March 30, 2022 • 26 mins
Welcoming Zibby Owens and Glory Edim to the Pod Club! In this week’s special episode, host Jo Piazza conducts not one but TWO interviews to scratch the surface of the book podcasting world. Host of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books, Zibby Owens has interviewed over 950 authors throughout four years of making her show. She's become a must-stop on most publishing tours these days. When Zibby recommended Glory Edim's new podcast we decided to give her a call too. Glory, the founder of Well-Read Black Girl, has brought her vast community of writers and readers to the audio world. She celebrates the written word through conversations with women at the forefront of today’s culture. Zibby and Glory will make you want to put your phone down and curl up with a good book...after listening to their podcast recommendations of course.
Zibby’s Show:
Moms Don’t Have Time to Read Books
Glory’s Show:
Shows Mentioned:
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
OK, guys, radio, we ask you a couple of questions.
All right, we are asking questions about podcasts. Do you
guys know what a podcast is? Yes? Yeah? Do you
listen to podcasts? Not very often? When you hear the
word podcast? What comes to my listening in the car
chilling time? Okay? Wow? Is it just something you do
(00:23):
when you're board? It's a podcast? Podcast? Welcome back to
the pod club. This week we are celebrating something very
near and dear to my own heart. Book podcasts. For me,
book podcasts are like your own little personal book club
(00:43):
that you can show up to whenever you want, whenever
you want, on your own schedule. You may not be
talking back to them, but you've got experts and book
enthusiasts talking about all of the things that you want
to know about A book on demand on demand, and
in today's crazy world, on demand is pretty good. Today,
we're featuring not one, but two literary podcasters. My first
(01:06):
guest is Ziddy Owens. She's a writer and the co
founder of the publishing company Zimmy Books. Of course, she
also has a very popular podcast called Moms Don't Have
Time to Read Books. I absolutely adore that title and
I'm going to tell you it right off of that
that Zimby is a hustler when it comes to getting
every famous author on the planet on her podcast. They're
(01:28):
all there, they are, Zimby. I am so excited to
have you on the pod Club. Thank you so much
for having me. Since we first conceived of the pod Club,
I kept thinking, when are we going to have Zippy on?
To have a full, a whole podcast devoted to book podcasts.
(01:50):
But the problem with this is that your book podcast
has literally interviewed almost every author in the world. I
don't even know what else to recommend. How many authors
have you interviewed? Now? I have to look, but it's
like probably or so shut up. Yeah, who is possibly
(02:13):
left on your dream interview list? Let's see, I'd really
love to interview Oprah, She's number one on my list.
Throwing it out to the universe. Let's throw into the universe,
because on the pod Club, we like to make dreams
come true. Oh perfect. I mean, I always loved like
Michael Lewis, Jennifer Egan, but I think I'm interviewing her
finding out soon. I don't know. I feel like there's
(02:35):
so many for for our listeners who haven't listened to
your podcast before, tell them what it is and a
little bit about it. My podcast is called Moms Don't
Have Time to Read Books and I launched it in
March of two eighteen and during the pandemic. Starting in March,
I started releasing one episode every single day, seven days
a week, including many days where I released several So
(02:58):
I promised that I am going to slow down. I'm
I'm hoping by June I'm going to go to five
a week instead of seven a week. But that's why
I have amassed so much content in such a short
amount of time. Now, do you have a favorite episode
of favorite guests that we could play a little bit
of a clip of for our audience? Oh? Um, my
(03:18):
most exciting celebrity one was with Alicia Keys and she
actually talked to my girls in the beginning, which was
my personal favorite. Yeah, that was a great one. And well,
of course, Joe episodes with you are my favorite, so
you should just play those no way. Everyone is so
sick of my voice at this point, they're like someone
(03:41):
else that it's a lot of you, Joe Piazza. My
second podcast ever was with Andre Agassy, so I was
probably terrible on that podcast, but he was awesome. Uh
So that was a fun one. And a lot of
authors I've just revered, like Anna quinlin Um. It was
so amazing to get to talk to her. And I've
done a lot of politicians, so whatever you're, whatever you've bent,
(04:04):
I've done like Hillary Clinton and even Chelsea Clinton, and
not that she's politician per se, but uh I've done
Jenna bush Hagar from the Republican side of the world,
at least her family. So I've done all sorts of politicians, athletes, chefs.
I love Julietteson's episode. That was great. Oh, I love
(04:24):
Juliettortion's episode. Which book did you talk to Hillary? For
State of Terror? And I interviewed her for the Striker
Center at Temple Emmanuel and I was live with her
and Louise Penny at the same time, and it was
just when they found out that their book had hit
the best seller list, so they were all giddy and excited,
and I was joking that I was going to bring
a bottle of wine because they mentioned shardon Ay fifty
(04:46):
seven thousand times in the book, and I was like, Allen,
who likes the shardoney, you know what's calling me on here? Um?
And they were really funny, and I was surprised by that,
but it was awesome. I actually loved that book. And
I'm not a huge thriller person, but I thought that
State of Terror was so fun. So I want to
play a little clip of that interview for our audience.
(05:08):
And even like layering on mothering of adult children and
what you do in their pads kind of aren't maybe
well anyway when they when they when the paths diverge
in the woods, and you see what your kids end
up wanting to do, whether or not that's what you
had in mind or not, and how you keep those
all those conflicts together while you're busy, like you know,
(05:28):
running the country and everything else. That that's a oh,
that's such a great insight to be, you know. Obviously
the plot has many twists and turns, and some of
them have to do with adult children, as you just
rightly point out. And you know, that's what I think
we mean when when Louise is saying, you know, these
women are not perfect, you know, and and in most
(05:49):
political thrillers, the women are there, you know, their their
assassins or or their love interests or you know, they're
the stern you know, intelligence director who gives the guys
in the field their orders, and you don't really get
to see much about their life. And yes, this may
be the only book you'll ever read, Zibbie that has
both spanks and flannel moose pajamas in it. Okay, so
(06:18):
you have done more than nine hundred interviews, more than
nine hundred podcasts. Which book podcasts do you listen to
to get inspired or do you not listen to them?
To be honest, I do not listen to really any
podcasts right now, but I have listened to everything. I've
sampled everything. I'm just not a regular listener because I
(06:42):
don't I don't really have to have to even listen
to my own podcasts. But when I started out and vogels,
what should I read next? Was one of my models
have had a podcast? She is so calm and knowledgeable,
and I just it's seems so professional. I was like
(07:03):
in awe of her. So that's one of my gold
standards of book podcasts and Bogol I think she should
be everybody's gold standard of book podcasts. She's so good.
I have been listening to her from the very beginning.
She really does give you great book recommendations that you
wouldn't think that you would fall in love with two,
(07:23):
which I love in in almost every episode, and she
sent over so many questions before my interview with her
that we're really like. She made me think they were
questions I've never been asked by an interviewer. Hey, readers,
I'm a Bogel and this is what should I read next?
Episode three two. Welcome to the show that's dedicated to
(07:45):
answering the question that plagues every reader, what should I
read next? We don't get bossy on the show. What
we will do here is give you the information you
need did use your next read. Every week we'll talk
all things books and reading and do a little literary
mex making with one guest. When I first started out,
(08:05):
I listened to the New York Times Book review podcast,
and I listened to the episode with David Sedaris, which
I found fascinating. It's long. It was like a long,
in depth interview with him, and I remember listening to
it in the car and being like, Wow, how cool
would it be if I ever got to interview David Sadaris?
And then I did so it was like the most
exciting thing. Of course, mine was like really short. And
then afterwards he sent me a postcard which I actually
(08:28):
framed and I have here in my office. What was
the postcard up? It was like a little thank you
note and he was apologizing because he thought he didn't
do a good job. Oh my god, I love that.
I here's the thing. I like the New York Times
book review podcast. It's not my favorite book podcast just
because I like the little scrappier independent ones. But I
think that any episode of anything with David Sedaris is
(08:51):
just gold. Yes, it's gold. It is He can and
he could be on a podcast reading the phone Book
and I would laugh my butt off. Okay, Zby final question,
your brand is moms don't have time essentially for anything
anything at all. We don't have time to read bugs,
(09:13):
we don't have time to have kids, we don't have
time to sleep. What do do moms actually have time
for podcasts? It seems like they do, because a lot
of them say that they listen to mind. Maybe they're
just joking, but I see downloads. You can't tell, of course,
as you will know like who is listening? But um, yeah,
(09:35):
I think moms listen to podcasts when they're doing the
laundry and doing the dishes and driving their kids places,
or driving home after dropping their kids places, walking to work.
So yes, I think actually listening to a podcast is
one of the easiest things for mom to do because
you can do other things and yet still get this
extra benefit from listening, as opposed to having to stuff
(09:55):
what you're doing and go to a yoga class or
something like that. This is you take with you. You
just plug it in your ears, exactly exactly. I think
that since becoming a mom, listening to podcasts is one
of the easiest things I can do because I can multitask,
and I can't multitask while doing much else. So yeah,
I think moms do absolutely have time to listen to podcasts.
(10:16):
Are there any podcasts that you love that have nothing
to do with books, that are like your guilty pleasure
when you're like, oh my gosh, I'm so sick of
talking about books every day all day. I just want
something else. Then I listened to Under the Influence. Oh
my gosh, I love that answer. I love that. So
I think I told you I was like sick in
(10:37):
bed and listening to your podcast, and I loved it
so much that I ended up applying to be one
of those influencer moms um as a result, and forgot
that I had even done it until I got some
email like you've been accepted for like to know it,
and I was like, what is this? And I was like, oh,
my gosh, that was Joe's podcast. One night, about a
year ago, I realized something. I had a toddler spread
(11:01):
eagld in the middle of my bed and a baby
with her head nuzzled right in my armpit. I was
covered in just a little bit of breast milk a
fair amount of pee. And that's when I realized that
I could, with just one click, purchase what I needed
to be like these women in the pictures. Through their
tags and links and the swipe ups. I could buy
(11:21):
their lazy nursing bra their long flowing dresses, their sustainable
cloth napkins, and bamboo books for toddlers that are very,
very good for the earth. I realized that all of
these seemingly perfect mothers on social media, they were all
trying to sell me something I didn't need to create
my own perfect life, and I could buy theirs, and
(11:44):
I did I just introduced to the tea, which is
a horrible point heard to thank and say why most
of them are just Oh my god, this for relation.
(12:05):
It changed everything about how I looked at Instagram. I
was no longer Dorothy dazzled by os and pulled back
the curtain and I began to see it for the
business that it is. Oh my god, I love it
so much. You know, we maybe we don't talk about
Under the Influence enough on this podcast. We do. Season
(12:27):
two of Under the Influence did just long. So one
podcast that I'm really excited for is Glory Adams new podcast.
Is that on your radar? Absolutely, it's on my radar.
I'm so excited for it. It's called Well Read Black Girl.
And I had Glory on my podcast when her anthology
came out probably two years ago, and have just so
(12:48):
admired the way she's cultivated this community around reading and
she's just such a superstar. So I can't wait to
listen to it. I'm actually wondering maybe we should call
up Glory and ask her about her new podcast. You
totally should. With the magic of audio, that might be possible.
Zimby having you on has been so wonderful. I loved
(13:09):
getting to talk to you. I always love getting to
talk to you. Tell our listeners where they can find you.
They can find me on Instagram at Zimby Owens and
my website is zimby Owens dot com. After the break,
we are going to follow up on what Zimby and
I just talked about. We're gonna have Glory Adam on
(13:30):
to talk about her new podcast, well read black Girl.
(13:53):
All right, I'm recording on my side. Hello, Hey, Glory,
welcome to the pod Club. Thank you for having me.
I'm so excited to speak with you. So I have
been a huge fan of yours for a long time,
but I'm really excited that you now have a podcast
because I feel like with a podcast you can reach
(14:16):
a different audience in an even more intimate way. Is
this something you always wanted to do with your platform? Yes? Absolutely.
I was really yearning to be closer to readers and
listeners and really dive into the author process. I wanted
to hear about their dreams, you know, you know, what
they were reading was on their nights, nan how they
(14:38):
actually became writers, and so creating a podcast allowed for
just more room to ask those questions. They were always
going on and on in my mind. Yeah, totally. And
I think it's really nice too to hear an author's
voice because there's so much emotion in it that that
can't be conveyed on the printed page. It's difficult on Instagram,
(15:00):
and so this, I think this just makes the writing
process come alive in such a cool way. Yeah, because
you get to hear just their feelings, how they um,
how they feel when they're afraid, when they're excited, when
they are in front of a fellow reader. You know,
the jitters that they get, and you just get to
hear their full process. And that's what I was like
(15:23):
longing for. I'm like what happens? And I you know,
like when you turn off Instagram when you're not in
your laptop, like what are you thinking about? And getting
closer to that interior is always just like really interesting
and very helpful, especially if you're aspiring writer yourself. Oh
I think so. I One of my favorite things that
(15:43):
I love to hear from other authors is like, what's
your morning routine? I don't know why, I just I
think maybe I want to know how mind stacks up
or what I should be doing better but it's it's
one of my absolute favorite things. I just adore it. Yeah, no,
it's it's my favorite too. It's kind to like when you,
I mean, I don't know how many people still read
People Magazine. I still read it, you know, when you're
(16:05):
like you're like flipping through people and then you see
like everyday celebrity is like they go to like Whole
Foods too. It's like the same kind of vibe when
you hear that, You're like, writer loves to you know,
make their camera meal ty in the morning. They put
like two drops of honey. You're like, yeah, I do
that too. It just makes you feel closer to them absolutely.
(16:26):
So tell me a little bit about who you have
on this first season of Well Read Black Girl. The
podcast this season is just like full of powerhouse women.
We kick it off with Toronto Burke, first time author
and activists who is the leader of the Me Too movement,
reading her memoir really just like it was just like
(16:49):
a light in my life, Like it just was so inspiring.
And then we follow it with Minjin Lee, the author
of Pachinko, one of my favorite favorite favorite books. I
love that you go so much and it's like seeing
turned into a series, we get to watch it on
TV as well. Like, so wild Men has so many
great just like stories about how she became a writer
(17:09):
and you know the process of taking twelve years to
write Pagenko, which is so amazing. And then you know
like Britt Bennett, Gabriel Union, Zebra Ballet, like all these
incredible writers that have vastly different stories, but they all
come to the page with such energy and love. You know, Yeah,
I'm so jealous of your first season line up because
(17:31):
it is just that good. Do you have a favorite
interview or an episode? I always ask on It's like
choose your children, you know, it really is. I want
to call it my favorite. I'll say my most memorable
was speaking with Anita Hill, because she is such iconic
figure and so powerful and has such a wonderful tenacity
(17:52):
about her that I just I think, like, for the
first you know, five to ten minutes, I just was
like I cannot believe I'm speaking being with Anita Hell,
you know, like this is just like just completely out
of my world, but listening to her and like looking
at her whole life, like like who she was as
a young woman, who she is now reading her book,
(18:15):
how like such a testimony, you know what I mean? Like,
I just was really floored by our conversation and just
even learning like little things that I wouldn't expect, like
she talked about her favorite superhero and talked about just
like you know, these like fun topics that just that
aren't just like the intense, political, mission driven work, which
(18:35):
is just as important. But it's awesome to learn, like
what her favorite color is, and you know where she
likes to travel, just to show that she has a full,
well rounded life and she does all these things. You know,
we see her in the media portrayed as one way,
it's this incredible professor and lawyer, but she's also a
daughter and a sister and just a loving person, you know.
(18:57):
So I just felt really honored to share let's space
with her. I have a very important question, which one
is Anita Hill's favorite superhero, favorite comic book character? Oh gosh,
I don't have a favorite character, but let me tell you.
I was a big fan of Stanley, you know. Oh yeah,
(19:19):
and I and one of my wishes that Stanley would
make a comic book character out of me. Oh it's okay.
So this goes to the next question, it's if you
were a superhero, what would your superpower be? Oh? I
have thought about that, and that is we have superheroes
where they can like look into the future. My superpower
(19:42):
would be every time that I've met someone that I
would be able to glimpse their past. Oh that's a
good one, yeah, because I think if we know their past,
you understand how they behave and why. Oh that's a
good one. Oh, I might have to borrow that superpower
(20:02):
because you know, I encounter some people like, wow, do
you have a go to podcast here? Like every day
if you pick up your phone or not even every
day because you just had a kid and we don't
do anything every day. That's that's mother's yes, thank you
for that. So if you if you have a spare moment,
(20:23):
what podcast is your go to? What are you listening to?
And there's so many podcasts that I love, But I'm
very much into like soothing voices, and like I need
to be soothed. I need like you know, and so
I I live for on being by christa tippet. Being
is like such like some renity now, so it's delightful
(20:46):
and peaceful, and so I can do that while I
cooking or even when I'm I'm running around after my son,
I can listen to her podcast and again those questions
that really get to the heart of people's minds and souls,
Like you really is deep very quickly. So you'll start
listening to something and then you're like, Wow, they're talking
about you know, this moment that they had in childhood
(21:08):
or you know this incredible experience that like was transformative
in their life, and it just is really lovely. So
that's one of my favorite like go to podcasts. You
know what's amazing. We have had so many empisodes of
this show so far and have not talked about on
being or Krista Tippitt, and she is just one of
my favorites and so so old school. She's been doing
(21:31):
this forever. I'm gonna play a little bit of Krista
Tippett right now, just so just so our audience can
can hear her completely soothing voice. Here's a here's a secret,
secret thing about me. Sometimes I listen to Krista to
fall asleep, and not because her podcasts aren't amazingly interesting,
but because her voice just just soothes me. Just it's
like a it's like white noise. For me, I love
(21:53):
it so much. I do think it's worth underlining because
it's so hard for people to imagine that as late
as you know, the latter half of the twentieth century,
human beings thought that we were the only creatures who
made tools. That's what Western science believed. If somebody at
(22:14):
that time had gone to the pygmies in the rainforest
in Congo, they could have told you, I've sat and
talked to them. They've watched it. Right. It was, you know,
man the toolmaker. It was Osmond Hill who defined us thus,
and so it was it was a shock, I think,
to the scientific world. And when I finally was made
(22:36):
to go to Cambridge University by Louis Leakey said I
needed a degree. He wouldn't always be around to get money.
And also you were the eighth person in the history
of Cambridge to come in. You came in to do
graduate work without an undergraduate degree, which was almost unheard of. Yes,
yes I did, he said, it was the time for that. Yeah.
I was weeted with signed who said, well, you've done
(22:59):
your study wrong. You shouldn't have named the chimpanzees. They
should have had numbers. That's science, and you can't talk
about personality mind capable of problem solving our emotions because
they're unique to us. But the dog you mentioned, Rusty,
he told me when I was a child that that
certainly wasn't true. We are not the only beings on
(23:21):
the planet with personalities, minds, and emotions, and we are
part of and not separate from the rest of the
animal kingdom. She does have the most soothing voice that
you've ever heard. Yeah, it's totally like old school like
that you know, public radio vibe. Yes, yes, some good
(23:43):
old car talk, yes, yes, exactly. Yeah, and of course
like MPR like you know everyone like you know, the
funny thing those voices. And also Howard Stern is the
voice of my childhood because my mom was a little
subversive and she would like right, and so I heard
a lot of things that I probably shouldn't have heard. Um,
I think it made me a more interesting human being. Well,
(24:03):
and I think about it a lot too, because a
lot of issues there with misogyny, and they were always
naked women in the studio, but Robin was a bad
ass co host and a woman in radio in the
years when there were no women in radio, And I
just like, Robin Quivers was my end all be all.
(24:23):
She really was. I freaking loved her. She was to
reply and just like so beautiful and how's her ground
with him? I totally held her ground. Yes, yes, Robin
Quivers and Christa Tippett both the best. Glory, those are
actually my only questions. This is so fun. You guys
are awesome. This is great. That's it for the pod
(24:50):
club today. Thank you so much to Zity and Glory
for coming on. The two of them just gave me
so many more books to read, which is not the
best because my t VR is already toppling over and
it might actually fall over and knock someone out one
of these days. As a reminder, here's the shows we
talked about today. Both Zimby and Glory shows moms don't
(25:11):
have time to read books and well read Black Girl.
Zimby recommended Anne Bogles what should I read next? The
New York Times book review podcast, and I recommended to
her under the Influence, Even though yes, I hate talking
about myself, I'm the lamest. Glory recommended on being with
Krista Tippett such such a good o G podcast, and
(25:32):
I'm going to go find some old Robin Quivers clips
to listen to right now, and also desperately try to
get Robin on this show. Wouldn't that be the most
amazing Robin Quivers. And that's it for this week. Go
have fun, happy listening, read some books. We all deserve
some reading time right now, and I'll talk to you
(25:52):
next week at the pod Club is hosted I'm me
Joe Pianza. Our executive producers are Me Again and Emily Marinoff.
Our producers are Mary Do and Darby Masters. Our associate
producer is Lauren Philip. Our theme and additional music was
(26:14):
composed by Aaron Kaufman. Aaron Kaufman is also our consulting
producer and special thanks to Nikki e Tor he was
just a wonderful human being who I like to think
at the end of episodes.
OK, guys, radio, we ask you a couple of questions.
All right, we are asking questions about podcasts. Do you
guys know what a podcast is? Yes? Yeah? Do you
listen to podcasts? Not very often? When you hear the
word podcast? What comes to my listening in the car
chilling time? Okay? Wow? Is it just something you do
(00:23):
when you're board? It's a podcast? Podcast? Welcome back to
the pod club. This week we are celebrating something very
near and dear to my own heart. Book podcasts. For me,
book podcasts are like your own little personal book club
(00:43):
that you can show up to whenever you want, whenever
you want, on your own schedule. You may not be
talking back to them, but you've got experts and book
enthusiasts talking about all of the things that you want
to know about A book on demand on demand, and
in today's crazy world, on demand is pretty good. Today,
we're featuring not one, but two literary podcasters. My first
(01:06):
guest is Ziddy Owens. She's a writer and the co
founder of the publishing company Zimmy Books. Of course, she
also has a very popular podcast called Moms Don't Have
Time to Read Books. I absolutely adore that title and
I'm going to tell you it right off of that
that Zimby is a hustler when it comes to getting
every famous author on the planet on her podcast. They're
(01:28):
all there, they are, Zimby. I am so excited to
have you on the pod Club. Thank you so much
for having me. Since we first conceived of the pod Club,
I kept thinking, when are we going to have Zippy on?
To have a full, a whole podcast devoted to book podcasts.
(01:50):
But the problem with this is that your book podcast
has literally interviewed almost every author in the world. I
don't even know what else to recommend. How many authors
have you interviewed? Now? I have to look, but it's
like probably or so shut up. Yeah, who is possibly
(02:13):
left on your dream interview list? Let's see, I'd really
love to interview Oprah, She's number one on my list.
Throwing it out to the universe. Let's throw into the universe,
because on the pod Club, we like to make dreams
come true. Oh perfect. I mean, I always loved like
Michael Lewis, Jennifer Egan, but I think I'm interviewing her
finding out soon. I don't know. I feel like there's
(02:35):
so many for for our listeners who haven't listened to
your podcast before, tell them what it is and a
little bit about it. My podcast is called Moms Don't
Have Time to Read Books and I launched it in
March of two eighteen and during the pandemic. Starting in March,
I started releasing one episode every single day, seven days
a week, including many days where I released several So
(02:58):
I promised that I am going to slow down. I'm
I'm hoping by June I'm going to go to five
a week instead of seven a week. But that's why
I have amassed so much content in such a short
amount of time. Now, do you have a favorite episode
of favorite guests that we could play a little bit
of a clip of for our audience? Oh? Um, my
(03:18):
most exciting celebrity one was with Alicia Keys and she
actually talked to my girls in the beginning, which was
my personal favorite. Yeah, that was a great one. And well,
of course, Joe episodes with you are my favorite, so
you should just play those no way. Everyone is so
sick of my voice at this point, they're like someone
(03:41):
else that it's a lot of you, Joe Piazza. My
second podcast ever was with Andre Agassy, so I was
probably terrible on that podcast, but he was awesome. Uh
So that was a fun one. And a lot of
authors I've just revered, like Anna quinlin Um. It was
so amazing to get to talk to her. And I've
done a lot of politicians, so whatever you're, whatever you've bent,
(04:04):
I've done like Hillary Clinton and even Chelsea Clinton, and
not that she's politician per se, but uh I've done
Jenna bush Hagar from the Republican side of the world,
at least her family. So I've done all sorts of politicians, athletes, chefs.
I love Julietteson's episode. That was great. Oh, I love
(04:24):
Juliettortion's episode. Which book did you talk to Hillary? For
State of Terror? And I interviewed her for the Striker
Center at Temple Emmanuel and I was live with her
and Louise Penny at the same time, and it was
just when they found out that their book had hit
the best seller list, so they were all giddy and excited,
and I was joking that I was going to bring
a bottle of wine because they mentioned shardon Ay fifty
(04:46):
seven thousand times in the book, and I was like, Allen,
who likes the shardoney, you know what's calling me on here? Um?
And they were really funny, and I was surprised by that,
but it was awesome. I actually loved that book. And
I'm not a huge thriller person, but I thought that
State of Terror was so fun. So I want to
play a little clip of that interview for our audience.
(05:08):
And even like layering on mothering of adult children and
what you do in their pads kind of aren't maybe
well anyway when they when they when the paths diverge
in the woods, and you see what your kids end
up wanting to do, whether or not that's what you
had in mind or not, and how you keep those
all those conflicts together while you're busy, like you know,
(05:28):
running the country and everything else. That that's a oh,
that's such a great insight to be, you know. Obviously
the plot has many twists and turns, and some of
them have to do with adult children, as you just
rightly point out. And you know, that's what I think
we mean when when Louise is saying, you know, these
women are not perfect, you know, and and in most
(05:49):
political thrillers, the women are there, you know, their their
assassins or or their love interests or you know, they're
the stern you know, intelligence director who gives the guys
in the field their orders, and you don't really get
to see much about their life. And yes, this may
be the only book you'll ever read, Zibbie that has
both spanks and flannel moose pajamas in it. Okay, so
(06:18):
you have done more than nine hundred interviews, more than
nine hundred podcasts. Which book podcasts do you listen to
to get inspired or do you not listen to them?
To be honest, I do not listen to really any
podcasts right now, but I have listened to everything. I've
sampled everything. I'm just not a regular listener because I
(06:42):
don't I don't really have to have to even listen
to my own podcasts. But when I started out and vogels,
what should I read next? Was one of my models
have had a podcast? She is so calm and knowledgeable,
and I just it's seems so professional. I was like
(07:03):
in awe of her. So that's one of my gold
standards of book podcasts and Bogol I think she should
be everybody's gold standard of book podcasts. She's so good.
I have been listening to her from the very beginning.
She really does give you great book recommendations that you
wouldn't think that you would fall in love with two,
(07:23):
which I love in in almost every episode, and she
sent over so many questions before my interview with her
that we're really like. She made me think they were
questions I've never been asked by an interviewer. Hey, readers,
I'm a Bogel and this is what should I read next?
Episode three two. Welcome to the show that's dedicated to
(07:45):
answering the question that plagues every reader, what should I
read next? We don't get bossy on the show. What
we will do here is give you the information you
need did use your next read. Every week we'll talk
all things books and reading and do a little literary
mex making with one guest. When I first started out,
(08:05):
I listened to the New York Times Book review podcast,
and I listened to the episode with David Sedaris, which
I found fascinating. It's long. It was like a long,
in depth interview with him, and I remember listening to
it in the car and being like, Wow, how cool
would it be if I ever got to interview David Sadaris?
And then I did so it was like the most
exciting thing. Of course, mine was like really short. And
then afterwards he sent me a postcard which I actually
(08:28):
framed and I have here in my office. What was
the postcard up? It was like a little thank you
note and he was apologizing because he thought he didn't
do a good job. Oh my god, I love that.
I here's the thing. I like the New York Times
book review podcast. It's not my favorite book podcast just
because I like the little scrappier independent ones. But I
think that any episode of anything with David Sedaris is
(08:51):
just gold. Yes, it's gold. It is He can and
he could be on a podcast reading the phone Book
and I would laugh my butt off. Okay, Zby final question,
your brand is moms don't have time essentially for anything
anything at all. We don't have time to read bugs,
(09:13):
we don't have time to have kids, we don't have
time to sleep. What do do moms actually have time
for podcasts? It seems like they do, because a lot
of them say that they listen to mind. Maybe they're
just joking, but I see downloads. You can't tell, of course,
as you will know like who is listening? But um, yeah,
(09:35):
I think moms listen to podcasts when they're doing the
laundry and doing the dishes and driving their kids places,
or driving home after dropping their kids places, walking to work.
So yes, I think actually listening to a podcast is
one of the easiest things for mom to do because
you can do other things and yet still get this
extra benefit from listening, as opposed to having to stuff
(09:55):
what you're doing and go to a yoga class or
something like that. This is you take with you. You
just plug it in your ears, exactly exactly. I think
that since becoming a mom, listening to podcasts is one
of the easiest things I can do because I can multitask,
and I can't multitask while doing much else. So yeah,
I think moms do absolutely have time to listen to podcasts.
(10:16):
Are there any podcasts that you love that have nothing
to do with books, that are like your guilty pleasure
when you're like, oh my gosh, I'm so sick of
talking about books every day all day. I just want
something else. Then I listened to Under the Influence. Oh
my gosh, I love that answer. I love that. So
I think I told you I was like sick in
(10:37):
bed and listening to your podcast, and I loved it
so much that I ended up applying to be one
of those influencer moms um as a result, and forgot
that I had even done it until I got some
email like you've been accepted for like to know it,
and I was like, what is this? And I was like, oh,
my gosh, that was Joe's podcast. One night, about a
year ago, I realized something. I had a toddler spread
(11:01):
eagld in the middle of my bed and a baby
with her head nuzzled right in my armpit. I was
covered in just a little bit of breast milk a
fair amount of pee. And that's when I realized that
I could, with just one click, purchase what I needed
to be like these women in the pictures. Through their
tags and links and the swipe ups. I could buy
(11:21):
their lazy nursing bra their long flowing dresses, their sustainable
cloth napkins, and bamboo books for toddlers that are very,
very good for the earth. I realized that all of
these seemingly perfect mothers on social media, they were all
trying to sell me something I didn't need to create
my own perfect life, and I could buy theirs, and
(11:44):
I did I just introduced to the tea, which is
a horrible point heard to thank and say why most
of them are just Oh my god, this for relation.
(12:05):
It changed everything about how I looked at Instagram. I
was no longer Dorothy dazzled by os and pulled back
the curtain and I began to see it for the
business that it is. Oh my god, I love it
so much. You know, we maybe we don't talk about
Under the Influence enough on this podcast. We do. Season
(12:27):
two of Under the Influence did just long. So one
podcast that I'm really excited for is Glory Adams new podcast.
Is that on your radar? Absolutely, it's on my radar.
I'm so excited for it. It's called Well Read Black Girl.
And I had Glory on my podcast when her anthology
came out probably two years ago, and have just so
(12:48):
admired the way she's cultivated this community around reading and
she's just such a superstar. So I can't wait to
listen to it. I'm actually wondering maybe we should call
up Glory and ask her about her new podcast. You
totally should. With the magic of audio, that might be possible.
Zimby having you on has been so wonderful. I loved
(13:09):
getting to talk to you. I always love getting to
talk to you. Tell our listeners where they can find you.
They can find me on Instagram at Zimby Owens and
my website is zimby Owens dot com. After the break,
we are going to follow up on what Zimby and
I just talked about. We're gonna have Glory Adam on
(13:30):
to talk about her new podcast, well read black Girl.
(13:53):
All right, I'm recording on my side. Hello, Hey, Glory,
welcome to the pod Club. Thank you for having me.
I'm so excited to speak with you. So I have
been a huge fan of yours for a long time,
but I'm really excited that you now have a podcast
because I feel like with a podcast you can reach
(14:16):
a different audience in an even more intimate way. Is
this something you always wanted to do with your platform? Yes? Absolutely.
I was really yearning to be closer to readers and
listeners and really dive into the author process. I wanted
to hear about their dreams, you know, you know, what
they were reading was on their nights, nan how they
(14:38):
actually became writers, and so creating a podcast allowed for
just more room to ask those questions. They were always
going on and on in my mind. Yeah, totally. And
I think it's really nice too to hear an author's
voice because there's so much emotion in it that that
can't be conveyed on the printed page. It's difficult on Instagram,
(15:00):
and so this, I think this just makes the writing
process come alive in such a cool way. Yeah, because
you get to hear just their feelings, how they um,
how they feel when they're afraid, when they're excited, when
they are in front of a fellow reader. You know,
the jitters that they get, and you just get to
hear their full process. And that's what I was like
(15:23):
longing for. I'm like what happens? And I you know,
like when you turn off Instagram when you're not in
your laptop, like what are you thinking about? And getting
closer to that interior is always just like really interesting
and very helpful, especially if you're aspiring writer yourself. Oh
I think so. I One of my favorite things that
(15:43):
I love to hear from other authors is like, what's
your morning routine? I don't know why, I just I
think maybe I want to know how mind stacks up
or what I should be doing better but it's it's
one of my absolute favorite things. I just adore it. Yeah, no,
it's it's my favorite too. It's kind to like when you,
I mean, I don't know how many people still read
People Magazine. I still read it, you know, when you're
(16:05):
like you're like flipping through people and then you see
like everyday celebrity is like they go to like Whole
Foods too. It's like the same kind of vibe when
you hear that, You're like, writer loves to you know,
make their camera meal ty in the morning. They put
like two drops of honey. You're like, yeah, I do
that too. It just makes you feel closer to them absolutely.
(16:26):
So tell me a little bit about who you have
on this first season of Well Read Black Girl. The
podcast this season is just like full of powerhouse women.
We kick it off with Toronto Burke, first time author
and activists who is the leader of the Me Too movement,
reading her memoir really just like it was just like
(16:49):
a light in my life, Like it just was so inspiring.
And then we follow it with Minjin Lee, the author
of Pachinko, one of my favorite favorite favorite books. I
love that you go so much and it's like seeing
turned into a series, we get to watch it on
TV as well. Like, so wild Men has so many
great just like stories about how she became a writer
(17:09):
and you know the process of taking twelve years to
write Pagenko, which is so amazing. And then you know
like Britt Bennett, Gabriel Union, Zebra Ballet, like all these
incredible writers that have vastly different stories, but they all
come to the page with such energy and love. You know, Yeah,
I'm so jealous of your first season line up because
(17:31):
it is just that good. Do you have a favorite
interview or an episode? I always ask on It's like
choose your children, you know, it really is. I want
to call it my favorite. I'll say my most memorable
was speaking with Anita Hill, because she is such iconic
figure and so powerful and has such a wonderful tenacity
(17:52):
about her that I just I think, like, for the
first you know, five to ten minutes, I just was
like I cannot believe I'm speaking being with Anita Hell,
you know, like this is just like just completely out
of my world, but listening to her and like looking
at her whole life, like like who she was as
a young woman, who she is now reading her book,
(18:15):
how like such a testimony, you know what I mean? Like,
I just was really floored by our conversation and just
even learning like little things that I wouldn't expect, like
she talked about her favorite superhero and talked about just
like you know, these like fun topics that just that
aren't just like the intense, political, mission driven work, which
(18:35):
is just as important. But it's awesome to learn, like
what her favorite color is, and you know where she
likes to travel, just to show that she has a full,
well rounded life and she does all these things. You know,
we see her in the media portrayed as one way,
it's this incredible professor and lawyer, but she's also a
daughter and a sister and just a loving person, you know.
(18:57):
So I just felt really honored to share let's space
with her. I have a very important question, which one
is Anita Hill's favorite superhero, favorite comic book character? Oh gosh,
I don't have a favorite character, but let me tell you.
I was a big fan of Stanley, you know. Oh yeah,
(19:19):
and I and one of my wishes that Stanley would
make a comic book character out of me. Oh it's okay.
So this goes to the next question, it's if you
were a superhero, what would your superpower be? Oh? I
have thought about that, and that is we have superheroes
where they can like look into the future. My superpower
(19:42):
would be every time that I've met someone that I
would be able to glimpse their past. Oh that's a
good one, yeah, because I think if we know their past,
you understand how they behave and why. Oh that's a
good one. Oh, I might have to borrow that superpower
(20:02):
because you know, I encounter some people like, wow, do
you have a go to podcast here? Like every day
if you pick up your phone or not even every
day because you just had a kid and we don't
do anything every day. That's that's mother's yes, thank you
for that. So if you if you have a spare moment,
(20:23):
what podcast is your go to? What are you listening to?
And there's so many podcasts that I love, But I'm
very much into like soothing voices, and like I need
to be soothed. I need like you know, and so
I I live for on being by christa tippet. Being
is like such like some renity now, so it's delightful
(20:46):
and peaceful, and so I can do that while I
cooking or even when I'm I'm running around after my son,
I can listen to her podcast and again those questions
that really get to the heart of people's minds and souls,
Like you really is deep very quickly. So you'll start
listening to something and then you're like, Wow, they're talking
about you know, this moment that they had in childhood
(21:08):
or you know this incredible experience that like was transformative
in their life, and it just is really lovely. So
that's one of my favorite like go to podcasts. You
know what's amazing. We have had so many empisodes of
this show so far and have not talked about on
being or Krista Tippitt, and she is just one of
my favorites and so so old school. She's been doing
(21:31):
this forever. I'm gonna play a little bit of Krista
Tippett right now, just so just so our audience can
can hear her completely soothing voice. Here's a here's a secret,
secret thing about me. Sometimes I listen to Krista to
fall asleep, and not because her podcasts aren't amazingly interesting,
but because her voice just just soothes me. Just it's
like a it's like white noise. For me, I love
(21:53):
it so much. I do think it's worth underlining because
it's so hard for people to imagine that as late
as you know, the latter half of the twentieth century,
human beings thought that we were the only creatures who
made tools. That's what Western science believed. If somebody at
(22:14):
that time had gone to the pygmies in the rainforest
in Congo, they could have told you, I've sat and
talked to them. They've watched it. Right. It was, you know,
man the toolmaker. It was Osmond Hill who defined us thus,
and so it was it was a shock, I think,
to the scientific world. And when I finally was made
(22:36):
to go to Cambridge University by Louis Leakey said I
needed a degree. He wouldn't always be around to get money.
And also you were the eighth person in the history
of Cambridge to come in. You came in to do
graduate work without an undergraduate degree, which was almost unheard of. Yes,
yes I did, he said, it was the time for that. Yeah.
I was weeted with signed who said, well, you've done
(22:59):
your study wrong. You shouldn't have named the chimpanzees. They
should have had numbers. That's science, and you can't talk
about personality mind capable of problem solving our emotions because
they're unique to us. But the dog you mentioned, Rusty,
he told me when I was a child that that
certainly wasn't true. We are not the only beings on
(23:21):
the planet with personalities, minds, and emotions, and we are
part of and not separate from the rest of the
animal kingdom. She does have the most soothing voice that
you've ever heard. Yeah, it's totally like old school like
that you know, public radio vibe. Yes, yes, some good
(23:43):
old car talk, yes, yes, exactly. Yeah, and of course
like MPR like you know everyone like you know, the
funny thing those voices. And also Howard Stern is the
voice of my childhood because my mom was a little
subversive and she would like right, and so I heard
a lot of things that I probably shouldn't have heard. Um,
I think it made me a more interesting human being. Well,
(24:03):
and I think about it a lot too, because a
lot of issues there with misogyny, and they were always
naked women in the studio, but Robin was a bad
ass co host and a woman in radio in the
years when there were no women in radio, And I
just like, Robin Quivers was my end all be all.
(24:23):
She really was. I freaking loved her. She was to
reply and just like so beautiful and how's her ground
with him? I totally held her ground. Yes, yes, Robin
Quivers and Christa Tippett both the best. Glory, those are
actually my only questions. This is so fun. You guys
are awesome. This is great. That's it for the pod
(24:50):
club today. Thank you so much to Zity and Glory
for coming on. The two of them just gave me
so many more books to read, which is not the
best because my t VR is already toppling over and
it might actually fall over and knock someone out one
of these days. As a reminder, here's the shows we
talked about today. Both Zimby and Glory shows moms don't
(25:11):
have time to read books and well read Black Girl.
Zimby recommended Anne Bogles what should I read next? The
New York Times book review podcast, and I recommended to
her under the Influence, Even though yes, I hate talking
about myself, I'm the lamest. Glory recommended on being with
Krista Tippett such such a good o G podcast, and
(25:32):
I'm going to go find some old Robin Quivers clips
to listen to right now, and also desperately try to
get Robin on this show. Wouldn't that be the most
amazing Robin Quivers. And that's it for this week. Go
have fun, happy listening, read some books. We all deserve
some reading time right now, and I'll talk to you
(25:52):
next week at the pod Club is hosted I'm me
Joe Pianza. Our executive producers are Me Again and Emily Marinoff.
Our producers are Mary Do and Darby Masters. Our associate
producer is Lauren Philip. Our theme and additional music was
(26:14):
composed by Aaron Kaufman. Aaron Kaufman is also our consulting
producer and special thanks to Nikki e Tor he was
just a wonderful human being who I like to think
at the end of episodes.
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