Latest / The Mookse and the Gripes Podcast / Episode 137: Another Summer Walk

Transcript

Episode 137: Another Summer Walk · The Mookse and the Gripes Podcast

• 0:00
  [music]
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: This is the Mookse and the Gripes podcast.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: Hello, everybody.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: This is Trevor out for a walk with the thing with feathers.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: Paul, Paul, that's you.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: You're like Hope today.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, I like that.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe instead of walking, then I'll just take a little short flight.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_03: There you go.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_03: Just be careful of the wind sound.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's true.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_03: That's notorious on these walks with me, so we'll see how it does today.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: Well, listeners,
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: as you can tell,
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: we are not sitting at our desks recording a normal episode of the Mookse and
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: the Gripes podcast.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: We have been busy and we've used this excuse before to go for a walk and talk
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: about how to read while you're busy.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: That was an episode we did probably a year ago.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: To try and kill two birds with one stone.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, we've both been wandering around, running around, doing different things.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: And we realized this week that if we didn't do this,
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: that we might have some trouble recording anything.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: But I love getting together and still talking about reading and what's going on.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, we've gotten good feedback on these episodes before.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: Probably not every listener's favorites, but I think they work.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I agree.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_03: Like you said,
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_03: it may not be everybody's favorites,
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_03: but hopefully it's better than the alternative,
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_03: which might have been like, how are we going to do this at all?
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, or we're going to replay episode 42.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: I wonder what episode 42 was.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: Someday, someday we might do replays.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I've often wondered if we ever did that, if there would be any interest.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_03: 42, was that a attacker's guide reference?
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, no.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_01: Though, what have you been reading?
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: I have been reading that to my kids who are still home.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, nice.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, my first time
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_03: reading it ever.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, really?
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_03: I'll be very curious to hear what you think.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_03: It's funny.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_03: My son just brought up 42 the other day as a joke.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_03: And I was like, well, we must be doing some things right as parents.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's how you know what's all is good.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: But what have you been reading, Paul?
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I have been continuing to make my way through Life and Fate.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_03: You and I have checked in a couple of times because I know we're both reading it.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I'm tearing right through it.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_03: I would say I've slowed down just a tiny bit,
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_03: but not necessarily because of the book, just because of life stuff.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_03: But I think I'm coming up on halfway through it and just continue to be blown away
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_03: by the scope of it.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_03: I can see why it's often kind of compared to something like War and Peace,
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_03: just in the sheer size.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_03: So that ability to kind of jump back and forth between the epic oversight of the war
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_03: and And kind of the personal lives that it impacts.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_03: I can definitely see that comparison and continue to be blown away.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_03: You and I were chatting a little bit about whether it would have been worth it
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_03: to do Stalingrad first.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_03: You said you'd heard that some people said that that gives you a better introduction
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_03: to some of the characters, right?
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's right.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_03: But I felt pretty good about it.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, yes,
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_03: you get dropped into people's lives and All that but I took that as just part of
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_03: the book so I didn't even realize that you know Stalingrad would be
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_03: a different option so to me it's worked really well but I've been reading that and
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_03: then you'll be happy to hear this Trevor I told our friend Kim the other day
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_03: and she was happy.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_03: I finally am reading The Waves by Virginia Woolf first time ever.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: Nice, nice I saw that on Instagram you put that so way to go that'll be that's
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_01: a great one oh my gosh.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: I know.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_03: Again, with expectations,
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_03: you have to be careful,
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_03: but I could already anticipate that one turning out to be an all-time favorite.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_03: To the Lighthouse is currently probably my favorite of hers,
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_03: but I don't know if that one will end up kind of taking its place or not.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_03: And then the last thing I was going to mention is I'm also getting a little ahead of the game.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_03: Probably not really because we need to get going.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_03: But we have an upcoming author episode down the road for Elizabeth Taylor.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_03: And so I started reading one of her collections of short stories,
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_03: The Blush, which, like Elizabeth Taylor, it's just blown me away.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_03: She is absolutely amazing.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_03: So really loving that one so far, too.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_03: It's a nice Virago edition, which I always forget how much I love reading their books.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_03: They're just amazing.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_03: Beautiful to look at, but they're also so easy to read.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, that's been keeping me pretty busy.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: Do you have the NYRB Classics collection of her short stories?
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: I do not, actually.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: Does that have all of them?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: Is it collected?
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think it is.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's her complete stories.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: I could be wrong, but I think it is everything.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, I need to do a little research because that would definitely be worth...
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_03: I've read several of her novels now and...
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_03: Obviously,
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_03: she's a master,
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_03: but reading,
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_03: whatever it's been now,
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_03: maybe 10 of her short stories,
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_03: like, man, she might be just as good or even better at the stories, which is crazy.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's awesome to find an author that you love who excels in both forms
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: because they do different things,
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: but they can be so, you know, both of them can be so good and important.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_01: I know.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_01: Have you read any of her stories yet?
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: I forget.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: I have back when that edition from NYRB came out.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: But I can't right now remember which ones I've read.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: Certainly her novels have stood out to me more than her short stories.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't disagree with you that she's great at both.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe I'm not the best witness right now.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, well,
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_03: and again,
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_03: I'm only basing it on eight or ten,
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_03: but it'll be fun as we continue to kind of head towards that episode
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_03: and explore her work just to see how it all shakes out.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, she's wonderful.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_03: So how about you?
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_03: What have you been reading?
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: So as I said,
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: I've been reading to the kids,
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Life and Fate, as you mentioned.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: I'm about 220,
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: 230 pages into that and getting to the passages where he steps back
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: and starts almost philosophizing in brief passages about fascism and the effects
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: of all of this on people.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: Which is interesting and very,
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: like you said, reminds me of Tolstoy who would, you know, it's not just a storybook.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: It's a whole compendium of trying to account for a lot of what's going on on various levels.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: I am reading still The Girls of Slender Means.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: That's the one that's actually taken the hit from being busy because it's so short.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: It feels like it would be easy.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: It feels like it would be easy to, you know, get back to it.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't want to lose my footing with life and fate.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: So I read it.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: And when I'm short for time,
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: I just keep reading it rather than putting it aside and getting through Girls
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: of Slender Means, which I'm hoping I'll have more time this weekend.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's my birthday weekend, so I'm anticipating it.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_03: I know.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_03: I was going to mention that.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_03: Happy birthday in advance.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: And as listeners listen
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_03: relatedly.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_02: But technically, I'm ahead of the game, so I want credit.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_03: Any fun plans, book-related or other?
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: Well, so I'm hoping there's some book-related plans because that's pretty much all
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: that I asked my family to get me.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: If they got me something else,
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: it'll be a surprise, which they like to surprise me, and that's fun.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah,
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: I asked for some more Charles Dickens Everyman editions
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: and some Henry James Everyman's editions.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: And then the other kind of book related thing,
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: kind of,
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: I am going with my two middle kids to see Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey today.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: So we actually leave for that here.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: Right when I'm done with this walk, I'll get cleaned up and go out to the movies.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: So we'll see how that goes.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_03: I was going to say,
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_03: I think I've heard some mixed reviews and I think I told you that
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_03: and you said you'd mostly been hearing only positive.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_03: So I'll be very curious to hear your take on it.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it seems like most people are like it is visually awe-inspiring.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: Christopher Nolan still can't write women.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: And the dialogue is, you know, maybe not everything that you'd hope for.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: But that ultimately,
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: even people who kind of had those criticisms that I've read are like,
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: but this is a very effective, tear-wrenching epic.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm curious.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I went with my wife to see Oppenheimer when it came out.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: And that's just not my kind of movie.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: I thought it would be.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: It could be.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: Visually stunning.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: But that's...
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: I think that Oppenheimer...
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: Felt like one long trailer.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: Like the music just was unrelenting, pushing you through it.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: And it wasn't ever like enough to settle into something.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_01: It was like, and here's this, here's a taste of this scene.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: And here's a taste of that scene.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: And here's the taste of this other scene.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I, I don't know.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: I did like the exploration of Oppenheimer, but ultimately I didn't really like that movie.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: And my wife didn't like it either.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so but it can be a little tricky to go with my wife to see movies
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: because she doesn't like them.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: She doesn't like to go and sit down for two, three hours in the theater.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so that can affect my enjoyment, even if I am liking the movie.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_01: So she was like, oh, it's your birthday weekend.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: I'll go with you.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, do you want to go?
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: Because if you want to go because you want to see it.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's fine.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: But if you're only going because you think that's what I want, I don't want that.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: I'd rather,
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: I would rather go by myself than,
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: than feel like you're suffering through it on my behalf.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: So then the kids wanted to go with me.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: So we're, we're going to have a timeout.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, I know too.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_03: And that's, that's a good compromise.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_03: Cause like you said,
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_03: that way,
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_03: Love it or hate it, you can kind of be involved and just, you know, immersed in it.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_03: Your summary of why you didn't like Oppenheimer is kind of like a good summary
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_03: of why I struggle with some of the kind of highly touted blockbusters like this.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_03: That idea of jumping from, it feels like an extended trailer.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_03: I think that's a really good way of describing it.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_03: So that's probably why I'm most wary about the Odyssey,
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_03: but That said, I definitely think it has the opportunity to be a really good one.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, still going to definitely
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: watch it.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but is that book related to you?
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: If I bring up the Odyssey and going to see a Christopher Nolan movie?
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_03: Oh yeah, for sure.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_03: I think,
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_03: what is it,
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_03: our friends over at the Book Cougars,
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_03: they always have like,
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_03: I can't remember what they call it, like bookish jaunts or something like that.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_03: I feel like it falls under that category where it's book adjacent but close enough.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: I think so, too.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: I've actually thought maybe we should invite my other podcast co-host,
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: David Blanksley, on for that episode.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: But I've mentioned it to him,
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: but I have not really persisted and followed up and,
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: you know, made sure you and he really want to.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I love that idea.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_01: I would love
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_03: to do that.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_03: As I've said before,
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_03: I'm a longtime listener of your other podcast with him,
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_03: and I am always blown away by his knowledge of both film and
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_03: the historical surroundings of the films.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_03: And so I would be yeah, I would love that.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: That'd be so much fun.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: And he does.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: He does like to read.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, he's he's a listener of this podcast, too.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: I should should note.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think it could be a fun one.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: I just as much as I love both worlds, film and book, and I do know they're related.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: I don't often think of them that way.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: When I go to a movie, I'm not analyzing it as an adaptation.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: I just know that they are.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes I know the book.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't sit and...
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: I completely separate them as best I can.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: As just like, hey, this is only incidentally a movie about your favorite book.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_03: That's a smart way to do it.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_03: And it's something I try to do, sometimes struggle to do.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_03: But that would be a very interesting conversation because I don't know,
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_03: I'd have to think about it.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_03: But I would say the number of movies that lived up to the book
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_03: in my expectation is probably pretty small.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_03: But maybe as I started to talk about it, that would be more complicated.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_03: It probably would.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_01: Along those lines, another book that I'm reading right now, I'm rereading it.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm almost done with it for Book Club.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, I got to talk to you about Book Club here in a second.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: So the Library Book Club for July, we just had that meeting this past week.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: I talked to you a little bit about that when we met up with some of our friends
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: on Zoom the other day, but I got to share that with listeners too.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: In August, we were doing a recent Newbery winner, The Last Quintista.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then in September,
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: we're doing The Nickel Boys,
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: Colson Whitehead's second Pulitzer winning book,
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_01: which I read when it came out and loved it.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I've been wanting to reread it ever since because it's just one of those books
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: that once you're done with it, you're like, oh.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot to that.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe on a reread, I'll see more going on, you know.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm almost done with it.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it has a film adaptation that I think people absolutely love.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: So that could be a fun conversation,
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: kind of similar to Erasure, Percival Everett's novel being made into a great film.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: But again, I didn't think it was great because it was faithfully adapting.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: The book in my brain, it just was its own thing that happened to be great as well.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: But I've heard that about the Nickel Boys film.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm wanting to watch it for our book club in September now.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: Very cool.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_03: I know that Colson Whitehead has an ongoing trilogy.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_03: That's the first in that one, right?
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_03: Isn't that the Nickel Boys trilogy?
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_03: No, no, I don't.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: No, it's a standalone.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: Unless I'm wrong, and then you're right.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: So he has another trilogy called, like, the first one's Crook Manifesto, Harlem Shuffle.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: I might be getting those mixed up.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: They're very different.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: They're like little romps, like little crime.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they're still...
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: He actually was saying after he wrote The Underground Railroad and won the Pulitzer
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: for it,
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_01: that he had no intention of writing,
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: especially so close together, another serious book about race and all that.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's just not necessarily what he sees as his genre or his calling or anything like that.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: But then the election of Donald Trump made him go, I got to write The Nickel Boys.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_01: When it came out,
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think I read it in an art form, like they gave me a digital art or something.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I actually remember thinking, oh, I like the Underground Railroad fine.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's too bad it won the Pulitzer because this is the one he should win the Pulitzer for.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I was pretty happy what he did.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: I assumed they might use that against him,
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: you know, like, oh, you just won for your previous book.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: We're not going to give you another Pulitzer, but I think it deserved it.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, it's different.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: And then this Harlem Shuffle Crook Manifesto,
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: I can't remember the name of the third one that is either just coming out
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_01: or something like that, but I haven't read the third one yet.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's quite a different tone.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you're right.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_03: Those are the ones I was thinking of.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_03: I think I just got them mixed up in my head.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, no, that'll be interesting to see how a book like that does in a book club.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_03: We've talked about this before,
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_03: but it's always interesting When you get that many different people in
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_03: a book club together to figure out what the most interesting combinations are
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_03: for books.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_03: Because obviously it's a variety of tastes and opinions and things like that.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_03: So something like that that's got a strong undertone might do really well, actually.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love that book club.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's probably my favorite book club I've ever been a part of.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: We've become friends with the people in it that we do things with them outside of book club.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of them are the ones who come to pub night at the library, the quiz night.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's a great group of a variety of tastes,
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: but people who are willing to be diverse in what we read and approach each book
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: on its own.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: whether it's a graphic novel or a children's book or,
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_01: we did Ta-Nehisi Coates Between the World and Me a couple of weeks ago and it was
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: a lot of fun and really interesting.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: they're willing to have hard conversations and,
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: you know, we did the remains of the day.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_01: People were crying as they talked about it, but, you know, it's a good group.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: And this last one that we just did,
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: the last one we just did for July,
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: my wife chose it because it seemed so silly and just strange.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: And because of Shark Week,
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: you know, on the Discovery Channel, was a book called Shark Heart by Emily Habick.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: Which is about a young couple.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: Well, they're kind of in their 30s when they finally get married and get together.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: But they've only been married for a few months when it turns out
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: that he has been diagnosed with an irreversible condition of mutating into
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: a great white shark.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a silly premise, absurd premise.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: But I think that's part of the point is that, hey,
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: we have to learn in this life to Live through a lot of absurdity in order to get
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_01: through the days.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: This is just an exploration of that.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: And it was it was really I thought it was a great book.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: I really liked it.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_03: Nice.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_03: You mentioned that to me in another conversation we had.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_03: And I've seen that one at the bookstore and never knew what to make of it.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_03: Just based on the very little I read about it and the cover, but hearing you talk about it.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it definitely sounds intriguing.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_03: Well, that's one of the good things like we've talked about some of
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_03: the potential drawbacks of book clubs.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_03: But one of the great things about book clubs is sometimes you get exposed to stuff
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_03: that you never would have actually taken the plunge on.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_03: And sometimes you find out you were right and never should have.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_03: But often it's the opposite where you're just like, oh, wow, so glad I got to read that.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: So very cool.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and I think it would be interesting someday for us to have this conversation.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: We've talked about it a little bit.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: we touch on this,
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: but someday to really kind of dig in,
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: I don't always read a book hoping that it is my next favorite book or the ideal read
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: for where I'm at.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's good to read books you don't like.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's good to explore that and then have those conversations in good faith.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I do feel like sometimes we don't always read to explore things.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_01: Ourselves and our tastes, we read because that is our favorite type of book.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I do that too, of course.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: I want to read books that I think are good.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: I try not to read books that I'm not enjoying.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: But an angle of that is,
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: in a book club,
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: if you've got a good one,
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: is even with the books that you don't like,
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: is approaching them and trying to genuinely understand why.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: Is it just a style?
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: Is it a genre you don't like?
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: And why not?
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: Why doesn't it resonate with you while it might with others?
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_01: That's kind of interesting.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_01: Is it because you have a major disagreement with the author or what the book is doing?
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_01: Is it immoral to you?
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: What are the problems with the philosophies or the ways it's exploring certain things?
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: I think that that can be a very valuable and fun conversation.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_01: And the book clubs often make me read those kinds of books.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_01: To the extent that at the end of them,
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: I often am really glad that I read every single book because I still got a lot out
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: of it that I find valuable,
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: even if it's not going to be a top 10 book at the end of the year.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, no, it's a great point.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_03: I have experienced the same thing with our book club.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_03: And granted, it's a little skewed because I pick a lot of the books for ours for the book club.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_03: So I'm predisposed to at least think I have an interest in them.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_03: What I've noticed is a lot of times people in our book group,
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_03: it's rare that everybody loves or doesn't like a book,
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_03: but usually it's pretty evenly divided.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_03: And those conversations about why that you just described are some
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_03: of my favorite parts about the book club.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_03: And I feel like,
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_03: and a lot of the members have told me by the end of most of our book clubs,
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_03: their views of the book have grown and changed and evolved in ways
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_03: that are really interesting to everybody.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_03: So that's amazing.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_03: Just reading is such a solitary hobby like we've talked about,
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_03: but When you start including community and conversations,
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_03: it's amazing what it can do for you.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: And just having to sit down and try to talk about
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: a book can help you sometimes understand that even the negative reaction you had to
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: a book might have been deliberate and might actually,
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: if you stop and think about it, Make you love that book.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: That kind of happened in this conversation about Shark Heart to an extent.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I am assuming here a little bit based on the conversation,
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_01: but one of the members of the group
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_01: kind of started with, I didn't like that book.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: And the book is strange.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: Not only is the premise strange, but the structure is a little bit strange.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_01: You follow these two characters through part one and then part two, You entirely leave them.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_01: You're reading about different people.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's really frustrating.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: that's disorienting and the author has left you someplace
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: and you can respond very viscerally like, I hate this.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_01: I want the other.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: But then when you start to kind of think, okay, why?
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: And especially when you're like,
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: huh, I actually think the author might want me to feel that frustration.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_01: That's part of the story.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: That's part of the experience of reading this book.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_01: That very thing that initially was a negative reaction can become
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: an emotional reaction that makes you even appreciate the things
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: that are normally like all that.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: I was mad, that's a bad feeling.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, maybe,
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_01: but it also might be exactly What you're supposed to feel and it might,
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: if you stop and think about it,
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_01: be exactly what you realize made the book so powerful in the first place.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I really like that.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, we've talked about that even with like NYRB Classics,
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_03: for example,
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_03: how we may not always love every book,
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_03: but we're always glad by the time we're done for various reasons that we read it.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_03: And I feel like that's very similar where it's good to be challenged.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_03: It's good to be pushed outside your comfort zone and even provoked at times.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_03: So, yeah, I really like that idea.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_01: Well, kind of another,
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: I'll move us on maybe a little bit to a final topic because you've got to go
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_01: and do some good work in the bookstore here shortly.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: But the last couple of weeks,
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: I have been,
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: I pack my bag every day to go to work and I put a ton of books in there
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: that I just might want to touch on,
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_01: maybe at lunchtime or if I have a few minutes here and there.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: It is stuff full of short books,
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: like short books that I'm deliberately thinking,
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_01: okay, I can get into this while I'm busy.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: And every day I tote that bag to work and then I tote it home again.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: Essentially untouched.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: I just haven't had a chance to sit down with them even at lunchtime.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: I've ended up just sitting at my desk and working through a bunch of stuff
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: or making phone calls or whatever.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: And so there's that been going on.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: But I have a lot of really interesting looking short books that are coming out.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: That I just, you'd think that they're short, you should just be able to get through them.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: I am having an easier time these days getting through the big ones.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: Have you ever had that happen to you?
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: I have.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_03: And that's really interesting when that happens because it seems exactly opposite
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_03: of what it should be.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah,
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_03: I wonder if you're just in the kind of chip away mode and not really in a place
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_03: where you need that capability.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_03: You know,
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_03: quick resolution, like,
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_03: or do you think it's just more that you're feeling not an obligation,
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_03: but like you were talking about with like,
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_03: I'm in life and fate, I need to keep going.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_03: So since I'm here, I'm going to keep reading.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_03: Do you think it's more about that side of it,
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_03: like making sure that you're chipping away at the big ones?
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_03: Or are you feeling more drawn to them?
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: I think you may have said it right with the chip away.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's just my frame of mind.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's easier to, you know, I'm in the middle of life and fate.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have to worry that I'm going to be in the middle of a climax or,
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: you know, got 10 pages left of this short book.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: I should finish it.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think you're right.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: There's that sense that while I'm busy,
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: it's easier to have something that I'm chipping away at slowly
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: than feel like there's something that I need to sit with, even though it's short.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: I've got to go through the full experience in a short amount of time as well.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: That really could be it.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's interesting.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_03: No, it is funny because you think like it's usually when you think of a long book,
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_03: it does feel like something you do in the winter where you're like fully immersed.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_03: But I, it kind of touches on to something that you've talked about more and more
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_03: in recent years of that idea of living with the book.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_03: I think sometimes during a long summer or during a time where you're really busy,
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_03: um, I totally see what you're saying, the value of just living in a book.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_03: When you do dip back in,
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_03: you kind of know what's happening and you just pick up and carry on where you are.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I guess in the case of Life and Fate,
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_03: you do have to learn new characters along the way because there's a lot.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_03: But generally speaking,
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_03: it's not like you're starting a bunch of new short books and having to get used to
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_02: the writing style and learn the characters and all that stuff over and over again.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, I don't know.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_02: That is interesting.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I agree.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's fun.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: Now, Paul,
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: I know you've got to be going and it sounds like you're back home
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: because you're robotic.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_01: Am I right?
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, am I?
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm back home.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's a little bit trickier to hear you, but that's OK because we need to wrap this up.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_01: Listeners, we actually might be doing something like this for our next episode as well.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: We'll kind of see and play it out.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: We're playing a little bit by ear as the latter part of the summer gets,
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_01: you know, that schedule's just been a little bit tricky.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: But we will be back soon and we hope everyone's doing well and,
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: let it keep us in the loop as you talk about what you're reading and why and how
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: and all of that.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I hope everybody's having a great summer and thanks for putting up with,
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_03: like I said,
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_03: our guerrilla podcasting,
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_03: but we wanted to make sure that we get a chance to chat with each other and keep
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_03: in touch with all of you.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_03: So looking forward to our next one and hope everybody's having a great summer so far.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_03: Indeed.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_03: Everyone, goodbye.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_03: Bye.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you for listening to the Mooks and the Gripes podcast.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_02: If you enjoyed the bookish banter, we have more than 100 past episodes for you to dive into.
• 29:00
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• 29:04
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• 29:07
  SPEAKER_02: at mooks and at bibliopal for more bookish musings and updates.
• 29:11
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• 29:14
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• 29:15
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• 29:17
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• 29:21
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• 29:24
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• 29:26
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• 29:30
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• 29:34
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• 29:39
  SPEAKER_02: May you keep exploring great books until next time.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.