Disgruntled, Asali Solomon’s debut novel, is simultaneously ambitious and accessible. It’s a coming-of-age novel that grapples with questions of race, identity, and family, all heavy topics. But it’s always clear and direct and it’s often funny, and Solomon has a gift for making complicated feelings easy to understand.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We are doomed to remember a podcast about a book about a boy with a wrecked voice. John Irving's seminal bildungsroman A Prayer for Owen Meany weaves together themes of American disillusionment and religious destiny into a fable about little Owen, who changed the world of everyone that knew him. Join us as we find excuses to talk about Seinfeld, prayers for war robots, and strange dads. This week's episode is brought to you in part by Squarespace.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Stephen King's It deserves most of the praise it gets - it's an incredibly long, incredibly detailed book that tells two long intertwined stories and a bunch of short ones besides, and in one section it made Andrew physically uncomfortable. Mission accomplished, Stephen! But it's not all good; the book is longer than it probably needs to be and it lingers on certain aspects of pre-teen sexuality just a BIT more than seems advisable. Anyway, come on down and enjoy this week's episode! We all float down here. And you'll float, too.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Special guest Jake Hurwitz (of Jake and Amir, If I Were You, and Headgum fame) joins us this week to talk about Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, one of the very earliest examples of the modern novel. Along the way, we discuss the ins and outs of being stuck on a desert island, the many ways in which this years-old story is pretty racist, and just how long the REAL title of the book is. This week's show is sponsored by Squarespace.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hosts discuss two science fiction stories and delve into feminist writing and the role of humor in writing. They explore the festival and the dark secret in one of the stories, and discuss the moral cost of sacrifice. They also explore the concept of scapegoats and the theme of censorship in another story, and touch on self-censorship in journalism and its consequences for controversial stories.

Widely regarded as one of the best, and most important books, of the last half-century, Toni Morrison's Beloved is an unflinching examination of how the past can enslave just as painfully as a yoke or a whip can - and how our inability to wrestle with the past begets wrongdoing for generations to come. Listen in as we discuss full-contact sports, the myth of the well-meaning slave-owner, hauntings, and Craig's quest to find #achairformyandrew.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week's book manages to combine eerily accurate biology with a Margaret Atwood-esque dystopia, a potent mixture that you need to read to believe. We also dive deep into our mailbag, discuss the recent blizzard, and put some basketball jokes in the place you would LEAST expect. This week's episode is brought to you in part by Squarespace.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In A Canticle for Leibowitz, the 1959 post-apocalyptic classic by Walter M. Miller, Jr., a secluded order of monks have dedicated themselves to preserving knowledge that predates an apocalyptic event several centuries prior. But what to do when people come asking for it? Is mankind doomed to repeat its mistakes forever? This week we're doomed to chat about cyclical history, the first rule of improv, space monks and desert priests, and Casey Kasem's Roaring 20s.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Good Omens was written by a sort of science fiction supergroup, Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. It's one of those books where it's as fun to chew on the turns of phrase as it is to find out what happens, which is pretty amazing since it's literally about the end of the world. Join us for a chat about humanity's innate goodness and evilness, a moratorium on Serial jokes, and some sleepy giggles.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Odd's fish! It's time to reveal the identity of the Scarlet Pimpernel, the hero of Baroness Emma Orczy's 1908 novel. (No seriously, we're going to tell you who he or she is.) Other spoilers during our Reign of Terror include what finally tipped the public against Robespierre, some truly terrible accents, and secret identities stretching from Batman to Zorro.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.