Grab your ginger ale, your hockey pucks, and your intense sense of longing, because we’re heading to the cottage. Cleveland author Sonia Feldman joins us to discuss the Heated Rivalry phenomenon—the hit show and its cultural impact, the art of adapting romance novels, and what it means to be girls who love boys who love boys. We also turn to another form of queer love found in Feldman’s forthcoming debut literary novel, Girl’s Girl.

Come for the hockey romance but stay for an in-depth discussion covering Feldman’s writing process, how she discovered the true heart of her novel midway through writing, why she read the entire manuscript out loud to a friend, how she determined she was ready to query literary agents, and more. Finally, be sure to stick around to the end for some rapid rivalry questions that make us contemplate ginger ale and vodka cocktails, raves vs. book events, favorite Heated Rivalry episodes, and our love of figure skating. See you on the ice for the happily ever after.

Content warning: This episode generally references sex depicted on screen in Heated Rivalry and in romance novels at large.

Sonia Feldman is a recipient of the PEN America PEN/Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers, and her poetry and fiction have been published in literary journals like The Missouri Review, The Southern Review, and Waxwing. She runs Sonia’s Poem of the Week, a popular email newsletter. Girl’s Girl, her first novel, is forthcoming from Dial Press on June 2, 2026. Sonia lives and writes in Cleveland. Visit her website, follow her on Instagram at @writsonia, and preorder Girl’s Girl from Loganberry Books or wherever books are sold. Author photo credit: Lizzy Montana Myers.

Page Count is produced by Ohio Center for the Book at Cleveland Public Library. For full show notes and an edited transcript of this episode, visit the episode page. To get in touch, email ohiocenterforthebook@cpl.org (put “podcast” in the subject line) or follow us on Instagram or Facebook.

Welcome to the dark world of horror author Tracy Cross! In this episode, Cross discusses her Conjure series trilogy, which follows a young girl developing into a powerful Hoodoo practitioner in Louisiana in the late 1800s. In the process, Cross sheds light on the practice of Hoodoo, why she was drawn to writing about this time period and setting, her research process, how Black writers are reclaiming the narrative surrounding Hoodoo and Voodoo, her experiences in an MFA program focusing on popular fiction, why writers must persist, and more.

Content warning: This episode includes a discussion of some dark topics horror writers might research as part of their work, including tanning practices for human skin. Please proceed with caution as needed.

Tracy Cross is a horror author based in Washington, DC. She is author of the Conjure Series (Dark Matter INK), which includes the novels Rootwork (2022), A Gathering of Weapons (2024), and The Legend of Pee Wee Conway (forthcoming 2026). A short story collection, The Journal of Small Hours, is also forthcoming. Her writing has been featured in numerous anthologies, and she has received awards from the Ladies of Horror Fiction and the Horror Writers Association. Follow her in Instagram @tracycrosswrites or visit her website, tracycrossonline.com.

Page Count is produced by Ohio Center for the Book at Cleveland Public Library. For full show notes and an edited transcript of this episode, visit the episode page. To get in touch, email ohiocenterforthebook@cpl.org (put “podcast” in the subject line) or follow us on Instagram or Facebook.

It’s the year of Toni Morrison! Our friends at Literary Cleveland, in partnership with Ohio Humanities, are leading a yearlong, statewide celebration of the life, literature, and legacy of Toni Morrison, a Lorain, Ohio, native and the first African American woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. With the event kickoff just around the corner on February 18, Page Count is celebrating by rerunning our 2024 exploration of the Toni Morrison Reading Room. Listen to learn more about Morrison’s legacy, and then head over to ohiocelebratestonimorrison.org/events to get the scoop on the many incredible events, screenings, discussions, book clubs, and other programs held statewide this year.

To view images from the Toni Morrison Reading Room, visit “Inside the Toni Morrison Reading Room.”

Page Count is produced by Ohio Center for the Book at Cleveland Public Library. For full show notes and an edited transcript of this episode, visit the episode page. To get in touch, email ohiocenterforthebook@cpl.org (put “podcast” in the subject line) or follow us on Instagram or Facebook.