Brontez Purnell on Staying Unclassifiable
From the Write-minded Podcast, Hosted by Brooke Warner and Grant Faulkner
Write-minded: Weekly Inspiration for Writers is currently in its fourth year. We are a weekly podcast for writers craving a unique blend of inspiration and real talk about the ups and downs of the writing life. Hosted by Brooke Warner of She Writes and Grant Faulkner of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), each theme-focused episode of Write-minded features an interview with a writer, author, or publishing industry professional.
This week’s guest, Brontez Purnell, is the kind of writer who’s either hard to pin down, or just won’t be. As such, he’s inspired an episode about who gets to draw outside the lines and why in the realm of book publishing. Whether you love your lane, feel confined by your lane, or insist on busting out of your lane, we invite you to consider what it means to be classifiable and contained, and whether or not it suits you to be so—or to refuse the categories and labels publishing loves to put on authors. An existential episode inspired by an author who’s blowing up the boxes and having fun doing it. This week’s Substackin’ is based on Brooke’s post, “Why You Can’t Equate Your Substack Posts to a Book: On the Staying Power of the Book.” Grant and Brooke are drawing from their own Substacks and others for these features, and we invite you to find us at https://grantfaulkner.
Subscribe and download the episode, wherever you get your podcasts.
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Brontez Purnell is the author of several books, most recently Ten Bridges I’ve Burnt, a memoir in essays, and 100 Boyfriends, which won the 2022 Lambda Literary Award in Gay Fiction. Brontez was named one of the 32 Black Male Writers of Our Time by T: The New York Times Style Magazine in 2018 and is the frontman for the band the Younger Lovers and a renowned dancer, performance artist, and zine-maker.
