how to win the lottery: a book club podcast

we continue our campus season with prep by curtis sittenfeld, the first book on the pod that’s new to bobby. we talk about its spanning breadth (in a relatively tight package), lee as a reluctant and naive narrator, and our the novel’s lack of narrative darkness. we also talk about how unsexy prep is (and whether that’s good or bad), who high school books are actually written for, and the elements...

we're kicking off the second season (campus-themed!) of how to win the lottery with sylvia plath's classic novel the bell jar. (content warning: this book and this discussion contain references to suicide and suicidal thoughts.) we talk about the relatability of the protagonist, even 60 years later, and how the story (and its characters and societal issues) are largely timeless. we also discuss pa...

we’re going back to school for season two of how to win the lottery. all of our books are campus or varsity novels. find the full reading list below, and email in your thoughts about any of these books to lottery@cageclub.me. keep reading! (joey writes these so he can say this without fear of retribution or anger from bob.) reading list for season two the bell jar by sylvia plath, 11/4 prep by cur...

we close out our first season -- on processing pain, the ways we've hurt people, and how we've been hurt -- with kazuo ishiguro's never let me go, and we wonder: just how depressing has this season been, really? we talk about the book's lack of irony (and the reasoning behind it), its understated major reveals, and the two things the book is "really" about. we also talk about how never let me go i...

we’re nearing the end of the first season of the podcast, and with open city by teju cole, we’ve reached out first real widespread difference of opinion. open city was a polarizing book when bob taught it in his classes, and it leads to a discussion here around the influences of guy debord, the anti-identity of the protagonist, the discrepancy on display between high and low culture, and what a mo...

the fact that we’ve been building to ducks, newburyport by lucy ellmann all season long, the fact that it’s more than 1,000 pages long, the fact that this is the end of this poor imitation of the book’s writing style. this episode, we’re talking about the longest book we’re covering in our first season — ducks, newburyport — and how it encompasses nearly every facet of modern life. we discuss the...

every book in the first season of how to win the lottery has dealt with heavy themes, but any man by amber tamblyn may be the heaviest one yet. in this episode, we talk about the target audience for the book, amber tamblyn’s style and background as a writer, and the way she’s able to create empathy for all of the characters, even the unlikeable ones. we welcome a new judge in the chambers in what’...

haruki murakami is possibly the most successful and most well-known author we'll cover this season, and our sixth stop on our book club world tour dives into his novel colorless tsukuru tazaki and his years of pilgrimage. we talk about murakami's style, the supernatural elements in the story (and why murakami doesn't take them far enough, and the annoying and frustrating reality of authors making...

we read a prayer for owen meany, so now it's time to watch the semi-adaptation, simon birch. we do the owen voice. (want more bonus episodes? go to patreon.com/lotterypod for new episodes in every "off" week.)

bob has called a prayer for owen meany by john irving one of the best books of the 1980s, but re-reading it has elevated that praise. (joey, far less educated and far less well read, would agree.) we discuss the novel's exquisite plotting, the idea of determinism, and the mysteries core to the plot. bob threatens to fight john irving based on an interview that joey talks about, then criticizes joe...

it’s time to remember back to your childhood (sitting behind your dad, flipping marshmallows into your mouth) because our latest book club entry is memories of my father watching tv by curtis white. in this episode, we disagree about stick figure art, then discuss the ways curtis white dissects 1950s television shows and the 1950s nuclear family (and seems to predict the wave of referential media...

we’ve got just seven days to travel around the world, give away $32,000, and talk about you shall know our velocity! (previously re-titled as sacrament) by dave eggers. our book club continues on as we discuss the weirdness of the title (and the weirdness of the two very different reading experiences), the book’s powerful depiction of grief, and the wildly subjective nature of the narrative. we al...

grab a slice of pepperoni and pickle pizza because it's time to talk about pizza girl by jean kyoung frazier. in our latest book club sesh, we talk about how pizza girl's cover art belies its narrative weight, the narrative's commentary on jobs and paid vs. unpaid labor, and its ties to our previous book, death in her hands by ottessa moshfegh. bob shares an experience with a pizza delivery guy he...

our podcast book club kicks off with death in her hands by ottessa moshfegh, which tells a type of story that’s often ignored and left untold. we discuss the plot, the concept of poststructuralism (and its expression as postmodernism literature), and the novel’s horror elements in atmosphere and descriptions. we also explore ghosts in a way that feels off-base until we pull a pro move and weave it...

a book club, like oprah’s if oprah were two suburban guys from new jersey, or reese witherspoon’s if reese were two suburban guys from new jersey, except without the engine of fame that those two huge stars provide. but come on: oprah is not going to answer your emails. (trust us, we know.) every two weeks, a new book microscoped and surgeried by benevolent despot joey lewandowski and disgraced co...