If Books Could Kill
The airport bestsellers that captured our hearts and ruined our minds
Episodes
In 2004, historian Thomas Frank proposed a theory about the rightward drift of the white working class. Was he a prescient king whose work presaged the rise of Trump — or a bumbling fool with a broken thesis? Unfortunately it turns out he is a secret third thing that takes one hour and six minutes to explain.
Special thanks to Julia Valdés for her help with this episode!
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Peter and Michael discuss the book that launched the phenomenon of New Atheism and asked the question: What if we hated Muslims, but in a secular way?
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What should workers do when they get laid off? In 1998 a bleak, asinine bestseller told them to find another whey.
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New York’s favorite criminal is in the news, so here is our episode about his ridiculous life.
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Is fact-checking a legitimate enterprise? Is America's most famous fact-checker nothing more than a dweeb? Michael and Peter discuss.
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A memoir about parenting very badly and then getting weirdly defensive when anyone asks you about it.
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Is social media to blame for the teen mental health crisis? It's complicated!
Thanks to Emily Weinstein, Amy Orben, Andrew Przybylski, Dean Burnett, Michael Mullarkey and Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz for help researching and fact-checking this episode!
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To celebrate ("celebrate") Donald Trump choosing JD Vance as his running mate we are re-releasing our "Hillbilly Elegy" episode. Enjoy!
Peter and Michael discuss "The Origins of Woke," a glimpse into the dark aspirations of the Republican Party and the mind of a very unusual man.
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Peter and Michael discuss the media coverage of the protests at Columbia — from the crazed, bloodthirsty ravings of right-wing media to the more muted, respectful bloodthirst of centrist media.
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Peter and Michael discuss Michael Lewis’s bestselling book about the rise and fall of Sam Bankman-Fried, a young prodigy whose only flaw was that he dreamed too big.
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2 Better 2 Angels
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We're finally discussing a good book! Naomi Klein's "Doppelgänger" chronicles the long, steady descent of another Naomi — Wolf (buddy oof) — from feminist icon to crank conspiracist.
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In 2013, Sheryl Sandberg became an icon for women who wanted to move from middle management at a tech company into upper management at a tech company. Today, Peter and Michael examine the contents of her bestselling book, survey the wreckage of corporate feminism and ask whether women will finally find liberation in the Metaverse.
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This week we're tackling Steven Pinker's 900 page dissection of the reasons why violence, torture and war have declined over the last 10,000 years. Was it an indeterminate mixture of politics, economics, technology and serendipity? Or did some European guys write some books that said murder was bad?
Special thanks to Philip Dwyer, Eleanor Janega, David M. Perry and Doug Thompson for help researching and fact-che...
Before Donald Trump became America's most prominent politician and birth certificate inspector, he spent his days making everyone in New York City slightly uncomfortable. Michael and Peter discuss "The Art of the Deal," Trump’s 1987 bestseller chronicling his exploits as a celebrity slumlord.
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"There are two kinds of political scientists: The types who deal with noisy data and post on Twitter with a bunch of caveats. And then there are the types who write books about identity politics."
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- Sam Huneke's "Yascha Mounk’s Woke Straw Man"
- Jacob T. Levy's "The Defens...
You stare, mouth agape, at the bookstore display. It’s a self-help book, but with curse words in the title?! This must be a revolutionary new framework, not simply the same dull, reactionary ideas repackaged as hip and new.
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