What Are You Reading Right Now?

Summary

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Podcast Summary

Podcast: All Of It (WNYC)
Episode: What Are You Reading Right Now?
Air Date: April 29, 2024
Host: Tiffany Hansen (in for Alison Stewart)
Guest: Jordan Loff (All Of It & Get Lit producer)
Main Theme: Community book recommendations and upcoming literary events; recommendations for books across genres for a diverse range of readers.

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1. Episode Overview

This episode of All Of It centers on book recommendations and literary discussion with Jordan Loff, producer of All Of It and Get Lit. With a focus on recent reads, listener recommendations, and upcoming releases, the conversation fosters community engagement around books and current cultural moments. Listeners are encouraged to call or text with their own recommendations, cementing the show's role as a lively hub for New York’s reading community.

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2. Key Discussion Points & Insights

A. Current Read & Adaptation: Under the Bridge by Rebecca Godfrey

• [01:12]
  • Jordan Loff shares her love of reading source material before watching adaptations.
  • Under the Bridge is a true crime account of the murder of a teenage girl in a small Canadian town—now a Hulu series with Riley Keough & Lily Gladstone.
  • Insight: Godfrey's immersive reporting brings novelistic style to nonfiction:

    "She really gets into the psyche of these teens...the book almost reads more like a novel than a work of nonfiction because you can't believe some of the stuff these kids are telling her." (Jordan Loff, 01:28)

B. Historical Fantasy: The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo

• [02:54]
  • Set during Spain’s Inquisition, the story follows Lucia, a secretive Jewish scullion with magical powers, forced to join a miracle-working competition for the king.
  • For fantasy fans and skeptics alike:

    "There's not all of the world building that sometimes you get with a fantasy book that could feel overwhelming... We're grounded in Spain, just with a little bit of a magical flair." (Jordan, 04:08)

C. Complex Narratives: Trust Exercise by Susan Choi

• [04:54]
  • Jordan praises this "puzzle of a book" set in a theater high school, where a boundary-pushing drama professor’s intentions and actions are up for debate.
  • The book’s second half reframes the entire narrative with a new protagonist and narrator:

    "It calls into doubt everything we've read in the first half...Once you get to the end, you kind of want to start over and reread the whole thing..." (Jordan, 05:38)

D. Memoir & Self-Examination: Consent by Jill Ciment

• [06:38]
  • Anticipated memoir reflecting on a relationship that began when the author was a teen and her partner was married and much older.
  • Revisits her earlier memoir to reinterpret past events in light of MeToo and evolving notions of consent and boundaries:

    "It's almost a memoir dissecting her previous memoir." (Jordan, 07:47)

E. Adult Debut: One of Our Kind by Nicola Yoon

• [08:07]
  • Nicola Yoon’s transition from YA to adult fiction; story set in a utopian Black community in California that turns out to have hidden flaws.
  • For dystopia fans:

    "I'm a sucker for a dystopian novel. And, you know, Utopia is falling apart very quickly..." (Jordan, 08:34)

F. Listener Book Recommendations & Community Picks

• [09:03] - [15:05]
  • Callers and texters contribute a range of recommendations:
    • Only This Beautiful Moment by Abdi Nazemian
    • Absolution by Alice McDermott
    • Short War by Lily Meyer (“has everything: teen love, mystery, political history”) (Text, 09:34)
    • The Paris Novel by Ruth Reichl (“a vacation without leaving my apartment”) (Text, 10:04)
    • The Bird Hotel by Joyce Maynard (“Central America, some magic in it”) (Caller Tom, 11:39)
    • Clearing set in Scotland (historically themed)
    • End of Days by Jenny Erpenbeck (translated German, “the main character dies a different death in each section, spanning 20th-century Central/Eastern Europe”) (Caller Al, 13:28)
• Jordan notes the value of branching into world literature:

  "Every time I pick up a work of translated literature, I'm transported...always good to seek out some translated lit." (15:05)

G. Anticipated & New Releases

• Long Island by Colm Tóibín (sequel to Brooklyn) ([10:22])
  • Picks up with Eilis and Tony now living on Long Island, with a dramatic new family crisis ensuing.
  • Jordan is eager for the novel (and potential film sequel with Saoirse Ronan).
• Knife by Salman Rushdie ([12:30])
  • Rushdie’s memoir on his 2023 assassination attempt.
  • Jordan reflects on its significance:

    "I think the bravest thing you can do in an attack...is to not be silent and to keep writing. And so that's what he's doing..." (Jordan, 13:01)

H. Nonfiction Highlight: The Swans of Harlem by Karen Valby

• [15:27]
  • Tiffany recommends this true account of five Black ballerinas from Harlem—nearly erased stories reclaimed through Valby’s research.

I. Literary Event Spotlight: “Get Lit” with Stephen Graham Jones

• [16:06]
  • Jordan previews her upcoming live conversation with acclaimed horror writer Stephen Graham Jones at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library, featuring his Indian Lake trilogy.
  • The event will also have a performance by Indigenous rapper Frank Waln (free tickets available).

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3. Notable Quotes & Moments

• On book-to-screen adaptations:

  "Anytime I see that there is a adaptation of a book coming up, I love to try to read the book before the show comes out." (Jordan, 01:12)

• On writing quality in nonfiction:

  "If you're a good writer, you should be a good storyteller, regardless of whether you're writing fiction or nonfiction." (Jordan, 02:37)

• On Trust Exercise’s narrative structure:

  "The second half...calls into doubt everything we've read in the first half...You kind of want to start over and reread the whole thing because you don't know what's up and what's down." (Jordan, 05:38)

• On memoir and reflecting on consent:

  "Was I excusing things at the time, or can it be true that you can love someone who's much older than you and discover that love at a young age? Those are all sticky, tricky questions to grapple with." (Jordan, 07:18)

• On translated fiction:

  "There's a whole world of writers out there...Every time I pick up a work of translated literature, I'm transported, I'm excited." (Jordan, 15:05)

• On Salman Rushdie’s new memoir:

  "The bravest thing you can do in an attack in which someone is trying to silence you for your writing and your voice is to not be silent and to keep writing." (Jordan, 13:01)

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4. Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:08 – Host introduction, segment premise, invitation for listener recommendations
• 01:12 – Jordan introduces Under the Bridge (true crime & adaptation)
• 02:54 – Discussion of The Familiar (historical fantasy)
• 04:54 – Trust Exercise (literary fiction with meta-narrative)
• 06:38 – Upcoming memoir Consent by Jill Ciment
• 08:07 – One of Our Kind by Nicola Yoon (adult debut, utopian/dystopian fiction)
• 09:03 – 15:05 – Listener recommendations & texts (varied genres and themes)
• 10:22 – Preview of Long Island (Brooklyn sequel)
• 12:30 – Release of Salman Rushdie’s memoir Knife
• 13:28 – Call: End of Days by Jenny Erpenbeck (translated fiction)
• 15:27 – The Swans of Harlem by Karen Valby (nonfiction, Black ballet history)
• 16:06 – Preview of Get Lit event with Stephen Graham Jones

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5. Episode Takeaways

• Wide-ranging recommendations: Listeners and producers discuss fiction, nonfiction, translated works, memoirs, and debuts across genres.
• Engagement: Calls/texts create a vibrant participatory feel.
• Community-building: The show intentionally bridges literary culture with local events and diverse voices, celebrating New York's cultural vibrancy.

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For a full list of book recommendations and upcoming events, visit the All Of It website.

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Transcript

[A]

Foreign.

[B]

This is All OF it. I'm Tiffany Hansen in for Alison Stewart today. Thanks so much for joining us this afternoon. Nice warm afternoon. We just heard a bit from Stephen Graham Jones, this month's get lit with all of it author. He will be joining us for an event tonight at 6 o'. Clock. As I mentioned, you can still get those tickets by heading to wnyc.org getlit hosting that event tonight is all of It. And get lit producer Jordan Lof. Hi, Jordan.

[A]

Hi.

[B]

She's joining us in studio to talk about some of the other books she recommends and listeners, look, we know you have a book you want to recommend, so call us, tell us the title, share it with the world. 2124-3396-9221-2433, wnyc, taking your book recommendations. You can call us. You can text us at that number. Let us know what you're excited about, what's on your nightstand. All right. Is this book on your nightstand right now, Jordan? This is under the Bridge. It's nonfiction. So tell us about that.

[A]

Yeah. So anytime I see that there is a adaptation of a book coming up, I love to try to read the book before the show comes out. So you might have heard of this one because it's a Hulu series, a new Hulu series starring Riley Keough and Lily Gladstone. But it's based on this work of nonfiction by Rebecca Godfrey, who it's a work of true crime, and she spent years embedded in this small Canadian town investigating this brutal murder of a teenage girl that happened under a bridge, as the title suggests, by a pack of teenagers who seemingly had very little motivation to do such a thing. And she really gets into the psyche of these teens. She speaks with all of them. They speak with her very candidly. And so the book, it almost reads more like a novel than a work of nonfiction because you can't believe some of the stu these kids are telling her. But it's true and it's heartbreaking. So that's the work of nonfiction that the series is based on. And then if you love that, there's the Hulu series starring Riley Keough and Lily Gladstone, which I believe is out already.

[B]

I believe so. So you haven't seen that yet. You wanted to read this first?

[A]

I like to read the book before the series most times, if I can.

[B]

Yeah, got it. And I would say, correct me if you think differently, but most really great nonfiction works read like fiction. I mean, I guess they have that kind of feel to them, even though they're not nonfiction, obviously, but yeah, I.

[A]

Think that if you're a good writer, you should be a good storyteller, regardless of whether you're writing fiction or nonfiction. So if you're writing a good nonfiction book, it should be propulsive. It should bring you along. It shouldn't feel like you're reading a textbook that's no fun for anyone.

[B]

Yeah, right. Fantasy lovers. You have one for fantasy lovers?

[A]

I do. This is the Familiar by Leigh Bardugo. We had Leigh on the show maybe a couple weeks ago. I finished it over my vacation. I absolutely loved it. This one is set in Golden Age Spain during an era of the Inquisition. It follows a girl named Lucia who has magical powers. She's a scullion who has these secret magical abilities, but one day her boss sort of discovers that she has these powers and that snowballs into the king and powerful men around the king getting invested in seeing whether or not she could work miracles for him to help him in his war against England. Now, the problem is, is that Lucia is secretly of Jewish heritage. And at this time, of course, it was not good to be Jewish. The Inquisition was around. So she has to find a way to sort of compete in this tournament of magical abilities and showcase her talents without drawing the suspicion of the Inquisition into saying, like, hey, what's up with this? Are these miracles coming from God or are they coming from somewhere else? I just thought it was a really well written piece of adult fantasy and.

[B]

Good for people who maybe don't necessarily like fantasy. I mean, I know you mentioned, like, good storytelling is good storytelling.

[A]

Definitely. I think because this one is grounded in history and in historical fiction. There's not all of the world building that sometimes you get with a fantasy book that could feel overwhelming. We're not on a new planet. We're not. We're not in a new age of dragons and whatever. We're grounded in Spain, just with a little bit of a magical flair.

[B]

Got it. Listeners, you have a book recommendation and we want to hear it. You can call us at 212-433-9692. You can also text us at 212-433-WNYC. That get lit event is tonight. Jordan Loff is hosting that event. We're talking books right now and hoping you'll chime in. All right, Jordan. Trust Exercise by Susan Choi. Another novel you're a interested in?

[A]

Yeah, this one came out a few years ago, but if you missed the boat the first time, I really recommend coming back around to it. And maybe I'm biased because My. My sister is in theater school right now, so this takes place at a theater high school. So I was seeing a lot of parallels. The story is about two kids who are at this performing arts high school who enter into this intense romantic relationship, and their drama professor starts meddling in that in very sort of inappropriate ways, ostensibly to sort of drag some sort of artistic enlightenment out of them, but it ends up feeling very inappropriate. Now, that's the first half of the book.

[B]

Like, inappropriate creepy, or does it go beyond creepy?

[A]

Well, that's the question of the second half. So in the first half, you sort of think, well, he's just. He's meddling in a way that feels like he's trying to draw some art out of them. But in the second half, everything you think that, you know in the first half gets flipped on its head. I don't want to spoil it, but it calls into doubt. Everything we've read in the first half and the second half is completely different, and it puts a new light on everything. The protagonist is different, the narrator is different. It's a little puzzle of a book. It's very short, but once you get to the end, you kind of want to start over and reread the whole thing because you don't know what's up and what's down. And exactly to your point, was this teacher a meddler? Was he abusive? Was he something else? It's a fascinating book. It's a really, really well written piece of work.

[B]

So that book is Trust Exercise by Susan Choi Jordan. We should say we will have a list of this put up on our website for people, right?

[A]

Yeah, I'm sure we'll get a million texts. We'll put it up, I promise.

[B]

We'll put up this list, I promise. All right, so books that you're looking forward to.

[A]

Yes. One that I've been really looking and itching to read is this memoir called Consent, but by Jill Cement. And I think that this has a really interesting story. So Jill Cement is someone who began her relationship with her husband, a man that she was with until he died when she was a teenager and he was married with two children. They stayed together until his death, and she actually wrote a memoir about that experience many years ago. This memoir is horror, sort of after his death and in this new age of thinking about consent and grooming and boundaries and MeToo, looking back both on her life and that relationship and on the memoir that she wrote and sort of reexamining how much of what I was feeling was valid, how much of this relationship was inappropriate. Was I excusing things at the time, or can it be true that you can love someone who's much older than you and discover that love at a young age? I mean, those are all sticky, tricky questions to grapple with. But I find it so interesting that it's almost a memoir. Dissecting her previous memoir.

[B]

Right, the memoir on a memoir.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

And we should just spell her last name. Maybe it's. It's Ciment. You're saying Ciment, but it's C I, M E N T. Right?

[A]

Yeah. There's a chance I'm saying it wrong, but yes, C I M E N T. Got it.

[B]

And the title of that book is the Memoir on a Memoir.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Okay, so let's move to ya.

[A]

Well, so this is actually an adult novel from a YA author. This is One of Our Kind by Nicola Yoon. You might know her from books like the Sun Is Also a Star. That was a YA romance that I read. This is her adult debut, and it is set in a utopian, quote unquote black community called Liberty that forms in California. It's supposed to be this great new haven for black families. But a woman who moves there, discovers, as one does, that all is not as it seems. And I'm a sucker for a dystopian novel. And, you know, Utopia is falling apart very quickly, so I'm excited to see what she does with her adult debut.

[B]

All right, and that is. Give us the title again. I just missed my page here. Where is it? Her name is Nicola Yoon and the.

[A]

Book is One of Our Kind.

[B]

One of Our Kind. All right, Jordan, let's take a call here. Matthew and Spring Lake. Good morning. Or actually, good afternoon, Matthew.

[C]

Good afternoon. I have two recommendations.

[B]

Excellent.

[C]

One is only this Beautiful Moment by Abdi Nazmian. I might be mispronouncing his last name.

[B]

Okay. And the second.

[C]

And the Second is Alice McDermott's Absolution.

[B]

Absolution. Have you heard of either of those?

[A]

Absolution is a new one that's been on my radar. I think it just came out this year. I have not read any Alice McDermott. I can't believe I'm admitting that, but I really need to, so maybe I'll add that to my list.

[B]

Good. To add to the list, we have a text short War by Lily Meyer. It's a multi generational novel about American involvement in the Chilean coup. But mostly it's a brilliantly written teen love story followed by literary mystery capped off with a secret.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

This really has everything Rolled into it. Have you heard about that short? No. Short War by Lily Meyer.

[A]

I haven't, but for something with short in the title, it sounds like there's.

[B]

A lot going on. It sounds like there's a lot going on. Also, the Paris novel by Ruth Reichel. Did I say that right?

[A]

I believe so. Is she the. The food writer?

[B]

Rachel, it's a vacation. Without leaving my apartment. Now, that sounds like a good recommendation. I could take a vacation. Although today's a great day. You could just take the book outside.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

All right, so up next, we have an anticipated sequel.

[A]

Yes. So for fans of Brooklyn by Colm Toy Bean, guess what? There's a new one coming out, and it's called Long island, which I love it. I love also. So maybe you read the book, maybe you saw the movie with Saoirse Ronan. If you need a refresher. The center of Brooklyn was an Irish immigrant to Brooklyn named Alice falls in love with a Italian man named Tony. At the end of that story, they buy a house, they buy a plot of land in Long island, and that's where they're going to move. This one picks up many years later. They've been living in Long island and now they have some teenage kids and. And one day the husband of an Irish woman shows up on Aaylis's doorstep and says, hey, my wife is pregnant. The baby is your husband's, and as soon as the baby is born, I will be dropping the baby off at your house, and that'll be your responsibility. So.

[B]

Well, there's a good premise for a novel.

[A]

Exactly. So it's all the trials and tribulations that go on from there. And, you know, if Saoirse Ronan wants to, you know, get aged up and go in for the sequel, I'm ready for the next adaptation.

[B]

I'm ready for that as well. All right, so the title of that book, not surprisingly, Long Island.

[A]

The author is Colm Toy Bean.

[B]

Thank you for saying that, because I don't think I could have done that. All right, so we're gonna take another call here. Let's go to Oyster Bay. We have Tom. Hi, Tom.

[C]

Hi. Hello. I'm just now reading a book called the Bird Hotel by Joyce Maynard. Maynard. And then it's Central America, and there's some magic in it, and I think it's pretty good. And the other one is a book called Clearing, which is the other end of it. It's a northern Scottish island, and it's about when they cleared all the tenants off of the land. And that also Was a really good read.

[B]

Sounds great. Thanks, Tom.

[A]

All right.

[B]

Have you read the Bird Hotel?

[A]

I have not, no. I'm not familiar. Although that Scottish one sounds interesting because I just came back from a trip to Scotland, so maybe I'll. I'll add that to my pile.

[B]

Yeah, sounds good. All right, so another book that you want to mention that is forthcoming is Knife Forthcoming still.

[A]

Just came out. I think it came out last week. This is Salman Rushdie's memoir about his assassination attempt and the aftermath.

[B]

How long ago was that now? That was it, a year. So that happened at Chautauqua, right, where he was attacked on stage by someone wielding a knife.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

Lost his eye, was horribly injured, didn't think he was gonna make it.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

And he sort of poured all of that into this. It's not really. I guess it is a memoir, right?

[A]

It's a memoir. It's a memoir about that story. And, you know, I mean, I think the bravest thing you can do in an attack in which someone is trying to silence you for your writing and your voice is to not be silent and to keep writing. And so that's what he's doing with this memoir, and I'm very eager to pick it up.

[B]

We have another call from Brooklyn. Good afternoon. Is this Al?

[D]

Yes. Hi. Thanks for taking my call.

[B]

Great. You got a recommendation.

[D]

Yeah, I actually just happened upon this book in a free little library, and it's called the End of Days by Jenny Erpenbeck. It's translated from the original German, and it's so good. It is. Basically, the premise of the book is set in a couple different sections, and each section, the main character dies a different death at a different point in her life. So I'm not giving anything away by telling people that, but she lives a little bit longer in each section of the book. If you think about, like, chapbooks, it's kind of separated like that, but it's all in one volume. So, like, the first section of it, she dies as an infant. And that entire section is what happened to the rest of her family because she died so young. And what's fascinating, what was an added fascinating layer for me was that it kind of spans the First World War and then into kind of the beginning, depending on how long she lives, into the beginning of the second. And it takes place over in. And depending on how long she lives in Germany, in Austria, Austria, in Poland, and, like, you know, in Ukraine. So it's very fascinating to read it in the context of everything that's happening right now. And A lot of it also happens in Russia.

[B]

Oh, Al, thank you so much. That's a the title of that book, Jordan, I believe, was the End of Days by Jenny Erpenbeck. Have you read that?

[A]

I haven't. But it is always reminding me that I'm trying to read more translated literature these days. There's a whole world of writers out there that I, I find that I'm just limiting myself often to American authors. And every time I pick up a work of translated literature, I'm transported, I'm excited. I feel like I get something new out of it. So always good to go and seek out some translated lit.

[B]

So, Jordan, the book I'm reading, I'm pointing to right now is the Swans of Harlem. Loving this book. It's a work of nonfiction about five black ballerinas from Harlem whose history was pretty much lost until recently. The author, Karen Valby, you know, dug into their histories and spent a lot of time in conversation with these women. Shameless plug. We're going to talk to her on Wednesday. But this is a fantastic book as well. So tonight, Jordan, you are going to be busy. You're going to be busy talking about a book. I'm going to let you take it away with all the details about get lit for tonight.

[A]

Yes. At six o' clock at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library, I will be speaking with Stephen Graham Jones, who is an acclaimed horror writer. He is the author of My Heart Is a Chainsaw, which is the book that we read this month, but it's also the first in his Indian Lake trilogy, which just wrapped up this year. So if you come and you end up loving what you hear, you can get all three books and you'll have a whole trilogy ahead of you to read. Tickets are on sale at wnyc.org/get lit. And we will also have a really awesome musical performance from an indigenous rapper named Frank Waln. And my colleague Simon Close will be doing that interview. So you got books, you got music, you got a little bit of gore. What, what more could you want from.

[B]

Well, I got one more thing you could want. They're free tickets.

[A]

Free tickets.

[B]

You don't even have to buy them. WNYC.org getlit that's how you get those tickets. Jordan Loft, thanks so much for the conversation.

[A]

Thanks, Tiffany.

[E]

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[B]

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