Host Christopher Kaufman Ilstrup interviews author Tillie Walden and other experts about the graphic novel "Charity and Sylvia" and its historical context.
2 Sept 2025
Vermont Reads 2025: Episode Two: Water
The Light Pirate is divided into four sections. This second episode focuses on Water.
We speak with author Lily Brooks-Dalton, along with:
Filmmaker Jay Craven
Dan Nott, author of the Vermont Book Award-winning graphic novel “Hidden Systems”
Paul W. Gates from the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum
Writer and environmental journalist Megan Mayhew Bergman
Cyril Brunner, Innovation and Technology Leader at Vermont Electric Cooperative
The Vermont Reads 2025 podcast was produced by Ryan Newswanger; with script, interview and production help from Noel Clark; and with script and narration help from Miciah Bay Gault.
We’re grateful to our supporters: the Trout Lily Foundation and the Jack & Dorothy Byrne Foundation. Vermont Public is our Media Sponsor. And thanks to Junction Arts and Media for the use of their recording studio.
Music in this episode was created by:
Theo Gerard
Adi Goldstein
Rick Gallagher
28 Aug 2025
Vermont Reads 2025 Episode One: Power
We are releasing two podcast episodes featuring interviews with people whose work intersects with the themes in "The Light Pirate," our Vermont Reads 2025 book. The episodes are centered around the first two sections of the book: Power, and Water.
This first episode focuses on Power. We speak with author Lily Brooks-Dalton, along with:
- Federico Cintrón Moscoso, Ph.D., Program Director of El Puente Puerto Rico, a group working on sustainability issues for Puerto Rican communities
- Writer and environmental journalist Megan Mayhew Bergman
- Dan Nott, author of the Vermont Book Award-winning graphic novel Hidden Systems
- Cyril Brunner, Innovation and Technology Leader at Vermont Electric Cooperative
Inside a recent episode
Vermont Reads 2026: Charity and Sylvia
Published 17 Aug 2026 · Transcript excerpt
[…] As someone who's gay and writes a lot of books, it's nice to read a story where their queerness is also not really the main problem. Their identities being two women living together is certainly a point of conflict and a source of pain for them at a lot of points, but I think that survival, getting through illness, finding enough to eat, and their religiosity is way more on their mind than the fact that they're two women living together. And I think it's also really fun to read queer stories where you mix in elements that are somewhat unexpected, and there are not a lot of especially graphic novels, about queer people wrestling with their faith or queer people being devout. […]
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