Book Fight

This week we read an essay from The Oxford American co-written by John T. Edge and Tunde Wey, " Who Owns Southern Food ?" The piece was inspired, in part, by an article in Eater called " How Gullah Cuisine Transformed Charleston Food ," which created a bit of a firestorm in Charleston, sparking debate about the economics of cultural appropriation.  All of which is a bit afield of what we normally...

This week we welcome guest Sam Allingham (author of The Great American Songbook) to discuss the South Korean novel The Vegetarian, which won the Man Booker International Prize. We also talk about Sam's story collection, which recently came out from A Strange Object, and we subject him to our usual tomfoolery.  As will be obvious within the first few seconds of this episode, we recorded it before t...

A listener sent us a big box of Canadian snacks, so we're devoting this episode to our friendly neighbor to the north. We're talking about an Alice Munro story, "Family Furnishings," and specifically how Munro uses food and eating to characterize family members and the relationships between them.  In the second half of the show, we dig into those snacks! Ketchup-flavored potato chips. Smarties (of...

You may know the name Kinsella from the Kevin Costner character Ray Kinsella in Field of Dreams. But it's also the name of the author who wrote the novel, Shoeless Joe, on which that movie was based. Kinsella was born in Canada, and lived most of his life there, though he did a stint at the Iowa Writers Workshop, near where the book is set. He wrote several other novels, and a bunch of short story...

We're talking about two super-spooky short stories for Halloween this year: Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" and Joe Hill's "Abraham's Boys." We talk about what scares us, and the qualities that make for a good horror story. It also continues to be the Fall of Food, so this week we're talking Halloween candy. Best treats? Worst treats? And what's up with those candies that seem to exist only on Hal...

This week we've got a special Fall of Food episode with guest Sarah Sweeney, who chose an essay for us to read: an Esquire profile of acclaimed chef Ferran Adria, written by Michael Paterniti. We talk about the line between interestingly descriptive food writing and absurd, overblown food writing. We also talk about the culture of the celebrity chef, and whether it's gone too far.  In the second h...

This week we're discussing an Anthony Bourdain essay that became part of his breakout book, Kitchen Confidential, plus we talk about our very different experiences working in food service, and we eat a couple of weird, unconventionally flavored snacks.  For more, visit us online at bookfightpod.com . 

This week we welcome special guest Jim Miller to talk about one of his favorite books, Michael Crichton's 1990 bestseller Jurassic Park. We discuss dinosaur knowledge, books we loved as children, and Crichton's supposed dickishness.  We also talk to Jim about his work as a cartographer, his appearance in Sports Illustrated, and his development of various apps, including one that teaches kids how t...

Do you like food? Do you eat it several times a day in order to survive? Then you will love our new seasonal theme! This fall we'll be reading stories and essays in which food plays a major role. We'll also be talking about a variety of food-related things. This week: What foods are we nostalgic for? What foods make us think of our childhoods? Each of us also brought in a nostalgic snack for a qui...

Have you heard of this Cormac McCarthy fellow? Pretty good writer! Somehow, neither of us had ever read The Road, and we thought it was time to rectify that. Especially since America seems to be getting closer and closer to making its post-apocalyptic hellscape a reality.   

In the first half of this week's show we discuss this 2007 Matthew Quick story , originally published in Agni. Long-time listeners will recall that Tom has occasionally taken issue with Mr. Quick's work, as well as his life and just his all-around "thing." So reading one of his early publications, from a reputable lit journal, seemed like a great opportunity for Tom to open up his heart and give "...

This week we're reading the critically celebrated 1992 novel by Javier Marias, a writer we've both been meaning to check out for a while now. We talk about what people expect from novels, unusual/innovative narrative structures, and reading while stoned. In the second half of the show we've got a new installment of Fan Fiction Corner, featuring Alvin & the Chipmunks. For more, visit us online at b...

Back in Episode 15, we talked about Sheila Heti's novel How Should a Person Be, which neither of us loved. This week we're giving Heti a second chance, reading a recent story of hers from The New Yorker.  We talk about whether we were too quick to judge her book based on its marketing materials, and what it is we want from fiction. If certain types of novels feel stale, for instance, is the proble...

Tom picked this novel, the author's first (though he'd already published two story collections, the first of which made him the youngest-ever winner of a Whiting Award). Reading the book made Mike question why he's making this podcast in the first place. So: good times! In the second half of the show, Mike puts Tom on the metaphorical couch to help him figure out why he keeps feeling pulled away f...

Agatha Christie is one of the world's best-selling authors of all time, yet when we read her novel And Then There Were None earlier this year, we gave it mixed reviews. So we're giving Christie a second chance, digging into one of her most celebrated short stories, " Witness For the Prosecution " (which you can read for free via that link).  Tom, in particular, seemed to dislike And Then There Wer...

Mike first read this book nearly a decade ago, and decided to revisit it after pulling it randomly from his shelf and reading the inscription inside, which he'd managed to forget. We talk about Bouillier's idea of a "report" as its own genre of literature, and books narrated by eccentric people trapped inside their own heads. In the second half of the show we've got a quick bit of fanfiction, plus...

Back in 105, we were less than thrilled with Penelope Lively's novel Making It Up. This week we're giving her work a second chance by reading a couple short stories from her 1997 collection, The Five Thousand and One Nights. Will we fall in love? Or will Lively fall prey to the Book Fight "two strikes and you're out" rule? Also this week: Another listener-submitted story of literary second chances...

This week's book is Mosley's first Easy Rawlings novel, in which we're introduced to a war vet in 1948 Los Angeles. We talk about the qualities that make for a good detective novel, and why Rawlings has become such an enduring character. In the second half of the show: the return of Fan Fiction Corner, and boy is it a doozy. For more, visit us online at bookfightpod.com . 

A few years ago we read a John Barth story collection (On With the Story) that Mike enjoyed and Tom did not. So this week Mike's making Tom read one of Barth's most-loved short stories to see if he can turn him into a fan. Also: We talk about other artists we took a while to warm up to, and listener-submitted stories of second chances. For more, visit us online at bookfightpod.com . 

We read Rachel Kushner's National Book Award-nominated second novel and try to figure out what we think about it. Is it a great book? Is it an ok book with the scope and ambition and atmospherics of a great book? Is it ever, actually, possible to say, after reading a book for the first time? We also talk about the gender-related flap this novel, and some of its criticism, briefly caused, and wheth...

Welcome to the first of our new summer series, in which we revisit work by authors who we've panned in the past. We read a Harlan Ellison essay last spring, and found it lacking, but perhaps we'll be swayed by one of Ellison's best-loved short stories. Also discussed: How do you know when to give your own work a second chance, and when should you simply give up on a story/essay/book and move on to...

We're joined by writer Sandra Newman (author of, most recently, The Country of Ice Cream Star) to discuss a much-revered and deeply weird sci fi novel by M. John Harrison. We talk to Newman about what she loves (and doesn't) about science fiction, a genre we've tended to be hard on in the past. Will this be the book to win us over?   We also talk to Sandra about her own work, her decision to write...

We wrap up our Spring of Success series by checking out the first published story of Jennifer Weiner, which appeared in a 1992 issue of Seventeen Magazine. We talk about Weiner's path to success, her 10-point advice to aspiring novelists, and her much-publicized beef with Jonathan Franzen. For more, visit us online at bookfightpod.com . 

Kanan Makiya is probably best known for his 1989 book, Republic of Fear, a nonfictional account of Iraq under Saddam Hussein. He's also known as one of the key Iraqi agitators for the U.S. invasion, arguing to America's political elite that Hussein's regime needed to be toppled. It was Makiya, in fact, who told White House officials that the U.S. would be greeted with "flowers and sweets" by the I...

Welcome to the Franzone! This week we're reading the first published story of celebrated author Jonathan Franzen, which was featured in a 1987 issue of Fiction International. We also talk about Franzen's path to success: his early ambitions, his writing habits, and his self-conscious pivoting toward a different kind of fictional project. We also talk about why so many people seem to hate on Franze...