What Are the Odds?

What Are the Odds?

From Selected Shorts by Symphony Space

March 12, 2026 · 59 min

About this episode

The episode features stories about unlikely scenarios, including a unique book exchange and the experience of winning the lottery.

Host Meg Wolitzer presents two stories with unlikely scenarios, rare events that have, at least fictionally, come to pass. Naomi Kritzer uses the idea of “The Little Free Library”—one of those impromptu structures that facilitate the swapping of books—to imagine an exchange of quite a different sort. The reader is Melora Hardin. And Ling Ma imagines how winning the lottery—292.2 million to one—actually plays out. “Winner” is read by Cindy Cheung.

People in this episode

Host: Meg Wolitzer

Guests: Naomi Kritzer, Ling Ma

Topics covered

  • fiction
  • unlikely scenarios
  • book exchange
  • lottery
  • rare events

Keywords

  • Selected Shorts
  • fiction
  • lottery
  • book exchange
  • Naomi Kritzer
  • Ling Ma

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