Off The Shelf: Recent Episodes
The Ordinary Podcasting Network
Off the Shelf is a struggling bookworm’s call to other bookworms – those who miss the days we’d stay up scandalously late with the lights out, the covers up, and a flashlight perfectly balanced to allow us to devour books in secret until we couldn’t keep our eyes open another second – to get back to reading. Think of it as a podcast book-club: month by month, we’ll take a book and really dig in, taking its words, its characters, and its stories into our hearts and allow them to speak to us, to teach us, and even to change us.
Today’s the day! Let’s wrap up our chats on Nichole Perkins’ beautifully, brutally honest essay collection. Her opinions and views on self, relationships, womanhood, and the way that the influence of pop culture directs and shapes those things are piercingly perceptive and real. Today we’ll be digging into some specifics, and get into just what in the world Miss Piggy has to do with self-discovery and identity. I hope you enjoyed reading along with me on this book throughout this month. I hope that this little book-loving space has inspired you to make more time for books, to grow a greater love for them, and to find something in them that you hadn’t ever known before. Until we meet here again, take good care, and happy reading.
It’s time to check in on this month’s read! Is anyone else blushing yet? Laughing? Crying? Perkins’ essays threw me around emotionally from one to the next; her thoughts, feelings,and stories are unpredictable, sometimes in the best and sometimes in the worst of ways, but taken all together they make for an absolutely unique collection. Today, we’ll talk a bit about Nichole Perkins as a person and as a writer before dipping our toes into some of the book’s most standout themes and features. Most importantly,I want to think about why, especially for this book, the format of the book as an essay collection holds significance and value to the way we read her stories. Enjoy the rest of this holiday season, and see you when we come back together at the end of the month!
A happy chilly December! This month our focus turns to Nichole Perkins’ essay collection, Sometimes I Trip On How Happy We Could Be. This book is honest, and open, and in it, Perkins shares all, about all, for us all, without any reservations. It isn’t all pretty, but it all comes together to give us a picture of who she is – one of the major purposes of writers sharing their most personal works. Before we jump into this book, though, I’ll take some time today to talk about my vague, still pretty lax, but nonetheless hopeful reading goals for the new year, as we come closer and closer to it every day. I know myself better than to make any goals too specific, but it’s still important, I think, to give myself a roadmap to guide my way and keep working through my stacks. Thanks for joining me and happy reading this month!
November is almost over, which means it’s time for our wrap-up chat on Malinda Lo’s Last Night at the Telegraph Club. This book, as I discuss in today’s episode, is multi-layered and complex. There are so many pieces – of both the details of setting and plot as well as the characters themselves, their identities – that risk being lost in the rest if not taken for every ounce they’re worth. Lily’s story is an important one in the way that it represents the real, and by the simple act of telling the truth, it refuses to let anything be left out. It was a difficult read for many of the same reasons – it doesn’t hesitate to expose the injustice in our histories, and it demands better of us. There’s something so important – many things, actually –about a book like this one. I’m glad we had the chance to share it together.
Maybe it’s because of the build-up to the holidays, or maybe it’s because the hours of daylight keep getting to be fewer and fewer, but it seems like the month is just flying by! It’s already time for our mid-month check-in on Malinda Lo’s Last Night at the Telegraph Club. Today we talk about the way that this book handles the issue of hiding in plain sight. I’ll focus on Lily, and the way that hiding keeps her from fully realizing the truth of her identity – but as you read, think about the other characters who, in various circumstances, are made to hide some piece or part of themselves in order to survive, and what that does to the way they live. I hope you’re enjoying your read so far!
Who knew that November could come so quickly? If you feel like this year is moving by way too quickly, then maybe it’s time to take a little step back in time – and what better way to do that than through historical fiction? For the month, the book we’ll be sharing is Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo, a work that is a bit of an octopus-book, which is a term I just made up to refer to a book that falls under multiple different classifications and categories and takes on a lot of different topics and points of interest. This one, for example, is a young adult-targeted, historical, coming-of-age, LGBT romantic fiction, which in itself contains commentaries on race relations, immigration, political tensions, women’s education and social empowerment, and sexuality and gender, and the history of underground lesbian communities. As so many of us in English studies love to say, “there’s a lot to unpack there.” It’s a lot of work to write a good historical fiction book – it takes dedication and care and closeness and so much research, but when it all comes together, it gives us something beautiful. I hope that you and I find this month that Last Night at the Telegraph Club is one of the good ones.
Happy Halloween! Today we finish out our focus on the graphic novels Pumpkinheads and Garlic and the Vampire. Mostly, I think what hit me the most while reading these books was how much it speaks to the idea that growing up never really ends. The challenges we face every day never quit. There will always be something next to adapt to, and that is something that should excite us about life as much as it might scare us. I loved the way that the characters in these stories faced those challenges and overcame them. So, with lessons like that shining through the story? Who’s still out there saying that graphic novels are inferior, juvenile, or that their stories don’t matter? I hope you enjoyed joining me this month for these books! I’ll offer you some related reads to close us out as usual, and see you again soon for our November launch.
Anyone else getting into the fall moods now that we’re well into October? As we read through our two picks for this month, we should consider a lot of things: their stories, of course, but the way that the artwork enriches the stories, too. The possibility that the specific ways these stories are told matters a lot, and not just because we might like or dislike the way they’re drawn. Today, I’ll share short author bios for our three writers/artists of interest for the month and share my first impressions of each of the books. Beyond that, I think it quite important to lay out all the cards on why graphic novels have emerged as such a majorly important player on the field of literacy, and relevant also to speculate how and why they might be here to stay. Like we’ve said before about any other stories told in any other format, their tellers have a reason for doing so; finding that reason might be one of the most important pieces to understanding the story as a whole.
October is here! Cue the surplus of social media posts with earth tones, fallen leaves, pumpkin spice, and caption quotes taken from Anne of Green Gables! My favourite! This month, I’m excited to share not one read, but two with you– two graphic novels, to be more exact: Pumpkinheads by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Erin Hicks, and Garlic & the Vampire by Bree Paulsen. Both of these stories are filled with fall fun, seasonal vegetables, and character developments and journeys through all of the emotions. As we read, remember to take it slowly; consider the possibility that the choice of the graphic novel format itself is an intentional one. Before we jump into them, though, for today the bookish topic I’m weighing in on is re-reading. If you’re a one-and-done reader, even of your favourites, then maybe answer me a question, too: HOW?!
For September, our focus has been on Over the Woodward Wall by A. Deborah Baker, and what an adventure it was! Today marks our month end, which means it’s time for us to put a wrap on thinking about this book – at least, for now. We’ll think about the way that the story – a coming-of-age story, at its heart – is told through its fantastic setting, and consider why that specific method of telling is so effective and memorable. To close out sharing my overall reading experience and my final verdict on the book, as usual, I’ll share with you a few related book recommendations as well.
See you in October!
Today we continue our focus on A. Deborah Baker’s Over the Woodward Wall. There’s a lot to say about the author – but I’ll keep it as brief but informative for you as possible, because there’s also a lot to say about this book. As we work our way through, something to note is the way that the story, reminiscent of fairy-tales in its telling, handles and interacts with tropes and clichés; further, what’s maybe more important is to pay attention to which of those it embraces, and which it rejects. The book’s main characters are portrayed as polar opposites – does that create expectations about how each of them will fare in their new, unknown fantastic setting?
Happy September, bookies! This month our focus turns to A. Deborah Baker’s Over the Woodward Wall, a fantastical, fairy-tale-esque tale of two ordinary children on their ways to school, whose lives suddenly become anything but ordinary at the pivot point of one simple choice. For today, though, before we get too deep into the story, I want to indulge a bit in the fresh start that September so often seems to bring, and think about the question of whether we read according to season, as popular recommendations lists (30 Perfect Pumpkin-y Reads to Pair with Your PSL!) and releases always seem to imply. Are our reading habits and moods something fully mental and emotional, or can our physical environments and experiences impact the way we read as well? Are we, a bunch of bookworms, really getting this science-y? Tune in to find out!
This month our focus has been on Brian Selznick’s Kaleidoscope, and what a journey – or should I say, journeys? – this book is. The plot and structure of this book is non-linear, meaning that it jumps from one time and place to another; it does little to keep us grounded. It challenges us with every step to read in a new and different way in order to find and make meaning, and it isn’t always easy, but the way I see it – and I hope that you can agree – it’s all worth it in the end. The characters, and the eventually-familiar threads that continually tie them together in each of the book’s fragments, bring all of the small pieces together in a patchwork, a mosaic: when we back up to see the whole, we might see just how beautiful it really is.
For August’s mid-month check-in on Brian Selznick’s Kaleidoscope, we bring our focus to the book’s illustrations and the way they help to lead us through the mysteries surrounding the stories. There are a lot of assumptions made about illustrated novels –particularly, they’re often thought to be juvenile – but like every word and sentence and paragraph of a story, every line and brushstroke and colour in an illustration has purpose. Today, let’s dig into that a little bit: how do the illustrations in Kaleidoscope in particular impact the way we take in its stories?
With the start of a new month comes the announcement of our next monthly read on Off the Shelf! For the month of August we’ll be focusing on Brian Selznick’s Kaleidoscope**, a novel told through both story and illustration, and one that resists simple description or definition. Because this is summer, and we’ve spent a lot of time in the last couple of episodes, we’re going to take a little break from the academic brain work today; instead, enjoy a part-confessional, part-advice column session where I, a chronic book-buyer, advise other chronic book-buyers on how best to temper the bad (if it can be called bad?) habit of impulsive, compulsive book-buying.
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Surprise! I had the unexpected (and incredibly exciting AND incredibly anxious) pleasure of chatting with the author of Satellite Love, Genki Ferguson, this week! Tune in to hear a little more background on where the story all began for him, and what we had to say about the themes of humanity, loneliness, and connection. Think about what those words really mean for our lives, and, big picture: what that meaning might say about us, for the future generations of people who learn both about us and from us.
As July comes to a close, we’ll be wrapping up on our focus on Genki Ferguson’s novel Satellite Love. Part overview and part study, in this episode I share my experience in reading and my general review of the book. This includes taking some time to focus more specifically on some of the book’s most stand-out moments with regard to what I think of as its most prevalent themes and important takeaways. Lastly, stay tuned for a few related book recommendations (as if we don’t all already have enough to-be-read books lined up?) and start getting excited about next month’s book announcement!
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Welcome back! Today we’re checking in with Satellite Love by Genki Ferguson with a bit of background on the author before moving into doing a bit of digging into the way the novel is narrated. We’ll also consider the effect that that narration has on the way we understand and empathize with the main voice, Anna. Some points to ponder as you make your way through the novel: what impact does loneliness have on the human spirit? On one’s own sense of identity? Does it keep us from fulfillment, from contentment? What is the cure?
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Welcome to episode 1 of Off the Shelf, the brand-new book club podcast all about; what we read, why we read, and maybe most importantly for this show, who we read with! Today’s episode includes: the announcement of, and introduction to, the book of the month for July: Satellite Love by Genki Ferguson; and a few points to ponder on the question: who reads what?
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Off the Shelf is a struggling bookworm’s call to other bookworms – those who miss the days we’d stay up scandalously late with the lights out, the covers up, and a flashlight perfectly balanced to allow us to devour books in secret until we couldn’t keep our eyes open another second – to get back to reading. Think of it as a podcast book-club: month by month, we’ll take a book and really dig in, taking its words, its characters, and its stories into our hearts and allow them to speak to us, to teach us, and even to change us.
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