137. The Burden of Family Secrets featuring David Tereshchuk

David Tereshchuk joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about being drawn to journalism to help him cure the matter of unanswered questions in his own life, his early years living in the rural borderlands of Scotland, how he turned to alcohol at a very early age, going from from tea and copy boy to anchorman of a nightly news program, becoming sober in his forties, his pursuit of ironclad truth, the place uncertainty holds in our lives, and his resolution to be open-hearted and honest about his life when writing his new memoir A Question of Paternity.

Also in this episode:

-the place uncertainty holds in our lives

-his work in media

-the paradox in his life and work

Books:

The Liar’s Club by Mary Karr

Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

DAVID TERESHCHUK is a journalist working mainly in broadcast media but also for magazines and newspapers (New York Times, The Guardian, New Statesman). He spent two decades with British commercial television, reporting, producing, and making documentaries, before moving to the US, where he worked for ABC, CBS, CNN, Discovery, A&E and The History Channel. His earliest work included coverage of the guerrilla war in Northern Ireland, and then extended into international issues, especially in the Third World. Since 2012 he has been a producer and correspondent for PBS, concentrating on ethical issues. He broadcasts a weekly public radio dispatch of media criticism, The Media Beat, and writes an online column by the same name. A graduate of Oxford University, he has been a US citizen since 2002 and lives in New York City and Ireland. His memoir, A Question of Paternity: My Life as an Unaffiliated Reporter, was published by Envelope Books on September 19th.

Connect with David:

Website: https://www.themediabeat.us/david-tereshchuk/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidtereshchuk

X: https://x.com/dtereshchuk

Facebook: facebook.com/david.tereshchuk

Get the book: https://www.amazon.com/Question-Paternity-Life-Unaffiliated-Reporter/dp/1915023157

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Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches and edits memoir and is working on her next book.

More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com

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Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers