You're listening to Book Exploder, where authors break down a passage from their work

to show us how they write.

I'm Rishi Keishirui.

And I'm Susan Orleen.

This is the last episode of Book Exploder.

Thank you so much for listening.

If you haven't heard them yet, you can still go back and listen to the first seven episodes

with Susan Orleen, Minjin Lee, Michael Cunningham, Carmen Maria Machado, Teari Jones, Celeste

Bing, and George Saunders.

And today I'm speaking with James McBride, author of Deakin King Kong, which was published

in 2020.

In 2015, President Obama awarded James McBride with the National Humanities Medal, and

in 2021, Deakin King Kong won the Andrew Carnegie Medal for excellence in fiction.

Susan, when did you first read James McBride?

Actually, I first ended up listening to James McBride.

As it happens, the very first audiobook I ever listened to was The Color of Water, which

is a memoir that McBride published.

And I couldn't wait to get my hands on Deakin King Kong.

It's hilarious.

In fact, you find yourself laughing out loud.

And I don't laugh out loud at a lot of books, even books that are funny.

It's a little bit more of a private internal chuckle, but I was literally causing people

...