Three Percent Podcast

On this week's podcast, Carolyn Kellogg of the Los Angeles Times joins us to discuss Thomas Pynchon's latest novel, Bleeding Edge . All three of us are Pynchon fans, and all three of us really like this latest book. Although, as we talk about, the fact that we experienced a lot of the cultural items Pynchon references makes this a bit odd . . . Like, Pynchon's watched Office Space ? He is aware of...

This week's podcast is the first one Tom and I have recorded in almost a month. So after a bit of catching up, we talked about David Bellos's new translation of Simenon's Pietr the Latvian , the difficulties of translating "I love you" and all the swears into Japanese, and the list  of "The 20 Best Books in Translation You've Never Read." As necessary, we also talked about the baseball playoffs an...

With Tom back from his relaxing vacation, we decided to catch up and talk about the books we read recently, including Sjöwall and Wahlöö's mystery series, Juan Gabriel Vasquez's The Sound of Things Falling , and Rafael Bernal's The Mongolian Conspiracy , among others. We also talk about Amazon's MatchBook program, making things as easy as possible for readers, and baseball. Because, baseball.  Thi...

This week's podcast is a special combo version featuring two separate conversations: one between Chad, Stephen Sparks (BTBA judge, Green Apple bookseller , and excellent reviewer), and George Carroll; and one between Chad and Paul Yamazaki (legendary City Lights ). Topics range from soccer to Karl Pohrt to Javier Marias to Jonathan Lethem to other books we're reading this summer. It's always great...

This week's podcast is a hodgepodge of opinions, rants, and jokes. We talked about summer music--and our mutual dislike of Robin Thicke-- Hawthorne & Child , my trip to Brazil, and bike thieves. And nobody talked about J.K. Rowling or her widely-known pseudonym.    Enjoy!  This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thre...

At the request of one of Tom's friends, we tried to keep this particular podcast upbeat and cheery . . . and we sort of succeeded. Most of the podcast revolves around "this interview from Publishing Perspectives that Amanda DeMarco did with German publisher Michael Krüger about the 40 years he's spent at Hanser and what's changed over that time. Krüger is a really interesting, brilliant guy, who d...

This post-BookExpo America podcast (with special guest, Bromance Will/Will Evans, the man behind Deep Vellum Press) is all about the good and bad of the country's largest trade show for publishing. Mostly, it's a series of rants--not necessarily about the show itself, but about the crap that craps it all up. From tech-speak nonsense to Mitch "Fucking" Albom, this is one of the funniest and most fi...

On this week's podcast, Chad and Tom make fun of yet another new "social book community recommendation" website. Also, they discuss the awesomeness of a number of San Francisco bookstores (and bookstores in general), on the heels of Tom's first trip to The City by the Bay. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thre...

We're back! With our newest and semi-delayed installment of the Three Percent Podcast. This week is a two-parter. First, Chad and Tom run down the list of fiction  and poetry  finalists for the 2013 Best Translated Book Awards. Yes, it's true that these were announced a couple weeks ago, but, as luck would have it, today (Friday, May 3) happens to be the big awards ceremony , which is taking place...

What is this? The much-delayed "favorite movies of 2012" episode of the Three Percent Podcast? It is! Better late than never, right? Yes, it is. Stop disagreeing, please.   This week, Tom is joined by Nate, and they grit their teeth to discuss The Master (P. T. Anderson) and Django Unchained (Quentin Tarantino), after having forced one another to finally watch each other's favorite movies of the y...

This week's podcast is a bit of a hodge-podge: We start out talking about the concept of selling used ebooks , then Tom gets to express his admiration for Javier Marias's new novel, The Infatuations , and Marias in general, and finally we talk about Houellebecq, which, as can only be expected, is controversial. Oh, and there is some talk about the NCAA Tournament. Naturally.  This is a public epis...

This week's podcast is a look at the 25 titles on the Best Translated Book Awards Fiction Longlist . Tom and I discuss each title, talking about which books we've read (or want to), and which ones we think will make the list of 10 Finalists. For those of you who aren't that familiar with all of these books, I highly recommend checking out this handy guide  that Typographical Era put together, with...

This week, Chad talks with special guest George Carroll about the enchanted lives of literary sales reps, Seagull Books, the Seagull School of Publishing, László Krasznahorkai's forthcoming books, and . . . the UEFA Champions League. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit threepercentproblem.substack.com

On this week's podcast, we welcome National Book Critics Circle board member Carolyn Kellogg to talk about the NBCC awards, the changes to the National Book Award (which set me off on a bit of a paranoid rant), Bookish and its suckishness, and a variety of other literary topics.    I also want to add a bit of an update. Since the time we spoke, I've finished HHhH and most of NW , and contrary to a...

So, it's been a while. Due to some technical difficulties, we haven't been able to post a podcast for the past few weeks. But thanks to the whizbang IT department at the University of Rochester, our 10,000 year old iMac is up and functioning again. Which means that 2013 can finally officially start--thanks to our preview podcast. This week, Tom Roberge and I discuss a bunch of 2013 books that we'r...

This week's podcast features Chad, Nathan Furl, Kaija Straumanis, and Will Cleveland talking about their favorite albums of 2012. (And sometimes 2011.) It's a pretty tight podcast, featuring thirteen different artists and some interesting insights into why we each like different styles of music. Oh, and of course we digress a bit to talk about awful job postings and whatnot.    Supplementing this...

In this week's podcast (Tom's last one of of the year), we discuss the translations we did (and didn't) read from 2012, including Maidenhair by Mikhail Shishkin, Satantango by Laszlo Krashnahorkai, Woes of the True Policeman by Roberto Bolano, and Necropolis by Santiago Gamboa. This kicks off the beginning of our "best of" podcasts for this year. Next week we'll talk about music, and in the new ye...

This week's podcast is focused on crime and detective books--both fiction and nonfiction. First off, we talk I monologue about Errol Morris's A Wilderness of Error: The Trials of Jeffrey MacDonald and my recent Twitter fight with Joe McGinniss about this case, then we move on to talking about Wolf Haas's Brenner and God and what makes this book (and detective books in general) fun to read.  This i...

After a bit of a hiatus, Tom Roberge and Chad W. Post are back to discuss what we mean when we say that a book is "difficult." They use a range of examples, from Finnegans Wake to Mrs. Dalloway to define a few different categories of reading "difficulty," such as, not being compelled, and having to read a book like a puzzle.    For a Three Percent podcast, this one is pretty serious, and even more...

This week, Chad W. Post and Kaija Straumanis talk with Philip Graham--a co-founder and current nonfiction editor of Ninth Letter, author of several books, including The Moon, Come to Earth: Dispatches from Lisbon  about Portuguese culture and literature, specifically the works of Gonçalo Tavares, whose book The Neighborhood  is coming out this month with Philip's introduction. (Which will appear h...

This week's podcast features special guest Kaija Straumanis to help preview the upcoming American Literary Translators Conference . Every fall, approx. 350 translators get together for three days of panels, discussions, readings, movies, and drinking. (Oh, and mechanical bull riding . Unless your name is Scott Esposito.)  This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subsc...

This week's podcast features freelance book critic Jacob Silverman, who stirred up a lot of discussion last month when Slate published his piece, " Against Enthusiasm " about "the epidemic of niceness in online book culture." Basically, Jacob argued that online book culture has lead away from legit discussion to a series of endorsements and "+1s." Shortly after he wrote this, William Giraldi trash...

This week's podcast--the last before Tom goes off to visit the good people of Carolina--is a bit of a surprise. Tom told me he had a topic, but wanted to spring it on me and get my unprepared reaction. So, to share in the spirit of surprises, I'm not going to say anything about what we talked about, except to mention that it wasn't about baseball or Arsenal's post-RVP lack of firepower. It does in...

I'm just back from family vacation, so this week we decided to take things easy and talk about The Dark Knight Rises (which we sort of spoil for anyone who either hasn't seen it, or thinks it's great), the Olympics, books we've read recently, and J. K. Rowling and her misguided attempt to prevent piracy  of her new book. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscr...

This week, Will Evans joins us to talk about contemporary Russian literature ( READ THIS BOOK ) and the Read Russia  initiative at this year's BEA. (Sidenote: click on that link just to see the section at the bottom left corner where you can share the page via "Socialist Media." Seriously.) We talk about Zakhar Prilepin, Mikhail Shishkin, Dmitry Danilov (who looks a bit like Ignatius J. Reilly, se...