July 1, 2014 • 38 mins
Looking for a good, intelligent beach read? Join Robert and Julie for their annual Summer Reading episode, loaded with fiction and non-fiction reading recommendations for the curious mind: zombies, animals, Marilyn Monroe, torture, monsters, Muppets, Guillermo del Toro, skeptic science for kids and more.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuff
Works dot com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow
your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Julie Douglas,
and we have something about tradition here at Stuff to
Blow your Mind Every summer you only need the early
goings of summer. We devote an episode to just sharing
(00:24):
some of our personal weading recommendations for you. The Stuff
to Blow your Mind listener, it's right because summer breeze
makes you feel fine blowing through the jasmine of your mind.
You want a book to accompany that jasmine of your mind,
and we've got a bunch of recommendations here. That's right.
We have As always, we we try and get a
collection a little fiction, a little nonfiction, because you know,
(00:46):
we don't want just throw a whole bunch of scientific
books at you, and we're you know, we're probably not
going to hit you over the head with anything to stuffy.
But likewise, we know that ourreers have diverse taste and
we want to present you with some some fictional selections
as well. All right, so I'm gonna launch and are
because I feel like this is probably the best beachiest
read if you are going to the beach and you
do kind of want to put your brain on on
(01:07):
hold for a second, but you're really interested in knowing
how some people's brains work when it comes to their art.
And I'm talking about this book called Daily Rituals How
Artists Work, and it covers everybody from like Gustav Roubert,
Tony Morrison, Hruki Marakami, uh Igor Stravinsky. I mean it's
it's got a bunch of selections here that details the
(01:30):
sort of habits that these people are made up of
and how they create their art. And I find it
fascinating because, um, you may have some favorite authors and
here are favorite artists or even favorite scientists, and you
will find out how they started the day and more importantly,
how they obsessed. Because I feel like this is such
(01:50):
a great little way to eavesdrop on people and and
find out how they do the thing that they do. Yeah,
and just I was glancing through this earlier. Um, it's segmented, correct,
Like you can sort of skip through and you can
see an individual in the individual's name and hone in
on that section, right, Yeah, I mean yes, And it's
it's done in little chunks. So again, it's something you
(02:12):
can pick up and put down really easily. The writer
is Mason Curry, and he collected these. I believe he
has a website in which she sorted to detail people's
daily habits, people luminaries mostly. Um, I'll just read this
one little bit about Franz Kafka. This is frustrated with
his living quarters in day job, wrote in a letter
to police Bower in n quote. Time is short, my
(02:33):
strength is limited. The office is a horror, the apartment
is noisy. And if a pleasant, straightforward life is not possible,
then one must try to wriggle through by subtle maneuvers,
so you get insight into their psyche as well as
what their daily rituals are. Yeah, and you can say, hey,
his life is chaotic, and he got some stuff done
and made a name for himself. Maybe I can do
that too. There's even this great bit about Patricia Highsmith,
(02:56):
who is She wrote I believe the talented Mr Ripley,
about how she had this intense connection with animals, particularly snails,
and how she smuggled these snails into other countries by
attaching them to I think under her breast. Good stuff. Wow,
so there's another You know, she attached snails to her
(03:17):
breasts and she got stuff done. Maybe I can do
that as well, improving that's the answer work, all right. Well,
the first book I'm gonna bring up is is when
you may have heard me talk about a little bit before,
and that is Dark Banquet Blood and the Curious Lives
of Blood Feeding Creatures by Bill shoot Um. And he
has a website devoted to this book, which is dark
(03:38):
Banquet dot com. So this is a wonderful text, very accessible.
This is not a stuffy science Texas is a fun
science text. The book deals primarily with vampire bats, but
it also discusses a variety of natural other natural world
blood drinkers, and he goes into the surprisingly interconnected worlds
of natural world single of wars, and the mythic world
(04:02):
of humanoid vampires. He gets into into vampire hysteria and
in this interesting reality where you had the idea of
the vampire um in the West before we'd actually discovered
vampire bats. I'm gonna read just a quick little section
from this book. Clearly, though, once word of the existence
of real vampire bats began to circulate, a new supernatural
(04:24):
emphasis on these mysterious and as yet unidentified creatures began
to take shape. Bats living in Europe, where blood feeding
species had never existed, were gradually implicated as being vampires.
Hysteria and storytelling outpaced reason and science. Though to be frank,
science has done a lousy job of getting its vampire
bat story straight. So there's just a taste from the book,
(04:47):
Like I said, very accessible, fun and when I ran
across it, it it really blew my mind because I was
just doing a quick Monster Science Monster the Week post
on the blog series where I was just kind of thinking,
how would a human vampire have evolved? Uh, the the
answer or some suggestion of how this would work would
be would would best be found in the evolution of
(05:07):
the vampire bat. And when I was looking for a
good source on that, I ran across his text and
uh we ended up discussing this in a in an
episode on vampire bats. For stuff to blow your mind,
go back and listen to that. But essentially, you just
get into this crazy idea of in this crazy world
where you're you're imagining the evolution of this creature, how
does it how does it end up in this scenario
(05:28):
where it uh, it takes on blood uh as its
eventual primary mode of feeding itself. It's primary food, right,
because as we've discussed before, this is not an easy living.
You know, it's not like they found the get rich
quick scheme in the in the hunger game that is uh,
(05:49):
that is evolution. No, they ended up making a name
for themselves on a on a really poor source of sustenance. Yeah,
and I think it underscores this whole idea of of this,
this heartbreaking idea when you talk about predation and you
talk about being one of the animals and those circles.
Because again, we're pretty lucky to have gotten out of this,
(06:10):
right that no longer do we have predators going after us.
But this heartbreaking idea where you have to, you know,
constantly go after something, tear it apart, take its energy
for your own day after day, particularly with these vampire bats,
right night after night, you must seek this blood for sustenance.
(06:31):
And to me, that underscores the whole predation thing. In
the first place. We're all kind of vampires in a sense. Yeah,
I know, I'm one of vegetarian so plant vampire. Fine,
and their sun vampires so dirt vampires. Good point. Good point.
The next selection here is as a fiction work of fiction.
(06:54):
It is called The Girl with All the Gifts by
Mr Carey, and I guess you would put this in
the sci fi realm um. I don't want to say
too much about it because I don't I don't want
any plot spoilers here, but it is just it's grabbed
me by the khonies, the invisible coonies that I have,
and I'm just gonna read this little selection here says
every morning Melanie waits in herself to be collected for class.
(07:17):
When they come for her, sergeant keeps his gun pointing
at her while two of his people strap her into
the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes
that she won't bite, but they don't laugh. I mean
it just that's the beginning of it. And I'm reading
that because I want you guys to understand that this,
honestly is something that has completely arrested my attention here.
(07:39):
I know that I'm not through it all the way yet,
but it's excellent so far. Josh Weeden has said the
story of Melanie that people around her is so thoroughly crafted,
so heartfelt, remorseless, and painfully human. That it takes the
potentially tired trope of the zombie apocalypse and makes it
as fresh as it is terrifying. The story spirals towards
(07:59):
a conclusions so surprising, so warm, and yet so chilling,
that it takes a moment to realize it's been earned
since the first page and even before it left me
sighing with envious joy like i'd been Simmy. Simmy chanously
offered flowers and beaten at chess a jewel. So just
to give you guys an idea of of what it's
about and sort of accolades it's getting. Yeah, it sounds
(08:21):
fascinating and I can't help but wonder I did the
did the author take this on as a like a
challenge to say, I'm going to write a zombie apocalypse novel?
Even though that idea there everyone, when with any in
irrational thought, is going to say, don't write a zombie book.
Don't whatever you do, don't write a zombie apocalypse. But
but then she's she's done it, and she's made it work,
(08:43):
and she and done it in in a new and
exciting way. Yeah, I was making me think about Richard
Mouth heasons I am legend in the same way that
you're the internal state of this person is being plumbed
to the deepest depths that it's um that you kind
of forget that there's this other horrific story that it's
(09:03):
wrapped up And does that make sense? So and I
am legend you're this man is so isolated and there's
such existential terror having to board yourself up every night
to keep you know, the Boogeyman away, that you forget
that this is essentially a vampire story. And in the
same way, you know, um, the girl with all the
gifts is making you forget that this is a zombie story.
(09:26):
Very cool, Very cool. All right, Well, my next reading
recommendation is another book that we've mentioned on the podcast,
particularly in our Fraggle Rock Troglafauna episode, And this is
The Wider Worlds of Jim Hinson, essays on his work
and legacy beyond the Muppet Show in Sesame Street. Uh.
This was compiled was edited by Jennifer C. Garland and
(09:47):
Anissa M. Graham. You can find this in I think
it's cheapest as a kindle book. You can order a
physical copy as well. Uh. And I'm not going to
read an excerpt but I just want to roll through
the titles of some of the colle that essays by
various authors just to give you a taste about how
how deeply uh these authors dive into the world of Hinton,
which you know, ultimately is a very thought out world.
(10:10):
I mean, we Hinson wasn't just you know, spit firing
some ideas and saying, now, let's make something about some
muppets living in a cave. Now, that was a very
nuanced idea. They were setting out to achieve certain things
and and relate certain messages to a young audience. Yeah,
I mean psychological and talking about the bio diversity is
really interesting. Yeah. So you have a four different essays
(10:33):
on Fraggle Rock, including um, no sex, please were fragg
holes which gets into uh gender and fraggle Rock. Uh,
the wonderful Ecology of Fraggle Rock by Justin Verfel that
we are referenced. You see either various essays in here
about the Dark Crystal and Labyrinth, including uh interpreting the
various species in the Dark Crystal and Fraggle Rock, including
(10:54):
what was sundered and undone shall be whole Union nature
and agra in the Dark Crystal there are some essays
about the Storyteller series, which I adore as well. Um,
Everyone's Storyteller, the shifting rolls of story storyteller, storytellers and
audiences in the Jim Hinson Hour, Uh, there's some stuff
on em and Honor's jug Band Christmas of course. Um.
(11:15):
And then there's a let's see a couple here on
far Escape as well, including exploring the alien other of
far skate human puppet costume cosmetics. So if you are
a Hinston fan, if you are a you know, a
Labyrinth fan, Dark Crystal fan, Frankle Flan fan, It's, etcetera,
this is a book you really should check out because
they all all the authors take a deep, loving dive
(11:36):
into these creations. All right, And speaking of representations of animals,
my next pick is a non fiction pick um. It's
called Wild Ones. It's sometimes dismaying, weirdly reassuring story about
looking at people looking at animals in America. And it's
by John Well um um who's also the author of
(11:57):
the two thousand and ten New York Times piece and
Animals Be Gay, which we did episode on based on
his writing and research. So I was really excited when
this book came out because I think that he has
a very interesting perspective and his stuff is really well researched. UM.
I was also very interested in his perspective on the
(12:19):
relationship between animals and humans because he comes at it
from the angle of In two thousand and ten, he
became a father, he became a new parent, and all
of a sudden, he was aware of this, this deluge
of animal themed things coming into his life via his child.
So you know what I'm talking about, Yeah, you get you.
(12:41):
You all of a sudden have five books about animals,
You have pajamas with animals on them, you have you know,
um songs about animals. And he began to think about
this in very serious terms, like what does this mean?
This is a very illusory, uh fictional world that we're
creating thing for these children. This is a fairy tale
(13:02):
about animals when in fact, the actual state of animals
and the animal kingdom on Earth now is going to
be vastly different. When when you know, my daughter reaches
the age of thirty, polar bears may not exist. So
he started to take this on this idea of conservation
(13:23):
and extinction, and he looks at I believe it's butterflies,
polar bears, and the whooping crane, and follows their specific
um trajectories through conservation through um looming extinction, and how
humans are are actually trying to affect change. And it
does get depressing at times because um, I don't want
(13:46):
to ruin it for people. But the way in which
we're going about this, he may argue, is that we
may be creating a world that cannot sustain an animal
kingdom in earnest as it has in the past. So
even trying to conserve animals maybe uh, sort of a
zero sum game because we have so altered the landscape
(14:07):
and we are squarely in the anthroposyne era in which
is the man made era, and we are manipulating everything
around us. So it's a good one to read at
the barbecue this summer, that's what you're saying. It is
something that you should corner one of her family members
about at the barbecue and just depressed the hell out
of them. Sounds good, I mean, if you like me.
(14:28):
I mean I I like a good sobering read, you know.
I mean we're not talking about escapist books here. We're
talking about books that they make you think, make you
re evaluate humanities, uh trajectory, your own personal trajectory. Well, yeah,
and he's also digging deeper into um, you know, subconscious
(14:49):
here too. He's saying, like, why why aren't those polar
bears effective anymore? Have their cuteness actually usurped their message
or the message that controversations are trying to put out
there about habitat loss and extinction, And so it's very interesting.
It sort of talks about how psychologically we are taking
all this information in, how it's essentially becoming ineffective and
(15:12):
why that is. Anyway, Yes, it's a it's a good read. Now, Julie,
I understand that you are about maybe halfway through um
watching True Detective, the HBO series right now? Correct, yes, yeah,
and you you're enjoying it? Yes? Can you see the
spirals in my eyes? So I cannot think of better writing,
better storytelling, and also UM stories that hit on a
(15:36):
lot of the things that we talked about. Yeah, I
was when when I first started watching it, which was
I guess it was like three or four episodes into
the run, and I started hearing all the buzz and
people were cornering me null here in the recording studio,
was cornering me and producer asking me if I was reading,
if I was watching at and why I had not
watched the yet. It was hitting all these various themes
that we've covered before. It was lining up with some
(15:58):
of my own personal interests. So I love the show.
And afterwards, I was really interested in the show's creator
and writer, uh Nick Pizo Alatta, because clearly this is
a guy whose brain is lining up with my own
in some respects, and it's created some art that I'm
really into. So I discovered his book, Galveston, a novel
and uh I very strongly recommended, particularly if you're if
(16:19):
you were a fan of a true detective and you
want a little more of that kind of flavoring. UM
in anticipation of a second season eventually coming out. Now,
I wanna preface and say this is not a book
that is rife with a bunch of super mysterious intrigue.
There's no there's no mention of Yellow Kings, there's no
uh sort of love crafty and sort of elements in
(16:42):
the works. Um. But but it does have a lot
of the uh, the the feel that you would find
in the in some of the characters in true detective. Now,
this novel deals with a character of the name of
Roy Caddy who's a criminal, career criminal living in New
Orleans and and he finds out that he has a
terminal illness, or right about the time that he that,
he finds out that his boss is a dangerous loan
(17:05):
sharking bar owner wants him dead. So there's this uh,
brutal sequence where he's double cross, barely makes out and
makes it out of town with his life and he
ends up on the run into coastal Texas with a
prostitute and a young girl, and from there it just
goes into some very interesting places. I don't want to
(17:27):
give anything away, but but you do have a character
who's really coming to terms with with what's important in life.
What's he gonna do with the rest of the life
that he has here? How does that square with what
he's made of his life so far? And it's just
beautifully written. Um. I was really impressed with Pizolato's use
of language in this novel. Um that the character at
(17:49):
times feels like he is kind of cut from the
same cloth as the rust Coal character, Like they're like,
there may be sort of cosmic twins in some way.
But yeah, beautiful read and at the end I actually
ended up tearing up a bit, so I'm not gonna
I do have one little section when I read for you.
I really want to read you, read you the last
(18:09):
couple of paragraphs, but that would be spoiling things. We
were silent for a long stretch. Then, with the wind
shushing outside and the rhythm of a skier, a cloud
riddled heaven sealed the horizon, and I felt like we
were bugs crawling along the edge of the world, which
we were in a way. I kept this westward, the
sun at our backs, the girl's faces turning sleepy. That
old rule came back. You do your own time, not
(18:31):
someone else's. But what about after your own time is done?
I wondered. I looked down at the little girl sleeping,
one fist curled under her chin. Why did you take
the silencer off? I asked. Rocky shrugged and followed something
out the window. I thought it looked meaner without it,
I said, have you ever been to Galveston? She shook
her head. So there's just a taste again already. I'm like,
(18:54):
they're in that scene, so yeah, don't go into it. Expecting,
you know, another slice of True Detective. But if you
appreciate did the writing appreciated some of the feel of
that show, then you really can't go wrong with that book.
And last I checked, the Kindle version is available for
like twine, so you're basically losing money if you don't
buy it. There you go. Alright, So in the realm
(19:14):
of fiction, Joyce Carol Oates, the pick that I have
here is Blonde. I believe this came out maybe in
two thousand. It's an older book, but I wanted to
go back to it because I think we were talking
about Marilyn Monroe and her breathiness, and that got MA
hated thinking, like I really would like to know more
about Marilyn Monroe. And Joyce Carroll Oates is one of
(19:35):
my favorite writers. Um. The first time I was sort
of indoctrinated with her writing was in a short story
where are You Going? Where Have You Been? And that's
about a teenager named Connie, and she's got a really
bad case of teenager on we at the same time,
she's got this burgeoning sexuality that she's trying to deal with.
(19:56):
And what I love about this story is that is
a kind of coming age story that everybody knows about
that they never discussed. And what I'm talking about here
is like the burden of sexuality as a woman and
essentially what that sometimes boils down to his predator and prey.
And in that short story, um, this guy arnold friend
shows up as the predator and this golden convertible and
(20:18):
this this gold convertible becomes this kind of like death
chariot for kind. So the reason I bring this short
story up is because Blonde is about Marilyn Monroe obviously,
but more about that burden of sexuality, and it is
just a phenomenal take on this historic, iconic person who
(20:39):
is in many ways unknowable and yet somehow Oates has
gotten into her internal life, her into her thoughts what
I think might be her thoughts, right, and has written
this narrative that is so compelling that you think that
you are reading Marilyn Mina Rose diary. And it's starts
(21:00):
out with marily Monrose child and follows her through her
suicide and it is so gripping I can't even tell you,
like it's probably one of the most haunting texts that
I've ever read. And I don't know how she did it.
I really feel like that's one of those moments where
she was struck by the muse and how she inhabited UM,
this person who is very much sort of a flat
(21:23):
character force. Right, it's this Um, this woman who is
innocence and yet she's the sex kitten, and you see
through this, this lens of her life, this other side
to her. Maybe how she became Marilyn Monroe and Maril Monroe,
by the way, in real life was freighted with all
sorts of problems since we know and her mother UM
(21:45):
had some very bad mental problems UM that obviously showed
up in Marial Monrose life. Anyway, let me just read
this New York Times review real quick, because I think
it is pithy, and I will go on and on
if I don't stop myself by reading this. So it says,
and although sometimes sloppy and sentimental, it is perhaps the
most ferocious fictional treatise ever written on the uninhabitable grotesqueness
(22:08):
of femininity. No one embodied femininity better than mal Monroe,
who concocted a persona who seemed to exist only for
sex and at the same time to be oblivious of it.
Who possessed an eroticism that was all responsiveness and no desire.
How else to cater to a masculine sexuality that hates
itself and demands that females receive and bear away that
(22:31):
hatred like dutiful wives cleaning up after a husband's violent binge.
And I thought that was that was great. That really
takes the spirit of this book and the spirit of
those times in which Miller Monroe um came to inhabit
all of these anxieties about sexuality excellent. Well, I have
to I have to admit that when I when I
(22:51):
first heard about that book, it was hard for me
to get excited about it because I love Joyce Carol Oates.
Most of what I've read a verse is uh, you know,
strange fiction stories that she's written and u uh and
we've read read a longer work or two sort of
dealing with with twisted, flawed individuals, um grotesque individuals and
(23:13):
so the cell. Oh, she wrote a book about Marilyn Monroe.
Just on the surface, it doesn't seem to match up,
you know, because I'm thinking thinking, Joyce Carol Oates is
on one end of the spectrum. Uh, Marilyn Monroe is
on the other and and and never the two should meet.
But but now that you've explained it, I mean it
makes perfect since you mentioned the grotesqueness of femininity, so
I mean that that bridges the gap right there. So
(23:36):
I'm I'm actually more interested in checking the book out
myself now. Yeah. And her narrative techniques are fascinating, and
she uses smell a lot, and you wouldn't think that, like, oh,
I'm going to read this book about Marin Monroe and
there's one of the tropes is going to be smell,
and it comes to symbolize and really it even comes
to to sort of symbolize, um, Milen Monroe's attempt to
(23:56):
try to escape her more working class ressroots, you know,
um and then a sent to stardom through the sense
of smell. It's fascinating. But yeah, I mean this is
the person Joyce Carol Ows who wrote the book Zombie
about dam Yeah, great book. You've read that one, Yeah, yeah,
of course, yeah, so you wouldn't you wouldn't think Dahmer
(24:16):
Marilyn Monroe. But again, it it sounds like it works
in her capable hands. Sure. My next selection is one
is another one that I would definitely put in this
category of the cell maybe not sounding all that great
on the surface of things. And the book is sixty
three by Stephen King. Now I'm a long time King fan,
so I don't have to come. I don't have to
(24:37):
get over a Stephen King hurdle. I think some people
have that in their mind, like, here's a very popular author.
Uh he's and he's been churning out books like crazy
for years. Is he deserving of my attention? I would argue, yes,
I think I think Stephen King has has earned his place,
uh and has certainly earned his his literary reputation on
top of his commercial reputation. But even m for me,
(25:00):
this was a hard sell because the the idea on
the book here is, hey, what have you traveled back
in time to stop the Kennedy assassination, which of course
occurred one It's kind of an interesting thought experiment, you know,
you get into what happened, What would happen if you
could travel back in time? What would happen if you
change things? The butterfly effect of changing something in history? Um,
(25:21):
And that's fascinating, but it doesn't necessarily um connect with
me beyond that I like I, so when the book
came out, I just kind of noticed that it existed
and moved on. And then just in the last fall,
I was in a situation where, of course I had
a new child in the house. I seemed like I
was spending a lot of time, uh, laying on the
floor of his bedroom waiting for him to go to
(25:42):
sleep so I could sneak out. And friends sent me
a kindle copy of this book, and I started reading
it and just could not put it down. It was
just it's just highly addictive right from the beginning. There's
no there's no hurdle to overcome in reading three because
one of the really fascinating things here is, first of all,
there's no worrying about time travel science, how you do it? Basically,
(26:03):
magic portal opens up. How does it work? Who knows?
Maybe it's a wormhole, maybe it's magic. Don't concern your
stuff with that, because it's it's The story is ultimately
about more than that. The idea is that this portal
only opens up to a period in the past prior
to three, and so in order to go back in
time and change the past, you would have to go back.
(26:26):
Uh you have you have to live in the past,
you have to go back into the past and live
for like for you know, a year or two to
reach the point where you could change history. And there
are these added complications and that you get into the
idea that the time stream is like it's like a river,
and to try and divert a river, there's there's resistance.
(26:47):
So our character as he goes back in time and
ultimately sets out on this quest to change history, he
begins to encounter resistance to the change. So he's trying
to be injected out of that time stream. Um, yeah,
to to a sense, it's sort of like there's so
much writing on the way things work that there's a
resistance to making small changes in the time stream, but
(27:07):
he's trying to make a large one, and in doing so,
the forces against him are are almost immeasurable. So it's, uh,
it's a fascinating read. It's really one of the best
King books I've read in quite some time. So they recommend, well, yeah,
and I think that again, he is someone who is
also just a master at his craft, and so I
can't imagine a bad turn at a character or even
(27:30):
just a plot line with him. And you also learned
way more about the Kennedy assassination than you ever thought
you wanted to know. Okay, that means that you can
drop in on those conspiracy theory chat rooms, right, Yeah,
and then you know what they're talking about. You know
who some of these figures are because they show up
as figures in this book because part of it too.
If the character goes back in time and he's not
certain there's no one, they think there's like a nineties
(27:52):
something percent chance that it that it is just the
lone gunment theory. But what if you don't want to
go back and and kill Lee Harvey Oswald if there's
even like a two percent five percent chance even that
he's not the guy, and then ultimately you wouldn't be
able to change your history anyway. Yeah, and by the way,
Marilyn Monroe is wrapped up into this as well, So
(28:12):
you have fitting fitting pair of books there for the summer. Indeed,
all right, My last pick here is Cabinet of Curiosities,
My Notebooks, Collections and Other Obsessions by Guiannimo and Mark
Scott Zacrie. And this was actually a book that I
got for my husband because um, he likes Del Toro
(28:33):
and he really likes a lot of this for I
don't know if you would call it this like monster aesthetic,
an art, grotesque ery. I don't know, but I've been
pouring through it. It is kind of a much bigger,
deep than that Daily Ritual's book I was talking about
where you get to appear into artist lives. Here is
(28:54):
this this really like lens into del Toro's life. You
get to see his collection, just stuff that he collects.
In fact, I'm looking at this picture right now of
a life size sculpture of HP Lovecraft by Thomas Cubler,
which is watching over the horror library at the Bleak House. Um,
(29:15):
I mean he has a life size closure of HP
Lovecraft leering at you as you walk around the house.
Very odd look on HP lovecraft face. And so you
also have some of his influences, so Mary Shelley and
Lovecraft of course, and Arthur mackin ed Garland Poe is
it Macinnermashon, I'm not sure, but author of The Great
(29:38):
God Pan which is an extremely creepy short story. Yeah.
So in this sense, I think you get a lot
more than you would bargain for from someone who is
um a director, right, You would normally think, oh, maybe
I'll get a little bit of access to how he works,
but no, you get everything. It looks like here um
short of a personal tour of his own home. So
(30:00):
I just thought it was great for anybody who is
interested in some of the monster science that you have
been covering, um, and anybody who is interested in his films,
because he's got thoughts for new films kind of scribbled
in there, bits of dialogue. Um, He's got other bits
of dialogue from plays and from stories that have colored
(30:21):
his perception. And then of course just his sketches are fascinating. Yeah,
his sketches are amazing, And apparently when he pitches projects
like the sketches are very much a part of it,
and they're the sketches sketches are are part of his
writing process and a part of his way of of
bringing his own ideas together and then ultimately presenting them
to the studios. Yeah, so it is really kind of
(30:43):
like cracking up in his brain. You're able to see
all his obsessions, his influences, and then how he thinks
and his representation of that and sketches is beautiful. Yeah, yeah,
not a beautiful but horrifically beautiful. Yeah, that's the thing.
He gets horrifically beautiful better than than just about anybody.
And I mean certainly see in his work there's there's
(31:04):
so much monstrosity. He genuinely loves monsters and understands what
monsters are. You see a great deal of Catholic imagery.
Like especially with Blade too. I love that he created
a vampire that could only be killed by staking it
through the side of the rib cage. Uh as in
(31:24):
the same way that Christ dies on the Cross when
the spear enters the rib cage and pierces the heart.
Uh And he you know, he has his whole, this
whole design in place where the bone is u is
too solid over the heart so you can only go
in through the side. I mean, it's just I love
the man's aesthetic. It's wonderful, which makes it that much
more exciting to know that he's working on HP Lovecrafts
(31:47):
at the Mountains of Madness. And in fact, there's a
couple of pages dedicated to that as well, So that
level of detail. Seeing that come across and a film
is would be amazing. Yeah, I really, I really hope
that project comes together. It sounds sounds wonderful. Alright. I
have one more reading suggestion, and this one has to
do with monsters, and it's for young readers, so um uh,
(32:07):
this one is certainly worth picking up. It's called Monsters
and Water Beast Creatures of Fact or Fiction by Karen Miller,
with illustrations by Sergio Rousier. And this is uh. This
looks at a number of different monsters, including Bigfoot, the
Big Bird of Texas, hoop Snakes, Mothman, the Jersey Devil,
and then the water Beast, uh, Sea Maiden of Biloxi, chant,
(32:28):
the Sea Serpent of Gloucester, and the Cadborosaurus. Uh. This
is uh. This is ultimately a skeptics book on monsters
for young readers. I mean, I mean I enjoy it,
so you don't have to be you don't have to
be too young to get into it. But it's uh,
it's wonderfully illustrated. It's it's looking at these creatures from
a skeptical point of view, but a fun point of view.
(32:50):
It's it's you know, it's not full of negativity. It
doesn't say don't love your monsters, because clearly this is
a book that loves the monsters. While also saying, hey,
I can, I can love this and also a lie
a skeptic mind to it. So if you have a
young reader or not a young reader in your household
that is interested in monsters and and has that kind
of skeptical mindset, then I highly recommend it. Indeed, which
(33:14):
is actually a good reminder about your monster series called
Monster Science. You should check that out on our mind
Stuff YouTube channel. Yes, we have six episodes of it,
and we're plotting six more. I'll let you know when
those come to fruition. All right, Well what about you, Julia,
do you have anything you were planning to read later
this summer or later this year? Well, what's what's on
(33:35):
the future? What's on the two? Read shell Um The
Martian by Andy, We're in The Leftovers by Tom proto
which Nolan, producer told me he is actually being made
into a series. I believe. Oh. I've seen the ads
for it an HBO and I can't tell what it's
about except screaming and pain. And I think it's people
who suddenly disappear. Really yeah, yeah. I have picked it
(33:57):
up in my hands a couple of times and looked
at it, and I have bought it yet, but it's
on my list very very good. Uh. Two things I'm
looking forward to reading. One, I don't know when this
is coming out, hopefully sometime. It's supposedly coming out this year,
sooner the better for my taste. And that is The
Unholy Consult by our Scott Baker. I've mentioned Baker before
(34:20):
on the podcast, probably way too many times. Actually he uh,
he's written. He wrote a Disciple of the Dog, he
wrote Neuropath, and he also wrote the trilogy The Prince
of Nothing trilogy, followed by the the trilogy The Aspect Emperor.
This is the third book in the Aspect Emperor trilogy.
These all these uh, the both these trilogies take place
(34:41):
in this dark fantasy world that it's created. You can think,
think Game of Thrones, but with more sort of dark
love Craft I and Clark Ashton Smithy sort of magic
going on. But also Baker is deeply immersed in um
in philosophy and neuroscience, so all all of everything he's creating,
(35:02):
it's uh, it really like it's not pure escapism because
even though you're reading about say, uh, you know, a
barbarian on on the planes of some dark fantasy epic world.
Uh that that character is is struggling with with the
with his own self in a way that really forces
you to reconsider uh you know, your own predicament. It's
(35:23):
it's tremendous stuff. I highly highly recommend it, and I'm
really looking forward to reading Beyond Holy Consult when it
comes out. A bit of nonfiction that I'm looking forward
to reading as of this morning is The Body and
Pain The Making and Unmaking of the World by Elaine Scary.
I heard about this one listening to the episode Unspeakable
(35:45):
Acts on the CBC radio program Ideas with Paul Kennedy, which,
for for my money, is just about the best uh
podcast or radio show out their Ideas CBC Paul Kennedy,
check it out if you haven't. But this this book
by Scary, apparently, you know, gets into this idea of
pain and torture in a really deep manner. Looking at
(36:08):
pain is is frame breaking, context breaking, our difficulty to
understand the pain of others, the terrible power of torture
to destroy the language. Uh. There's a quote just from
the intro of the book where she says, this book
is about the way other persons become visible to us
or cease to be visible to us. It's about the
way we make ourselves available to one another. So I'm
(36:32):
as someone who has late been been interested in elements
of torture and pain, this seems like a must read
book for me. Yeah. It sounds like she'll be covering
the territory of of objectifying someone and creating that space. Yeah,
like a very interesting realm to explore. Yeah, she she
speaks in this uh this Ideas episode. I mentioned unspeakable acts,
(36:55):
and it's really really interesting to hear her talk about
about pain and in these terms that I hadn't even
thought about yet. So so yeah, check check out the
Ideas of podcast radio show and and check out The
Body and Pain if this is the topic of interest
to you as well. What does the author's name again?
Elaine scary S C A R R. Y Okay, So
(37:17):
dominative determinism at work again? Yeah? Yeah, indeed, part philosophical meditation,
part cultural critique. All right, Um, I bet you guys
have some books that you would like to recommend, But
please let us know, like, what is the number one
thing on your list to read or that you would recommend.
Either way, we would love to know you can find us,
of course, that's stuff to blow your Mind dot com. Yeah,
(37:38):
and that's where you will find all our blog post episodes,
our podcasts, our videos, as well as links out to
our social media accounts such as tumbler, Twitter and Facebook.
And there is still an old fashioned way to get
in touch with us as well. That's right. You could
send an old creaky email to us at blew the
Mind at how stuff works dot com. For moralness and
(38:01):
thousands of other topics, visit hastaff works dot com
Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuff
Works dot com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow
your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Julie Douglas,
and we have something about tradition here at Stuff to
Blow your Mind Every summer you only need the early
goings of summer. We devote an episode to just sharing
(00:24):
some of our personal weading recommendations for you. The Stuff
to Blow your Mind listener, it's right because summer breeze
makes you feel fine blowing through the jasmine of your mind.
You want a book to accompany that jasmine of your mind,
and we've got a bunch of recommendations here. That's right.
We have As always, we we try and get a
collection a little fiction, a little nonfiction, because you know,
(00:46):
we don't want just throw a whole bunch of scientific
books at you, and we're you know, we're probably not
going to hit you over the head with anything to stuffy.
But likewise, we know that ourreers have diverse taste and
we want to present you with some some fictional selections
as well. All right, so I'm gonna launch and are
because I feel like this is probably the best beachiest
read if you are going to the beach and you
do kind of want to put your brain on on
(01:07):
hold for a second, but you're really interested in knowing
how some people's brains work when it comes to their art.
And I'm talking about this book called Daily Rituals How
Artists Work, and it covers everybody from like Gustav Roubert,
Tony Morrison, Hruki Marakami, uh Igor Stravinsky. I mean it's
it's got a bunch of selections here that details the
(01:30):
sort of habits that these people are made up of
and how they create their art. And I find it
fascinating because, um, you may have some favorite authors and
here are favorite artists or even favorite scientists, and you
will find out how they started the day and more importantly,
how they obsessed. Because I feel like this is such
(01:50):
a great little way to eavesdrop on people and and
find out how they do the thing that they do. Yeah,
and just I was glancing through this earlier. Um, it's segmented, correct,
Like you can sort of skip through and you can
see an individual in the individual's name and hone in
on that section, right, Yeah, I mean yes, And it's
it's done in little chunks. So again, it's something you
(02:12):
can pick up and put down really easily. The writer
is Mason Curry, and he collected these. I believe he
has a website in which she sorted to detail people's
daily habits, people luminaries mostly. Um, I'll just read this
one little bit about Franz Kafka. This is frustrated with
his living quarters in day job, wrote in a letter
to police Bower in n quote. Time is short, my
(02:33):
strength is limited. The office is a horror, the apartment
is noisy. And if a pleasant, straightforward life is not possible,
then one must try to wriggle through by subtle maneuvers,
so you get insight into their psyche as well as
what their daily rituals are. Yeah, and you can say, hey,
his life is chaotic, and he got some stuff done
and made a name for himself. Maybe I can do
that too. There's even this great bit about Patricia Highsmith,
(02:56):
who is She wrote I believe the talented Mr Ripley,
about how she had this intense connection with animals, particularly snails,
and how she smuggled these snails into other countries by
attaching them to I think under her breast. Good stuff. Wow,
so there's another You know, she attached snails to her
(03:17):
breasts and she got stuff done. Maybe I can do
that as well, improving that's the answer work, all right. Well,
the first book I'm gonna bring up is is when
you may have heard me talk about a little bit before,
and that is Dark Banquet Blood and the Curious Lives
of Blood Feeding Creatures by Bill shoot Um. And he
has a website devoted to this book, which is dark
(03:38):
Banquet dot com. So this is a wonderful text, very accessible.
This is not a stuffy science Texas is a fun
science text. The book deals primarily with vampire bats, but
it also discusses a variety of natural other natural world
blood drinkers, and he goes into the surprisingly interconnected worlds
of natural world single of wars, and the mythic world
(04:02):
of humanoid vampires. He gets into into vampire hysteria and
in this interesting reality where you had the idea of
the vampire um in the West before we'd actually discovered
vampire bats. I'm gonna read just a quick little section
from this book. Clearly, though, once word of the existence
of real vampire bats began to circulate, a new supernatural
(04:24):
emphasis on these mysterious and as yet unidentified creatures began
to take shape. Bats living in Europe, where blood feeding
species had never existed, were gradually implicated as being vampires.
Hysteria and storytelling outpaced reason and science. Though to be frank,
science has done a lousy job of getting its vampire
bat story straight. So there's just a taste from the book,
(04:47):
Like I said, very accessible, fun and when I ran
across it, it it really blew my mind because I was
just doing a quick Monster Science Monster the Week post
on the blog series where I was just kind of thinking,
how would a human vampire have evolved? Uh, the the
answer or some suggestion of how this would work would
be would would best be found in the evolution of
(05:07):
the vampire bat. And when I was looking for a
good source on that, I ran across his text and
uh we ended up discussing this in a in an
episode on vampire bats. For stuff to blow your mind,
go back and listen to that. But essentially, you just
get into this crazy idea of in this crazy world
where you're you're imagining the evolution of this creature, how
does it how does it end up in this scenario
(05:28):
where it uh, it takes on blood uh as its
eventual primary mode of feeding itself. It's primary food, right,
because as we've discussed before, this is not an easy living.
You know, it's not like they found the get rich
quick scheme in the in the hunger game that is uh,
(05:49):
that is evolution. No, they ended up making a name
for themselves on a on a really poor source of sustenance. Yeah,
and I think it underscores this whole idea of of this,
this heartbreaking idea when you talk about predation and you
talk about being one of the animals and those circles.
Because again, we're pretty lucky to have gotten out of this,
(06:10):
right that no longer do we have predators going after us.
But this heartbreaking idea where you have to, you know,
constantly go after something, tear it apart, take its energy
for your own day after day, particularly with these vampire bats,
right night after night, you must seek this blood for sustenance.
(06:31):
And to me, that underscores the whole predation thing. In
the first place. We're all kind of vampires in a sense. Yeah,
I know, I'm one of vegetarian so plant vampire. Fine,
and their sun vampires so dirt vampires. Good point. Good point.
The next selection here is as a fiction work of fiction.
(06:54):
It is called The Girl with All the Gifts by
Mr Carey, and I guess you would put this in
the sci fi realm um. I don't want to say
too much about it because I don't I don't want
any plot spoilers here, but it is just it's grabbed
me by the khonies, the invisible coonies that I have,
and I'm just gonna read this little selection here says
every morning Melanie waits in herself to be collected for class.
(07:17):
When they come for her, sergeant keeps his gun pointing
at her while two of his people strap her into
the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes
that she won't bite, but they don't laugh. I mean
it just that's the beginning of it. And I'm reading
that because I want you guys to understand that this,
honestly is something that has completely arrested my attention here.
(07:39):
I know that I'm not through it all the way yet,
but it's excellent so far. Josh Weeden has said the
story of Melanie that people around her is so thoroughly crafted,
so heartfelt, remorseless, and painfully human. That it takes the
potentially tired trope of the zombie apocalypse and makes it
as fresh as it is terrifying. The story spirals towards
(07:59):
a conclusions so surprising, so warm, and yet so chilling,
that it takes a moment to realize it's been earned
since the first page and even before it left me
sighing with envious joy like i'd been Simmy. Simmy chanously
offered flowers and beaten at chess a jewel. So just
to give you guys an idea of of what it's
about and sort of accolades it's getting. Yeah, it sounds
(08:21):
fascinating and I can't help but wonder I did the
did the author take this on as a like a
challenge to say, I'm going to write a zombie apocalypse novel?
Even though that idea there everyone, when with any in
irrational thought, is going to say, don't write a zombie book.
Don't whatever you do, don't write a zombie apocalypse. But
but then she's she's done it, and she's made it work,
(08:43):
and she and done it in in a new and
exciting way. Yeah, I was making me think about Richard
Mouth heasons I am legend in the same way that
you're the internal state of this person is being plumbed
to the deepest depths that it's um that you kind
of forget that there's this other horrific story that it's
(09:03):
wrapped up And does that make sense? So and I
am legend you're this man is so isolated and there's
such existential terror having to board yourself up every night
to keep you know, the Boogeyman away, that you forget
that this is essentially a vampire story. And in the
same way, you know, um, the girl with all the
gifts is making you forget that this is a zombie story.
(09:26):
Very cool, Very cool. All right, Well, my next reading
recommendation is another book that we've mentioned on the podcast,
particularly in our Fraggle Rock Troglafauna episode, And this is
The Wider Worlds of Jim Hinson, essays on his work
and legacy beyond the Muppet Show in Sesame Street. Uh.
This was compiled was edited by Jennifer C. Garland and
(09:47):
Anissa M. Graham. You can find this in I think
it's cheapest as a kindle book. You can order a
physical copy as well. Uh. And I'm not going to
read an excerpt but I just want to roll through
the titles of some of the colle that essays by
various authors just to give you a taste about how
how deeply uh these authors dive into the world of Hinton,
which you know, ultimately is a very thought out world.
(10:10):
I mean, we Hinson wasn't just you know, spit firing
some ideas and saying, now, let's make something about some
muppets living in a cave. Now, that was a very
nuanced idea. They were setting out to achieve certain things
and and relate certain messages to a young audience. Yeah,
I mean psychological and talking about the bio diversity is
really interesting. Yeah. So you have a four different essays
(10:33):
on Fraggle Rock, including um, no sex, please were fragg
holes which gets into uh gender and fraggle Rock. Uh,
the wonderful Ecology of Fraggle Rock by Justin Verfel that
we are referenced. You see either various essays in here
about the Dark Crystal and Labyrinth, including uh interpreting the
various species in the Dark Crystal and Fraggle Rock, including
(10:54):
what was sundered and undone shall be whole Union nature
and agra in the Dark Crystal there are some essays
about the Storyteller series, which I adore as well. Um,
Everyone's Storyteller, the shifting rolls of story storyteller, storytellers and
audiences in the Jim Hinson Hour, Uh, there's some stuff
on em and Honor's jug Band Christmas of course. Um.
(11:15):
And then there's a let's see a couple here on
far Escape as well, including exploring the alien other of
far skate human puppet costume cosmetics. So if you are
a Hinston fan, if you are a you know, a
Labyrinth fan, Dark Crystal fan, Frankle Flan fan, It's, etcetera,
this is a book you really should check out because
they all all the authors take a deep, loving dive
(11:36):
into these creations. All right, And speaking of representations of animals,
my next pick is a non fiction pick um. It's
called Wild Ones. It's sometimes dismaying, weirdly reassuring story about
looking at people looking at animals in America. And it's
by John Well um um who's also the author of
(11:57):
the two thousand and ten New York Times piece and
Animals Be Gay, which we did episode on based on
his writing and research. So I was really excited when
this book came out because I think that he has
a very interesting perspective and his stuff is really well researched. UM.
I was also very interested in his perspective on the
(12:19):
relationship between animals and humans because he comes at it
from the angle of In two thousand and ten, he
became a father, he became a new parent, and all
of a sudden, he was aware of this, this deluge
of animal themed things coming into his life via his child.
So you know what I'm talking about, Yeah, you get you.
(12:41):
You all of a sudden have five books about animals,
You have pajamas with animals on them, you have you know,
um songs about animals. And he began to think about
this in very serious terms, like what does this mean?
This is a very illusory, uh fictional world that we're
creating thing for these children. This is a fairy tale
(13:02):
about animals when in fact, the actual state of animals
and the animal kingdom on Earth now is going to
be vastly different. When when you know, my daughter reaches
the age of thirty, polar bears may not exist. So
he started to take this on this idea of conservation
(13:23):
and extinction, and he looks at I believe it's butterflies,
polar bears, and the whooping crane, and follows their specific
um trajectories through conservation through um looming extinction, and how
humans are are actually trying to affect change. And it
does get depressing at times because um, I don't want
(13:46):
to ruin it for people. But the way in which
we're going about this, he may argue, is that we
may be creating a world that cannot sustain an animal
kingdom in earnest as it has in the past. So
even trying to conserve animals maybe uh, sort of a
zero sum game because we have so altered the landscape
(14:07):
and we are squarely in the anthroposyne era in which
is the man made era, and we are manipulating everything
around us. So it's a good one to read at
the barbecue this summer, that's what you're saying. It is
something that you should corner one of her family members
about at the barbecue and just depressed the hell out
of them. Sounds good, I mean, if you like me.
(14:28):
I mean I I like a good sobering read, you know.
I mean we're not talking about escapist books here. We're
talking about books that they make you think, make you
re evaluate humanities, uh trajectory, your own personal trajectory. Well, yeah,
and he's also digging deeper into um, you know, subconscious
(14:49):
here too. He's saying, like, why why aren't those polar
bears effective anymore? Have their cuteness actually usurped their message
or the message that controversations are trying to put out
there about habitat loss and extinction, And so it's very interesting.
It sort of talks about how psychologically we are taking
all this information in, how it's essentially becoming ineffective and
(15:12):
why that is. Anyway, Yes, it's a it's a good read. Now, Julie,
I understand that you are about maybe halfway through um
watching True Detective, the HBO series right now? Correct, yes, yeah,
and you you're enjoying it? Yes? Can you see the
spirals in my eyes? So I cannot think of better writing,
better storytelling, and also UM stories that hit on a
(15:36):
lot of the things that we talked about. Yeah, I
was when when I first started watching it, which was
I guess it was like three or four episodes into
the run, and I started hearing all the buzz and
people were cornering me null here in the recording studio,
was cornering me and producer asking me if I was reading,
if I was watching at and why I had not
watched the yet. It was hitting all these various themes
that we've covered before. It was lining up with some
(15:58):
of my own personal interests. So I love the show.
And afterwards, I was really interested in the show's creator
and writer, uh Nick Pizo Alatta, because clearly this is
a guy whose brain is lining up with my own
in some respects, and it's created some art that I'm
really into. So I discovered his book, Galveston, a novel
and uh I very strongly recommended, particularly if you're if
(16:19):
you were a fan of a true detective and you
want a little more of that kind of flavoring. UM
in anticipation of a second season eventually coming out. Now,
I wanna preface and say this is not a book
that is rife with a bunch of super mysterious intrigue.
There's no there's no mention of Yellow Kings, there's no
uh sort of love crafty and sort of elements in
(16:42):
the works. Um. But but it does have a lot
of the uh, the the feel that you would find
in the in some of the characters in true detective. Now,
this novel deals with a character of the name of
Roy Caddy who's a criminal, career criminal living in New
Orleans and and he finds out that he has a
terminal illness, or right about the time that he that,
he finds out that his boss is a dangerous loan
(17:05):
sharking bar owner wants him dead. So there's this uh,
brutal sequence where he's double cross, barely makes out and
makes it out of town with his life and he
ends up on the run into coastal Texas with a
prostitute and a young girl, and from there it just
goes into some very interesting places. I don't want to
(17:27):
give anything away, but but you do have a character
who's really coming to terms with with what's important in life.
What's he gonna do with the rest of the life
that he has here? How does that square with what
he's made of his life so far? And it's just
beautifully written. Um. I was really impressed with Pizolato's use
of language in this novel. Um that the character at
(17:49):
times feels like he is kind of cut from the
same cloth as the rust Coal character, Like they're like,
there may be sort of cosmic twins in some way.
But yeah, beautiful read and at the end I actually
ended up tearing up a bit, so I'm not gonna
I do have one little section when I read for you.
I really want to read you, read you the last
(18:09):
couple of paragraphs, but that would be spoiling things. We
were silent for a long stretch. Then, with the wind
shushing outside and the rhythm of a skier, a cloud
riddled heaven sealed the horizon, and I felt like we
were bugs crawling along the edge of the world, which
we were in a way. I kept this westward, the
sun at our backs, the girl's faces turning sleepy. That
old rule came back. You do your own time, not
(18:31):
someone else's. But what about after your own time is done?
I wondered. I looked down at the little girl sleeping,
one fist curled under her chin. Why did you take
the silencer off? I asked. Rocky shrugged and followed something
out the window. I thought it looked meaner without it,
I said, have you ever been to Galveston? She shook
her head. So there's just a taste again already. I'm like,
(18:54):
they're in that scene, so yeah, don't go into it. Expecting,
you know, another slice of True Detective. But if you
appreciate did the writing appreciated some of the feel of
that show, then you really can't go wrong with that book.
And last I checked, the Kindle version is available for
like twine, so you're basically losing money if you don't
buy it. There you go. Alright, So in the realm
(19:14):
of fiction, Joyce Carol Oates, the pick that I have
here is Blonde. I believe this came out maybe in
two thousand. It's an older book, but I wanted to
go back to it because I think we were talking
about Marilyn Monroe and her breathiness, and that got MA
hated thinking, like I really would like to know more
about Marilyn Monroe. And Joyce Carroll Oates is one of
(19:35):
my favorite writers. Um. The first time I was sort
of indoctrinated with her writing was in a short story
where are You Going? Where Have You Been? And that's
about a teenager named Connie, and she's got a really
bad case of teenager on we at the same time,
she's got this burgeoning sexuality that she's trying to deal with.
(19:56):
And what I love about this story is that is
a kind of coming age story that everybody knows about
that they never discussed. And what I'm talking about here
is like the burden of sexuality as a woman and
essentially what that sometimes boils down to his predator and prey.
And in that short story, um, this guy arnold friend
shows up as the predator and this golden convertible and
(20:18):
this this gold convertible becomes this kind of like death
chariot for kind. So the reason I bring this short
story up is because Blonde is about Marilyn Monroe obviously,
but more about that burden of sexuality, and it is
just a phenomenal take on this historic, iconic person who
(20:39):
is in many ways unknowable and yet somehow Oates has
gotten into her internal life, her into her thoughts what
I think might be her thoughts, right, and has written
this narrative that is so compelling that you think that
you are reading Marilyn Mina Rose diary. And it's starts
(21:00):
out with marily Monrose child and follows her through her
suicide and it is so gripping I can't even tell you,
like it's probably one of the most haunting texts that
I've ever read. And I don't know how she did it.
I really feel like that's one of those moments where
she was struck by the muse and how she inhabited UM,
this person who is very much sort of a flat
(21:23):
character force. Right, it's this Um, this woman who is
innocence and yet she's the sex kitten, and you see
through this, this lens of her life, this other side
to her. Maybe how she became Marilyn Monroe and Maril Monroe,
by the way, in real life was freighted with all
sorts of problems since we know and her mother UM
(21:45):
had some very bad mental problems UM that obviously showed
up in Marial Monrose life. Anyway, let me just read
this New York Times review real quick, because I think
it is pithy, and I will go on and on
if I don't stop myself by reading this. So it says,
and although sometimes sloppy and sentimental, it is perhaps the
most ferocious fictional treatise ever written on the uninhabitable grotesqueness
(22:08):
of femininity. No one embodied femininity better than mal Monroe,
who concocted a persona who seemed to exist only for
sex and at the same time to be oblivious of it.
Who possessed an eroticism that was all responsiveness and no desire.
How else to cater to a masculine sexuality that hates
itself and demands that females receive and bear away that
(22:31):
hatred like dutiful wives cleaning up after a husband's violent binge.
And I thought that was that was great. That really
takes the spirit of this book and the spirit of
those times in which Miller Monroe um came to inhabit
all of these anxieties about sexuality excellent. Well, I have
to I have to admit that when I when I
(22:51):
first heard about that book, it was hard for me
to get excited about it because I love Joyce Carol Oates.
Most of what I've read a verse is uh, you know,
strange fiction stories that she's written and u uh and
we've read read a longer work or two sort of
dealing with with twisted, flawed individuals, um grotesque individuals and
(23:13):
so the cell. Oh, she wrote a book about Marilyn Monroe.
Just on the surface, it doesn't seem to match up,
you know, because I'm thinking thinking, Joyce Carol Oates is
on one end of the spectrum. Uh, Marilyn Monroe is
on the other and and and never the two should meet.
But but now that you've explained it, I mean it
makes perfect since you mentioned the grotesqueness of femininity, so
I mean that that bridges the gap right there. So
(23:36):
I'm I'm actually more interested in checking the book out
myself now. Yeah. And her narrative techniques are fascinating, and
she uses smell a lot, and you wouldn't think that, like, oh,
I'm going to read this book about Marin Monroe and
there's one of the tropes is going to be smell,
and it comes to symbolize and really it even comes
to to sort of symbolize, um, Milen Monroe's attempt to
(23:56):
try to escape her more working class ressroots, you know,
um and then a sent to stardom through the sense
of smell. It's fascinating. But yeah, I mean this is
the person Joyce Carol Ows who wrote the book Zombie
about dam Yeah, great book. You've read that one, Yeah, yeah,
of course, yeah, so you wouldn't you wouldn't think Dahmer
(24:16):
Marilyn Monroe. But again, it it sounds like it works
in her capable hands. Sure. My next selection is one
is another one that I would definitely put in this
category of the cell maybe not sounding all that great
on the surface of things. And the book is sixty
three by Stephen King. Now I'm a long time King fan,
so I don't have to come. I don't have to
(24:37):
get over a Stephen King hurdle. I think some people
have that in their mind, like, here's a very popular author.
Uh he's and he's been churning out books like crazy
for years. Is he deserving of my attention? I would argue, yes,
I think I think Stephen King has has earned his place,
uh and has certainly earned his his literary reputation on
top of his commercial reputation. But even m for me,
(25:00):
this was a hard sell because the the idea on
the book here is, hey, what have you traveled back
in time to stop the Kennedy assassination, which of course
occurred one It's kind of an interesting thought experiment, you know,
you get into what happened, What would happen if you
could travel back in time? What would happen if you
change things? The butterfly effect of changing something in history? Um,
(25:21):
And that's fascinating, but it doesn't necessarily um connect with
me beyond that I like I, so when the book
came out, I just kind of noticed that it existed
and moved on. And then just in the last fall,
I was in a situation where, of course I had
a new child in the house. I seemed like I
was spending a lot of time, uh, laying on the
floor of his bedroom waiting for him to go to
(25:42):
sleep so I could sneak out. And friends sent me
a kindle copy of this book, and I started reading
it and just could not put it down. It was
just it's just highly addictive right from the beginning. There's
no there's no hurdle to overcome in reading three because
one of the really fascinating things here is, first of all,
there's no worrying about time travel science, how you do it? Basically,
(26:03):
magic portal opens up. How does it work? Who knows?
Maybe it's a wormhole, maybe it's magic. Don't concern your
stuff with that, because it's it's The story is ultimately
about more than that. The idea is that this portal
only opens up to a period in the past prior
to three, and so in order to go back in
time and change the past, you would have to go back.
(26:26):
Uh you have you have to live in the past,
you have to go back into the past and live
for like for you know, a year or two to
reach the point where you could change history. And there
are these added complications and that you get into the
idea that the time stream is like it's like a river,
and to try and divert a river, there's there's resistance.
(26:47):
So our character as he goes back in time and
ultimately sets out on this quest to change history, he
begins to encounter resistance to the change. So he's trying
to be injected out of that time stream. Um, yeah,
to to a sense, it's sort of like there's so
much writing on the way things work that there's a
resistance to making small changes in the time stream, but
(27:07):
he's trying to make a large one, and in doing so,
the forces against him are are almost immeasurable. So it's, uh,
it's a fascinating read. It's really one of the best
King books I've read in quite some time. So they recommend, well, yeah,
and I think that again, he is someone who is
also just a master at his craft, and so I
can't imagine a bad turn at a character or even
(27:30):
just a plot line with him. And you also learned
way more about the Kennedy assassination than you ever thought
you wanted to know. Okay, that means that you can
drop in on those conspiracy theory chat rooms, right, Yeah,
and then you know what they're talking about. You know
who some of these figures are because they show up
as figures in this book because part of it too.
If the character goes back in time and he's not
certain there's no one, they think there's like a nineties
(27:52):
something percent chance that it that it is just the
lone gunment theory. But what if you don't want to
go back and and kill Lee Harvey Oswald if there's
even like a two percent five percent chance even that
he's not the guy, and then ultimately you wouldn't be
able to change your history anyway. Yeah, and by the way,
Marilyn Monroe is wrapped up into this as well, So
(28:12):
you have fitting fitting pair of books there for the summer. Indeed,
all right, My last pick here is Cabinet of Curiosities,
My Notebooks, Collections and Other Obsessions by Guiannimo and Mark
Scott Zacrie. And this was actually a book that I
got for my husband because um, he likes Del Toro
(28:33):
and he really likes a lot of this for I
don't know if you would call it this like monster aesthetic,
an art, grotesque ery. I don't know, but I've been
pouring through it. It is kind of a much bigger,
deep than that Daily Ritual's book I was talking about
where you get to appear into artist lives. Here is
(28:54):
this this really like lens into del Toro's life. You
get to see his collection, just stuff that he collects.
In fact, I'm looking at this picture right now of
a life size sculpture of HP Lovecraft by Thomas Cubler,
which is watching over the horror library at the Bleak House. Um,
(29:15):
I mean he has a life size closure of HP
Lovecraft leering at you as you walk around the house.
Very odd look on HP lovecraft face. And so you
also have some of his influences, so Mary Shelley and
Lovecraft of course, and Arthur mackin ed Garland Poe is
it Macinnermashon, I'm not sure, but author of The Great
(29:38):
God Pan which is an extremely creepy short story. Yeah.
So in this sense, I think you get a lot
more than you would bargain for from someone who is
um a director, right, You would normally think, oh, maybe
I'll get a little bit of access to how he works,
but no, you get everything. It looks like here um
short of a personal tour of his own home. So
(30:00):
I just thought it was great for anybody who is
interested in some of the monster science that you have
been covering, um, and anybody who is interested in his films,
because he's got thoughts for new films kind of scribbled
in there, bits of dialogue. Um, He's got other bits
of dialogue from plays and from stories that have colored
(30:21):
his perception. And then of course just his sketches are fascinating. Yeah,
his sketches are amazing, And apparently when he pitches projects
like the sketches are very much a part of it,
and they're the sketches sketches are are part of his
writing process and a part of his way of of
bringing his own ideas together and then ultimately presenting them
to the studios. Yeah, so it is really kind of
(30:43):
like cracking up in his brain. You're able to see
all his obsessions, his influences, and then how he thinks
and his representation of that and sketches is beautiful. Yeah, yeah,
not a beautiful but horrifically beautiful. Yeah, that's the thing.
He gets horrifically beautiful better than than just about anybody.
And I mean certainly see in his work there's there's
(31:04):
so much monstrosity. He genuinely loves monsters and understands what
monsters are. You see a great deal of Catholic imagery.
Like especially with Blade too. I love that he created
a vampire that could only be killed by staking it
through the side of the rib cage. Uh as in
(31:24):
the same way that Christ dies on the Cross when
the spear enters the rib cage and pierces the heart.
Uh And he you know, he has his whole, this
whole design in place where the bone is u is
too solid over the heart so you can only go
in through the side. I mean, it's just I love
the man's aesthetic. It's wonderful, which makes it that much
more exciting to know that he's working on HP Lovecrafts
(31:47):
at the Mountains of Madness. And in fact, there's a
couple of pages dedicated to that as well, So that
level of detail. Seeing that come across and a film
is would be amazing. Yeah, I really, I really hope
that project comes together. It sounds sounds wonderful. Alright. I
have one more reading suggestion, and this one has to
do with monsters, and it's for young readers, so um uh,
(32:07):
this one is certainly worth picking up. It's called Monsters
and Water Beast Creatures of Fact or Fiction by Karen Miller,
with illustrations by Sergio Rousier. And this is uh. This
looks at a number of different monsters, including Bigfoot, the
Big Bird of Texas, hoop Snakes, Mothman, the Jersey Devil,
and then the water Beast, uh, Sea Maiden of Biloxi, chant,
(32:28):
the Sea Serpent of Gloucester, and the Cadborosaurus. Uh. This
is uh. This is ultimately a skeptics book on monsters
for young readers. I mean, I mean I enjoy it,
so you don't have to be you don't have to
be too young to get into it. But it's uh,
it's wonderfully illustrated. It's it's looking at these creatures from
a skeptical point of view, but a fun point of view.
(32:50):
It's it's you know, it's not full of negativity. It
doesn't say don't love your monsters, because clearly this is
a book that loves the monsters. While also saying, hey,
I can, I can love this and also a lie
a skeptic mind to it. So if you have a
young reader or not a young reader in your household
that is interested in monsters and and has that kind
of skeptical mindset, then I highly recommend it. Indeed, which
(33:14):
is actually a good reminder about your monster series called
Monster Science. You should check that out on our mind
Stuff YouTube channel. Yes, we have six episodes of it,
and we're plotting six more. I'll let you know when
those come to fruition. All right, Well what about you, Julia,
do you have anything you were planning to read later
this summer or later this year? Well, what's what's on
(33:35):
the future? What's on the two? Read shell Um The
Martian by Andy, We're in The Leftovers by Tom proto
which Nolan, producer told me he is actually being made
into a series. I believe. Oh. I've seen the ads
for it an HBO and I can't tell what it's
about except screaming and pain. And I think it's people
who suddenly disappear. Really yeah, yeah. I have picked it
(33:57):
up in my hands a couple of times and looked
at it, and I have bought it yet, but it's
on my list very very good. Uh. Two things I'm
looking forward to reading. One, I don't know when this
is coming out, hopefully sometime. It's supposedly coming out this year,
sooner the better for my taste. And that is The
Unholy Consult by our Scott Baker. I've mentioned Baker before
(34:20):
on the podcast, probably way too many times. Actually he uh,
he's written. He wrote a Disciple of the Dog, he
wrote Neuropath, and he also wrote the trilogy The Prince
of Nothing trilogy, followed by the the trilogy The Aspect Emperor.
This is the third book in the Aspect Emperor trilogy.
These all these uh, the both these trilogies take place
(34:41):
in this dark fantasy world that it's created. You can think,
think Game of Thrones, but with more sort of dark
love Craft I and Clark Ashton Smithy sort of magic
going on. But also Baker is deeply immersed in um
in philosophy and neuroscience, so all all of everything he's creating,
(35:02):
it's uh, it really like it's not pure escapism because
even though you're reading about say, uh, you know, a
barbarian on on the planes of some dark fantasy epic world.
Uh that that character is is struggling with with the
with his own self in a way that really forces
you to reconsider uh you know, your own predicament. It's
(35:23):
it's tremendous stuff. I highly highly recommend it, and I'm
really looking forward to reading Beyond Holy Consult when it
comes out. A bit of nonfiction that I'm looking forward
to reading as of this morning is The Body and
Pain The Making and Unmaking of the World by Elaine Scary.
I heard about this one listening to the episode Unspeakable
(35:45):
Acts on the CBC radio program Ideas with Paul Kennedy, which,
for for my money, is just about the best uh
podcast or radio show out their Ideas CBC Paul Kennedy,
check it out if you haven't. But this this book
by Scary, apparently, you know, gets into this idea of
pain and torture in a really deep manner. Looking at
(36:08):
pain is is frame breaking, context breaking, our difficulty to
understand the pain of others, the terrible power of torture
to destroy the language. Uh. There's a quote just from
the intro of the book where she says, this book
is about the way other persons become visible to us
or cease to be visible to us. It's about the
way we make ourselves available to one another. So I'm
(36:32):
as someone who has late been been interested in elements
of torture and pain, this seems like a must read
book for me. Yeah. It sounds like she'll be covering
the territory of of objectifying someone and creating that space. Yeah,
like a very interesting realm to explore. Yeah, she she
speaks in this uh this Ideas episode. I mentioned unspeakable acts,
(36:55):
and it's really really interesting to hear her talk about
about pain and in these terms that I hadn't even
thought about yet. So so yeah, check check out the
Ideas of podcast radio show and and check out The
Body and Pain if this is the topic of interest
to you as well. What does the author's name again?
Elaine scary S C A R R. Y Okay, So
(37:17):
dominative determinism at work again? Yeah? Yeah, indeed, part philosophical meditation,
part cultural critique. All right, Um, I bet you guys
have some books that you would like to recommend, But
please let us know, like, what is the number one
thing on your list to read or that you would recommend.
Either way, we would love to know you can find us,
of course, that's stuff to blow your Mind dot com. Yeah,
(37:38):
and that's where you will find all our blog post episodes,
our podcasts, our videos, as well as links out to
our social media accounts such as tumbler, Twitter and Facebook.
And there is still an old fashioned way to get
in touch with us as well. That's right. You could
send an old creaky email to us at blew the
Mind at how stuff works dot com. For moralness and
(38:01):
thousands of other topics, visit hastaff works dot com
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