Writer's Voice with Francesca Rheannon Francesca Rheannon

Can we achieve 100% clean power by 2030?











“It would be economically efficient and technologically possible to produce all of our power and all of our energy needs through clean power sources. It’s basically as simple as that.”

John J. Berger















We spend the hour with John Berger talking about his inspiring new book, Solving The Climate Crisis: Frontier Reports From The Race To Save The Earth.







Writers Voice— in depth conversation with writers of all genres, on the air since 2004.







Find us on Facebook at Writers Voice with Francesca Rheannon, on Instagram and Threads @WritersVoicePodcast or find us on X/Twitter @WritersVoice. Read transcripts and subscribe at the Writer’s Voice Substack.







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Key words: climate change, climate crisis, global warming, John Berger, podcast, book recommendations, author interview, book podcast, book show, writer’s voice, Francesca Rheannon,







Oil Deals Over Climate: Controversy Surrounds Annual UN Climate Talks in Dubai







The annual UN Climate talks are taking place in the petro-state, the United Arab Republics. It is the largest such Conference of Parties, or COP, so far.







But, forgive the cynicism, it’s also likely to be the most corrupt. As they say, fish rots from the head and the head of this COP, its president, is Sultan Al Jaber, CEO of Abu Dhabi National Oil.







According to the BBC, The UAE plans to use its role as the host of the UN climate talks in Dubai as a chance to strike oil and gas deals with other countries—deals that would blow right through our fast depleting global carbon budget. (That’s the amount we can still emit before passing the point of no return on climate.) Leaked briefing documents revealed the plans for making the deals, but the UAE is denying the report.







Climate Hopes in the Shadow of Scandal: Finding Inspiration in John Berger’s Book







The annual COPs seem to be where climate hopes go to die. But John Berger’s book, Solving The Climate Crisis, makes clear that there is still ample room for hope.







A practical roadmap for effective climate action, his book is full of inspiring advances in clean power, energy efficiency, and other means of climate protection that will create millions of new jobs and substantial economic benefits for all of us.







About the Author







John J. Berger is an environmental science and policy specialist, prize-winning author, and journalist. He is the author of eleven books on energy and environmental issues.







Read An Excerpt from Solving The Climate Crisis







Read The Interview Transcript

We talk with poet, farmer and author Scott Chaskey about his new book, Soil and Spirit: Cultivation and Kinship In The Web of Life. It’s about poetry, soil, farming and community.













Then, Chef Ravinder Bhogal introduces us to the comfort and joy of immigrant food. Her book is Comfort and Joy: Irresistible Pleasures from a Vegetarian Kitchen.















Writers Voice— in depth conversation with writers of all genres, on the air since 2004.







Find us on Facebook at Writers Voice with Francesca Rheannon, on Instagram and Threads @WritersVoicePodcast or find us on X/Twitter @WritersVoice. Read transcripts and subscribe at the Writer’s Voice Substack.
Love Writer’s Voice? Please rate us on your podcast app. It really helps to get the word out about our show.















Farmer-Poet Scott Chaskey













As a farmer with decades spent working in fields, Scott Chaskey has been shaped by daily attention to the earth. A leader in the international Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) movement, he has combined a longstanding commitment to food sovereignty and organic farming with a belief that attention to the soil and the life, microbial and otherwise that inhabit it offers valuable lessons for building healthy human communities.







We last spoke with him in 2014 about his book, Seedtime. Now Chaskey’s come out with a collection of essays, wherein he explores the evolution of his perspective, both as a farmer and as a poet. The reader travels with him on a journey accompanied by his beautiful poetry as he shares the people and projects that have inspired him.















Food, Community, Celebration













The holiday season has begun, a time for celebrating food, family and community. While meat-based dishes are traditional, more people are deciding to go lightly on the planet and their own health with vegetarian fare.







But too often, giving up meat and poultry is tied to a narratives of sacrifice. Award-winning chef Ravinder Bhogal knows better. In her new cookbook, Comfort and Joy, she reclaims vegan and vegetarian cooking in all its abundance.







Ravinder Bhogal is a food journalist, chef and restauraneur of the London restaurant, Jikoni.















Marge Bruchac Sings The Green Corn Song







In honor of the indigenous people who were here long before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, we hear Abenaki writer, scholar and musician Marge Bruchac singing The Green Corn Song. Listen to our full conversation with Marge Bruchac here.

We talk with Simon Worrall and Heather Dune-Macadam. About the fascinating and tragic story of a young Jewish artist in Nazi-occupied Paris. Their book is STAR CROSSED: A True Romeo and Juliet Story in Hitler’s Paris.







Then, New York Times columnist and author Margaret Renkl tells us about her acclaimed new book THE COMFORT OF CROWS: A Backyard Year.







Writers Voice— in depth conversation with writers of all genres, on the air since 2004.







Find us on Facebook at Writers Voice with Francesca Rheannon, on Instagram and Threads @WritersVoicePodcast or find us on X/Twitter @WritersVoice. Read transcripts and subscribe at the Writer’s Voice Substack Love Writer’s Voice? Please rate us on your podcast app. It really helps to get the word out about our show.















(Note: This week’s and last week’s show commemorate the anniversary of Kristallnacht, the first major pogrom against Germany’s Jews, which happened November 9 and 10, 1938.)







Paris, 1940







In Nazi-occupied Paris, pursuing art, culture, and jazz becomes an act of defiance for patriotic Parisians. Forbidden love blossoms between Annette Zelman, a spirited Jewish student at the Academy of Beaux-Arts, and the poet Jean Jausion. But escalating restrictions on the Jewish community lead the young lovers down divergent and tragic paths.







Literary couple Heather Dune-Macadam and Simon Worrall used a treasure-trove of personal letters to uncover the story behind Starcrossed. Beyond the lovers at the heart of the tale, they paint a fascinating portrait of wartime Paris and its lively scene of intellectual resistance to Nazi rule.







About the Authors







Heather Dune is the author of the award-winning book, 999: The Extra­or­di­nary Young Women of the First Offi­cial Jew­ish Trans­port to Auschwitz. Simon Worrall is the author of several books, including The Poet and the Murderer: A True Story of Verse, Violence and the Art of Forgery.















Margaret Renkl’s Backyard Year







The leaves are falling in ever greater numbers as Fall marches into Winter. And as they do, the question arises, what to do with them?













My guest, New York Times columnist and author Margaret Renkl has a simple solution: do nothing. A messy yard is great habitat for our endangered wildlife.







Her new book The Comfort of Crows is a a literary devotional: fifty-two chapters that follow the creatures and plants in her backyard over the course of a year. Beautifully written, it reminds us to pay attention to the fragile and wondrous life around us. By protecting it, we enrich our own lives immeasurably.







About the Author







Margaret Renkl is the author of Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss and Graceland, At Last: Notes on Hope and Heartache From the American South. She is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times, where her essays appear weekly.

Military violence against hospitals, patients, and health workers has become a common feature of modern war. Israel’s current bombardment of hospitals, ambulances and medical personnel in Gaza is a textbook example of this disturbing trend.













That’s why Writer’s Voice is re-posting our 2019 interview with Leonard Rubenstein about his book, Perilous Medicine.







It’s about the development of international law and conventions to protect health care workers and facilities from military attack — conventions Israel is violating now — and what remains to be done.







The attacks destroy lives. They also destroy the capacity of health systems to tend to those in need. Yet little is being done about this abomination. That’s why Leonard Rubenstein wrote the book Perilous Medicine.







A human rights lawyer who has investigated atrocities against health workers around the world, Rubenstein tells of the dangers health workers face during conflict and the legal, political, and moral struggle to protect them.







Leonard Rubenstein is professor and director of the Program on Human Rights and Health in Conflict at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He founded the Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition and is a former president of Physicians for Human Rights.

What an owl taught a famed ecologist about a deadly human misconception. Also, the role of oil in the Israel/Palestine conflict.







We talk with ecologist Carl Safina about his book, Alfie and Me: What Owls Know, What Humans Believe. It’s about how a tiny ragged ball of fluff taught a famed ecologist about a deadly human misconception.







Then, do the endless wars around oil include the current Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Charlotte Dennett’s book Follow The Pipelines is about the deadly politics of the great game for oil. We talk with her about how those deadly politics are a hidden factor in the West and Israel’s dealings with the Palestinians.







Writers Voice— in depth conversation with writers of all genres, on the air since 2004.







Love Writer’s Voice? Please recommend us on Substack. It really helps to get the word out about our show.







Key Words: Carl Safina, Charlotte Dennett, Israel, Palestine, owls, oil, podcast, book recommendations, author interview, book podcast, book show, creative nonfiction, environment, writer’s voice







[More on page 2 below]

Is hunting actually good for the environment? That’s what conservationist Brant MacDuff says. We spend the hour with him talking about his book, The Shotgun Conservationist: Why Environmentalists Should Love Hunting.

Writers Voice— in depth conversation with writers of all genres, on the air since 2004.

Read transcripts and subscribe at the Writer’s Voice Substack 

Love Writer’s Voice? Please rate us on your podcast app. It really helps to get the word out about our show.

Key words: hunting, conservation, Brant MacDuff, podcast, book recommendations, author interview, book podcast, book show, creative nonfiction, writer’s voice, Francesca Rheannon



Hunters are like…

Picture a hunter. Who comes to mind? Millionaire playboys or big truck owning folks? Maybe so, but there’s more to it. Because if you love nature, value sustainability, hate the pollution and inhumanity of factory farms, you could be a hunter in the making. And if you’ve never even considered hunting, Brant MacDuff’s book The Shotgun Conservationist shows why you should — or at least support it.

A Change of Heart About Hunting

I’m a convert. I used to hate the idea of hunting. But that all changed when I moved into what had been my mother’s home before she passed away. Set in the middle of the woods, I noticed that the understory that used to be so abundant and biodiverse, was now deeply depleted, decimated by the deer whose population has exploded over the past thirty years.

Ground-dwelling birds have gone scarce, among other native species. So a few years ago, I invited a group of hunters to act like the top predators that humans long ago did away with in this area. They come every season, bag some deer and share the meat with me, their families and local food banks.

It so happens that I spoke with Brant MacDuff the day before hunting season opened. And I was joined by a fledgling hunter, my friend Jordy. He’s studying environmental science in college and he is keenly interested in conservation and sustainable forestry. You’ll hear him ask MacDuff some questions toward the end of our conversation.

About the Author

Brant MacDuff is a taxidermist and conservation historian. He’s worked for a variety of museums and aquariums, all while supporting his primary work as a public speaker on natural history.

Read An Excerpt