Narrative Edge

What makes a plantation more than just a historic mansion? In this episode, Peter and Orlando explore In the Shadow of the Great House: A History of the Plantation in America with University of Georgia historian Daniel Rood. From sugar plantations on São Tomé to cotton fields in Georgia, this episode examines how systems of labor, land use, and profit shaped American history and continue to influence the world around us.

In this episode of Narrative Edge, you join Peter Biello and Orlando Montoya for a conversation about Dark Sisters, the new horror novel by Atlanta writer Kristi DeMeester. Set across the 1700s, the 1950s, and 2007 in and around Atlanta, the story follows women trapped in oppressive Christian communities and bound by a generational curse that causes their mouths to rot when they hide their true selves. You hear how DeMeester weaves folk horror, queer love, and questions of personal freedom into a Southern gothic that feels hauntingly close to home.

Dive into Charles Sumner’s life and legacy, from his abolitionist roots in Boston to the “Crime Against Kansas” speech and the caning by Preston Brooks that galvanized the North. You hear how Sumner’s constitutional arguments shaped Republican thought, echoed in phrases like “freedom national, slavery sectional,” and how his ideas later surfaced in the Brown v. Board fight.

Peter and Orlando talk with Georgia writer and longtime teacher Alan Caldwell to discuss his first poetry collection, The Only Verse. You hear Caldwell read “Running for No Reason” and we explore how his work faces depression, grief, marriage, and memory with clarity and care. We also trace his path from fiction to the Carrollton Just Poetry group and discuss how story and image power his poems.

If we knew that Coca-Cola was one of the deadliest products in the American diet, would we keep drinking it? In this episode, journalist Murray Carpenter joins Peter and Orlando to uncover the story behind his book Sweet and Deadly. You learn how soda corporations spent decades funding research, building shadow networks, and spreading disinformation to obscure the links between sugary drinks and chronic disease. 

Orlando Montoya and Peter Biello explore Spitfires by Becky Aikman, the story of American women who ferried aircraft for Britain’s Royal Air Force during World War II, including Georgia pilot Hazel Jane Raines, whose daring flights and survival stories reveal the courage and skill of the “Atta Girls.”

The Fantasies of Future Things is set in the rapidly changing landscape of Atlanta on the eve of the 1996 Olympics. On this episode of Narrative Edge, Peter and Orlando delve into this powerful debut novel, which tells the story of two Black men working for a real estate development firm that is responsible for uprooting the very communities they call home.