Johanna Hedva : Your Love Is Not Good

Johanna Hedva : Your Love Is Not Good

Author: David Naimon, Milkweed Editions June 10, 2023 Duration: 2:46:58

What if you gave your fictional main character all of your own biographical details and family history but had them, at every point, choose “wrong”? At every point do the thing you yourself would be against? Johanna Hedva does just that, and their novel Your Love Is Not Good is not just full of sex battles and high-stakes art openings, but also high-stakes moral quandaries. Set in the institutional art world of museums and galleries, Your Love Is Not Good looks at making art (and love) under capitalism, at a mixed-race Korean American painter striving for universality (and whiteness) and yet wanting to be authentic, to build community and solidarity. When forced to choose, where and with whom will she stand?

Johanna Hedva is also a musician and a performance artist. And their contribution to the bonus audio archive is one of the most unique ones ever, and one created specifically with us in mind. After we recorded this conversation they went on book tour and, while traveling from city to city, recorded themselves moaning, grunting, screaming, and breathing; recorded themselves reading text they wrote while touring. They then sent all these voice files to LA audio engineer Henry Glover along with the voices of the universe itself: sonifications of a black hole and the helix nebula, raw audio of the sun, a field recording of the aurora borealis. Hedva explained to Glover the vibe and scenario they imagined as he mixed and mastered a layering of voices, personal and “universal,” into this unique track: “The Saddest Thing of All Is When a Lone Astronaut Falls in Her Suit—Who Is There to Help Her Up?” To learn about how to subscribe to the bonus audio archive and the many other potential benefits of joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter head over to the show’s Patreon page.

The Bookshop for today’s episode.

 

 


There's a particular kind of conversation that happens when a thoughtful reader sits down with a writer, one that moves beyond simple promotion into the real heart of the creative act. Between The Covers is built on that very premise. Hosted by David Naimon and presented with Milkweed Editions, this long-form interview podcast delves into the lives and minds of authors working across fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. Each episode feels less like an interview and more like a privileged eavesdrop on a deep, meandering dialogue. You'll hear writers discuss not just their latest book, but the fragments of life, the stubborn questions, and the daily rituals that feed their work. Naimon’s approach is informed and curious, often leading guests into unexpected reflections on craft, influence, and the ideas that haunt them. The result is a consistently illuminating audio experience that feels like a private workshop in narrative, language, and thought. For anyone who loves the texture of words and the stories behind them, this podcast offers a sustained and intimate look at how literature is made. It’s a space where the finished book is just the starting point for a richer exploration.
Author: Language: en-us Episodes: 100

Between The Covers : Conversations with Writers in Fiction, Nonfiction & Poetry
Podcast Episodes
Elle Nash : Deliver Me [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:47:07
Perhaps it is fitting that today’s episode, with writer and founding editor of Witch Craft Magazine, Elle Nash, is launched on the shortest day of the year, the longest night of darkness. Nash’s new novel Deliver Me expl…
Naomi Klein : Doppelganger : Part Two [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:28:12
Today’s part two of the conversation with Naomi Klein about Doppelganger highlights the Jewish elements in the book, and looks at them through the lens of Palestine and Israel. We discuss Zionism, Marxism, and the Jewish…
Kate Zambreno & Sofia Samatar : Tone [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:30:10
In Kate Zambreno & Sofia Samatar’s Tone they construct a shared voice, that of the “Committee to Investigate the Atmosphere.” Yes, they do this to investigate tone, in the writings of everyone from Nella Larsen to Claric…
Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore : Touching the Art [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:34:18
Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore returns to Between the Covers to talk about her remarkable new book, Touching the Art. A mixture of memoir, biography, criticism, and social history, Touching the Art is above all a complicate…
Bhanu Kapil : Incubation : A Space for Monsters [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:34:20
Bhanu Kapil’s postcolonial feminist road novel Incubation: A Space for Monsters has long been out of print. The book of hers that most engages with the mythos and reality of America, Incubation follows Laloo, a British w…
Colleen Burner : Sister Golden Calf [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 57:35
Colleen Burner’s novella Sister Golden Calf is the story of two sisters on the road set in a world without men. Inspired, in part, by Vanessa Veselka’s essay “Green Screen: The Lack of Female Road Narratives and Why it M…
Kate Briggs : The Long Form [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:21:51
Essayist and translator Kate Briggs’ first novel The Long Form is a book about, and happening within, the relationship between Helen and her infant daughter, Rose. What does making a novel baby-centric, not a novel about…
Lydia Davis : Our Strangers [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:58:06
Today’s conversation with Lydia Davis about her latest story collection, Our Strangers, a collection of 143 stories, is a deep dive into storytelling. These stories, whether incredibly short or quite long, often eschew b…
Naomi Klein : Doppelganger : Part One [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:18:24
Naomi Klein’s new book, Doppelganger, is a departure for her. One some of her closest friends even cautioned her against. On the one hand, it is what we’ve come to expect from Klein, a brilliant framing, through the coin…
Tin House Live : Matthew Zapruder on Story of a Poem [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:07:50
You could say that Matthew Zapruder’s Story of a Poem is about the revision of a poem, that it follows the life of one poem, from its first phrase to its final draft, and invites us, in the most mesmerizing way, behind t…