Jo's Boys: A Little Women Podcast

This week, Amy makes an anti-slavery fair all about her, and wins a trip to Europe for it. Jo, meanwhile, wins bupkis. Joining us to break down these hijinks is Jason Lipshutz, the senior director of music at Billboard. He’s written cover stories on Taylor Swift, Lorde, and U2, to name just a few, and he’s appeared on Good Morning America, Entertainment Tonight, and the Today Show, among numerous other broadcast programs. He’s also handled red carpet coverage at the Grammys, but he says he's more excited about coming on Jo's Boys than any of those things. Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith. Follow Jo's Boys on Instagram at @josboyspod.

This week, Jo sticks her foot in her mouth and fumbles a trip to Europe, but at least she sticks it to the patriarchy while doing so. With us to dissect each and every one of Jo's social faux pas (which, I just learned, is in fact the plural form of "faux pas") is scholar and author Anne Boyd Rioux. Anne has written several books, most notably Meg, Jo, Beth, Amy, her acclaimed 2019 history of Little Women. Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith. Follow Jo's Boys on Instagram @josboyspod.

Meg is shifting into baby mode - and here to help us pinpoint the exact moment of the twins' conception (yes, there is a sneaky, fade-to-black sex scene in this chapter!) is the poet and filmmaker Stephen Ira. Stephen is the author of the chapbook Chasers, and his poetry has appeared in the Paris Review, among other publications. He graduated from the Iowa Writers' Workshop in 2019 and he was a 2014 Lambda Literary Fellow. His film "I have to think of us as separate people" screened at OutFest, NewFest, and the New Orleans Film Festival, and he starred in the 2022 film Framing Agnes, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, where it won both an Audience Award and an Innovator Prize. Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith.

This week, Jo publishes her first novel... and it flops. Who better to guide Jo - and us - through this trial than renowned literary agent Bonnie Nadell? Bonnie is the president of the Hill Nadell Literary Agency, which represents a host of award-winning and best-selling books. Over the course of Bonnie's nearly 40-year career, her clients have been winners of or finalists for the Pulitzer Prize, Carnegie Medal, National Book Critics Circle Award, Kirkus Prize, and numerous PEN Awards, among others. You can visit Hill Nadell online and learn more at hillnadell.com. Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith and transcribed by Lou Paige Balikos. A transcript of this episode is available here.

This week, we’re joined by Hal Schrieve. Hal is the author of Out of Salem, which was longlisted for the National Book Award, and the forthcoming How to Get Over the End of the World. Ze is also a children's librarian at the New York Public Library. Together, we discuss Chapter 26: Artistic Attempts, in which Amy is bad at everything she tries, from charcoal sketches to lobster preparation. We spend a lot of time on the lobster. Both Consider the Lobster and Consider the Oyster are discussed. What do M.F.K., D.F.W., and L.M.A. have in common? Tune in to find out! Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith and transcribed by Lou Paige Balikos. A transcript of this episode is available here.

For this week's Scrap Bag, we're going deep with Anna Todd on her 2018 Little Women adaptation, The Spring Girls. Anna is the New York Times best-selling author of several novels. Her After series has been adapted into a trilogy of feature films. (Total box office gross to date, by the way: $150 million.) Together, we get into everything from Meg's sexuality to the military-industrial complex to the many definitions of fanfiction. It's some of the most fun I've ever had making this show, and I can't wait for Anna to drop The Spring Women.  Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith and transcribed by Lou Balikos.  A transcript of this episode is available here. Follow us on Instagram: @josboyspod.

If the Dovecote's a-rockin', don't come a-knockin'! This week, Meg and John Brooke tie the knot, and we bust out the Victorian floral analysis to tell you exactly what her bouquet really means. We also get into Laurie's longing, Jo's spinsterhood, and the presence of a ghost among the celebrants.  Joining us for the festivities is Michael Leali, the author of The Civil War of Amos Abernathy. We open the episode by chatting about Amos, the tale of a twelve-year-old boy who's falling in love and learning queer history from his post as a Civil War re-enactor. Did we mention most of the book is narrated via letters to Albert Cashier? Tailor-made for the Jo's Boys crowd. Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith and transcribed by Lou Balikos.  A transcript of this episode is available here.

This week, we're diving into the first chapter of the oft-maligned second volume of Little Women. The war is over, wedding bells are ringing, and the March girls are growing up -- but at what cost?  Our guest this week is the legendary Sarah Schulman. Sarah is a writer, activist, and AIDS historian. She’s written dozens of books, plays, and films. Her most recent book, Let the Record Show, won the Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Nonfiction. She was an active member of ACT UP and she co-founded the Lesbian Avengers, the direct action group the organized the first Dyke March. She’s been named a Guggenheim Fellow in playwriting and a Fulbright Fellow in Judaic Studies. She’s on the advisory board of Jewish Voice for Peace and she’s an endowed chair in creative writing at Northwestern. Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith and transcribed by Lou Balikos.  A transcript of this episode is available here.

This week, we're diving into the final chapter of Volume 1 of Little Women: Aunt March Settles the Question. What question? A marriage proposal. Oh, god. How is Alcott gonna proto-feminist her way out of this one?  Our special guest is Kim Tran, a writer and a consultant on transformative justice, sexual harassment prevention, and unlearning anti-Blackness in non-Black communities, among many other subjects. Her work has been featured in NPR, Slate, and the New York Times. She holds a PhD in Ethnic Studies with a designated emphasis in Women and Gender Studies from UC Berkeley, and she’s currently writing a book titled The End of Allyship: A New Era of Solidarity. You can visit Kim online at kimtranphd.com and on her very good Twitter, @but_im_kim_tran. You can also now follow us on Instagram at @josboyspod. We'll be posting news, updates, and Katharine Hepburn thirst traps. Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith and transcribed by Lou Balikos. A transcript of this episode is available here.

This week, we're joined by Camryn Garrett, the acclaimed author of Full Disclosure, Off the Record, and Friday I’m In Love, which just dropped on January 10 — so, like, take your headphones out of your ears, run to your nearest bookstore, and buy it now. In 2019, Camryn was named one of Teen Vogue’s 21 Under 21 and one of Glamour’s College Women of the Year, and she recently graduated from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts.  Together, Camryn and I tackle the scene in which Dad March comes home, at last, from war. (No, he does not actually say, "My little women!" Sorry, Bob Odenkirk fans.) He says his "son Jo" has become a fine young lady - and boy, do Camryn and I have thinky thoughts about that. We also ask why the subject of slavery is so curiously absent in this most Civil War-y of Civil War novels, and Camryn gives me a full recap of Taylor Swift's commencement speech, which she got to see firsthand, as a 2022 Tisch grad. Our cover art is by Mattie Lubchansky. It interpolates the cover art for Bethany C. Morrow's book "So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix," with permission from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group. It also interpolates the cover art for Hena Khan’s book “More to the Story,” with permission from Simon & Schuster. Our theme music is Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. This episode was edited by Antoinette Smith and transcribed by Lou Balikos. A transcript of this episode is available here.