Episode 22: Kyle Beachy

Kyle Beachy has been skateboarding for as long as he’s been creating stories. For him, the two have always been intertwined. After releasing the coming-of-age novel The Slide in 2009, he began to write more seriously about skateboarding, as aficionado, critic, and essayist. A decade’s worth of this material is now included in The Most Fun Thing (Grand Central Publishing), his second, book-length collection. The Most Fun Thing delves deep into skateboarding's origins and ethos. What is skateboarding? What does it mean to continue skateboarding after the age of 40, four decades after the kickflip was invented? How does one live authentically as an adult while staying true to a passion hatched in childhood? How does skateboarding shape one's understanding of contemporary American life? Contemplating these questions and more, Beachy offers a deep exploration of a pastime—often overlooked, regularly maligned—whose seeming simplicity conceals universal truths. Beachy is a professor of English and Creative Writing at Roosevelt University in Chicago, where he has taught for more than a decade. He sat down with J.C. Gabel earlier this fall to discuss the new book, nonfiction vs. fiction writing, and how exactly skateboarding has shaped his life.