Episode · The Book Review · 2019-05-03
Laila Lalami on The Book Review: books mentioned
Laila Lalami on 'The Other Americans'
Pamela Paul discussed The Other Americans by Laila Lalami, How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell, The Moor's account by Laila Lalami, and Milkman by Anna Burns, and read Odyssey : a Father, a Son and an Epic by Daniel Mendelsohn for a book club. Laila Lalami discussed Tell Me How It Ends by Valeria Luiselli. Alexandra Alter discussed Blood Heir by Amélie Wen Zhao and A Place for Wolves by Kosoko Jackson. Jennifer Szalai discussed Mind Fixers by Anne Harrington. Dwight Garner discussed Spring by Ali Smith. Parul Sehgal discussed Trust Exercise by Susan Choi and others and Those who knew by Idra Novey.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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The Other Americans
Discussed“Leela Lamy will join us to talk about her new book the other Americans”
Where to get it
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How to Do Nothing
How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell is an exploration of attention, the attention economy, and the value of stepping away from constant productivity.
Discussed“Jenny Odell will be here to talk about her book how to do nothing”
Where to get it
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The Moor's account
Discussed“so let's begin with the Moors account what was that book about”
Where to get it
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Tell Me How It Ends
Discussed“recently for example I taught Valaria Louis Elli's short book tell me how it ends an essay in 40 questions in one of my non-fiction classes”
Where to get it
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Odyssey : a Father, a Son and an Epic
Odyssey: A Father, a Son and an Epic by Daniel Mendelsohn is a deeply moving memoir that recounts the extraordinary journey of a classicist professor and his eighty-one-year-old father, who chose to audit his undergraduate seminar on Homer's Odyssey.
Book club“the club co-hosted by the New York Times book review and PBS NewsHour will be reading Daniel Mendelson's beautiful and moving Memoir and odyssey a father a son and an epic”
Where to get it
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Blood Heir
Discussed“there was one in particular that got a lot of attention earlier this year which was Amal wo's Blood air”
Where to get it
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A Place for Wolves
Discussed“and since her book came out it happened again with kosako Jackson's young adult novel a place for wolves which he also cancelled”
Where to get it
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Mind Fixers
Discussed“so last week I reviewed this book called Mind fixers by a historian of science at Harvard named an Harrington and it's the history of Psychiatry search for the biological origins of mental illness”
Where to get it
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Spring
Discussed“and she's embarked on this on this seasonal cycle of four novels and her new one is called Spring”
Where to get it
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Trust Exercise
Susan Choi's novel Trust Exercise is a complex narrative that explores a high-pressure performing arts high school while constantly upending reader expectations through startling structural shifts.
Discussed“so many different books are being described as me too novels trust exercise by Susan Choy Those Who Knew by idra Novi just goes on and on westerns dystopia in reviews people were calling them me to novels”
Where to get it
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Those who knew
Those Who Knew is a novel by Idra Novey that examines collective complicity, silence, and the reckoning with abuse in a fictional island nation.
Discussed“so many different books are being described as me too novels trust exercise by Susan Choy Those Who Knew by idra Novi just goes on and on westerns dystopia in reviews people were calling them me to novels”
Where to get it
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Milkman
Milkman by Anna Burns is a formally inventive, stream-of-consciousness novel set during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, following a young woman harassed by an older, powerful paramilitary figure known as the milkman.
Discussed“let's have it out about milkman did you you like because famously I'm the only person in America in the western world who didn't like mil I like Milkman”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (8) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
“Leila Lam's new book is called the other Americans novel”
“Jenny Odell is the author of how to do nothing resisting the attention economy”
“there is a new Ed book store that I like not new but you know there there's one that I've discovered on the upper west side you know there's a character in Tropic of Cancer who never wants other people to know what he's reading”
“Dwight you reviewed spr by Ali Smith”
“Jen mind fixers by Anne Harrington”
“and give us a few of the books you talked about in your essay parl Milkman by Anna Burns”
“trust exercise by Susan Choy”
“Those Who Knew by idra Novi”