For our final episode of our first season, Naomi is joined by fellow Annie Ernaux enthusiast Jeannie Vanasco for an in-depth discussion on immersion in the reading process, the un-self-consciousness of writing memoir, the question of whether there is a divide between the craft and the personal, and how we make choices about what to leave out when and why. For the Annie Ernaux fans out there, Naomi and Jeannie look closely at Jeannie’s marginalia in her copies of Shameand The Other Girland their influence on Jeannie’s work, particularly The Glass Eye. Shout-out to Seven Stories Press, Ernaux’s American publisher — we’re repping your Annie Ernaux hats and shirts and hope you’ll make more of them ;)

Author Bio: Jeannie Vanasco is the author of A Silent Treatment, which was named a best book of 2025 by NPR and a best nonfiction book of 2025 by Electric Literature. Her other memoirs include Things We Didn’t Talk About When I Was a Girl—a New York Times Editors’ Choice and a best book of 2019 by TIME, Esquire, Kirkus, among others—and The Glass Eye, which Poets & Writers called one of the five best literary nonfiction debuts of 2017. Born and raised in Sandusky, Ohio, she lives in Baltimore and is an associate professor of English at Towson University. Her fourth book is under contract with Tin House, publisher of her other memoirs.

Marginalia: an autobiography is out now! Order it from Autofocus Books or your favorite, cool bookstore (like Unnameable Books, Book Club Bar, Exile in Bookville, Literati, Third Place Books, Skunk Cabbage Books, Interabang Books, and more)! Subscribe to her Substack, Process Notes, for further thoughts and reflections.