Houseguest Ep 2: Kate Beaton

When Carson and I first set out to make Houseguest, our podcast where we interview people who stay at out house, I think we might’ve overestimated how many people stay over at our house. Chalk it up to the pandemic, chalk it up to our hospitality (or lack thereof), chalk it up to the relative discomfort of our broken fold-out couch — chalk it up to whatever you like, but there’s been a real dearth of houseguests at our house of late.

But rather than let Houseguest, a podcast with real promise in life, molder in the corner, we figured we’d do what other, more veteran podcasters do — we ditched the conceit and decided to interview people remotely. A couple weeks ago, we managed (after some schedule wrangling and time zone miscalculating) to get Kate Beaton on the line. Kate is a Nova Scotian, a Cape Breton…eer (?), a mother and a wife, and an incredible artist, writer, and cartoonist. Her most recent graphic novel, Ducks, came out a few months ago and it is finding its way on to practically every best-of-2022 list worth its salt. You should read it. But first: you should listen to Houseguest, Episode 2, in which we talk to Kate about her life and work. Enjoy!