Podcast Favorites | Listening

I just finished back to back audiobooks, so of course now I have a huge podcast backlog. I’m going to share three podcasts that I currently have on rotation:

Alice Isn’t Dead

This just wrapped up Part One, so you have plenty of time to catch up before it resumes. It’s made by the people from Welcome to Night Vale, but where WTNV is jokey-horror, this is actually super creepy. Our unnamed narrator is on a cross-country truck drive, telling her wife Alice about her quest to find her.

For fans of: Welcome to Night Vale, Stranger Things, Twin Peaks

Call Your Girlfriend

CYG is a weekly talk show hosted by best friends Ann Friedman and Aminatou Sow. They talk about current events, pop culture, this week in menstruation and tackle topics like ethical shopping and long-distance bestie-hood. They’re super smart and their discussions always delve into the complexities of an issue — even if that issue is the economics of the Kardashians.

For fans of: Samantha Bee, Beyoncé, Shine Theory

Sunday School Dropouts

Sunday School Dropouts is hosted by a former Christian and a cultural Jew, both of whom are reading through the Christian Bible for the first time. They take a gently mocking, while still largely respectful tone, and provide a lot of interesting context on where the events and writers are placed historically. I’m learning all kinds of interesting things about wisdom literature, ancient faiths, and also that the Old Testament is little Game of Thrones-y.

 

Complicated Families | Reading

Fiction and nonfiction alike are rife with complicated families. After all, “all happy families are alike each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” I love to read about complicated families: it’s a good exercise in seeing people complexly. And, they’re often just entertaining as all get-out. Here are my current top picks for complicated family stories.

Boy, Snow, Bird by Helen Oyeyemi

Bird escapes from her terrible family life to a small town in New England, where she falls in love with Arturo Whitman and becomes his daughter’s step mother. When she gives birth to their next daughter, family secrets come very much to the front.

In The Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez

This is based on the true story of the Mirabel sisters, who rebelled against the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic. The story follows them from childhood, seeing how they are often at odds with each other, their parents, their husbands, each other’s husbands, and of course the dictator they all live under.

The Turner House by Angela Flournoy

The Turner children must decide what happens to their parent’s house in Detroit, now virtually worthless, now that their mother is elderly. The thirteen kids have a myriad of opinions and memories tied to the house, including the oldest Francis, who saw the Haint, and Lelah, battling a serious gambling addiction.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

While this story is about Henrietta Lacks, the HeLa cells, scientific research, and how segregation and the medical system treated African Americans, it is also about Lacks’ children. The author works very closely with one of Lacks’ daughters, and tells the story of what happened to her family and how they reacted to learning their mother’s story.

The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton

Nella Oortman comes to Amsterdam to marry Johannes Brandt, and live with him and his sister Marin. He is kind, but standoffish; his sister is stern and serious. Nella feels out of place in this family, until she figures out the secrets they’re hiding, that threaten to unravel the whole family — including her. This book also delves into 17th century Dutch society, which we should all remember is where the Pilgrims fled to when the 17th century English were too loosey-goosey for them.

Link Round Up | Friday Reads

Courtesy of Grey Malin’s “Beaches”

It’s one of the last Fridays of the summer, so things are real quiet at my office. I’ll be daydreaming of reading all the things at the beach, so this week’s links is a link/Friday reads hybrid.

Currently Reading

The Givenness of Things by Marilynne Robinson — savoring this one, one essay at a time.

Master of the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson and His Slaves by Henry Wiencek — pretty damning look at Jefferson. Not the most uplifting commute audiobook, but so important.

Life Debt (Aftermath #2) by Chuck Wendig — the second in the Star Wars Aftermath trilogy.

Links I’m reading/emailing/tweeting to everyone 

YouTubers are known for relentless positivity. But what happens when that positivity is applied to North Korea? Is there room for critical thinking in the positivity vacuum?

Joseph Goebbels’ secretary is now 105 years old and sharing her story.

So much of the work done by Black women is brushed under the rug and forgotten by history. Luckily, Hollywood has picked up this story of the Black female mathematicians at NASA who contributed to the Apollo 11 mission.

Why every coffee shop and hip apartment look exactly the same.

#tbt

An ode to the Villainesses of Disney.

The fascinating article about Rose Wilder and Laura Ingalls Wilder getting the Little House books published. Much rougher around the edges (and more than a little like Ron Swanson) than their fictional counterparts, the real Wilder Women are definitely more interesting.

Books to read if you love The West Wing | Reading

Courtesy of Warner Bros. and Getty.

Since it’s an election year and everything is terrible, I’ve been marathoning The West Wing, where even if the good guys don’t win, the bad guys aren’t cartoon villains so it’s kind of okay. There are so many books referenced on the show (as President Bartlet is an absolute nerd), and I’m sure its nerdy audience is full of readers. So today, we’re going to talk about books to read if you love TWW.

For the nitty gritty of how stuff gets done, read Sisters in Law. This joint biography of Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg covers their legal careers as well as the ways that found each other as allies on the court despite their philosophical differences.

For a look at the intersection of disability, politics, and secrecy, read Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter.  This book is about JFK’s older sister, but it’s also about the harmful ableist narratives in our culture and the lengths ambitious people will go to.

For those who love Toby Ziegler dealing with the free trade protestors, read Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist. Told from multiple points of view, this book tells the story of one day during the WTO protests in Seattle in 1999. Protestors, police, and delegates narrate the story as protests and violence unfold.

Finally, for tensions between idealism and reality, Lafayette in the Somewhat United States, which tells the story of the founding fathers from a slightly different angle.

Link Round Up | Reading

Links are heavy. Have a cat picture

This week is a little heavy, with the dark side of the Olympics and business-casual shopping, but some weeks are just like that. 

To the links!

A reading list on the social justice implications of hosting the Olympics.

End the tyranny of flossing!

On thinking it might not matter that Hillary Clinton is a woman, until you find yourself crying during her speech. (Also, will read anything Sarah Vowell writes).

Catholics who grew up post-Vatican II and find themselves at a crossroads between Catholicism and services with guitars. Relevant to anyone who thinks the Church never lets its hair down.

The implications of calling a store Banana Republic.

#tbt

Lin-Manuel Miranda on By The Book.

 

Backlist Summer Reading | Reading

This time of year, the book lists are moving away from summer reading and toward back-to-school. I always want to scream BUT WE HAVE ALL OF AUGUST. Well, that’s what blogs are for.

Here are three backlist summer reading picks, for holding onto those last dog days of summer.

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

Yes, I have Ferrante Fever. If you aren’t familiar, this is the first of four books following two Italian women from their childhood in Naples to their old age. Ferrante’s writing is spare, with the women’s friendship at the center of these novels. Seriously, just read them.

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes by Caitlin Doughty

This is half-memoir of how Doughty started working in the funeral industry, half-treatise on death and dying. There is so much about the funeral industry that I never knew (like if you donate your body to science, different parts of your body will trickle into various crematories. A foot here, arm there) that Doughty talks about with dry humor and deep knowledge. Read it and then bug all your friends with your “didya knows” about death.

Almost Famous Women by Megan Mayhew Bergman

Mayhew Bergman speculates on the lives of women on the periphery of fame in this fantastic short story collection. Women like Edna St. Vincent Millay’s sister, Lord Byron’s daughter, conjoined twins who briefly saw fame. The stories show these women, and their famous counterparts, as complex, fascinating women.