(typewriter clicking) - Welcome to A Word On Words.

We are gathered here today to share some bittersweet news.

Our dear Mary Laura is moving on to greener pastures after six seasons with the show.

And I know you viewers are going to miss her terribly.

- I hope you'll consider me still part of the team, just in a different seat.

And the seat is my sofa.

- So let's do, let's do a special Word on Words themed lightning round.

(bell dinging) - Alright.

- Uh, what was your favorite on-site shoot?

- We did an episode with Jane Smiley at this equestrian center, and I was so excited that we had gotten Jane Smiley that I didn't tell anyone I was allergic to horses.

Whole time we were shooting I kept thinking, "Oh, I hope both my eyes are open.

Do I look alert?

Am I slurring my words?

I hope not."

(laughing) - Can you, can you possibly choose a favorite interview?

- No.

I was kind of scrolling through the website the other day going, this is, like, every season is my favorite season.

It's just stunning.

The range of people that we got to interview from, you know, like the, the household name kind of people, like, you know, we got to interview Elizabeth Strout, we got to interview Nick Hornby, Jesmyn Ward.

And then we, we, there were so many people where we caught them at just the right moment, just as their stars were rising, like Yaa Gyasi and Rebecca Makkai, and, and Ocean Vuong.

And if I think about, like, the one that still blows my mind, it would be my very last one, which was Kazuo Ishiguro.

I still can't believe I got to talk to him from my living room into his living room.

Like that, that to me is still surreal.

- What was your most challenging interview?

- Logistically it might've been the conversation with Jesmyn Ward, where we were really deep into kind of a sad part of the conversation and we both had, like, tears in our eyes, and we were really close to each other on my back porch.

And then the whole house generator went off spontaneously about 10 feet away from us, and it sounded like a helicopter landing.

And both of us had screamed and it completely broke the flow of the conversation.

- That's awesome.

(laughing) In addition to being the co-host of A Word on Words, you are an author in your own right.

- I'm an essayist.

I write short, true stories, and sometimes I pile them all together into a book.

Uh, my last book was I Miss You When I Blink, which came out in 2019.

My next book is called Bomb Shelter.

It comes out in 2022, it's a memoir.

- Where can our viewers find you now that they're not going to see you every Sunday morning?

- Um in my backyard, hopefully on book tour next year.

I hope, if book tours come back.

Probably in the bookstore, you know, I'm always buying books, and, you know, out and about walking in the park with my dog.

- And thank you for watching A Word on Words.

I'm J.T.

Ellison flying solo right now.

Keep reading.

- [Mary] Hashtag keep reading.

- [J.T.]

Hashtag keep reading.

- [Mary] Oh, the poor little hashtag.

It's just been sitting there for a year and a half.