community, and absorbing the movement's demand for total commitment and unselfishness. It took until she was thirty-five for her to admit that a world she genuinely loved wasn't serving the person she was becoming. In this conversation, Margaret and Mike talk about what it means to have your adolescent crisis and your midlife crisis at the same time, why leaving a group is only half the work (building a new life is the other half), the surprising things she chose to keep, and how a memoir forty years in the making became a story about untangling family, faith, and self — and finally learning what love actually asks of us. KEY TAKEAWAYS 1. Wanting a self is not selfish. Raised inside a movement that prized total commitment and unselfishness, Margaret had to unlearn the idea that seeking her own identity was a moral failure. Discovering what was "deeply etched in her heart" — and telling it apart from phrases she'd simply absorbed — became the real work. 2. Leaving late is its own kind of hard. Margaret didn't walk away as a rebellious teenager. She left at thirty-five, which meant her adolescent search for identity and her midlife reckoning arrived at the same moment. Some doors were open, some had closed, and she had to start over anyway. 3. Getting out is only half the story. She argues that too many accounts of leaving powerful groups stop at the exit. The harder, less-told chapter is building a new circle of friends, a new set of values, and a new place to put your feet down. 4. You don't have to reject everything you were given. The subtitle — What I Kept and What I Left Behind — is literal. Margaret kept a gift for hospitality, an instinct for reading a room, and a quieter, less literal faith that there's still a path worth listening for. 5. A path reveals itself by trying, not by waiting for a sign. She grew up believing God would make the way obvious. Instead she learned you have to test things — journalism, medicine, history, counseling — and only afterward sense whether they fit. 6. The scholar and the subject were the same person. Margaret spent nearly two decades studying how divided societies reckon with contested history, including Northern Ireland. Writing this memoir, she was finally turning that same lens on her own family. 7. Love starts with acceptance. "Absolute love" was one of the movement's standards, but Margaret felt it was never truly explored there. The book ends where her own understanding landed: love means accepting a person — and yourself — as you actually are. GET THE BOOK A Spectacular Inheritance: What I Kept and What I Left Behind by Margaret Eastman Smith Publisher: Sibylline Press Release Date: August 4, 2026 ISBN: 9798897400201 Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0G6S4R5R6?linkCode=ll2&tag=rettocasgra-20&language=en_US&ref_=as_li_ss_tl Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/a/54587/9798897400201 Also by Margaret Eastman Smith: Reckoning with the Past: Teaching History in Northern Ireland CONNECT WITH MARGARET Website: https://www.margareteastmansmith.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=750962603 Also writes for We Are One Humanity CONNECT WITH YOUR HOST Mike Carlon | Uncorking a Story Website: https://uncorkingastory.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@uncorkingastory Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uncorkingastory/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uncorkingastory TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@uncorkingastory Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/uncorkingastory Subscribe & Leave a Review — It helps more readers and writers find the show! Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/uncorking-a-story/id563636205 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5HZiAEtFlhAzk60Z4eAkhY Uncorking a Story is produced by Mike Carlon. New episodes drop every Tuesday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    The Search for Self, with Margaret Eastman Smith

  3. Sep 1

    Gerald Patnode on History, Empathy, and Untold Stories

    "What must it have felt like to be a white attorney defending a Black man in 1890, at the height of racism in the United States? I think there are lessons to be learned by those stories that we can tell about history in general." - Gerald Patnode ABOUT THIS EPISODE Gerald Patnode has lived many lives - Navy veteran, police officer, serial entrepreneur, television host, political analyst, university professor, academic dean - and now, bestselling author. His debut novel The Stirling Defense transforms a largely forgotten true story from 1889 Baltimore into a gripping historical legal thriller about forced labor, racial injustice, and one attorney's quest to defend a Black man at enormous personal cost. Mike and Gerry talk about discovering a family connection to the story in his grandmother's attic at age fifteen, how his academic research skills gave his fiction its backbone, why he arrested his first wife at a pot party in Ocean City, and how Archibald Stirling's fight for justice led to the creation of the public defender's office. KEY TAKEAWAYS 1. Great stories start with a question, not an answer. Gerry's academic career taught him that facts alone don't move people. When he started asking "What must it have been like to be those people?" - that's when the fiction came alive. 2. History has a way of repeating itself. The racial injustice at the heart of The Stirling Defense - set in 1890 - still resonates today. Gerry believes uncovering these forgotten stories is a form of truth-telling that we need now more than ever. 3. A family secret lit the fuse. At fifteen, Gerry found a steamer trunk in his grandmother's attic filled with his great-grandfather's diaries, maps, and letters - revealing a direct family connection to Navassa Island and the incident that inspired the novel. His great-grandfather wasn't the man the family stories made him out to be. 4. Justice has a price. The real Archibald Stirling lost his family, his fortune, and his law practice for defending a Black man. But his sacrifice helped establish the principle that everyone - regardless of race or wealth - deserves legal representation. 5. Every life you've lived feeds the work. From undercover vice work to academia to broadcast television, Gerry draws on the totality of his experience. "We are all the sum of our parts," he says - and he tries to make that sum bigger than the individual pieces. 6. Give historical figures grace. Rather than judging people of the past by today's moral standards, Gerry tries to understand the times they lived in. That empathy is what makes his characters feel human rather than like moral lessons. GET THE BOOK The Stirling Defense by Gerald Patnode Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Un7rWY Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/beta-search?keywords=The+Stirling+Defense Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/250703966-the-stirling-defense CONNECT WITH GERRY Website: https://patnodemedia.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/geraldrpatnode/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gerald.patnode CONNECT WITH YOUR HOST Mike Carlon | Uncorking a Story Website: https://uncorkingastory.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@uncorkingastory Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uncorkingastory/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uncorkingastory TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@uncorkingastory Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/uncorkingastory Subscribe & Leave a Review - It helps more readers and writers find the show! Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/uncorking-a-story/id563636205 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5HZiAEtFlhAzk60Z4eAkhY Uncorking a Story is produced by Mike Carlon. New episodes drop every Tuesday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Gerald Patnode on History, Empathy, and Untold Stories

  4. Aug 25

    Cowboys, Pottery, and Broken Things

    "Good writing should help readers see their own experiences and feel their own emotions through the characters and ideally understand that they are not alone and that they can prevail, survive, triumph even. And the way that we do that is connection to other people." — Ginger Pinholster ABOUT THIS EPISODE Ginger Pinholster returns to Uncorking a Story to talk about her third novel, THE TRAIN TO SANTA FE. A Pushcart Prize nominee and former science writer who spent nearly four decades at institutions like AAAS and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Ginger now splits her time between Florida's Ponce Inlet — where she volunteers with the Volusia Turtle Patrol — and Santa Fe, New Mexico. Her new book is a braided historical novel spanning three generations: a gifted sixteen-year-old Tewa potter who boards one of the first trains from Espanola to Santa Fe in the 1880s, her granddaughter Rose who's ninety-four and desperate to reclaim her stolen Native heritage, and a modern-day love story between a wounded veteran and a cowboy-hat-wearing orderly. Mike and Ginger talk about how a hot cowboy on a work trip inspired the book, the technical challenge of weaving multiple timelines together, using pottery as connective tissue between past and present, the healing power of landscape and community, and why broken things — pottery, bodies, hearts — can still become whole. KEY TAKEAWAYS 1. Sometimes a story finds you. Ginger had already begun working on a Southwestern historical novel when a work trip to Santa Fe introduced her to a real-life cowboy who became the inspiration for her male protagonist, Jonah. The personal and the creative merged. 2. Connective tissue holds a braided novel together. Inspired by Sarah Penner's workshop on dual-timeline fiction (The Lost Apothecary), Ginger needed a physical artifact to link her timelines. Her anthropologist daughter pointed her toward New Mexico's indigenous pottery — and the structure clicked into place. 3. The railroad changed everything for Indigenous communities. The Chili Line Railroad brought opportunity but also exploitation: bisecting irrigation channels, replacing barter with cash currency, and transforming Native artwork for tourist consumption. Ginger imagines what happened to one young woman caught in that upheaval. 4. Broken things are a throughline. Broken pottery, a broken body, broken hearts — the novel keeps returning to the question of how we remain resilient and ultimately heal after trauma. For Ginger, the answer is always community. 5. Writing is healing. Newly divorced and sending a daughter off to college when she began the book, Ginger channeled her own sense of being adrift into Jemi — a wounded veteran who urgently wants to climb a mountain where she once felt whole. 6. Landscape is a character. The purple shawls falling over mountaintops, the luminous butterscotch of cottonwood trees — Ginger makes the physical setting integral to how her characters live and feel. She even hiked Santa Fe Baldy with a roller bag to experience what her protagonist might feel. 7. Readers make the world a better place. Literature is a form of community. Reading about experiences outside our own connects us to one another and enriches the fabric of society. GET THE BOOK THE TRAIN TO SANTA FE by Ginger Pinholster Publisher: Regal House Publishing Release Date: August 25, 2026 ISBN: 978-1646037452 Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1646037456 Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-train-to-santa-fe-ginger-pinholster/21733970 UPCOMING EVENTS September 2 — Tombolo Books, St. Petersburg, FL (with Jessica Handler, author of The World to See), 7 p.m. September 4 — Book Launch at Fern & Fable Bookstore / The Collective, Ormond Beach, FL September (TBD) — Books & Books, Coral Gables, FL (with Christine Jean Chappell) Santa Fe (TBD) — Event with Connie May Fowler CONNECT WITH GINGER Website: gingerpinholster.com Instagram: @gingpin Facebook: @GingerPinholster TikTok: @Ginger_Pinholster LinkedIn: @GingerPinholster CONNECT WITH YOUR HOST Mike Carlon | Uncorking a Story Website: uncorkingastory.com YouTube: @uncorkingastory Instagram: @uncorkingastory Facebook: Uncorking a Story TikTok: @uncorkingastory Twitter/X: @uncorkingastory Subscribe & Leave a Review — It helps more readers and writers find the show! Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/uncorking-a-story/id563636205 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5HZiAEtFlhAzk60Z4eAkhY Uncorking a Story is produced by Mike Carlon. New episodes drop every Tuesday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Cowboys, Pottery, and Broken Things

  5. Aug 18

    Carol Snow on The Girl on the Beach

    "You really have to love the process. It can't be about, 'Oh, if I am an author, everyone will respect me so much.' You really have to love the process of it or there kind of isn't any point to doing it." — Carol Snow About This Episode Carol Snow is the author of ten books spanning romantic comedy, young adult fiction, and now psychological thrillers. She holds a BA in psychology from Brown University and a master's in teaching English from Boston College. Originally from New Jersey, she now splits her time between Cape Cod and Southern California. Her latest novel, The Girl on the Beach, is a gripping psychological thriller set along the coastline of Santa Barbara's American Riviera. It follows a wealthy Montecito couple, their four-year-old daughter, and the babysitter whose summer with the family ends in tragedy — and whose obsession with the truth may be the only thing keeping hope alive. Mike and Carol talk about growing up as an avid reader in Chatham, Massachusetts (where they share deep roots), the 16-year journey from first serious writing to first publication, switching genres multiple times, recovering from creative burnout, and why aspiring writers should focus on craft long before they worry about getting published. Key Takeaways 1. Readers become writers. Carol grew up in a family of avid readers, spent summers at a Cape Cod beach house without television, and devoured stacks of library books. That foundation — reading widely and constantly — is where her writing life began. 2. Sixteen years is not unusual. From the time Carol got serious about writing to the publication of her first novel, roughly sixteen years passed. Overnight success stories exist but are rare. Persistence and love of the craft are what carry you through. 3. Writing groups matter. After taking a fiction-writing class at Harvard Extension School, Carol and half the class formed a monthly writing group that applied the critique principles they'd been taught. That community kept the work moving forward. 4. Switching genres follows your reading life. Carol moved from romantic comedy to YA to psychological thrillers not out of strategy but because her reading interests evolved. She writes what she wants to read — and her psychology degree gives her thrillers an extra layer of character insight. 5. Burnout is real — and recoverable. After nine books in ten years, Carol hit a wall. She took time away, learned oil painting, and eventually returned with renewed gratitude and a fresh perspective. The ten-year gap between books taught her that stepping back can be a form of progress. 6. Wealth can't replace connection. In The Girl on the Beach, the ultra-wealthy parents are paradoxically the most isolated when tragedy strikes. Their money insulated them from building deep relationships, and when they need support most, no one is truly there. 7. Focus on craft before publication. Carol's single biggest piece of advice for aspiring writers: work on the writing itself before worrying about getting published. If you rush to publication before your craft is ready, you won't be prepared to sustain a career even if you get lucky early. 8. Don't take rejection personally — but do listen to feedback. A college professor told Carol she wasn't good enough. She ignored the verdict but kept working. The key distinction: rejection stings, but using feedback to improve is what separates writers who grow from those who quit. Get the Book The Girl on the Beach by Carol Snow Amazon: https://amzn.to/4wwfTjS Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/a/54587/9798892425773 Connect with Carol Website: https://www.carolsnow.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolsnowbooks/ Connect with Your Host Mike Carlon | Uncorking a Story Website: https://uncorkingastory.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@uncorkingastory Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uncorkingastory/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uncorkingastory TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@uncorkingastory Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/uncorkingastory Subscribe & Leave a Review — It helps more readers and writers find the show! Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/uncorking-a-story/id563636205 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5HZiAEtFlhAzk60Z4eAkhY --- Uncorking a Story is produced by Mike Carlon. New episodes drop every Tuesday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Carol Snow on The Girl on the Beach

  6. Aug 11

    Downloads from Spirit, with Katherine Marie

    "You're not alone. You really have guidance and support available to you. For all those people that are sitting there in silos that are frustrated with life and feel like they could use a friend — they are there with you. You just need to open up to it." — Katherine Marie Katherine Marie spent decades as a computer technology analyst — a world of algorithms, software installations, and zeros and ones. Then a road trip to Sedona, a book that fell into her lap, and a growing sense of intuition she couldn't ignore led her down a very different path. Her latest book, High Five Your Spirit Guides, is a beginner-friendly, hands-on guide to connecting with your intuition and building a relationship with what she calls your "soul team" — the spirit guides, angels, and allies she believes are available to everyone. Mike and Katherine talk about bridging the gap between analytical thinking and spiritual experience, how she received "downloads" while writing the book, what a spirit guide actually is, the role of signs and repeating numbers, and why even thirty seconds of quiet can be enough to make a connection. Key Takeaways: 1. Spirit guides are a helpful presence — and they look different for everyone. For Katherine, they manifest as beings she journals with. For others, it might be a strong gut feeling, a spirit animal, or just a sense of intuition. There's no prescribed rule. 2. You can have a whole team. Katherine describes a "soul team" that includes your core daily guides, angels who come and go based on need, ascended masters, archangels, and even spirit animals — all working together. 3. Signs are everywhere if you're paying attention. Repeating numbers (like 11:11), feathers on the sidewalk, heart shapes in the clouds — Katherine says these are ways your guides communicate that you're on the right path or that you're loved. 4. You don't need a mountaintop meditation. Even a thirty-second "micro meditation" — a deep breath and counting down from ten — can create enough of a gap for spirit to come in. You can also connect while walking or in any relaxed flow state. 5. Skepticism and spirituality can coexist. Katherine's analytical background made her push back hard at first. But research showed her she wasn't alone in these experiences, and over time she learned to trust what she was receiving. 6. The book was co-written with her guides. Katherine describes sitting down and receiving "downloads" — knowing what chapter to write, writing detailed content about tarot or spirit signs, then fact-checking it against reference books and finding it accurate. 7. Anyone can do this. The barrier isn't talent or special ability — it's willingness to quiet the noise, suspend ingrained beliefs, and simply ask: "Are you there?" Buy High Five Your Spirit Guides: Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FG7RVLJP Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/p/books/high-five-your-spirit-guides-katherine-marie/0aba424e434213c2 Connect with Katherine: Website: https://innercompassmedia.com/katherinemarie/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/katherinemarieinnercompass Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/katherinemarie1111/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@katherine.marie1111 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@KatherineMarie-1111 Connect with Mike: Website: https://uncorkingastory.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@uncorkingastory Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uncorkingastory/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uncorkingastory TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@uncorkingastory Twitter: https://twitter.com/uncorkingastory If you like this episode, please share it with a friend. If you have not done so already, please rate and review Uncorking a Story on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Downloads from Spirit, with Katherine Marie

  7. Aug 4

    Nikki Mamanno on Breaking Good

    "I've been at the bottom of the mountain and I've looked up and it looked like the top was a million miles away and it felt like I couldn't do it a hundred times over. And I've taken that step and sometimes I don't look up, I just keep stepping, and eventually I look back and I've gained a little ground." — Nikki Mammano Nikki Mammano's debut memoir Breaking Good is exactly what it sounds like — a play on Breaking Bad, but in reverse. Raised in the greater New York metro area, Nikki went to Hawaii at twenty for a fresh start and college. Instead, she fell into meth addiction and the criminal underworld of Waikiki. What followed was prison, homelessness, and prostitution — before a discovery in a motel room changed everything. Now a mother of two adult daughters in Montclair, New Jersey, Nikki has spent three decades rebuilding her life and decided it was time to tell the story. Mike and Nikki talk about why addiction is the disease of trauma and disconnection, the moment she found out she was pregnant, what it's like to reveal your past to a PTA community, and why your story is never over — no matter how far gone you think you are. Key Takeaways: 1. Addiction is the disease of trauma and disconnection. Nikki didn't wake up wanting to be a drug dealer. Childhood trauma that started young — and betrayal by nearly everyone around her — set the wheels in motion long before Hawaii. 2. Getting clean isn't the same as getting healed. Nikki went to rehab and a halfway house before Hawaii and had a year of sobriety. But without doing the deeper work of understanding why she used, she relapsed the first night she arrived at a party in Waikiki. 3. Your story is not over. The prologue opens in a motel room where Nikki is at rock bottom — homeless, addicted, working as a prostitute. Then she discovers she's pregnant. That moment of choice became the beginning of her way back. 4. Vulnerability is freedom. Writing the most authentic, unsanitized version of her story was the most vulnerable Nikki has ever been. But by refusing to alter or hide anything, she found a radical acceptance and freedom she'd never experienced before. 5. Redemption is ongoing work. Breaking good isn't a one-time event. It's how Nikki shows up every day — as a friend, a community member, a parent, and now as an author helping others who've been through what she's been through. 6. Take the risk. Nikki's community, her daughters, and her readers have met her story with open arms. The fear of judgment was real, but the connection on the other side has been life-changing. Buy Breaking Good: Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Breaking-Good-Memoir-Nikki-Mammano/dp/B0FP5JX13F/ Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/p/books/breaking-good-a-memoir-nikki-mammano/76dd5cc34382c172 Connect with Nikki: Website: https://www.nikkimammano.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nikki_mammano/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nikkimammano Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nikki.mammano.3 Connect with Mike: Website: https://uncorkingastory.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@uncorkingastory Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uncorkingastory/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uncorkingastory TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@uncorkingastory Twitter: https://twitter.com/uncorkingastory If you like this episode, please share it with a friend. If you have not done so already, please rate and review Uncorking a Story on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Nikki Mamanno on Breaking Good

  8. Jul 28

    Jim Carlon on Keeping the Faith

    "Imagine somebody who's been disconnected from this church and he's reignited. That fire is back, that spark is back. Imagine what that one person can do in his life. If that happens one time, the eighteen months it took to put this thing together will have been worth it." — Jim Carlon Jim Carlon is a lawyer, army veteran, and lifelong Catholic whose twenty-five years of practice have shaped a deep commitment to wellness in the legal profession. He founded the Fairfield County Bar Association's Wellness Committee and serves on the board of the Care Coalition, a Westchester-based nonprofit focused on mental health. A Fairfield University grad and former JAG Corps officer, Jim is also a returning guest — his first appearance covered Conversation with a Desperate Man, a fictionalized account of his time in a psychiatric hospital. His new book, Keep the Faith: A Man's Guide to Staying Catholic After Divorce, grew out of a simple moment: his wife Kelly's refusal to consider anything but a Catholic framework for their wedding. That question — why is this faith non-negotiable? — became the seed of the book, especially after a string of family losses tested everything. Mike and Jim talk about the intellectual case for staying Catholic, what the annulment process actually looks like, the biggest misconceptions about divorce and the Church, and why marriage prep could use a boot-camp overhaul. Key Takeaways: 1. Write the book you can't find. Jim searched for a direct, practical resource for divorced Catholic men and came up empty. So he wrote one — a reminder that the best books fill a gap only the author can see. 2. Start with the why. Part one of the book gives ten reasons to remain Catholic after divorce. Jim's logic: if the why isn't compelling enough, nobody will stick around for the how — which is genuinely difficult. 3. The Eucharist is the intellectual anchor. Jim's core argument is simple: if you believe in transubstantiation — the actual presence of Christ in the Eucharist — there's no lateral move to another denomination that preserves that belief. 4. The biggest myth: you're automatically excluded. A divorced Catholic who is single and not in another relationship can fully participate in the liturgy. Civil divorce alone does not make you more of a sinner than anyone else in the pews. 5. The annulment process is hard — by design. It takes years, requires witnesses, involves reading your ex-spouse's file, and feels like reopening an old wound. But Jim found real healing in it: space to understand what happened spiritually and emotionally, separate from the civil proceedings. 6. Talk to a priest, not to yourself. Jim's experience at his mother's funeral — where a quick conversation led to confession and communion in minutes — illustrates how pastoral reality is often more welcoming than the narrative people construct in isolation. 7. Marriage prep needs more realism. Jim and Mike riff on putting engaged couples through practical stress tests — sleep deprivation, hunger, a crowded airport — instead of hypothetical "what if" discussions. The relationship between spouses must be paramount, second only to the relationship with God. 8. Grief upon grief can strengthen a marriage. Kelly and Jim lost family members almost immediately after their wedding. Three years in, they feel like they've lived a lifetime together — and the shared trials confirmed the partnership. Buy Keep the Faith: Amazon: https://amzn.to/4wXx7Y9 Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/a/54587/9798996568604 Also by Jim Carlon: Conversation with a Desperate Man — a fictionalized account of his stay and recovery at Silver Hill Hospital in Connecticut. Connect with Jim: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/keepthefaithrcc/ Connect with Mike: Website: https://uncorkingastory.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@uncorkingastory Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uncorkingastory/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uncorkingastory TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@uncorkingastory Twitter: https://twitter.com/uncorkingastory If you like this episode, please share it with a friend. If you have not done so already, please rate and review Uncorking a Story on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Jim Carlon on Keeping the Faith
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67 Ratings

About

Listen in to Uncorking a Story, where we pop the cork on hidden narratives and delve deep into the brilliant minds of your favorite authors. Get ready to unlock the magic behind your favorite books, one unforgettable story at a time. Hit that subscribe button and never miss a sip of inspiration!

Information

  • Creator
    Michael Carlon
  • Years Active
    2012 - 2026
  • Episodes
    495
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Copyright Uncorking a Story, 2026
  • Show Website
    Uncorking a Story

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