WAKE ISLAND Paul K

From the critically acclaimed author dubbed “one of today’s finest practitioners of nonfiction” (The New York Times Book Review), a breathless true crime tale of sex, religion, and murder in the deep South.



Mike and Denise Williams had a tight knit, seemingly unbreakable bond with childhood friends, Brian and Kathy Winchester. The two couples were devout, hardworking Baptists who lived perfect, quintessentially Southern lives. Their friendship seemed ironclad. That is, until December 16, 2000, when Denise’s husband Mike disappeared while duck hunting on Lake Seminole.

After no body was found, everyone assumed that Mike had drowned in a tragic accident, his body eaten by alligators. But things took an unexpected turn when, within five years of Mike’s disappearance, Brian Winchester divorced his wife and married Denise. Their surprising romance set tongues talking. People began wondering how long they had been a couple, and whether they had anything to do with Mike’s death. It took another twelve years for the truth to come out—and when it did, it was unimaginable.



Now, the full, shocking story is revealed by Mikita Brottman, acclaimed true crime writer of the “enthralling” (San Francisco Book Review) An Unexplained Death. Through tenacious research and clear-eyed prose, she probes the psychology of a couple who killed and explores how it feels to live for eighteen years with murder on the soul.



A fascinating page-turner of modern noir, Guilty Creatures is destined to become an instant true crime classic.



Mikita Brottman is a writer and psychoanalyst living in Baltimore, Maryland. Her most recent book, An Unexplained Death, was shortlisted for the Gold Dagger Award for nonfiction by the Crime Writers Association of the UK. She has a DPhil from Oxford University and is a professor of literature at the Maryland Institute College of Art.



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David's Twitter: ⁠@raviddice


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Fear. Disgust. Pity. The cripple evokes our basest human emotions—as does the monster.



Told in lyric fragments, The Backwards Hand traces Matt Lee’s experience living in the United States for more than thirty years with a rare congenital defect. Weaving in historical research and pop culture references, Lee dissects how the disabled body has been conflated with impurity, worthlessness, and evil. His voice swirls amid those of artists, criminals, activists, and philosophers. With a particular focus on horror films, Lee juxtaposes portrayals of fictitious monsters with the real-life atrocities of the Nazi regime and the American eugenics movement. Through examining his struggles with physical and mental health, Lee confronts his own beliefs about monstrosity and searches for atonement as he awaits the birth of his son.



The Backwards Hand interrogates what it means to be a cripple in a predominantly ableist society, deconstructing how perceptions of disability are—and are not—reflected in art and media.



In this episode with ⁠Matt Lee⁠, we explore the destabilizing effects of an acid experience, delve into Goya’s creation of his most otherworldly works after becoming deaf, and Tennessee Williams’s deep fear of asylums. We discuss the concept of self-imposed exile within the disabled community and dissect what truly makes a monster. We examine the works of photographers like Diane Arbus and Robert Andy Coombs. We also reflect on the limits of empathy, consider if we are the greatest source of danger to others, and confront childhood terrors and the complexities of fatherhood.



MATT LEE is the author of Crisis Actor. His short fiction and nonfiction have appeared in numerous venues online and in print. He has also written and produced work for the stage, including an adaptation of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. He is a cofounder and editor of the magazine Ligeia. Matt lives in Maryland with his wife and son.



SOCIAL:
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David's Twitter: @raviddice


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Christopher Zeischegg is a writer and filmmaker who spent eight years working in the adult industry as performer, Danny Wylde. He is the author of The Magician, Body to Job, The Wolves that Live in Skin and Space, and Come to My Brother. 



His latest book CREATION spans a decade’s worth of writing on art, violence, sex work, and friendship. Acclaimed author, Christopher Zeischegg, confronts his past narratives, cruelty in auto-fiction, pornographic ambivalence, and transformative relationship to artist, Luka Fisher.



"Creation is a stunning new collection by one of the most exciting living writers. Reading a Christopher Zeischegg book is like stepping into a dream in which anything can happen—his particular combination of sex, death, beauty, and horror often feels downright transcendent." —Chelsea Hodson, author of Tonight I'm Someone Else

Theme music by Joseph E. Martinez of Junius



SOCIALS:
Twitter: @WakeIslandPod 

Instagram: @wakeislandpod 

David Leo Rice: www.raviddice.com

Chris's Twitter: @chriszeischegg

Chris's Instagram: @chriszeischegg

David's Twitter: @raviddice


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Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/wake-island/support

Last year, David Peak released "The World Below," a midwestern gothic tale intertwining two rival families whose animosity sparks amidst a ritualistic occult murder mystery, amplified by heroic doses of LSD.



Published by Apocalypse Party, a rapidly acclaimed purveyor of top-tier horror, "The World Below" is a testament to their commitment to darkness.



This book seamlessly blends atmosphere and narrative, achieving the rare feat of being both immersive and a page-turner. David Peak's work aligns him with horror luminaries like Brian Evenson, Clive Barker, and Poppy Z Brite.



In this episode, we delve into reading as a psychedelic act, exploring how family feuds in small towns can evolve into an art form. We also dissect the drama and artistry of Jerry Springer, touch on the American mythology surrounding the West Memphis Three, and revel in the exhilaration of death metal and films like "Mandy."



"A brilliant and flayed slice of Midwest gothic. While one might find traces of Poppy Z. Brite or Michael McDowell here, The World Below is wholly its own beast. Peak laces the classic premise of feuding, cursed families with high-potency LSD, forming something fresh, potent, and filled with ache."

-B.R. Yeager, author of Negative Space



"Violent, noir-soaked horror infuses every page of David Peak's astonishing The World Below, coiling like a serpent around love: first and lost loves, love of family and the land, love of darkness and blood. Peak mixes the most primal of emotions like an alchemist, leaving every reader transformed."

-Livia Llewellyn, author of Furnace

SOCIAL:
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Every city has that motel. The motel on the edge of town, the mythical place you dare not go. Logan Berry goes there.

In this episode, we calibrate a magical framework for understanding the world through a seance Logan conducted at the Skylark Motel. We get into cutting off spectral appendages, invoking chaos, exploring hoarder homes, practicing automatic writing, and Ultratheater.
 
Additionally, we discuss if relentless exposure to depravity makes us evil, and why occult commerce lacks the courage of its own convictions.

We also explore the possibility that these are the best times, or at least the only times we'll ever live in

Logan Berry is the author of Casket Flare (Inside the Castle), Run-off Sugar Crystal Lake (11:11 Press), and Transmissions to Artaud (Selffuck). He’s a playwright and theatre director. He lives in Chicago.

Theme music by Joseph E. Martinez of Junius

SOCIAL:

David's site: raviddice.com
Wake Island Twitter: @WakeIslandPod 
Wake Island Instagram: @wakeislandpod
David's Twitter: @raviddice
Logan's Twitter: @lgnbrry




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Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/wake-island/support

“The omnicidal will to constitute an infinite decision implies one of two things: either to kill the unfinished, or to let the unfinished kill.”



In the second part of our conversation with Jason Bahbak Mohaghegh, we delve deep into the realm of unreality. We explore topics such as the labor associated with maintaining the criminal enterprise of the dream, the suffering and expenditure associated with visionary figures like Joyce Monsuer, the allure of totalitarian seduction during times marked by the predatory and sadistic behavior of those in authority, the phenomenon of NPC culture and the detachment /neutrality it brings, the banality of repressed nerds and the enduring shittiness of the metaverse. 



Jason Bahbak Mohaghegh⁠ is a philosopher, literary theorist, and professor of comparative literature at Babson College. His work tracks currents of experimental thought across the so-called East and the West, with particular attention to concepts of chaos, violence, illusion, silence, extremism, mania, disappearance, night, evil, secrecy, and apocalyptic writing. He has published nine books to date, including: ⁠⁠⁠Night: A Philosophy of the After-Dark⁠⁠⁠ & ⁠⁠⁠Night: A Philosophy of the Last World⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠Omnicide: Mania, Fatality, and the Future-in-Delirium⁠⁠⁠ & ⁠⁠⁠Omnicide II: Mania, Doom, and the Future-in-Deception⁠⁠⁠, The Chaotic Imagination (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010); Inflictions (Continuum, 2012); The Radical Unspoken (Routledge, 2013); Insurgent, Poet, Mystic, Sectarian (SUNY, 2015);

He is also the founding director of the Future Studies Program (www.futurestudiesprogram.com), Programmer of Transdisciplinary Studies for the New Centre for Research & Practice, and co-editor of the "Futures Theory" and "Suspensions" book series (Bloomsbury).



Theme music by Joseph E. Martinez of Junius

SOCIAL:

David's site: raviddice.com

Wake Island Twitter: @WakeIslandPod 

Wake Island Instagram: @wakeislandpod

David's Twitter: @raviddice


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Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/wake-island/support