BOOKS

De Blasio is out, sharks are in, and lieutenant paramedic Anthony Almjoera joins the pod to talk about Riding the Lightning, his new book about his wrenching pandemic year, how he thinks the FDNY let down and left behind medical first responders, and much more. WARNING: This episode includes conversation about suicide and suicidal thoughts.

I faked all of my book reports as a kid – I hated reading. I got good grades in my ESL classes only because of some natural ability with words. At least that’s what teachers said. Gifted. My ease with diction and syntax had less to do with natural ability and more to do with my growing ability to adapt. I was surviving.

Jonathan Russell Clark debuts a monthly column for Tasteful Rude detailing the choicest selections from his book-obsessed life.

While the folks in my YA books were experience a blushing first romance, I was trying to reconcile pop culture with the teachings of my conservative Muslim upbringing.

Elizabeth Hall is a full-time lover and a part-time writer. She is the author of the chapbook Two Essays and the book I HAVE DEVOTED MY LIFE TO THE CLITORIS, a Lambda Literary Award Finalist. Bett Williams’ memoir THE WILD KINDNESS: A PSILOCYBIN ODYSSEY is all about the search.

Book Club! Podcast! Chrissy is feeling oddly optimistic about the Eric Adams-Andrew Cuomo alliance, and jazz great turned boxing manager Charles Farrell visits the pod to talk with Harry and Vice’s Tim Marchman about his memoir that covers, among other things, playing with Sonny Rollins and Ornette Coleman, fixing fights for the mob, “the Moby Dick of boxing” and lots more. Stick around to the end to hear him play a little piano, too.

By now, you must have heard about the shortlist of the Ako Caine Prize stories for 2021. It includes stellar offerings from Doreen Baingana, Rémy Ngamije, Meron Hadero, Troy Onyango, and Iryn Tushabe. We at Olongo wish them hearty congratulations! Caine Prizewinners and shortlistees have always gone on to become proud names in African literature, from Binyavanga Wainaina to Chimamanda Adichie to Tọ́pẹ́ Fọlárìn, to name a few.

Chrissy has a message for the pundits “explaining” what just happened in New York, and Times reporter and researcher Emma Goldberg discusses her new book on the medical students who became doctors in the city in the midst of the pandemic and reads one incredible passage from it.

You asked for help with your own particular rejection, and help is what you deserve.

It's no accident that Pola Oloixarac opens the novel with, "Come thirsty."

Here was nature audibly ripping meat apart, and there, a few yards off, was normal human business, flowing on at eye level.

Can you please tell me why it's OK for me to buy more books?