March Madness is not just confined to the basketball courts this year, as Episode #2 of the Tin House Podcast (click here to listen) is up and ready for your bracket busting (and downloading) pleasure. In this installment, host Lance Cleland (forever a #12 seed) brings you inside 2010′s Tin House Writers Workshop, with a wondrous lecture from author Karen Russell. In “The Cartography of Imaginary Places,” Karen holds forth on the ways magic and reality can coexist in fiction, as well as her fascination with the dust bowl and talking scarecrows. Her debut novel, Swamplandia, is in bookstores now, and you’ll be wise to check out her story “The Seagull Army Descends on Strong Beach,” in our forthcoming Fantastic Women anthology (August, 2011).

A big shout out to Daniel Grazzini (of the Portland band Reporter) for helping us out with the recording and mastering, as well as for providing us with a sweet intro/closing beat.