Ep. 266 We Are the Ones Who Make the World with Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

May 10, 2023May 17, 2023 ~ TheStacksPodcast ~ Leave a comment

Award-winning author Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah joins us for a spoiler-free discussion of his new novel Chain-Gang All Stars. He shares the pressures he’s felt ahead of releasing his second book, and his trepidation around how the book will be received in prison abolition spaces. Plus, we find out what makes revision so important to Nana, and how he thinks about employing violence in the book to help tell this story.

The Stacks Book Club selection for May is This Boy We Made by Taylor Harris. We will discuss the book on May 31st with Nicole Chung.

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Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes and on Bookshop.org and Amazon.

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
“Ep. 48 Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah — The Stacks Book Club (Wade Allain-Marcus)” (The Stacks)
“The Short Stacks 7: Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah//Friday Black” (The Stacks)
The Stacks Pack
“Sometimes, Academic Writing Hits Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah Emotionally” (Rebecca Clarke, The New York Times)
“Bookseller survey finds debut authors struggle with lack of support” (Editorial Team, The Bookseller)
Matt Bell on Second Book Anxiety (@mdbell79)
Simone Biles
“If You Can’t Beat Them, Change The Rules: “The Biles” And Unfair Barriers For Excellence In America” (Colin Seale, Forbes)
Mariame Kaba
“Ep. 239 The Purpose of a System Is What It Does with Mariame Kaba” (The Stacks)
Angela Davis
Ruth Wilson Gilmore
Eastern State Penitentiary Historic Site (Philadelphia, PA)
Peripheral Neuropathy (NIH)
My Government Means to Kill Me by Rasheed Newson
Bayard Rustin
Fred Trump
Larry Kramer
Waterstones UK edition of Chain-Gang All-Stars
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz
Squid Game (Netflix)
Serena Williams
LeBron James
Semicolon Cafe (New York, NY)
Semicolon Bookstore (Chicago, IL)
Delta Air Lines
Pantheon Books
We Do this Til We Free Us by Mariame Kaba
Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Y. Davis
How the Word is Passed by Clint Smith
The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner
“Ep. 22 The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner — The Stacks Book Club (Becca Tobin)” (The Stacks)
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (audiobook)
The “Look at Us” meme (Paul Rudd on Hot Ones)

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The Stacks participates in affiliate programs. We receive a small commission when products are purchased through links on this website, and this comes at no cost to you. This in no way effects opinions on books and products reviewed here. For more information click here.

Ep. 234 The Trees by Percival Everett — The Stacks Book Club (Lisa Lucas)

September 28, 2022March 27, 2023 ~ TheStacksPodcast ~ Leave a comment

Today, publisher Lisa Lucas returns to help us break down the 2021 crime novel The Trees by Percival Everett. In discussing the page-turning thriller, we admire the brilliance of the humor and history on every page, and the mastery Percival Everett himself. We also ask questions around the future, past, and present of the United States in the face of palpable political tensions.There are spoilers on this episode.

Be sure to listen all the way to end of the episode to find out what our October book club pick will be!

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Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes and on Bookshop.org and Amazon.

The Trees by Percival Everett
Money, Mississippi
Danzy Senna
Erasure by Percival Everett
Percival Everett by Virgil Russell by Percival Everett
I Am Not Sidney Poitier by Percival Everett
Telephone by Percival Everett

Emmett Till
Carolyn Bryant
“Woman at center of Emmett Till case tells author she fabricated testimony” (Rory Carroll, The Guardian)
Quentin Tarantino
The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe
“On Percival Everett’s Almost Secret Experiment in a Novel in Threes” (Literary Hub, David Lerner Schwartz)
The Rock Springs, Wyoming lynching
Tulsa race massacre
Chicago race riot
Elaine, AK massacre
Family Matters (ABC)
Los Angeles Chinese Massacre of 1871
Martin Luther King Jr.
“New Rule: A Unified Theory of Wokeness | Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO)” (Youtube.com)
Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
Sula by Toni Morrison
Black No More by George S. Schuyler
The Sellout by Paul Beatty
Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff
Lovecraft Country (HBO)
Watchmen by Alan Moore
Watchmen (HBO)
A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin
Game of Thrones (HBO)
The 1619 Project by Nikole Hannah-Jones and Renée Watson
“The 1619 Project and the Long Battle Over U.S. History” (New York Times)
How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
Golden Gulag by Ruth Wilson Gilmore
Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Y. Davis
Banned Books Week
“Banned in the USA: The Growing Movement to Censor Books in Schools” (Jonathan Friedman and Nadine Farid Johnson, PEN America)
Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
N.W.A
Tipper Gore putting warning labels on music
Moms for Liberty
Graywolf Press
The National Memorial for Peace and Justice (Montgomery, Alabama)
Bryan Stevenson
Vietnam Veterans Memorial
Sweet, Soft, Plenty Rhythm by Laura Warrell
“Ep. 231 At the End of Every Day There’s a Book with Lisa Lucas” (The Stacks)
Fairest by Meredith Talusan

To support The Stacks and find out more from this week’s sponsors, click here.

To contribute to The Stacks, join The Stacks Pack, and get exclusive perks, check out our Patreon page. If you prefer to support the show with a one time contribution go to paypal.me/thestackspod.

Ep. 231 At the End of Every Day There’s a Book with Lisa Lucas

September 7, 2022April 3, 2023 ~ TheStacksPodcast ~ Leave a comment

Lisa Lucas, Senior Vice President at Pantheon and Schocken, is our first ever book publisher to join the podcast. We discuss the path that led Lisa to her current role and how she sees book purchasing as integral to the push for diversity in publishing. We also talk about what inclusivity does and should mean in the world of books.

The Stacks Book Club selection for September is The Trees by Percival Everett. We will discuss the book on September 28th with Lisa Lucas.

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Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes and on Bookshop.org and Amazon.

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Maya Angelou
Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Our Town by Thornton Wilder
Tribeca Film Institute
Brooklyn Book Festival
Guernica Magazine
National Book Foundation
“Inside the Push to Diversify the Book Business” (Marcela Valdes, The New York Times)
Pantheon
Schocken
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Penguin Random House
Sweet, Soft, Plenty Rhythm by Laura Warrell
BookScan
Netflix
Disney+
Hulu
The Criterion Collection
A Pale View of Hills by Kazuo Ishiguro
Now is the Time to Open Your Heart by Alice Walker
Luster by Raven Leilani
Agatha of Little Neon by Claire Luchette
Motherhood by Sheila Heti
No One Tells You This by Glynnis MacNicol
Sugar by Bernice McFadden
The Immortal King Rao by Vauhini Vara
The Wall Street Journal
When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamin Labatut
A Small Place by Jamaica Kincaid
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
My Garden (Book) by Jamaica Kincaid
The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty
If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery
National Book Award
Windham–Campbell Literature Prizes
Pulitzer Prize
Booker Prize
Kirkus Prize
Los Angeles Times Book Prize
National Book Critics Circle Award
The Story Prize
Eso Won Books (Los Angeles, CA)
Chevalier’s Books (Los Angeles, CA)
Skylight Books (Los Angeles, CA)
Reparations Club (Los Angeles, CA)
The Salt Eaters Bookshop (Inglewood, CA)
“Ep. 101 Reading Black Women with Asha Grant” (The Stacks)
Rick Perlstein
Helen Garner
Harriet Lerner
Ben Lerner
The Dance of Intimacy by Harriet Lerner
The Dance of Anger by Harriet Lerner
All About Love by bell hooks
Uncoupling by Diane Vaughan
Constructing a Nervous System by Margo Jefferson
Seek You by Kristen Radtke
“Ep. 194 How We Understand Loneliness with Kristen Radtke” (The Stacks)
Yoga by Emmanuel Carrère
Bloodlands by Kimberly Snyder
Swan’s Way by Marcel Proust
Philip Roth
Joan Didion
Bunnicula by James Howe and Deborah Howe
Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead
Long Division by Kiese Laymon
Julian Lucas
Imani Perry
“Ep. 204 A Journey South with Imani Perry” (The Stacks)
Fight Like Hell by Kim Kelly
The Trees by Percival Everett

To support The Stacks and find out more from this week’s sponsors, click here.

To contribute to The Stacks, join The Stacks Pack, and get exclusive perks, check out our Patreon page. If you prefer to support the show with a one time contribution go to paypal.me/thestackspod.

Ep. 194 How We Understand Loneliness with Kristen Radtke

December 15, 2021September 6, 2022 ~ TheStacksPodcast ~ Leave a comment

Kristen Radkte is the author of Seek You: A Journey Through American Loneliness, a work of graphic nonfiction that uses prose and images to explore the experience and portrayal of loneliness. It is spectacular. Kristen talks to us about the ways the COVID-19 pandemic has changed our collective understanding of loneliness, what she wishes more people knew about graphic books, and how to connect with the lonely in our lives.

The Stacks Book Club selection for December is A Little Devil in America: Notes in Praise of Black Performance by Hanif Abdurraqib, we will discuss the book on December 29th with Andrew Ti.

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Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes. You can also find everything we talked about on Amazon.

Seek You by Kristen Radtke
Imagine Wanting Only This by Kristen Radtke
Harry Harlow
Princess Diana
Mad Men (AMC)
“Ep. 171 Trusting in Optimism with Mira Jacob” (The Stacks)
Fun Home by Alison Bechdel
The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY)
Good Talk by Mira Jacob
The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui
“Ep. 174 The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui — The Stacks Book Club (Mira Jacob)” (The Stacks)
Gabrielle Bell
The Verge
Believer Magazine
UCLA Loneliness Scale
Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
“Ep. 191 Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison — The Stacks Book Club (Dawnie Walton)” (The Stacks)
Pantheon
Kelly Blair
The Lonely City by Olivia Laing
Dr. John T. Cacioppo
Barack Obama

To support The Stacks and find out more from this week’s sponsors, click here.

To contribute to The Stacks, join The Stacks Pack, and get exclusive perks, check out our Patreon page. If you prefer to support the show with a one time contribution go to paypal.me/thestackspod.

Ep. 183 Blood in the Water by Heather Ann Thompson — The Stacks Book Club (Derecka Purnell)

September 29, 2021September 6, 2022 ~ TheStacksPodcast ~ Leave a comment

Today on The Stacks we discuss the book that inspired this podcast, Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy by Heather Ann Thompson. We’re joined by Derecka Purnell (activist and author of the forthcoming Becoming Abolitionists) to delve into this Pulitzer Prize winning book; the coverup, the legacy, and the ways we rely on a superficial notion of justice.
There are minor spoilers on this episode.

Be sure to listen to the end of today’s episode to find out our book club pick for October!

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Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes. You can also find everything we talked about on Amazon.

Blood in the Water by Heather Ann Thompson
Becoming Abolitionists by Derecka Purnell
Frank “Big Black” Smith
The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
Black Radical Tradition by Ben Mabie, Erin Grey, and Asad Haider
“The controversial 1994 crime law that Joe Biden helped write, explained” (German Lopez, Vox.com)
“Auburn Prisoners Hold 50 Hostages Eight Hours” (Martin Arnold Special to The New York Times)
George Jackson

To support The Stacks and find out more from this week’s sponsors, click here.

To contribute to The Stacks, join The Stacks Pack, and get exclusive perks, check out our Patreon page. If you prefer to support the show with a one time contribution go to paypal.me/thestackspod.

Ep. 180 Fifty Years After Attica with Heather Ann Thompson

September 8, 2021September 6, 2022 ~ TheStacksPodcast ~ Leave a comment

Today we are joined by Pulitzer Prize winning author of Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy, Heather Ann Thompson. We discuss her process in researching and writing this epic civil rights story, and the legacy of the uprising 50 years later.

The Stacks Book Club selection for September is Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy by Heather Ann Thompson. We will discuss the book with Derecka Purnell on Wednesday September 29th.

LISTEN NOW

Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google Podcasts | Overcast | Stitcher

Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes. You can also find everything we talked about on Amazon.

Blood in the Water by Heather Ann Thompson
“Heather Ann Thompson, “Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy” (Pantheon, 2016)” (NBN)
Russell Oswald
Nelson Rockefeller
Whose Detroit? by Heather Ann Thompson
“Movie in the Works on Attica Prison Riots Legal Fight” (Dave McNary, Yahoo Finance)
“Ernest Goodman, 90, Civil Rights Lawyer” (The New York Times)
Scottsboro Boys
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
Blood in my Eye by George L. Jackson
Attica (Stanley Nelson, 2021)
Zellnor Myrie
The Pulitzer Prize
Guggenheim Fellowships
Mister Rogers Neighborhood (PBS)
University of Michigan (Ann Arbor, MI)
Princeton University (Princeton, NJ)
Bullet and Burn by Heather Ann Thompson
“Discovery of Bones From MOVE Bombing Jolts Philadelphia Once Again” (Michael Levenson, The New York Times)
Blood in the Water on Goodreads
America on Fire by Elizabeth Hinton
The Blood of Emmett Till by Timothy B. Tyson
Elizabeth Fink
Tom Wicker

To support The Stacks and find out more from this week’s sponsors, click here.

To contribute to The Stacks, join The Stacks Pack, and get exclusive perks, check out our Patreon page. If you prefer to support the show with a one time contribution go to paypal.me/thestackspod.

The Stacks Book Club — September 2021

August 30, 2021August 29, 2021 ~ TheStacksPodcast ~ Leave a comment

If you’ve been a fan of The Stacks for a while you may know that there was one book that sparked my desire to start the show. I talk about the book all the time, but have never featured it on the show. The timing never seemed right, I never felt like I had the guest to take on such a transformational book. However, September 2021 marks the 50 year anniversary of the uprising at Attica Prison, and so this month, I am proud to say, we are finally reading Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy by Heather Ann Thompson for The Stacks Book Club.

In her Pulitzer Prize winning book Blood in the Water, Thompson takes the reader through the history of an event that has shaped the criminal legal system over the last 50 years. The book explains the conditions that led to the unrest in the prison, the five days of negotiations, the violent retaking of the prison, and the years of litigation that followed. The book is a master class in research and storytelling. Blood in the Water gives voice to the people who fought for over 45 years for the truth of Attica to be exposed.

We will be discussing Blood in the Water by Heather Ann Thompson on Wednesday, September 29th. You can find out who our guest will be for that discussion by listening to the podcast on September 1st. If you’d like even more discussion around the book consider joining The Stacks Pack on Patreon and participating in The Stacks’ monthly virtual book club.

Order your copy of our August book on Bookshop.org or Amazon.

To contribute to The Stacks, join The Stacks Pack, and get exclusive perks, check out our Patreon page (https://www.patreon.com/thestacks). We are beyond grateful for anything you’re able to give to support the production of The Stacks.