Top of The Stacks — November 2021
I am writing this to you at the end of the month feeling so confused that the month is already over. I feel like I did nothing all month, and yet I went to NYC (where I made my pilgrimage to Books are Magic), was on NPR again, hosted a Thanksgiving, and of course recorded a whole bunch of great episodes. So yeah, what do I know? Anyway, here are a bunch of things I was super into this month.
First off, I dropped a massive gift guide for the book lover in your life. These are all book-adjacent gift ideas that are not actual books.
I have been living in this Target bra and legging set. I am obsessed. There is also a bodysuit, that I have, and love.
Today is also Giving Tuesday, so I rereleased this list of literary related nonprofits for you to support.
This endive and blue cheese salad is so good, and I don’t even like salad.
We lost a titan of the theatre this month, Stephen Sondheim, and this obituary was the best I read.
I got invited back to NPR’s It’s Been a Minute with Sam Sanders, except this time Sam was gone and I got to talk to the incredible Ayesha Rascoe about banning books. I loved this conversation.
The movie of Passing is finally out, what did everyone think?
I know we’re over turkey now, but this year I spatchcocked my bird and used this recipe from Sohla El-Waylly and it was per-fec-tion. Now you’ll be ready for next year. Oh, and I had the butcher at the grocery store do the spatchcocking for me, so it was even easier.
I talked Bachelorette Michelle on the Love to See It podcast with Claire and Emma. It was great.
I also bought these leggings this month. I live in leggings.
I got to co-host on one of my favorite shows, Yo, Is This Racist? again. It was a blast. We talked blackface on Halloween.
WHAT I READ IN NOVEMBER
The Case for Rage: Why Anger is Essential to Anti-Racist Struggle by Myisha Cherry
Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters
A Little Devil in America: Notes in Praise of Black Performance by Hanif Abdurraqib
The Paper Palace by Miranda Cowley Heller
You Got Anything Stronger by Gabrielle Union
The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country by Amanda Gorman
THE STACKS NOVEMBER EPISODES
Dawnie Walton joined the show to talk about her debut novel, The Final Revival of Opal and Nev, as well as her love of icons and oral histories.
Professor and philosopher Myisha Cherry talked with us about the usefulness of rage and her new book The Case for Rage.
Cults, sexism, and books, oh my! Author and linguist Amanda Montell talked about both of her books, Cultish and Wordslut and the ways language informs so much of American culture.
Every year we dissect one Toni Morrison novel in depth for The Stacks Book Club, and this year it was Song of Solomon and the great Dawnie Walton joined us for the conversation.
This month’s bonus episode of The Stacks: Unabridged, for Patreon only, was all about Shakespeare with scholar of race, performance and Shakespeare, Ayanna Thompson.
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