990. Hala Alyan

Otherppl with Brad Listi

Brad Listi

Arts, Society & Culture, Books

4.8 • 554 Ratings

🗓️ 9 September 2025

⏱️ 69 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Hala Alyan is the author of the debut memoir I'll Tell You When I'm Home, available from Avid Reader Press. Alyan is the author of the novels Salt Houses—winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the Arab American Book Award, and a finalist for the Chautauqua Prize—and The Arsonists’ City, a finalist for the Aspen Words Literary Prize. She is also the author of five highly acclaimed collections of poetry, including The Twenty-Ninth Year and The Moon That Turns You Back. Her work has been published by The New Yorker, The Academy of American Poets, The New York Times, The Guardian, and Guernica. She lives in Brooklyn with her family, where she works as a clinical psychologist and professor at New York University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, etc. Get ⁠⁠⁠⁠How to Write a Novel,⁠⁠⁠⁠ the debut audio course from DeepDive. 50+ hours of never-before-heard insight, inspiration, and instruction from dozens of today's most celebrated contemporary authors. Subscribe to ⁠⁠⁠Brad's email newsletter⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Support the show on Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Merch⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Bluesky⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠proud affiliate partner of Bookshop⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	McDonald's wraps all flavour, no mess.
0:02.9	No drips on your drip or grease on your shirt.
0:05.2	No crumbs on your keyboard or sauce on your dashboard.
0:07.9	Just all the flavour of sweet chili chicken, barbecue and bacon chicken and new Tika chicken.
0:12.8	Rapped up neat.
0:14.8	Served after 11am.
0:16.1	Teaka Chicken wrap available until the 13th July 26.
0:18.2	Fees applied to delivery orders subject to availability.
0:21.0	300 years of expertise in every twining sleep blend.
0:26.8	100 hours of craft in every cup.
0:30.9	Eight natural ingredients in every sip.
0:34.7	One night of winding down in every drop. Your moment of serenity. Brought to you by
0:42.8	twining sleep. Twinings. Alive in every drop.
1:22.0	Okay, everybody, welcome to the program. This is the other people show, a weekly podcast featuring in-depth conversations with today's leading writers. I'm Brad Listy, and I'm in Los Angeles. Thanks for being here. I appreciate it. Hope you're doing okay out there wherever you happen to be. Don't forget to hit the subscribe button wherever you listen and you can follow me on Instagram and Blue Sky.
1:29.3	So my guest today is Hala Alian. She has a new memoir out called I'll Tell You When I'm Home. It is available from avid reader Press, an imprint of Simon and Schuster. It is a memoir about
1:37.0	miscarriage and surrogacy and motherhood. It's about addiction and relationships, both intimate relationships and family
1:48.7	relationships. It's about family history and identity. And it is also a book that is very much
1:55.8	about exile and displacement and generational trauma.
2:06.2	Hala al-Yanas of Palestinian, Syrian, and Lebanese descent,
2:09.6	and in her childhood she experienced displacement.
2:13.6	She was born in the United States and lived here for a time before returning to the Middle East.
2:16.7	She lived in Beirut for high school and college
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Brad Listi, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Brad Listi and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.