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Books podcasts were talking about in November 2025
November 2025 saw podcasts focusing heavily on political movements, societal disillusionment, and influential modern literature. On The Ezra Klein Show, Fareed Zakaria recommended Walter Lippmann's A Preface to Morals as a text he repeatedly returned to for its exploration of modern society and lost faith, alongside Alan Ehrenhalt's The Lost City. On the same podcast, John Gans recommended three distinct works addressing the political right: David Austin Walsh's Taking America Back, Laura K. Field's Furious Minds, and Leo Lowenthal and Norbert Gutderman's Profits of Deceit, which details the techniques of American agitators. Patti Smith also appeared on The Ezra Klein Show to recommend Roberto Bolaño's 2666, praising it as a towering twenty-first-century masterpiece. Other shows highlighted personal and professional works. On Modern Wisdom, Alison Armstrong recommended her own popular book, In Sync with the Opposite Sex, during the closing segment of her interview. Additionally, Joe Rogan recommended James Fox's documentary film Moment of Contact on The Joe Rogan Experience. Together, these conversations demonstrated a deep engagement with the historical roots of political ideologies, propaganda techniques, and literary masterpieces that continue to resonate in contemporary cultural and political discourse.
Lex Fridman Podcast
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The Darkest Minds
Discussed“I think one useful one comes from the paper, A Technological Approach to Mind Everywhere. An experimentally grounded framework for understanding diverse bodies and minds.”
The Joe Rogan Experience
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Solved the Riddle of Heart Attacks
Discussed“And a really interesting thread that uh got left behind in 1976 is uh Broa Barnes wrote this book called Solved the Riddle of Heart Attacks in 1976.”
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Project Mind Control
Discussed“He has gotten the rights to this to this book, you know, this book Project Mind Control, and he's Yeah.”
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Active Measures
Discussed“And there's there's a book called active measures by Thomas Rid and he kind of chronicles um what they were doing.”
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Heaven's Mirror
Discussed“And this is as reported by Robert Bauval and Graham Hancock in their book um Heaven's Mirror and also I found it in um the Arabic publications”
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The Abyss
Discussed“Maybe the abyss is a lot closer to reality than than we ever thought.”
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The Phenomenon of Man
Discussed“So um James Fox's movie The Phenomenon, which … he directed it.”
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Design of an instrument for measuring the true vertical velocity of an airplane at moment of contact in landing
Recommended“If you haven't seen that, folks, it's called Moment of Contact. It's really good.”
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Hitler's Professors
Discussed“There's a book called Hitler's Professors, and it is about a a process that Hitler administration used.”
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The house of numbers
Recommended“and so it it keeps the you know the great documentary that's on YouTube is called House of Numbers about this. It keeps the numbers going.”
Modern Wisdom
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The Queen's Code
Discussed“Have you listened to or read The Queen's Code? Yes. Read it. So, um do you remember the line in there where Mike says to his wife Karen, "I'm always trying to impress you." And then she's like, "Then why don't you take out the trash?" She's like, "That would impress you."”
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No More Mr. Nice Guy
Discussed“Ever read Dr. Robert Glitter's book, No More Mr. Nice Guy? I've never read it, but he interviewed me about three months ago.”
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In Sync with the Opposite Sex
Recommended“In sync with the opposite sex is one of the most popular and I recommend it to people.”
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How to Stop Worrying and Start Living
Discussed“Dale Kanigi wrote a lesserk known second book that's called uh how to stop worrying and start living. And in it, he advocates for something called worry time.”
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Verse and prose in peace and war
Discussed“So this I that is a a dogeared copy of it's called verse and pros in peace and war by William null Hodson.”
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The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and Other Stories
Discussed“Another one about poor little mummy boy, and it's a a pharaoh's curse that causes this woman to give birth to a a a bundle of gauze.”
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Jamaica Inn
Discussed“he has a little discussion about Daphne Demorier's novels um and Jamaica in particularly and Rebecca and he talks you know his reading of of Daphne Demorier is as is as a feminist you”
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Rebecca
Discussed“he has a little discussion about Daphne Demorier's novels um and Jamaica in particularly and Rebecca and he talks you know his reading of of Daphne Demorier is as is as a feminist you”
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The Status Game
Discussed“If you've read Will Sto's status game, you've probably interviewed him at some point. His really really good piece of life advice is that everyone is completely obsessed with status.”
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Reasons and Persons
Discussed“So, um, a Brit named Derek Parett, a famous philosopher, wrote a book in 1984 called Reasons and Persons.”
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Manhood in the Making
Recommended“And I think what what may be happening here and and these ideas were inspired by um this amazing book called Manhood in the Making by the anthropologist David Gilmore.”
The Ezra Klein Show
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A preface to morals
Recommended“The one book that I have loved and have gone back to over and over is a book by Walter Lipman called a preface to morals. Uh it was written in the 1920s during the jazz age and he first identifies not first but he identifies very powerfully this problem of modern societies that you lose faith in religion and”
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The Lost City
Recommended“There's a wonderful book called The Lost City by Alan Erin Halt, a journalist who went back to Chicago to wonder you wondering why the Chicago of his youth seemed so community oriented and why what what did they do that that was lost and he discovered that it was so community oriented because everyone was so poor they couldn't”
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Understanding the Old Testament
Critiqued“The book that really was disturbing for me was the Old Testament because I started reading it very young and the things in it were supposed to accept as real”
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Just Kids
Discussed“So, back in 2010, I picked up this book that everyone seemed to be reading that year, Just Kids by Patty Smith.”
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Bread of Angels
Discussed“Smith's latest book is Bread of Angels, which like Just Kids is a memoir, but spans a much wider range of her life, and it's much more personal in a way, much more experiential.”
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Fox's book of martyrs
Discussed“It was had red silk binding and gold stamping and I was about three and I hid it under my pillow cuz I thought if I slept on it, it would come into my head what was in it. And my mother was distraught cuz she couldn't find it. It was my grandfather's book called Fox's Book of Martyrs.”
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Peter Pan
Discussed“And I love Peter Pan of course because I didn't want to grow up.”
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Grimm's fairy tales
Discussed“Um, like you, there was the German versions of Grimm's fairy tales that were very grim.”
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2666
Recommended“read um 2666 because I think it was our first 21st century masterpiece by Roberto Bologano.”
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Taking America Back
Recommended“One is Taking America Back by David Austin Walsh, which is a kind of history of uh the rights half-hearted, let's say, attempts to police anti-semitism.”
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Furious Minds
Recommended“One is Furious Minds. Uh, it's a new book by Laura K. field which is about um MAGA intellectuals the new right and how that how they justify explain rationalize things that are going on gave arguments for it”
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Prophets of deceit
Recommended“and the third one is a very old book and a little bit forgotten it's called profits of deceit techniques of the American agitator and it's by Leo Loenthal and Norbert Gutderman and it's a extremely astute ute detailed analysis of the techniques of anti-semitic [music] agitation and propaganda especially in the context of the United States.”
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The education of Henry Adams
Discussed“One is a famous line of uh Henry Adams from the education of Henry Adams. Politics as a practice, whatever its professions, has always been the systematic organization of hatreds.”
Interesting Times
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The Hebrew Bible
Discussed“You see this in Hebrew Bible, but you see it in many other sources.”
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The Am ha-aretz
Discussed“I mean, they’re basically reading Haaretz.”
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The Screwtape Letters
Discussed“I think if C.S. Lewis was writing The Screwtape Letters today, there would be a good few letters about how the demons can use the internet, how they can use the phones, um how they can use this to completely delude us and distract us and take us away from from our true purpose.”
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Warriors and Worriers
Discussed“Sure, that phrase comes from a psychologist called Joyce Benenson, who did a book called "Warriors and Worriers"”
The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett
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Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man
Discussed“Oh [ __ ] Will Packer, he was like, "I got this book that I want to make a movie. It's called Think Like a Man. Steve Harvey wrote it. I think you're funny as hell. I've been tracking you on tour. I want you to be the star."”
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Strong Ground
Discussed“So, there's four types of power you you you speak about in um Damn, you in Strong Ground.”
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The October Man (Rivers of London)
Discussed“Because I was reading the book series The Rivers of London. And in that book series, there are two gods of the Thames.”
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BRAVING THE WILDERNESS
Discussed“And when you talk about belonging, it's interesting in your book Braving the Wilderness, which I think the question's kind of summed up by the subtitle here. The quest for true belonging and the courage to stand alone.”
How I Write
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Being Mortal
Discussed“Being Mortal is 12 years old now. And, uh, and it's been, uh, it's been amazing.”
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Complications
Discussed“I wrote about a case in my first book, Complications. I came back again and better.”
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How We Die
Discussed“Sherwin Nulan a surgeon who wrote How We Die in 1980.”
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Forrest Gump
Discussed“You know who's like this I don't mean to interject but a really good example is Forrest Gump. Yes yes Like weird things happen to Forrest Gump”
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Los Náufragos Del Wager / the Wager
Discussed“And then there's The Wager. I can't think of a single book that more people I know have said that they just read [music] the entire thing from start to finish in one sitting.”
The Daily Stoic
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The death of expertise
Discussed“One of the favorite writer Atlantic writers is Tom Nichols in his book the death of expertise like just this sense that like I know better because I thought about this for 8 seconds.”
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Empire of Pain
Discussed“I read it in Empire of Pain. Yeah. About the Sackler family.”
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The 33 Strategies of War
Discussed“Of first coming across like that run. Yeah. In Robert's book 33 strategies of war.”
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Education of a wandering man
Recommended“Um, not that he and actually his memoir, Education of a Wandering Man, is incredible and it's totally a memoir about self-education and how you can get an untraditional and interesting education that fits you perfectly to do difficult, unusual, interesting, even lucrative thing. It's one of the great memoirs actually.”
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How to Be Perfect
Discussed“You know, Michael Sher like the so he has this book called How to Be Perfect, which is actually a book. It's very smart, but it's a book about moral philosophy.”
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A Man in Full
Recommended“Have you ever read a man in full? No. It's the Tom Wolf film. I'll give it to you. There's a scene between like a lone agent and the the main character of the book.”
