Zach is off this week, but we’re delighted to welcome a long time friend of the show for some mayhem at NBI HQ: we're lucky to have author extraordinaire Zoe Tokushige in the Bad Ideas Hot Seat! 

Things get heated with Gabriel’s first idea about a photographer who has a terrible time at a friend's wedding, which we turn into a Fellini movie from hell, with a weird ending that even European arthouses would be proud of. Then Sarah brings us a story of high-stakes, deeply weird negotiations between the Russian space authority and a Kazakh businessman, which we turn into the lowest-stakes treasure hunt we possibly can.

Then we talk to Zoe about her writing process, finding characters on the page, and the different between writing and other forms of creativity. 

Plus: Ships passing in the night, one star Yelp reviews, real-time descents, brief shining moments of potential, and Werner Herzog watching Cats. 

Today’s Bad Ideas™: 

Idea #1

Idea #2

If you’d like to check out more of Zoe’s work and get information on her upcoming novel, The Prankmaster General: New School Skirmish, you can find more on her website and follow her on Twitter.