Book Club for Masochists: a Readers’ Advisory Podcast

It’s episode 212 and time for us to talk about excellently complicate the non-fiction genre of Linguistics & Language! We discuss 🤔, our academic backgrounds, the power of words, accents, and more!  

You can download the podcast directly, find it on Libsyn, or get it through Apple Podcasts or your favourite podcast delivery system.

In this episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray 🦇 | Jam Edwards

Things We Read (or tried to…)

• Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language by Gretchen McCulloch
• Fifty Sounds by Polly Barton
• In Other Words by Jhumpa Lahiri, translated by Ann Goldstein
• I is an Other: The Secret Life of Metaphor and How it Shapes the Way We See the World by James Geary
• Babel: Around the World in Twenty Languages by Gaston Dorren

Other Media We Mentioned

• 19 Ways of Looking at Wang Wei: With More Ways by Eliot Weinberger
• Through the Language Glass: Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages by Guy Deutscher
• Otherwords - Inside the Fiercest Debate in Linguistics
• Your Computer Is on Fire edited by Thomas S. Mullaney, Benjamin Peters, Marie Hicks, and Kavita Philip
• What the Font?! - A Manga Guide to Western Typeface by Kuniichi Ashiya
• Giga Town: A Guide to Manga Iconography by Fumiyo Kouno, translated by Ko Ransom
• The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying by Marie Kondō, translated by Cathy Hirano
  • Occasional reminder that whenever you say "sparks joy" you are not quoting Marie Kondo.
    You are quoting her translator, Cathy Hirano. She invented "sparks joy" out of whole cloth.
    What Marie Kondo says is "This makes my heart go pitter pat.”
    -Zack Davisson
• Eine wie Alaska [Looking for Alaska] by John Green, translated by Sophie Zeitz
  • “I would read it in German, for a few reasons” - John Green
• Die kleine Fledermaus Wegda by Nanna Nesshöver and Wiebke Rauers
• Lingo: A Language Spotter's Guide to Europe by Gaston Dorren, translated by Alison Edwards

Links, Articles, and Things

• Great Vowel Shift (Wikipedia)
• Lolcat (Wikipedia)
• Kinokuniya
  • There are four Kinokuniya shops in Texas. Four! Put one in Denver!
• Abugida (Wikipedia)
• Episode 209 - Design

15 Language & Linguistics Books by BIPOC Authors:

Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers’ Advisory Podcast chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here.

• Otter's Journey Through Indigenous Language and Law by Lindsay Keegitah Borrows
• The Skin That We Speak: Thoughts on Language and Culture in the Classroom edited by Joanne Kilgour Dowdy and Lisa Delpit
• Tongues: On Longing and Belonging Through Language edited by Eufemia Fantetti, Leonarda Carranza, and Ayelet Tsabari
• Living Language Rights: Constitutional Pathways to Indigenous Language Education by Lorena Sekwan Fontaine
• Grammar Matters: The Social Significance of How We Use Language by Jila Ghomeshi
• A Tale of Monstrous Extravagance: Imagining Multilingualism by Tomson Highway
• My Broken Language: A Memoir by Quiara Alegría Hudes
• Et Cetera: An Illustrated Guide to Latin Phrases by Maia Lee-Chin with illustrations by Marta Bertello
• Translating Myself and Others by Jhumpa Lahiri
• Nine Nasty Words: English in the Gutter – Then, Now, and Forever by John McWhorter
• The Ecology of Language Evolution by Salikoko S. Mufwene
• Mâci-Nêhiyawêwin / Beginning Cree by Solomon Ratt with illustrations by Holly Martin
• Living Pidgin: Contemplations on Pidgin Culture by Lee A. Tonouchi
• Kingdom of Characters: The Language Revolution That Made China Modern by Jing Tsu
• Decolonizing Language and Other Revolutionary Ideas by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o

Give us feedback!

• Fill out the form to ask for a recommendation or suggest a genre or title for us to read!

Check out our Tumblr, join our Discord Server, or send us an email!

Join us again on Tuesday, June 3rd when we’ll be discussing “Found Books,”  that is books that we’ve found in public little free libraries, book exchanges, and book swaps.

Then on July 1st we’ll be talking about Non-Traditional Storytelling (e.g. fiction that’s not prose)!

 It’s episode 211 and we’re talking about books and other media we’ve enjoyed recently! We discuss early internet chatrooms, shuttlecocks, haunted dolls, what constitutes a “banger”, and more!

You can download the podcast directly, find it on Libsyn, or get it through Apple Podcasts or your favourite podcast delivery system.

In this episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray 🦇 | Jam Edwards

What We’re Into:

• Anna
  • Acid West by Joshua Wheeler
  • Two Point Museum
    • Trailer
  • R.E.P.O. || Crossing the Streams
    • R.E.P.O. on Stream
• Matthew
  • Never a Sidekick: Exploring the Dynamic History of Batgirl by Tim Hanley
  • Yakuza: Like a Dragon
    • 7 Weirdest Yakuza: Like a Dragon Quests That Were Bizarre Even by Yakuza Standards
  • Mantracks: a True Story of Fake Fossils
• Jam
  • WEBFISHING
    • Trailer
  • Murdle Volume 1 by G.T. Karber
  • RuPaul’s Drag Race adjacent media
    • Runnereye (YouTube)
    • Drag Her (podcast)
    • UpUntil Dawn (YouTube)
    • I Got Dr*nk and Built the Lego Tuxedo Cat (Crashout Included)
    • Crystal Envy & Lexi Love’s “Alter Ego” Lip Sync
    • Arrietty & Lydia B Kollins’ “Boogie Wonderland” Lip Sync
• Meghan
  • Hex by Thomas Olde Heuvelt
  • Badminton
    • Pilou
  • Meeting Infinity and Infinity Wars (short story collections)

Other Media We Mentioned

• Didi (film)
• Doechii - Denial is a River

Links, Articles, and Things

• RA in a Day
• folio - 019 - immanence 01 - with jam edwards & garbageface aka gnostic front aka karol orzechowski
• Spaceport America

15 Fairy Tales, Fables, Legends, Myths, and Folklore books by BIPOC Authors:

Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers’ Advisory Podcast chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here.

• Women Wide Awake: Stories, Sculptures and Poems From Sindhi Folklore by  Nimra Bandukwala and Manahil Bandukwala

• Blue Bamboo: Japanese Tales of Fantasy and Romance by Osamu Dazai, translated by Ralph F. McCarthy

• The Annotated African American Folktales by Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Maria Tatar

• Blackberry Blue: And Other Fairy Tales by Jamila Gavin

• Her Stories: African American Folktales, Fairy Tales, and True Tales by Virginia Hamilton, illustrated by Diane Dillon and Leo Dillon

• The Dragon Slayer: Folktales From Latin America by Jamie Hernandez

• Laughing with the Trickster: On Sex, Death, and Accordions by Tomson Highway

• Legends of Vancouver by E. Pauline Johnson

• Living Ghosts & Mischievous Monsters: Chilling American Indian Stories by Dan SaSuWeh Jones, illustrated by Weshoyot Alvitre

• An Introduction to Yōkai Culture: Monsters, Ghosts, and Outsiders in Japanese History by Komatsu Kazuhiko, translated by Matt Alt and Hiroko Yoda

• Rediscovering Turtle Island: a First Peoples' Account of the Sacred Geography of America by Taylor Keen

• Night Stories: Folktales From Latin America by Liniers

• Mangoes, Mischief, and Tales of Friendship: Stories From India by Chitra Soundar, illustrated by Uma Krishnaswamy

• Vietnamese Folktales for Children: Stories of Adventure and Wonder in Vietnamese and English by Phuoc Thi Minh Tran, illustrated by Dong Nguyen and Hop Thi Nguyen

• The Little Hummingbird by Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas

Give us feedback!

• Fill out the form to ask for a recommendation or suggest a genre or title for us to read!

Check out our Tumblr, join our Discord Server, or send us an email!

Join us again on Tuesday, May 6th when we’ll be discussing the genre/topic of Linguistics and Language!

Then on Tuesday, June 3rd we’ll be discussing “Found Books,” that is books that we’ve found in public little free libraries, book exchanges, and book swaps.

It’s episode 210 and time for us to talk about the genre of Romantasy! We discuss romance series, happily ever afters, tropes, social media, and more! Plus, special guest romance fiction researcher Christine Larson!

You can download the podcast directly, find it on Libsyn, or get it through Apple Podcasts or your favourite podcast delivery system.

In this episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray 🦇 | Jam Edwards

Things We Read (or tried to…)

• Wooing the Witch Queen by Stephanie Burgis, narrated by Amanda Leigh Cobb
• A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
• Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer
• The City of Brass by S. A. Chakraborty
  • The Significance Of S.A. Chakraborty’s Name Adjustment In Upcoming Book
• One Dark Window by Rachel Gillig
• Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros
• Newt’s Emerald by Garth Nix  (not mentioned in episode)
• The Bridge Kingdom by Danielle L. Jensen (not mentioned in episode)
• Order of Swans by Jude Deveraux (not mentioned by name)

Other Media We Mentioned

• Love in the Time of Self-Publishing: How Romance Writers Changed the Rules of Writing and Success by Christine Larson
• Ender’s Game / Ender’s Shadow by Orson Scott Card
• Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas
• Graceling by Kristin Cashore
• Redwall by Brian Jacques
• Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor
• The Cruel Prince by Holly Black
• The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold
• Empty Crown by Rosemary Edgehill 
• A Kiss of Shadows by Laurell K. Hamiton

Links, Articles, and Things

• RA in a Day
• Episode 057 - Nordic/Scandinavian Noir
• Episode 202 - A Wizard’s Guide to Defensive Baking
• Let Them Eat Tropes: Why Romantasy Needs to Grow Beyond Trends
• Did a Best-Selling Romantasy Novelist Steal Another Writer’s Story?
• What is ‘romantasy,’ and why can’t readers get enough? (Interview with Christine Larson)

15 Romantasy books by BIPOC Authors:

Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers’ Advisory Podcast chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here.

• This Monster of Mine by Shalini Abeysekara
• A Broken Blade by Melissa Blair
• Sing Me to Sleep by Gabi Burton
• Once More Upon a Time by Roshani Chokshi 
• Faebound by Saara El-Arifi
• Immortal Longings by Chloe Gong
• The Hurricane Wars by Thea Guanzon
• The Maid and the Crocodile by Jordan Ifueko
• Sinner's Isle by Angela Montoya
• Witchmark by C.L. Polk
• Lore of the Wilds by Analeigh Sbrana
• Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri
• Trial of the Sun Queen by Nisha J. Tuli
• The Prince Without Sorrow by Maithree Wijesekara
• The Scorpion and the Night Blossom by Amélie Wen Zhao

Give us feedback!

• Fill out the form to ask for a recommendation or suggest a genre or title for us to read!

Check out our Tumblr, join our Discord Server, or send us an email!

Join us again on Tuesday, April 15th for our Spring Media Update! We’ll let you know about the media we’ve been enjoying recently that we haven’t experienced for the podcast.

Then on Tuesday, May 6th we’ll be discussing the genre/topic of Linguistics and Language!

 It’s episode 209 and time for us to talk about the genre of Design! We discuss graphic design, interior design, the line between design and art, fonts, kerning, footnotes, and more! Plus: Anna talks about evidence synthesis and search design!

You can download the podcast directly, find it on Libsyn, or get it through Apple Podcasts or your favourite podcast delivery system.

In this episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray 🦇 | Jam Edwards

Things We Read (or tried to…)

• Make Your Own Pixel Art: Create Graphics for Games, Animations, and More! by Jennifer Dawe and Matthew Humphries
• The Wright Style: Re-Creating the Spirit of Frank Lloyd Wright by Carla Lind 
• The Design of Books: An Explainer for Authors, Editors, Agents, and Other Curious Readers by Debbie Berne
• Maker Comics: Design a Game! by Bree Wolf and Jesse Fuchs
• Patternalia: An Unconventional History of Polka Dots, Stripes, Plaid, Camouflage, & Other Graphic Patterns by Jude Stewart
• Design: The Definitive Visual Guide

Other Media We Mentioned

• Graphic Wit: The Art of Humor in Design by Steven Heller and Gail Anderson
• Bear and Breakfast
• Two Point Campus
• Cat Cafe Manager 2
• Soviet Bus Stops by Christopher Herwig
• The Man in the Glass House: Philip Johnson, Architect of the Modern Century by Mark Lamster
• The 99% Invisible City: A Field Guide to the Hidden World of Everyday Design by Roman Mars and Kurt Kohlstedt

Links, Articles, and Things

• Folio - 019 - immanence 01 - with jam edwards & garbageface aka gnostic front aka karol orzechowski
• Jam's Pokémon design 
• Kerning
• River (typography)
• Ampelmännchen (East German pedestrian walk signal)

16 Design Books by BIPOC Authors:

Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers’ Advisory Podcasts chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here.

• The Power of Style: How Fashion and Beauty Are Being Used to Reclaim Cultures by Christian Allaire
• More Than a Glitch: Confronting Race, Gender, and Ability Bias in Tech by Meredith Broussard
• Unmasking AI: My Mission to Protect What Is Human in a World of Machines by Joy Buolamwini
• The Layered Edible Garden: A Beginner's Guide to Creating A Productive Food Garden Layer by Layer by Christina Chung
• Exploring Game Mechanics: Principles and Techniques to Make Fun, Engaging Games by Maithili Dhule
• Salish Blankets: Robes of Protection and Transformation, Symbols of Wealth by  Janice George, Leslie H. Tepper, and Willard Joseph
• Extra Bold: A Feminist, Inclusive, Anti-Racist, Nonbinary Field Guide for Graphic Designers by Josh A. Halstead, Leslie Xia, Farah Kafei, Kaleena Sales, Ellen Lupton, Valentina Vergara, and Jennifer Tobias
• Mismatch: How Inclusion Shapes Design by Kat Holmes
• Reimagined Worlds: Narrative Placemaking for People, Play, and Purpose : A Designer's Manifesto by Margaret Chandra Kerrison
• The Creative Gene: How Books, Movies, and Music Inspired the Creator of Death Stranding and Metal Gear Solid by Hideo Kojima
• User Friendly: How the Hidden Rules of Design Are Changing the Way We Live, Work, and Play by Cliff Kuang and Robert Fabricant
• Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism by Safiya Umoja Noble
• Now You See Me! An Introduction to 100 Years of Black Design by Charlene Prempeh
• Just Enough Design: Reflections on the Japanese Philosophy of Hodo-Hodo by Taku Satoh
• Side Quest: A Visual History of Roleplaying Games by Steenz and Samuel Sattin
• Decolonizing Design: A Cultural Justice Guidebook by Elizabeth (Dori) Tunstall
  

Give us feedback!

• Fill out the form to ask for a recommendation or suggest a genre or title for us to read!

Check out our Tumblr, join our Discord Server, or send us an email!

Join us again on Tuesday, April 1st we’ll be talking about the genre of  Romantasy!

Then on Tuesday, April 15th it’s time for our Spring Media Update, as we talk about books and other things we haven’t read for the podcast.

It’s episode 208 and time for us to talk about our Reading Resolutions for 2025! We discuss our love of spreadsheets, the churn of books in public libraries, literacy, unschooling, and more! 

You can download the podcast directly, find it on Libsyn, or get it through Apple Podcasts or your favourite podcast delivery system.

In this episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray 🦇 | Jam Edwards

2025 Goals/Intentions/Etc.

• Jam
  • Theme of the year: “Cultivation”
  • Use Storygraph instead of Goodreads
    • Jam on Storygraph
  • Maybe put a book on the nightstand so I’ll read it before bed
• Meghan
  • Subscribe to print reading material
• Anna
  • Track favourite reads of the year in the spreadsheet
  • Try to figure out why she reads less fiction than she used to
• Matthew
  • Read every book on fiction to-read list published before the year 2000
  • Record the “why” when adding books to TBR
    

Other Media We Mentioned

• Folio podcast
  • Jam’s episode isn’t out yet
  • Immanence
• British Library Tales of the Weird
• The Year of the Locust by Terry Hayes
• The Gray House by Mariam Petrosyan, translated by Yuri Machkasov
• X-Men Classic Omnibus by Chris Claremont and others
• Role Models by John Waters
• Radical Unschooling: We NEED to Talk About This! 
• Sold a Story podcast
  

Links, Articles, and Things

• Episode 190 - Reading Resolutions and Rants
• r/AmItheAsshole (Wikipedia)
• If Books Could Kill (Wikipedia)
  

50 Recent Short Story Collections by BIPOC Authors:

Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers’ Advisory Podcasts chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here.

For this list of short story collections, we’ve focused on titles published within the past four years.

• Ghostroots by ‘Pemi Aguda (2024)
• Coexistence: Stories by Billy-Ray Belcourt (2024)
• Death by a Thousand Cuts by Shashi Bhat (2024)
• Your Utopia by Bora Chung, translated by Anton Hur (2024)
• Green Frog by Gina Chung (2024)
• Weird Black Girls by Elwin Cotman (2024)
• Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil by Ananda Lima (2024)
• Peacocks of Instagram by Deepa Rajagopalan (2024)
• Convergence Problems by Wole Talabi (2024)
• Rejection by Tony Tulathimutte (2024)
• A Kind of Madness by Uche Okonkwo (2024)
• Tomb Sweeping by Alexandra Chang (2023)
• Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology edited by Shane Hawk and Theodore C. Van Alst Jr. (2023)
• Every Drop Is A Man's Nightmare by Megan Kamalei Kakimoto (2023)
• No One Will Come Back for Us: And Other Stories by Premee Mohamed (2023)
• Drinking From Graveyard Wells by Yvette Lisa Ndlovu (2023)
• Jackal, Jackal by Tobi Ogundiran (2023)
• Tiger Work by Ben Okri (2023)
• Skin Thief by Suzan Palumbo (2023)
• Out There Screaming: An Anthology of New Black Horror edited by Jordan Peele (2023)
• Let’s Go Let’s Go Let’s Go by Cleo Qian (2023)
• New Suns 2: More Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color edited by Nisi Shawl (2023)
• The Goth House Experiment by SJ Sindu (2023)
• Chrysali by Anuja Varghese (2023)
• Tell Me Pleasant Things About Immortality by Lindsay Wong (2023)
• The Hive and the Honey by Paul Yoon (2023)
• Girlfriends by Emily Zhou (2023)
• Gods of Want by K-Ming Chang (2022)
• Fiona and Jane by Jean Chen Ho (2022)
• God's Children Are Little Broken Things by Arinze Ifeakandu (2022)
• Self-Portrait with Ghost by Meng Jin (2022)
• The Haunting of Hajji Hotak and Other Stories by Jamil Jan Kochai (2022)
• Bliss Montage by Ling Ma (2022)
• Uncertain Kin by Janice Lynn Mather (2022)
• The Memory Librarian by Janelle Monae  (2022)
• The Consequences by Manuel Muñoz (2022)
• Man Made Monsters by Andrea Rogers (2022)
• Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty (2022)
• Her First Palestinian by Saeed Teebi (2022)
• Africa Risen: A New Era of Speculative Fiction by Sheree Renée Thomas, Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki, and Zelda Knight (2022)
• Buffalo is the New Buffalo by Chelsea Vowel (2022)
• Home of the Floating Lily by Silmy Abdullah (2021)
• Skinship by Yoon Choi (2021)
• Tainna: The Unseen Ones by Norma Dunning (2021)
• Eat The Mouth That Feeds You by Carribean Fragoza (2021)
• My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson (2021)
• The Rock Eaters by Brenda Peynado (2021)
• 100 Boyfriends by Brontez Purnell (2021)
• Afterparties by Anthony Veasna So (2021)
• Never Have I Ever by Isabel Yap (2021)
  

Give us feedback!

• Fill out the form to ask for a recommendation or suggest a genre or title for us to read!

Check out our Tumblr, join our Discord Server, or send us an email!

Join us again on Tuesday, March 4th when we’ll be talking about the genre of Design!

Then on Tuesday, April 1st we’ll be talking about the genre of  Romantasy!