From Queens, Letty grew up in a conservative Jewish family. At age 20 in 1960, she became the director of publicity for the publishing company Bernard Geis Associates—later rising to vice president. There she was instrumental in making books like ‘Valley of the Dolls’ and ‘Sex and the Single Girl’ into mega-bestsellers. In 1970, she wrote her first book, ‘How to Make it in a Man’s World’; after its success, she left her job to focus on writing and raising her family. She was a founding member of the National Women's Political Caucus, through which she met Gloria Steinem; in 1972, they founded Ms. Magazine together. Letty was an editorial consultant for the 1972 TV special ‘Free to Be... You and Me’ for which she earned an Emmy. Throughout the 70s, 80s, 90s and up to today, she has continued writing books—centering on subjects around the family, raising children, being a working woman, aging, and Judaism. Her latest book, ‘Shanda: A Memoir of Shame and Secrecy,’ was released in 2022; in it she unfurls generations of secrets in her family and discusses how the Jewish teaching of “Shanda,” or shame, perpetuated constant paranoia and secrecy. Letty and I chat about everything—her childhood, the abortions she had in college in the 1950s, how she got her start in publishing, her almost 60-year marriage to labor lawyer Bert Pogrebin, what ‘Mad Men’ got right about the 1960s, discovering feminism, Ms. Magazine, balancing career and family life, being a working writer, and rediscovering Judaism.

Originally from Brooklyn, James Fritzhand published his first novel in 1971, ‘Son of the Great American Novel.’ He then went on to publish seventeen further novels, across many genres and using several pseudonyms—from showbiz roman a clefs to sagas to gothics to adventure novels and more. In the early 1980s, Fritzhand became a television screenwriter—writing for many of the major prime time soaps of the era: ‘Falcon Crest’, ‘Flamingo Road’, and ‘Hotel’ (which he also produced for a season). Around 2000, he retired from showbusiness and moved to northern California, where he lives a quiet life with his partner of 46 years. Jim and I talk about growing up in Brooklyn in the 50s and 60s, discovering himself as a writer, how he went from literary fiction to popular fiction to TV writing, meeting his partner in a gay bathhouse, AIDS, the quiet life, losing everything in the Tubbs Fire, and his passion for birding.

Manny Schongut has had a long and diverse career as an illustrator. From upstate New York, Schongut studied and taught at Brooklyn’s Pratt Institute before becoming a freelance illustrator. During the 1960s, Schongut became known for his distinctive book covers, often for science fiction and crime novels, that brought together watercolour and pen-and-ink in intriguing graphics. In the early 1970s, he was represented by Push Pin Studios, the legendary graphic design and illustration firm founded by Milton Glaser and Seymour Chwast. Taking a more traditional figurative tack, Manny’s work appeared in New York magazine, the New York Times, Vogue, Town & Country, Redbook, and many other publications. Starting in the 1970s, Schongut began working on children’s books—so far, he has illustrated over twenty, and been the author of five of those. Based in San Francisco since the early 1990s, 86-year-old Manny continues to create.