The Last We Fake
An LA novel-in-stories each season, along with selected short fiction from exceptional authors, both new and established, whose works take place at the shifting borders of the American Dream. Each season, the podcast debuts an original novel in serialized episodes. Separately, the episodes stand alone, but together they comprise a novel-length journey, with a cast of recurring characters.
Episodes
54 episodes
S3 E13 - The Celebrity by Catherine Hein: Episode 12, Don't Spit On the Stars
Using acting-school chops to conquer her deeply ingrained instinct to run away, Wanda finally phones for the directions to St. Jude's Hospital. But the flickering world at Sunset and Vine floods her with memories--from golden visits to the Holl...
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Season 3
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Episode 13
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1:07:22
S3 E12 - The Celebrity by Catherine Hein: Episode 11, The Broken Clock
Achieving a moment's peace between mind and body in the bathroom of June's trailer after the aborted three-way, Wanda staggers off toward a darker reality ...fully reassembled, although, yes, forgetting her horse ... But in the shelte...
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Season 3
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Episode 12
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1:07:01
S3 E11 - Natalie Goss Reads and Discusses "The Playwright"
This week's episode: "The Playwright,” a remarkable new short story by first-year talent Natalie Goss, about the subdued heart of a young Los Angeles theater reviewer-turned-dramatist who's losing the script. Goss is a Child...
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Season 3
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Episode 11
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32:03
S3 E10 - The Celebrity by Catherine Hein: Episode 10, What If She Was Wrong About Everything?
It's production as usual in Hotchkiss's office, despite the fact Sparks has landed in Good Samaritan, Wally Cleaver is sneaking cigarettes in fear of his dad, and Wanda's fixations lurch from suicide by graham crackers to the long-ago memory of...
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Season 3
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Episode 10
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1:11:38
S3 E9 - The Celebrity by Catherine Hein: Episode 9, Hotch's Hideaway
Somehow surviving an equestrian gauntlet of obstacles capped by an AWOL 14-year-old Wally Cleaver (“Will you go out with me when I get my license?”), Wanda has finally managed to dial out and hear the terrifying news about her grandmot...
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Season 3
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Episode 9
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50:56
S3 E8 - The Celebrity by Catherine Hein: Episode 8, Making the Beast with Six Legs
This was nothing like being a lamp ray glued to the back of Chase McSteve. Still, the weird-looking horse seems safe, until an explosion on the set of Abilene sends both Wanda and panicked beast off course--close enough to the home of televisio...
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Season 3
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Episode 8
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1:19:12
S3 E7 - The Celebrity by Catherine Hein: Episode 7, Man, Woman, Food, Bird, Insanity
"In a couple days, either this would all prove to be a huge comedy of errors, or nothing would ever be the same...."It's existential overload for Wanda, as sex life, pet care, family catastrophe and unanswered phones collide with an all...
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Season 3
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Episode 7
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32:14
S3 E6 - The Celebrity by Catherine Hein: Episode 6, "You're a Celebrity, Somebody Will Come Rescue You"
[UPDATE TO LISTENERS: Recordings for Catherine Hein's The Celebrity are on pause for a few weeks while she gets through some health procedures and related tsuris. Wanda will be back! Correspondence and well wishes may be sent via info@alanrifki...
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Season 3
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Episode 6
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59:22
S3 E5 - The Celebrity, by Catherine Hein: Episode 5, "Do I Look to You Like Someone Who Can’t Hold on from Behind?"
Half-buzzed from a night of more sex than rest with Howard the Ex, and done dirty by Dexatrim, Wanda is about to get even higher when the après le bain interview with Chase McSteve leads to deep kissing and a motorcycle date in the wor...
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Season 3
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Episode 5
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43:59
S3 E4 - The Celebrity, by Catherine Hein: Episode 4, "This Never Happened, Unless It Happens Again"
Wanda's moonlit drive on Mulholland turns into a hillside sleep-it-off, causing her to miss a big production meeting; then Howard somehow gets a foot in her door on the eve of her location swim with Chase McSteve.In what one liste...
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Season 3
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Episode 4
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52:59
S3 E3 - The Celebrity, by Catherine Hein: Episode 3, Wanda's Debut (or How It All Goes Wrong at the Tail O' the Cock)
Wanda survives her first appearance on the new show, but careful what song you perform afterward with a broken heart.In what one listener describes as "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" if it were written by a woman, Catherine Hein's histo...
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Season 3
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Episode 3
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38:47
S3 E2 - The Celebrity, by Catherine Hein: Episode 2, A Run-In with the Ex at Schwab's
There goes Wanda's diet after encountering ex-boyfriend Howard on the eve of her Daytalk debut. Catherine Hein's historical novel of early '60s Hollywood traces the journey of Wanda Fleming, the tenacious, calamity-prone co-host fatale ...
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Season 3
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Episode 2
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59:27
S3 E1 - The Celebrity, by Catherine Hein: Episode 1, The Party at Leonard Freeberg's
Season 3's novel, THE CELEBRITY, by Catherine Hein, traces the Hollywood journey of Wanda Fleming, the tenacious, calamity-prone co-host fatale of TV's Daytalk in the spring of 1962. Called to her grandmother's funeral in Orange County, the her...
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Season 3
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Episode 1
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48:37
Season 3 Trailer
Season 3's original novel, THE CELEBRITY, by Catherine Hein, traces the Hollywood journey of Wanda Fleming, the tenacious, calamity-prone co-host fatale of TV's "Daytalk" in the spring of 1962. Called to her grandmother's funeral, the heroine m...
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Season 3
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Episode 0
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3:35
S2 E19 - Lisa Cupolo Reads and Discusses "Whisper Screaming"
For this Season 2 finale, Lisa Cupolo reads her story "Whisper Screaming," about a Long Beach mother and actor whose inner question won't let her go, then talks with Alan Rifkin about the ghostly buffalo of Catalina Island. Cupolo's debut volum...
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Season 2
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Episode 19
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38:33
S2 E18 - Richard Bausch Reads and Discusses PLAYHOUSE
Richard Bausch (“A master of the novel as well as the story ” —Sven Birkerts, The New York Times) previews a chapter of his 13th novel, PLAYHOUSE, scheduled for release by Alfred A. Knopf on F...
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Season 2
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Episode 18
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1:01:15
S2 E17 - Gary Commins Reads and Discusses "Priest and Victim"
Retired Episcopal priest Gary Commins shares a new short story, "Priest and Victim," in which a pastoral meeting with a childhood rape victim turns over secrets both buried and not. Commins is the author of Spiritual People, Radical Lives <...
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Season 2
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Episode 17
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54:26
S2 E16 - Fanny Koelbl Reads and Discusses "Le Weekend"
Four-time TEXTE.WIEN
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Season 2
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Episode 16
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28:44
S2 E15 - Cameron Gomez Reads and Discusses "Volcanoes, from Above: Oil on Canvas"
Cameron Gomez reads his vision-filled but deeply human short story "Volcanoes, from Above: Oil on Canvas," then talks with Alan Rifkin about amusement parks out of season, risky career choices, and stories that decide not to be snarky and ironi...
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Season 2
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Episode 15
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34:41
S2 E14 - Brooke Prado Reads and Discusses "The Hollow Book"
Writer Brooke Prado reads her macabre, symbolically rich but never quite implausible modern parable, "The Hollow Book," developed this fall in an upper-division fiction workshop at California State University, Long Beach, then talks with Alan R...
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Season 2
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Episode 14
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34:52
S2 E13 - Rafael Zepeda Reads and Discusses DESPERADOS and "A Descent into Baja"
Long Beach's Rafael Zepeda (Horse Medicine & Other Stories, The Yellow Ford of Texas, Can This Wolf Survive, Tao Driver), whose deadpan prose style across many books has earned praise from authors like Jim Harrison and Edward Field...
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Season 2
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Episode 13
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1:01:23
S2 E12 - Sunland, Episode 12, by Charlie Haas
The finale of SUNLAND, by screenwriter, journalist and novelist Charlie Haas, about the brief desert flowering of a group of German artists, musicians, and free spirits who voyage to Southern California, “the America of America,” in 1914 to sta...
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Season 2
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Episode 12
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38:50
S2 E11 - Sunland, Episode 11, by Charlie Haas
Episode 11 of SUNLAND, by screenwriter, journalist and novelist Charlie Haas, about the brief desert flowering of a group of German artists, musicians, and free spirits who voyage to Southern California, “the America of America,” in 1914 to sta...
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Season 2
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Episode 11
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58:22
S2 E10 - Sunland, Episode 10, by Charlie Haas
Episode 10 of SUNLAND, by screenwriter, journalist and novelist Charlie Haas, about the brief desert flowering of a group of German artists, musicians, and free spirits who voyage to Southern California, “the America of America,” in 1914 to sta...
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Season 2
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Episode 10
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41:49
S2 E9 - Sunland, Episode 9, by Charlie Haas
Episode 9 of SUNLAND, by screenwriter, journalist and novelist Charlie Haas, about the brief desert flowering of a group of German artists, musicians, and free spirits who voyage to Southern California, “the America of America,” in 1914 to star...
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Season 2
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Episode 9
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39:19