The Perks Of Being A Book Lover Podcast

Ep. 47 An Anniversary, A Bored Teen Host, and Some Books 5-27-20

When Carrie and I began recording The Perks of Being a Book Lover, we called it our half-assed idea. One year later, we are still half-assing our way through it, although we think we have learned some things and gotten more adept at using microphones, troubleshooting the recording technology, and asking interesting questions of our guests. It was a year filled with laughter, frustrations, and climbing learning curves.

We thought it would be fun for our 1-year anniversary recording and 47th episode to put ourselves in the hot-seat, and fortunately, Carrie’s daughter, Norah, agreed to ask us the questions. Like a lot of 16-year-olds, she was excited to do it the night before but seemed to be completely bored and uninterested during the actual interview. She yawned and Pinterest-ed her way through our answers, which may be what a lot of our listeners do as well as they listen to it.

In this episode, we discuss how we started the show, some of our favorite experiences with guests, and what dictatorial book choices we’d make if we had the power.

Books We Discuss In This Episode:
1- Moby Dick by Herman Melville
2- Sula by Toni Morrison
3- Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
4- The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
5- The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin
6- The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix Harrow
7- March by Geraldine Brooks
8- A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler
9- Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake by Anne Quindlen
10- The Chaperone by Laura Moriarty
11- The Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling
12- The Glass Lake by Maeve BInchy
13- The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien
14- Me by Elton John
15- Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
16- Daisy and the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid
17- The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society by Annie Barrows and Mary Anne Shaffer
18- The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt
19- Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward
20- American Born Chinese by Gene Yuen Yang
21- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
22- To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
23- he Hate You Give by Angie Thomas
24- Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
25- White Teeth by Zadie Smith
26- Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
27- 1984 by George Orwell
28- It by Stephen King
29- Drood by Dan Simmons
30- I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell by Tucker Max

 

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

Ep. 46 The Greenhouse that Sows Literary Seeds with Hannah Rose Neuhauser 5-20-20

When I think of a greenhouse, I envision small seeds sprouting roots and then green shoots slowly rising toward the sunlight. The progress to grow may be slow at first but soon becomes rapidly transformational as the plant drinks in the nourishment of the heat, moisture, and sunlight in the greenhouse cocoon.

Our guest this week, Hannah Rose Neuhauser, is the co-founder and program director of The Young Author’s Greenhouse, an organization inspired by the 826 Valencia writing organization for children and teens launched by author Dave Eggers. The Louisville greenhouse, located in the Portland neighborhood, nurtures student writers in an imaginative writing space which includes a storefront called The Opposite Shop where you can find jars of sunshine and magic fish scales. But moving from the Shop through the portal into the organization’s writing center, young writers enter a world where they are taken seriously by mentors who question and instill confidence. One of the coolest programs offered by The Young Author’s Greenhouse is an annual song-writing event with Jim James, leader of the rock band My Morning Jacket, and Teddy Abrams, the young hip conductor of the Louisville Orchestra.

Hannah Rose tells us what book she read in college that inspired her to start this nonprofit journey, what skill is more important than writing for volunteers with the Young Author’s Greenhouse, and what perk of the program can entice even reluctant young writers to put their words on paper.

Books mentioned in this episode:

1- A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
2- If you Can See the Stars, There is Still Light by The Young Author's Greenhouse
3- Into the Wolf-Dark Shadows by The Young Author's Greenhouse
4- Know My Name by Chanel Miller
5- The Last Wish by Andrezej Sapkowski (Short Stories)
6- Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe
7- Bluets by Maggie Nelson
8- The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson

Online Article mentioned:
Flattened by the Curve
www.mcsweeneys.net/columns/flattened-by-the-curve

TV shows mentioned:
1- Derry Girls on Netflix
2- Sex Education on Netflix
3- Schitt's Creek on Hulu
4- Seinfeld on Hulu

 

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

Ep. 45 The Quarantine Quest for a Book Club with Robin Weiss 5-13-20

We all had big plans for our quarantine free time, right? Maybe we wanted to Marie Kondo organize the whole house, learn how to make beautiful loaves of bread, or begin training for that marathon you’ve had on your bucket list.

Our guest today, Robin Weiss, had a different kind of quarantine goal. She was determined to revitalize her reading life. This mother of 9 who is also a professor of public health as well as a childbirth expert and doula, fell out of love with reading when she attended grad school. In the intervening years, her knowledge of new titles and authors got stuck in a time warp where she left off in the 1990s. So, she formed an online quarantine bookclub with fellow readers across the country to help get her literary groove back.

Robin talks to us about what past favorite authors she is happy to discover have published new books in recent years, what benefits the group gets from meeting weekly versus monthly, whether her bookclub is experiencing trauma bonding, and what happens when the quarantine is over.

Books discussed in this episode:

1- The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
2- It By Stephen King
3- The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
4- On The Beach by Nevil Shute
5- The Charm School by Nelson DeMille
6- The Gold Coast by Nelson DeMille
7- The General's Daughter by Nelson DeMille
8- The Bone Collector by Jeffrey Deaver
9- The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski (short stories)
10- Sword of Destiny by Andrzej Sapkowski (short stories)
11- Blood of Elves by Andrzej Sapkowski (novel)
12- The Murmur of Bees by Sofia Segovia
13- The Braid by Laetitia Colombani

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

Ep. 44 Postcards From The Edge of Reading with Anita Martin

We probably all have memories of picking up a 25 cent postcard at a cheesy souvenir shop on a summer vacation to send to a friend or family member back home. The first postcard was invented by an Englishman in 1840 but now these iconic colorful cards have whole websites, youtube videos, and pinterest boards devoted to them with themes such as the best ways to write a meaningful message in just a few lines, postcards as a writing process, and 8 reasons you should be sending postcards right now.

Our guest today, Anita Martin, puts much time and energy into melding 2 of her favorite things; postcards and books. Her website Postcards and Authors invites bibliophiles of all types, including writers, book clubs, and bookish podcasts to send a postcard that lets readers get a glimpse of who they are.

Anita talks to us about how picking out a postcard can give you insight into a person’s personality, how books are just one facet of her desire to be a lifelong learner, what genre initially gave her the desire to always have a book in her hand, and how one author’s signature on his postcard made it one of her favorites.

Books Discussed in this Episode:
1- Roots by Alex Haley
2- Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly
3- The Flying Cutterbucks by Kathleen M. Rodgers
4- Akata Witch and Akata Warrior by Nnedi Okorafor
5- The Stowaway: A Young Man's Extraordinary Adventure to Antartica by Laurie Gwen Shapiro
6- The Last Painting of Sara DeVos by Dominic Smith
7- It's Great to Suck at Something by Karen Rinaldi

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

Ep. 43 A Trifecta of Books, Bluegrass, and the Backstretch with D.C. Alexander 4-29-20

 There is a collective sigh of disappointment that you can hear in our hometown this week. The Kentucky Derby race is always run the first Saturday of May; except this year. I checked the weather and it looks like it will be beautiful this Saturday, 79 degrees and sunny, and there are no horses to be run.

But now that you’ve had your Kentucky Derby primer from Carrie and I, we can all still celebrate this event quarantine-style, with a book and maybe a glass of bourbon. Our guest today, D.C. Alexander, is doing his part to help. D.C. is originally from Seattle but has eagerly adopted Louisville as his hometown. He is a former federal agent turned author who has written several mystery novels with the setting of his most recent being right here in Kentucky.

Blood in the Bluegrass takes place the week before the Kentucky Derby and begins with the murder of an up and coming horse jockey. But as mysteries often do, things get complicated with horse breeders, bourbon distilleries, corruption, and old money.

D.C. talks to us about why he thinks Louisvlle is a great locale for a novel, what book he read in his 20s that turned him from a book-loathing kid to a full-fledged bibliophile, and how long trips in his car in rural Colorado started him on the path to writing.

Books mentioned in this episode:

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John Le Carre
Secret Louisville by Kevin Gibson
Chasing the Monkey King by D.C. Alexander
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Dune by Frank Herbert
Rough Magic: Riding the World's Loneliest Horse Race by Laura Prior-Palmer
A Pearl in the Storm by Tori Murden McClure

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

Ep. 42 - Books That Bring Back Childhood Bliss with Diane Neu 4-22-20

Are you nostalgic about a book you read as a kid? What book from your childhood remains vivid in your mind? Our guest today, Diane Neu, hosts a podcast that explores that very question. The podcast titled Shaped by Stories features one avid reader each episode who talks about the book from their childhood or early adolescence that made the biggest impact on them and why. Diane had been a podcast fan for many years; in fact she’s been a podcast listener since almost the beginning of podcasts 12 years ago. But some changes in her own life convinced her there was no time like the present to start her own.

Diane talks to us about her very favorite spot to read when she was a child in small town Idaho, why she loves Jane Austen like no other, why reading children’s books as an adult is an important exercise, and how producing a podcast helped her find her special brand of “people” when she needed it most.

Books mentioned in this episode:
1- Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery
2- Betsy In Spite of Herself by Maud Hart Lovelace
3- I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
4- Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell
5- Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
6- No More Dead Dogs by Gordon Korman
7- Neverworld Wake by Marrisha Pessl
8- Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
9- The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman
10- The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
11- Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
12- Mary Poppins by P. L. Travers
13- Same Sun Here by Silas House and Neela Vaswani
14- Emma by Jane Austen
15- Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling
16- From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

Ep. 41 Quarantine Hacks for The Library Stack with Patty Clark 4-15-20

With many libraries across the country having to stay closed due to the Coronavirus pandemic, patrons may have more time to discover all the resources libraries have to offer that aren’t between the four walls of a library building. While many of us may be nostalgic about those card catalogues and the check-out card pocket glued inside the back of books, libraries have become focused on information in all forms and the best ways to get it to all of us at home.

Our guest today, Patty Clark, is a digital services librarian with the Oldham County library system. Oldham County is a more rural and suburban county on the far outskirts of Louisville Kentucky. The Oldham County library system is a member of the Kentucky Library Consortium, as are most of the library systems within the state except for large independent library systems in Louisville and Lexington. Members of the consortium pool their resources to offer their patrons as many technical services as possible. And while Patty is most familiar with her own library, many of the services we talk about today are ones that can be found in libraries throughout the country . If you aren’t sure if your library offers these services, just ask.

We had originally recorded with Patty in February, but the pandemic changed things immensely , and we wanted to ensure listeners had current info so we appreciate her being game to do it again.

Patty tells us about some of the special features ebooks from your library offer that you may not know about, why you should always put yourself on the waiting list for a highly sought after books even if that list seems ridiculously long, and about some services libraries offer that may just spark a new hobby which is fun for when your under quarantine.

Books mentioned in this episode:

1- A White Wind Blew by James Markert
2- Hawaii and other books by James Michener
3- The War That Saved My Life byKimberly Brubaker Bradley
4- The Wonder by Emma Donohue
5- The Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley
6- The Need by Helen Phillips

Podcasts mentioned:
1- Desert Island Discs (BBC)
2- Endless Thread
3- Laughter Permitted

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

 

 

 

 

Ep. 40 Life and Literary Loss with The Long Before the End Bookclub 4-8-20

When we recorded with our guests for today’s episode over a month and a half ago, we had no idea how timely our discussion would be. Our topic today is mortality. The vast majority of people probably don’t like talking or thinking about that topic, but with Covid-19 confronting us every day, it's a subject that is certainly taking up space in our heads. But what we discovered during our discussion is that thinking about death also makes you think about the joys of life and humanity; and that’s something we can all use more of.

Justin Magnuson and Rebecca Sturgeon are co-moderators of a book club called The Long Before the End Book Club that started as part of The Before I Die Festival in Louisville Kentucky. They are an organization that along with other groups like Bevival and the Trager Institute at the University of Louisville promote discussions about the end of life through a variety of means including the arts. While it may seem bleak, the Long Before the End book club gives members a chance to be honest in a safe space in which everyone is in a shared boat of limited life.

Justin and Rebecca talk to us about how every book we read is a little bit about death, how their book discussions help members get through hard conversations with loved ones, and how it has been a gift to form a community by connecting with people they wouldn’t ordinarily meet.

Under normal circumstances, their book club meets once a month at a local coffee shop.
The COVID-19 pandemic has recently made it necessary for the book club to use distance technology for their book discussion. Toward the end of this episode, Carrie checks back in with Justin to find out how their bookclub is adjusting and thoughts on how the pandemic is affecting the way we live and the way we die.

Book Discussed:

1- The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes
2- Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
3- Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters
4- Being Mortal by Atul Gawande
5- Spaceman of Bohemia by Jasoslav Kalfar
6- She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb
7- The Vegetarian by Han Kang
8- The Plaque by Albert Camus
9- All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
10- How Not to Die Alone by Richard Roper
11- The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai
12- The Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin
13- Near the Exit by Lori Erickson
14- The Memory of Old Jack by Wendell Berry
15- LovingKindness by Sharon Salzburg
16- The Eyre Affair and the Thursday Next Series by Jasper Fforde
17- The Undying by Anne Boyer
18- The Last Massai Warriors by Jackson Ntirkana, Wilson Meikuya, and Susan McClelland
19- Short Stories by Kelly Barnhill
20- The Last Romantics by Tara Conklin
21- The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

REBROADCAST - Knocking on Fantasy's Door with Alix Harrow 4-1-20

Alix Harrow is a Hugo award-winning writer of historical fantasy fiction who also happens to be a fellow Kentuckian. Her debut novel, The Ten Thousand Doors of January, has been called by Kirkus Reviews a ‘A love letter to imagination, adventure, the written word,’ and NPR books says it is one that should go on your Favorites Shelf. It has been on the Los Angeles Times Bestsellers List. It was recently nominated for the Nebula Award. She is a rising star in the burgeoning female revolution taking place in the science fiction and fantasy genres.

We interviewed Alix at the library of her alma mater, Berea College, in Berea, KY. She talked with us about the sub-genre of portal fantasies and her love-hate relationship with them
as a child, what influence becoming a mother had on writing the book, why she loves Chicago-style footnotes, and details about her second novel she is furiously trying to finish.

Books discussed in this episode:
1- The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix Harrow
2- The Man Who Sold Rope to the Gnoles by Margaret St. Clair (short story)
3- Gideon the 9th by Tamsyn Muir
4- The City We Became by N. K. Jemesin
5- The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep by H. G. Parry
6- The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.

Ep. 39 Mountain Mamas and the Meaningful Memoir with Cassie Chambers 3-25-20

Our guest today grew up in poverty in eastern Kentucky, but attended Yale and Harvard, received her law degree, and came back to Kentucky to work for the Legal Aid Society, helping at-risk women in her home state. Cassie Chambers has also written a memoir, called Hill Women: Finding Family and a Way Forward in the Appalachian Mountains, about life and culture in Owsley County through the lens of three generations of women in her own family.

Her book came out in January of this year. Newsweek has named it a must-read book to savor this Spring, and Publisher’s Weekly called it a “passionate memoir”.

Cassie talks to us about her favorite book series from childhood that she still rereads as an adult, why she felt the women of Appalachia specifically need their stories told and what compelled her to write it, and why she thinks more women don’t run for office and why that needs to change.

Books Discussed during this Episode:
1- Anne of Green Gables series by Lucy Maude Montgomery
2- Fair and Tender Ladies by Lee Smith
3- The Wonder by Emma Donoghue
4- Castaway: Poems for our Time by Naomi Shihab Nye
5- Walkable City by Jeff Speck

You can find us on FB, instagram (@perksofbeingabookloverpod) and on our blog site at www.perksofbeingabooklover.com

Perks airs on Forward Radio 106.5 FM and forwardradio.org every Wednesday at 6 pm, Thursdays at 6 am and 12 pm. We have purchased the rights to the theme music used.