Overdue

For this, the highest of holy days, we've revisited the Choose Your Own Adventure-verse with R.A. Montgomery's Smoke Jumpers. Come for the information about what it's like to be a trainee firefighter, stay for the ranger who sounds a whole lot like Strong Bad. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

The arena calls our name again, and we must volunteer as tribute! It's time we talked about Suzanne Collins' second novel about the dystopic land of Panem and their annual Hunger Games. Tune in for a discussion of revolution, game design, and underbaked love triangles. Plus, Andrew goes a-Googlin'! If you aren't caught up on our Hunger Games journey, go give Episode 400 a listen! See Privacy Polic...

Welcome to another installment of HELLBOYS, a Divine Comedy podcast from the boys here at Overdue! We're continuing our journey through Robert and Jean Hollander's translation of Dante's Divine Comedy a few cantos at a time. Some Patreon supporters get these episodes monthly, but every two months we combine them for general consumption. This combo episode carries us further into space where we mee...

The Shadow of the Wind is a complex noir-ish mystery set in post-WWII (and post-Spanish Civil War) Barcelona. Come for the endearing characters, stay for the Byzantine explanation of what is going on! See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

Katherine Arden's debut novel is a potent mix of Slavic folklore, Russian history, and good old-fashioned fantasy. We dig into which of those ingredients work best within the scope of The Bear and the Nightingale's story, but first we take a moment to debut Andrew's new classic catchphrase. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#d...

When Andrew read The Colour of Magic, people suggested that the beginning of the Discworld series was not necessarily the best place to start. Guards! Guards!, the eighth book in the series, is the start of its own contained-ish arc. According to our listeners and many readers, this serves as a more suitable jumping off point. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy...

There are some cars you just shouldn't get into! Michel Faber's thriller Under the Skin is about Isserley, the driver of one such dangerous vehicle. Why do all the men who get into her car disappear? Is she even really human? Are you ? Hop in for the answers to these questions and more! See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-no...

Friday Black, a debut collection of short stories by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, deftly employs hyperbole to make the reader notice horrors of American life that have become less-noticeable through repetition. It’s also going to resonate with anyone who has spent any amount of time working retail on the day after Thanksgiving. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy No...

We had a blast processing this novelization of the hit film Sonic the Hedgehog! Did you know it's based on a video game?! Gotta read fast! Special thanks to the Patreon supporters who joined us in the live chat. For more info on how to participate in bonus episode recordings, head to patreon.com/overduepod . See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://a...

This week’s episode is our recent live show crossover event with Appointment Television at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. The Appointment Television and Overdue crews gather together to discuss the recent TV adaptation and compare it to the book from which it (and the film, and the ill-starred musical) sprung. Whether we figure out the relative superiority of books or TV as competing artistic fo...

In this challenging novel, award-winning author Toni Morrison explores how utopias are defined (and perhaps undermined) by their boundaries. The all-black town of Ruby, Oklahoma survived for decades by cordoning itself off from the outside world. But what happens when the outside world starts gnawing at the people inside? See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notic...

This week's book is a cozy mystery, but for kids! Author Kate Racculia joins us for a discussion of The Westing Game, which was a major inspiration for her own work (and is a completely wild read, besides). See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

What better way to celebrate a milestone episode than to make a bunch of teenagers fight each other to the death? Join us as we discuss the first entry in Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games trilogy, taking particular delight in its worldbuilding and its protagonist Katniss Everdeen. We also get into some of the film-informed Discourse that has surrounded the series since its release, and of course we t...

Welcome to Febuwary! This week’s episode is a follow-up of sorts to Episode 291 , in which Andrew read Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With The Wind. The Wind Done Gone is labeled a “parody” for legal reasons but it feels somewhere in between a sequel and a critique, acknowledging the strong characters of the original but tearing down its rose-tinted nostalgia for the antebellum American South.  See...

Welcome to another installment of HELLBOYS, a Divine Comedy podcast from the boys here at Overdue! We're continuing our journey through Robert and Jean Hollander's translation of Dante's Divine Comedy a few cantos at a time. Some Patreon supporters get these episodes monthly, but every two months we combine them for general consumption. This combo episode carries us to the top of Mt. Purgatory (Pu...

In the future, all of mankind will be confined to an underground silo, wondering when and if the world outside will ever be habitable again. But if things aren't as bad as they seem? And what if everyone in the silo isn't as alone as they think? That's the premise of Hugh Howey's Wool , a collection of stories woven together into a novel about secrets, duties, and revolution. Time to talk about cl...

The Adventures of the Bailey School Kids commence with a new teacher who just MIGHT be a vampire! It's time to get to the undead bottom of this...or is it? We recorded this week's show with Alli from the SSR Podcast , a great show you should check out if you want a trip down memory lane to your middle school library. We were really honored to be included in SSR's "Manuary" lineup this year, and we...

To put it mildly, a lot of stuff has happened since we released our episode on The Handmaid's Tale back in 2014 . Among that stuff is the release of The Testaments, the 2019 sequel to the original book and a companion piece of sorts to the Hulu television series. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

It is better to be feared than loved. The ends justify the means. King Louis sucked. These are the (clearly) famous quotes from Machiavelli's classic yet innovative work of political science. It's time to talk power, political satire, and the wonderful translation by Tim Parks. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my...

Inspired by the raunchy humor and biblical events of Christopher Moore's take on Jesus, we recorded a rowdy bonus episode with our rollicking Patreon chat.  Want to join us for the next bonus recording? Head to patreon.com/overduepod to find out how. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

The Mists of Avalon is a seminal work of fantasy fiction that centers the women of Arthurian legend such as Morgan Le Fay. Its author was a terrible person. We talk about the terrible stuff first, and then we try to unpack why the book has entertained and resonated with so many. Also - don't spend any money on this book! Donate to www.rainn.org instead. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/priv...

Book one in the one-book Sexy Sylvie series isn’t about a sexy Hanukkah miracle where one night’s worth of personal lubricant lasts for eight nights, but we had fun with it anyway. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

The Eyre Affair is the book that you would get if Ready Player One were about literature instead of the 1980s, and also if Ready Player One was more engaging or half as clever as it thought it was. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

George Selden wrote a charming story about a charming cricket named Chester who just charms the pants right off everyone living in New York City - including a cat and a mouse. And the illustrations by Garth Williams are also charming! You know what's not so charming? Liverwurst. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-m...

Andrew's got the week off so Craig's wife Laura joins the show again to talk about Kate Grenville's award-winning novel The Secret River. The story is an an attempt to tell more truthfully the British settlement of Australia, as through the eyes of one man sent to the penal colony that would ultimately become the country we know today. The violence he witnesses - and participates in - against Abor...