Book Spider

In which we discuss the magical cinematic language of David Lynch, focusing on three of his most challenging movies, and lovingly (I hope) dig at him for his largely blah memoir. 

In which we discuss the seductive pointlessness of Jungian psycho-mysticism, whether consciousness emerges mechanistically or mysteriously, and our real fears about technology. 

In this episode, the devious, uncanny Spiders examine Mother Night, a solid and thought-provoking novel from the oft-overrated Kurt Vonnegut.

In this episode, the Spiders discuss the novels Watchers and Abduction, by Dean Koontz and Robin Cook respectively, to see what bad writing is all about.

In a departure from the general format, the Spiders take on the broader question of the relationship between AI, writing, literature, and other forms of creative arts (especially film). A snapshot of a moment in history, posing questions which will soon be answered or made irrelevant, but pretty interesting in spite of that. Works Cited: Max Read: “Drowning in Slop” (published in New York magazine 9/25/24) Max Read: “People prefer AI art because people prefer bad art” (published via Substack 11/22/24) Kelsey Piper: “There's a fix for AI-generated essays. Why aren't we using it?” (published on vox.com 9/7/24). Megan Herbst: “Nanowrimo said it was classist and ableist to condemn AI. All hell broke loose.” (published on wired.com 9/4/24).

In this episode we discuss the lesser known works of Melville, what they say about his style outside of Moby Dick, and how we define greatness. 

In this episode, the Book Spider hosts discuss Flicker, a huge novel that delves into the golden age of films and a strange conspiracy involving a Medieval Catholic sect.

In which the Spiders tackle Omensetter's Luck, a set of prose poem loosely organized by the subjectivity of a mad preacher, which somehow briefly acquired a reputation as one of the most significant novels of the mid 20th century, and is now mostly lost to history.

We revisit one of the earlier podcast subjects and come away a little bit underwhelmed. That said, this is still a magical and strange piece to be nearly a hundred years old, and there are incredible parts. 

In this episode, the Spider hosts discuss the shortcomings of Sayaka Murata's Earthlings.

The Spiders encounter Mary Shelley's The Last Man, in which grief is transfigured into a radically inventive and astonishingly bleak post-apocalyptic sci-fi novel whose impact and legacy are undone by a complete lack of editing.

In this episode, the Spiders discuss the heady and intriguing His Master's Voice, a first-contact novel that turns the trope upside down, to good effect.

In this episode, the hosts of Book Spider, along with special guest Eddie Kim, discuss the recently released horror novel Gusano, written by founding spider himself, Patrick Barney.

In which the Spiders consider Acceptance, the third book in Jeff Vandermeer's Southern Reach trilogy, and a step down from the focused mood and mystery of the first two installments -- though not without its virtues.

A discussion of Jeff Vandermeer's Authority, the second book in the Southern Reach Trilogy. The spiders find that it strikes an uncommonly good balance between that which is understood readily and that which can't be understood at all.

A discussion of Jeff Vandermeer's novel Annihilation, in which the Spiders can't help comparing it to Alex Garner's film adaptation, in particular the ways in which one character's arc turns her outward while the other's turns her inward.

In which we finish the Underworld Triptych. 

In this episode, we navigate the challenging and beautiful middle sections of DeLillo's Underworld. Before that, though, we listen to an excerpt from cohost Patrick Barney's new novel, Gusano. 

The first in a three-parter in which we tackle DeLillo's meganovel, Underworld. In this episode we discuss just about the first third of the novel. And: We crack ourselves up imagining a Werner Herzog baseball documentary.  

In this episode, the Spiders try to analyze Elias Khoury's Gate of the Sun, a harrowing novel of the decades-long occupation of Palestine by Israel. However, the challenge is overwhelming, as it appears that violence may not be interpretable.

The spiders consider the novella Pafko at the Wall, the first fifty pages of Don DeLillo's Underworld. Does its careful examination of its period kitsch reveal a deeper thematic weight? I mean, probably.

In which we struggle to talk about a text that is famous for generating endless discussion about how to talk about it. 

In this episode, the spiders discuss Julia, by Sandra Newman, which is a retelling of 1984, by George Orwell. Julia tells the classic dystopian tale from the perspective of the original's main female character, and in so doing, retcons the original in both positive and negative ways.

The Spiders pick over Otessa Moshfegh's novel Eileen, a novel whose protagonist's gaze might have its own spidery quality.

In which the Spider tries to unravel the tangled web of Miquel de Palol's The Garden of Seven Twilights, the Catalan language's addition to the canon of postmodern meganovelistic bricks like Infinite Jest and Gravity's Rainbow.

In this episode we discuss Lexi Freiman's new book, The Book of Ayn. We talk about objectivism, the relationship between humor and ideology, the difficulties of interrogating meaning through the perspectives of unreliable narrators, and the perpetual rightness of Patrick Barney. 

In this episode, the spiders are joined by a special guest, the author of several notable short story collections, David Nikki Crouse. We ask David craft questions about their most recent story collection, I'm Here: Alaska Stories. David gives insightful answers on a variety of topics, including class, identity, and the myth of Alaska.

In which the Spiders grudgingly admit to not connecting with Ben Okri's legendary The Famished Road, inspiration for the best early Radiohead song, and a novel which works much better in bits and fragments than it does as a unified whole.

Note: Some audio issues with our mics in this episode. Apologies for the diminished quality.  In this episode, the boys discuss the future of literacy - in large part to avoid discussing Vinge's disappointing novel. We touch upon what the emergence of generative AI might mean for writing and reading, and we talk about the craft of writing about the future. 

The Spiders are unsure how to approach Richard Powers's Galatea 2.2, a novel which they find eerily predictive of the methods used to build contemporary AI programs like ChatGPT. Does the contemporary relevance of its scientific principles cause us to overrate its thematic depth, or to look in the wrong places for meaning? And can Chris and Hans forgive Powers's unique brand of ornate prose?

A discussion of Mary Beth Willard's "Why it's OK to enjoy the work of immoral artists," a philosophical text which advances the titular thesis, with a specific focus on Hans and Patrick's relationship to the classic early work of industrial-metal singer and alleged abusive partner Marilyn Manson.

In this episode, the Book Spider hosts discuss three important questions in literature: Can literature contain or reveal truth? What is the relationship between literature and morality? And how seriously should we take an author's intentions when discussing her work? The hosts employ a range of background texts to address these questions, including Aristotle's Poetics.

In this episode, we discuss the tiny, ugly ways an otherwise beautifully written novel can age, as well as Patrick's inclination to invoke WWOD (What Would Orwell Do?). 

The Spiders puzzle admiringly over Claire-Louise Bennett's Checkout 19, which uses interpolated stories and a fractured narrative to explore the barriers facing artistically inclined women in a sexist society. Special focus is given to the story of Tarquin Superbus, which so charmed us that we've perhaps had a difficult time exploring other aspects of the novel.

In this episode, we discuss the lasting phenomenon that is the Hitchhikers' media series. Just why is it so popular? It's not extraordinarily profound. It's certainly not upbeat, either. But: it caught the world at the right time and: it was written to be very easily digestible by a lot of different folks. 

In this episode, the Book Spider hosts tackle The Mayor of Casterbridge, by Thomas Hardy. Casterbridge is a complex novel about the rise and fall of Michael Henchard. After dramatically selling his wife and baby daughter to a stranger for five pounds, Henchard vows to abstain from alcohol for twenty years. Eighteen years after this event, the novel picks up with Henchard at the height of his powers, living as a prosperous corn merchant and the mayor of the small town of Casterbridge. However, after selling some bad grain to his constituents and being surpassed in business acumen by Farfrae, a newcomer, Henchard's fortunes fall into steep decline.

Does submission to fate bring weight or lightness? Can Milan Kundera find the clit? Special guest Sarah Ashcraft joins us to discuss The Unbearable Lightness of being, a novel whose deceptive readability hides its thematic obscurity.

In this episode, we discuss the close attention Woolf gives to her characters and how mercurial and impermanent we are under her atomic analysis. We also discuss why, it seems, To the Lighthouse is a 1 of 1, rarely emulated (at least successfully) despite the fact that Woolf is in the canon. In fact, brilliant as she is - or maybe because of her brilliance - we suggest young writers shouldn't try to emulate her. Better to read her, and enjoy her, and accept that To the Lighthouse has already been written, and need never be written again. 

In this episode, the Book Spider hosts discuss Lost Memory of Skin, a novel that seeks to empathize with probably the most reviled subgroup in the entire world: pedophiles. The novel follows the exploits of a young sex criminal known only as the kid, whose life of hardship culminates in an attempt to meet a teenage girl for sex. In the aftermath, the kid finds himself homeless, living under a causeway in southern Florida, attempting to eke out an existence among other down-and-out sex criminals. When he meets the professor, a sociology researcher at a local university, his fortunes seem to turn for the better, until the professor's past catches up to both of them.

The spiders attempt to fit together the refracting, self-contradictory plot and reconcile the competing thematic strands of Namwali Serpell's enigmatic The Furrows, which might or might not be a compelling meditation on grief and loss.

In this episode we discuss McCarthy's newest two novels, published a couple months apart but obviously intended to be read together. And we talk about why, though they are excellent, these are such awful books for young writers to read and try to emulate. Don't even try it, kids. Leave this particular magic to McCarthy.

In this episode, we discuss a collection of poems by Charles Baudelaire, The Flowers of Evil. This collection revels in despair and decay, in erotic death. Come along with us into the depths of pain and sexual horror.

The spider tackles Painted Devils, a collection of strange stories (perhaps not horror but darkly surreal in a horror-adjacent way) by the author Robert Aickman. Dense and enigmatic, these stories use the uncanny to explore various themes, particularly the life of the artist. Recorded just in time for Halloween but then posted in the middle of January.

In which we discuss, among other things:  The proper level of shame one should feel for liking the television show Friends. Whether we would antagonize the rich hosts of a dinner party thrown by tech bros - should we somehow find ourselves invited. The big and messy and fascinating ideas - and bargain basement humor - of Drew Hayden Taylor's play about authenticity, and whether it is possible to decide what is or is not authentic.

In this episode, the hosts of Book Spider discuss Jean Toomer's Cane, a collection of poems and stories that evoke rural Georgia of the early 1900s. The critic Henry Louis Gates Jr. calls attention to Cane's use of black, white, and especially mixed-race characters to represent the American experience, an astounding literary innovation never used before or since. 

The podcast's second go-round with author Dana Spiotta sees us dig into her most recent novel Wayward, which makes a bold effort to argue for nuance and subtlety in the sociopolitical chaos following the 2016 election (for everyone except finance bros, who remain one-dimensional shitheads).

This week, we discuss Böll's compelling but messy multigenerational, German POV reflection on the World Wars, evil, and their impact on the lives of common people. 

This episode, the Book Spider gang discusses an early suspense / psychological thriller novel, Rebecca, which deals with the melancholia a nameless narrator experiences when she marries a rich man and moves to his huge estate on a whim, only to find that the memories of her husband's first wife haunt the very ground upon which she walks. 

This week we're dissecting a book which mixes fiction and nonfiction in ways which are enigmatic, compelling, and -- to some readers -- morally suspicious. Benjamin Labatut's When We Cease to Understand the World follows the fictionalized biographies of several scientists and mathematicians as they discover the principles which become quantum mechanics. This odd genre hybrid is admirable, gripping, and only partially satisfying, despite great critical acclaim.

This week, we discuss Ferris's famous "we" novel about late 2000s office space culture, and get briefly melancholic about what work friends felt like in the pre-pandemic world.