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The Stacks
Ep. 356 The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley — The Stacks Book Club (J Wortham)
01:05:32
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- [00:00]
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- [00:35]
Jay Wortham
Work for my brain at certain times, and I think I was just really ready to read a book about the instability of what we think of as the present and what we think of as the future because it feels so unstable. And I just, I don't think you can believe anything that the narrator tells us. Like this entire book is about how all of these historical figures, they get change time. The main character can actually see beyond herself and her own like obsession and fantasy with like this Kate and Leopold fanfic she's having with this man, you know, and I just, I think it's distracting because the book focuses from her perspective on these things, but I think that's kind of the point.
- [01:22]
Tracy Thomas
Welcome to the Stacks, a podcast about books and the people who read them. I'm your host Tracy Thomas, and it is the Stacks Book Club Day. It's our first one of 2025 and I am so excited to be discussing the Ministry of Time by debut author Kellyanne Bradley with our returning guest Jay Wortham. This sci fi speculative romance time travel novel follows a covert government agency working behind the scenes to prevent changes to history, exploring the complexities of memory, time and identity along the way. Today, Jay and I give you a spoiler filled conversation about personal responsibility, colon journalism, and the legacies that this book attempts to interrogate. As a reminder, there will be spoilers on today's episode, so make sure you've read the book before you listen. And listen all the way to the end of today's episode to find out what our February book club pick will be. Everything we talk about on each episode of the Stacks can be found in the link in the show Notes. Listen if you love this podcast and you want inside access to it, head to patreon.com/the stacks and join the Stacks Pack. You get a bunch of perks like bonus episodes, access to the Discord the Mega Reading Challenge, and if you join before January 31st, you can get access to my amazing reading Spreadsheet tracker and a shout out on this podcast that's right. The shout out perk which we've had since 2018 is going away for good. So if you join before January 31st, you get to hear me read your name. Head to patreon.com the stacks to earn that special limited edition perk. Shout out to some of our newest members of the stacks pack. Daniel DeJesus, Jennifer Booth, Brittany C, Jonathan Lasher, Hannah Stern, Rachel Rooney, Tiffany Eastom, Carol Anne, Matthew Barge, Maris Adams, Angie N. Murphy and Amy Johns. Thank you all so much for joining the Stacks Pack and thank you to every single member. All right, now it's time for my conversation with Jay Wortham about the Ministry of Time. All right, everybody, it's the Stacks Book Club Day. I'm so excited. I get to welcome back Jay Wortham to the Stacks. Jay, welcome back.
- [03:41]
Jay Wortham
Hi. Hi.
- [03:42]
Tracy Thomas
We're talking about the book that you picked.
- [03:45]
Jay Wortham
Okay?
- [03:45]
Tracy Thomas
So people who are mad you just email J hate this book dot com. The book is the Ministry of Time by Cully and Bradley. For those of you who are listening who have not read the book, it is important that you know there will be spoilers on today's episode. It is also important that you know if you want to listen to a conversation that is spoiler free about this book. I talked to Colleen Bradley about the book, absolutely zero spoilers two weeks ago. So you can go back and listen to that if you want a spoiler free moment until you finish the book. That being said, we are going to spoil the out of this book. So that is your warning. I know Jay famously doesn't care about spoilers. I am a person who does care about spoilers, so proceed at your own risk. Okay. We always start here for book club. Generally. What did you think of the book?
- [04:34]
Jay Wortham
I enjoyed it. That's why I picked it. It really itched all the right parts of my brain.
- [04:40]
Tracy Thomas
What did it itch? What was what worked for you? What stands out to you as like the biggest, like yes, for you?
- [04:46]
Jay Wortham
The themes of the book are really compelling to me. I read this, I reread it for our book club. But the first time I read this book, I should say it took me a few tries to get into the book. So I do, I really do understand people who have a hard time with this book. Since we talked, I didn't realize this book was so controversial and so polarizing. So I kind of went on a deep dive to read what other people had to say about it in various corners of the Internet. But this book was highly, highly, highly recommended to me by one of my favorite smarties in my life, Hafiza Gidor, who is an actual brilliant genius. And so I read it to appease her and we have the best book chats. So I was like, well, yeah, if you love this book, I want to talk to you about it. And it took me a while to get into it, but then once I did, I was like, oh, this is a book about the tally of complacency, about the long ranging impacts of oppression and white supremacy and the way it can kind of wind itself into all of us, even in ways we don't even know. And it is supposed to be this kind of steamy, time jumping kind of spy thriller, but I really, really, really, really see it as a book, as a. Well, I guess what I want to say is I really, really see it as a cautionary tale about the toll and the high, high, high cost from generations, you know, seven behind and seven forward, how we want to think about it, but just through past, present and the future of not being self aware and being seduced by the power and promise of empire, which is what I think happens to our main character. Like, she never really escapes that trap.
- [06:28]
Tracy Thomas
No, she does not. Okay, I will share my original thoughts and then I want to just sort of dive right in. So I was very bored by this book. I was like, I thought it was very slow. I kept waiting for things to happen. I was just like, where is this going? I kept thinking, why does Jay love this book? Right?
- [06:48]
Jay Wortham
Like, I loved it, I really enjoyed it.
- [06:51]
Tracy Thomas
Well, but why, like, why did Jay want to pick this book? Like, why? You know, like, I kept thinking about the book in the context. Why is this book on Obama's list? Why, you know, like all of these things? I felt like this was a book that had a really great idea, great topics for discussion. But I felt as an actual piece of writing, it fell very flat for me. Like, it was a little all over the place. There were too many elements that I didn't feel like were fleshed out. Well, is it a romance? Is it a spy thriller? Is it actually doing both of those things? Is it doing neither of those things? I had a lot of that sort of like, what is the book trying to do and is. And what is the book actually doing? And so I felt very frustrated as a reader. And then when the things finally start to happen in the last like 80 pages, I was so frustrated and bored that I was like, I don't care. Sure, whatever, like whatever you say. Great. You're Adela. Congratulations. Like, everybody wins So I think, so I think I was. It was a very frustrating reading experience for me. After I finished the book, I reached out to a lot of different people who I know who read the book and loved it and asked them why they loved it so much. And those are a lot of the things that I actually had already taken notes that I wanted to talk about. So I do think that, like, the ideas in the book were good. And my sense is a lot of people who liked the book liked what it made them think about, not necessarily what was actually written on the page. Like they liked what, what jumped off for them in the idea of the book more than like the actual characters or the actual plot lines. And before we. I should have done this at the beginning, but I always forget before we actually dive, dive, dive, dived in the Ministry of Time. Let me give you a quick plot thing for those of you who don't care about spoilers. This is a book about an unnamed narrator who works for the Ministry of Time, which is a, which is a department of the government in the uk and they bring back. They are attempting to bring back people from different time periods through time travel. And they, each person that comes back, each time traveler, they call them expats. There's five in this book. Each expat is paired with a modern day person from the Ministry. Our narrator is partnered with a guy named Graham Gore, who's an Arctic explorer who died in an Arctic expedition but is brought back to the 21st century. I think we. It's supposed to be modern, I think, or like current. And, and they sort of then have to do things and be together. But that's sort of the premise. I just want to set it up. That's sort of the premise of the book. Okay, that being said, let's just start with the time travel.
- [09:31]
Jay Wortham
Sure.
- [09:32]
Tracy Thomas
The conceit of the time travel. One of the rules of the book though, Kalyan Bradley tells us very specifically early in the book, don't worry about all the time. But then at the end of the book it's like, this is a detail about time travel you need to understand. And I was like, I wasn't worrying about any of this. Like I not, I don't know where we are. But the conceit is that they're dead already. So they, if they bring them back, it doesn't fuck up the future or the past or anything because the, it's like the moment of the person's death, the time travelers come and pick them up.
- [10:06]
Jay Wortham
But that's also, I Think that. Okay, here's what I want to say. I really hear you on the things about this book that are frustrating. And I hear you about the pacing. It worked for my brain. I think it took me a few tries to get into it. I don't exactly know. I would actually love if there was a reading study, like a sleep study I could do on my brain so I could figure out why some books work for me, why some books don't. I haven't really been able to read All Fours. The pacing and the writing of the book, there are some parts of it I've really enjoyed, but it doesn't work for me right now, so I'll come back to it. So it's just sometimes books work for my brain at certain times. And I think I was just really ready to read a book about the instability of what we think of as the present and what we think of as the future because it feels so unstable. And I just. I don't think you can believe anything that the narrator tells us. Like, we know that's not true. Like, this entire book is about how all of these historical figures, they get change time and Adella comes back in time. I mean, this is. I don't know if this is two layered. You can tell me if I need to explain this out more. But the main character is moving through one timeline with a boss who's actually traveled back in time. And it's another version of her to make sure that history plays out in the same way. Except it doesn't at all because the interaction that the main character has with Gorr are very different from the ones that have already preceded her existence. So.
- [11:32]
Tracy Thomas
Right.
- [11:33]
Jay Wortham
I mean, there's a character in the book called Smellia who I really, really wish we knew more about. I think I'm saying her name right. Samella Smellia. And she's the main character's counterpart. So they're both what they call bridges. They're meant to manage these ex paths. They also call them refugees, which is like, I thought, like, very cheeky government speak for, like, permissible people, displaced people. I mean, I just thought the book had a funny sense of humor. And it's to me. Okay, wait, let me. Let me slow down. I'll just save that point for another moment. Okay, but so anyway, so the main character's counterpart at work is a woman named Smellia. And they have a very kind of tense friendship. Smellia is a black woman, a black British woman. The main character is biracial. She's Cambodian and English, and she Has a very complicated relationship to it. She thinks she's white passing. It's not really clear if she is, but that's how she perceives herself. And she doesn't really want to be aligned with her co worker. She's uncomfortable with her blackness, not because Sommelia is black, but because she's very much embedded in her racial identity in a way that the main character just doesn't want to be right. There are all these examples where she's, like, angry because her sister writes an article about them enduring microaggressions. Growing up, she's just like, these things don't matter. When she meets the Commander Gor, she's like, I was wired to love him. Which I always read as, like, I was wired to fall in love with this, like, vestigial remnant of, like, empire and colonialism, you know, even though she's, like, critiquing him on it and she's like, oh, you can't say Negro. And like, this was actually, you know, you, like, you encountered enslaved people and, like, didn't do anything. And, like, that's fucked up. And, you know, but she's, like, politically aware, but she's not aware of how much she's a function of the system. But anyway, so Sommelia's character gets radicalized also because other. As the book evolves, you realize that many people are coming back through time, not just the ones that the government extracts. And all of their actions get influenced by what all these people from different moments in the past and the present, the future, are telling each other. So the books, like, history works this way. Like, once these people are brought back in time, they cannot affect history anymore. And it's like, well, that's not true. Because we find out immediately that the reason the expats are so important is because of the roles they play in the present to affect the future. And they need them to try to. I mean, the government, you know, the main character is telling us, well, the government is using this time door, which is how they kind of talk about it, to stop climate change. They keep saying that, well, they're trying to stop climate change. Well, they're trying to stop war. Well, they're trying. And it's like, is any of that true?
- [14:04]
Tracy Thomas
Like, any of it true?
- [14:05]
Jay Wortham
It just feels like watching the notes or reading the notes from. Watching the highlights or reading the notes from inauguration and just being like, well, you say you're gonna do this, but, like, what are you really gonna do? Like, she's just repeating party lines over and over again. So I think. I think for me, like, the first time I read the book, it was also destabilizing. And some of the language in the beginning is so overdone. And it's like, what's actually happening. And it is this romance, but, like, what's actually going on, though? And I think, again, I just think you're really meant to see that this woman is, like, missing the plot, like, the book. And maybe it's also a dexterity thing. Cause I think this is a debut novel, and so maybe this is a skill that gets refined with time. I had patience for it, but I thought it was just a really deaf device. Like, the main character can actually see beyond herself and her own obsession and fantasy with this Kate and Leopold fanfic she's having with this man. And she keeps being like, these things are above my pay grade. I'm getting paid too much to care about this stuff. And it's just all about her negligence. Even though she's the daughter of a woman whose people were horribly abused by dictators and a country with too much power and then just abused by the country that she was displaced into, she still is kind of just like, well, the government's doing what the government does. And it's like, babe, wake up, sheeple. Time to get up and get radicalized. But she never does. And I just. I think it's distracting because the book focuses from her perspective on these things. But I think that's kind of the point.
- [15:42]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah, I think you're right. I think. I think she can't see outside of herself enough to really be, like. For my reading, to be, like, a good enough guide in this book that is, like, really complicated technically. So it just feels very destabilizing because I'm like, wait, what's going on? Who's this? Like, wait, why are we talking about how hot Graham is right now? Like, aren't we trying to save the world, girl? Like, ew, he smokes so much, and he's. I know. He stinks. Like, I. This is, like, such a small thing, but, like, I couldn't get into the romance part because I was like, it smells there. It smells bad. He's smoking everywhere. Let me ask you this. I want to talk a little bit about what I am calling the sort of Hamilton effect in this book, because based on the conversation I had with Kalyan and also just my sense of reading of this book, we are supposed to root for the expats, right? We're supposed to, like, want them to get away safely, to get Pull one over on the government. They are these displaced people. Like we're supposed to be cheering for them. But of course, in the context of this book, they're all white people from different historical eras in British colonial conquest and like major times of British Britishness.
- [17:01]
Jay Wortham
Uh huh.
- [17:02]
Tracy Thomas
And the two people who are like the most against them or like the most in control of them are. Are two women of color. Right. Like, they're the ones that are like, you need to do this or you need to do that. You know, Sommelia ends up being our mole. She's sort of the bad guy in the context of keep Graham safe. And I find this to be really interesting because it reminds me so much of Hamilton where we are looking at black and brown bodies performing, forming the characters of white men who historically, in actual fact and history, were the people who enslaved the black. The ancestors of the black and brown men who are on the stage performing the show. And so it's this sort of like trick of colonialism, this book that like, we're rooting for the bad guys. If the idea of the book is like colonizing people from a different time period or whatever is bad, we're still rooting for the white people in the story. We're not really rooting for our narrator. At a certain point we're sort of like, girl, what are you doing? And we're definitely not rooting for Somalia. Even though I think I was. I don't.
- [18:07]
Jay Wortham
She's the hero of the book.
- [18:09]
Tracy Thomas
She's the hero to me. But I don't know that, like, if you're rooting for Graham that you feel that way. If you're rooting for the expats to like, be safe. She is in that version of the book, the bad guy.
- [18:23]
Jay Wortham
Yeah.
- [18:23]
Tracy Thomas
No, I don't know if you have thoughts about that.
- [18:26]
Jay Wortham
That's a real read. I mean, I. I didn't root for the expats. And so I'm just thinking about that if my brain missed something or. I was really charmed by, you know, the kind of like Encino man of it all in the middle part when like, they're getting used to modern life. Like they're.
- [18:44]
Tracy Thomas
That was my favorite part of the book.
- [18:46]
Jay Wortham
It's great.
- [18:46]
Tracy Thomas
It's so funny, the three of them. And like, the one expat I was rooting for is of course the one that dies, the soldier from.
- [18:54]
Jay Wortham
Yeah.
- [18:54]
Tracy Thomas
I liked him. I liked him.
- [18:55]
Jay Wortham
I was rooting for him.
- [18:56]
Tracy Thomas
I liked Maggie too. Right. But like, so we are sort of rooting for these people.
- [19:01]
Jay Wortham
Well, I Guess I'm rooting for them because they all. I forget what Maggie's role is, but they all don't have the same point of origin necessarily, like Graham and the other. There's another commander who are both like commanding officers who did fucked up things in history to varying degrees. And I feel like Arthur and Maggie didn't. I want to say that I think one also has to read this book with a British sensibility. So I'm thinking about shows like what We do in the Shadows and Garth Merengue's Dark Place and very much like, if that rings a bell for anybody, but like a very much Channel 4, like the IT Crowd. Like a very kind of sardonic view of like government culture. Right. So I think that's part of it. Like I had that in the back of my mind. Like, this is sort of cheeky and it's funny and like it's kind of supposed to be very silly in some ways. I also think that what I was really struck by when I read it again was how Graham's character, he. It becomes he has the same experience as the, as the people that he encounters in his life. Like, yes, he is a white cis, as far as we know, relatively heterosexual. There's some implications that he's bisexual or pansexual in the book, but they don't use that language because it's not his language. But he does imply about intimacies with other men, which is really lovely. But, you know, he is displaced, right? Like, he's not allowed to travel. Like, they don't know the impact of time travel on him. It turns out it's really bad for most people's bodies. They can't withstand it. So it's kind of a miracle that the four of them are pretty intact, you know, except for the. When Arthur dies. But like, they are okay for the most part, but pretty much everyone else who's time traveling is not okay. So we don't know what actually happens to them, how deleterious it is over time. But I just was sort of struck by how, you know, he talks about his experiences of like, taking a port and like what we would now consider the modern Middle east or this expedition, these expeditions in the Arctic he's doing where he's trying to like, find new routes and like, you know, he's. People are dying and he has to deal with their families and their, their, you know, the people that are left behind. Like he's encountering indigenous people in these places and they're dying and, you know, he doesn't see that as the same vein as what's being done to him. But as the reader, I think you kind of do. So there is a little bit of. For me, there's a little bit of satisfaction about, like, you know, he is valuable, but he is experiencing some version of what he's done to others because, you know, they catch him in, like, the still net and, like, it hurts and he's not allowed to leave the house. And I don't know. It's. It's pretty mild compared to what he is complacent to or witness to or adjacent to in his time. But I don't know, I kind of felt like. It just felt like this reminder that, like, even the people in power are still subject to the whimsical, the colonial, empiristic whims. I don't know. I just. Yeah, I hear what you mean about Hamilton, though.
- [22:12]
Tracy Thomas
I think you're right. Like, that. That is one of the messages of the book. I guess my question, like. Or my pushback to that is, well, then who is responsible if the people who are literally going out and colonizing places aren't responsible for it? Like, is it just the people at the top? Can we only blame the. The kings and queens?
- [22:30]
Jay Wortham
Or, like, no, Graham's definitely responsible. I was not implying he isn't.
- [22:34]
Tracy Thomas
No, no. I mean, but, like. But like, that he's at the whims of, like, someone ab. That there's always someone above you that, like, you're at the whims of, even if you're complacent. That, like, he's also, you know, like, that. That sort of. That's sort of how I was reading it is like, what she was saying was, like, Graham's actually a really nice guy, and he's doing the best he can given his station in life. And, like, that. This is, like, his job, and this is who he is. And my response to that is sort of like, okay, but, like, he did choose to be an Arctic explorer. Like, he did choose to be a literal colonizer. Like, his actual job is, like, to go out and be like, I stamp ye in the name of Victoria or whatever the hell.
- [23:11]
Jay Wortham
So I don't know, like, not to be trusted. Like, she is not to be trusted. And I think she sees it that way. Cause that's how she views herself. I mean, I think. I think the book comes down to questions of personal responsibility and what you do with the information that you have. And, you know, I watched the new season of Severance last night or the first episode of the new seasons of Severance last night. And I don't know if anybody's watching that or, you know, I don't want to get too far into a tangent, but the second season kicks off with these workers who have all agreed to have an implant in their mind that severs their memories of them when they're not at work. So it's this really interesting show about, like, are you someone else if you can't remember, like, this kind of waking life that you have? And at the end of the first season, they have a little bit of awakening. I won't spoil Severance because that's actually a show that I wouldn't want spoiled for me.
- [24:07]
Tracy Thomas
Thank you. Because I haven't seen it yet.
- [24:08]
Jay Wortham
Okay. Yeah. But they have a little bit of an awakening around some of the ethical and moral dilemmas that come up with, like when a big company is in control of your consciousness, in a sense. Right. And the next season starts out with them sort of trying to figure out how to, I think, maybe try to effectively press for change. And I do think there are some similar themes. Right. Like, and these are the questions that so many of us can ask ourselves and need to be asking ourselves and that we've been asking ourselves since watching the decimation of Palestine, watching Trump take office again for a second time. It's like, are you really not culpable or capable of damage if you aren't, quote, doing anything wrong or if you are, quote, a good person? And I think that we're all implicated. And I just like that the book. I'm sort of a time travel nerd. I don't mind when it doesn't make sense. Like, I kind of enjoy the like. And I, to me, it worked enough, I think that there were still some questions about place and time, you know, And I think the book is this, like, weird Mobius strip because it's written a lot in the past tense. Like, someone's really reflecting on their experiences and what they've kind of come to realize. And I think the book is a really regretful book about someone who really up. Really, really up. And it's.
- [25:26]
Tracy Thomas
Do you feel like she knows that she up? Like, do you feel like that is clear that the main character feels that way? Because there's parts where it feels like she does, but then there's also parts from you where she feels so confused about what's happened. And I'm like, wait, do you feel bad? Are you still. Are you also trying to figure this out?
- [25:45]
Jay Wortham
Oh, my God. There's so many points in the book when everyone's just like, you are not. You are not smart. Like, they're just like, you are such a disappointment. Like, Adela keeps looking at her and being like, I knew when I was your age, I was naive, but I didn't know. I was dumb, too. Like, she's just sort of like. And it's also interesting because one of the paradoxes that come up is that they actually aren't the same person. They're in different timelines. And so then I appreciate the book doesn't try to get into the, like, multiverse because I'm like, Marvel has made me so, like, just, like, saturated on that conversation. But, you know, they aren't the same person. And so it does sort of raise this, I think, place for possibility and optimism. That's like, well, the present is always changing. The future is always malleable. Like, things are never set in stone. Because even what this older woman has experienced in her timeline has now been altered 20 years later in this other timeline. So, you know, anything is possible at any given moment. But I do. I mean, yeah, I don't think she really ever figures it out. That's why I think the book is actually a tragedy, and I think it's a cautionary tale. And I think, you know, it's. It's not a hopeful book necessarily.
- [26:50]
Tracy Thomas
That's okay. So I want to tell you this. When I talked to Kalyan Bradley, I asked her, what's one thing you hope people will keep in mind? And she was like, that it's a hopeful book.
- [27:01]
Jay Wortham
Hopeful about what?
- [27:04]
Tracy Thomas
She just said that it was, like, hopeful and, like, to bring joy, I believe. I can't remember the exact answer, but that was, like, the final word she left us on, basically, was that, like, this in her mind. This is a hopeful book. I think for me, what's very interesting is that I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about what Cully and Bradley did as a writer versus what I feel like is actually happening on the page and the relationship with the actual story to my brain. Like, I felt like a lot of times I was thinking like, oh, the writer's doing this versus, like, the book is doing this.
- [27:38]
Jay Wortham
I see.
- [27:38]
Tracy Thomas
Which was.
- [27:39]
Jay Wortham
Do you remember any examples? Like, you know, yes.
- [27:42]
Tracy Thomas
So, like, I think the writer was writing about mixed race identity and, like, wanted to talk about that, but I felt like what was actually on the page about mixed race identity was extremely boring and bland and, like, very flat to me. And I felt like I could feel the Writer being like, I'm mixed race, so, like, I want to explore this, but also not actually having anything super interesting to say about it. That's like the main one because I'm mixed. And so I'm always thinking, I'm always curious about how other mixed people.
- [28:16]
Jay Wortham
Yeah.
- [28:17]
Tracy Thomas
Experience it or, like, want to write about it. And I felt like some of that was like, really flat for me. I think a lot of the, like, romance stuff, I definitely felt like, oh, this is not our narrator. Like, this is Kalyan. Because also part of the story of this book, of the backstory, which I knew before I even spoke to her, was that during COVID she became obsessed with Graham Gore. And so this started as like fan fiction that she would write to her friends that she made who were into Arctic exploration, which I didn't know that was a thing you could be into, but I learned so much. And that she would send this book, versions of this book, stories from this book, to her Arctic explorer friends. Oh, interesting. And she just had like a big crush on Graham Gore. And all of her friends had different Arctic explorers they were into. And so that part felt different to me in reading it before I. So I read the book, I had flag notes, then I researched the book, then I spoke to her. So, like, there were moments in the book where I was like, this is weird. Like, why is she like his dimples? I'm like, this is like such a, you know, like, it was just felt like slightly off to me. And so I think that that was also some of the struggle I had with the book was like, who's taught? Like, is this supposed to be the character? Is this the author? Like, yeah, I don't know. So that. So those two things definitely pop out to me. I also think, like, the like, Hamilton effect part for me, I. I could feel her hand in some of that. Or I felt like I felt like I could feel her. And I can't say if that actually was like, I can't exactly say what it was because I didn't ask her about that, but. Yeah, but it just felt like it sort of took me out of it a little bit, if that makes sense.
- [29:53]
Jay Wortham
I think that all those critiques are extraordinarily valid. I mean, I just read with a lot less. If I'm reading for pleasure, I'm not, I have to say, like, I don't always have that. That radar so attuned because I feel like I have a lot of grace for first time novelists. I have a lot of grace for fiction. Where the ideas are interesting to me. I just read Jacqueline Halpern's I who have Never Known Men, and it's a book where, like, truly nothing happens in that book. And I was riveted. Like, I was like, you know what I mean? Like, paging through it, like, what's gonna happen? And, like, nothing ever happens. And it's like, I didn't care. I was like, great. You know, and it's. It's not. You know, it didn't really get it much about, like, gender identity or really even that much about community. And I was just like, I don't care. Like, this book worked for me. I mean, I didn't love the book, but it really. It was great. Like, I really enjoyed reading it. But wait, okay, so I'm still thinking about this Hamilton effect, and I had this tab open in my brain from the moment you brought it up. And I think what I want to say is in the logic of this universe, and I do think we're in a little bit of the slightly near future. Like, I think it's a little bit in the future. There are some hints that we're few years into the future, but we know that.
- [31:00]
Tracy Thomas
We know that some. That Adela is, like, from 2040.
- [31:04]
Jay Wortham
We know Adele is from 2040. Right, right. And then the. The brigade and sad.
- [31:09]
Tracy Thomas
24 hundreds or 2200.
- [31:12]
Jay Wortham
Yeah. And they're like, oh, no. Has hit the fan. But even in Adela's timeline, she's from 2040. She's just like, oh, this era is so decadent. She's like, you guys, you're about to have your first resource war. You have no idea how bad it's going to get. She's like, I didn't remember it being this lush, but she's just like, oh, my God. Like, you have it so good. You know, it's really interesting. She's like, food rationing's not fun. You know, like, she's really giving this sense of how quickly shit's about to hit the fan. But I feel like, okay, in the logic of whatever the ministry is, they would go get all white people. And it's kind of implied that the two people that they decide to prioritize are the, like, people with the most military experience and, like, the people who kind of take to the field work. And then the people that they discard are the queer people and the people who. It's kind of chilling where they're like, well, they're like, yeah, they're not really, like, you know, because they're they're finally in a time where they can express themselves and like, enjoy the world and enjoy literature and film in any way. So I thought that was kind of interesting. But the logic of the ministry would be that we would have these women of color who are minders of these war generals essentially, and they would be met. Like, I just thought. I thought also the events were a little arbitrary. That was the only thing for me, that kind of the logic that stuck my brain, which is I was like, why these four people? Like, why? Like, and also how do they figure out, like, it's. It's not clear to me, like, how you set time on the time door. Like, I just didn't realize it had that much control. Like, I thought was really interesting, but whatever. But I do think that. I don't know, like, I. I do. The Hamilton effect is real because I. I have a lot of complicated feelings about that production, which I had to wait for like five years to talk about because people loved it so much. And I just, I'm not by trait like an outward hater. Like, I can be, but it's not my mo. I'm like, oh, everybody loves that thing. I'll wait. Like, even Drake, I was like, I'm. And I'm a Scorpio, so I'm like, I'm willing to bide my time. Like, there will be a moment to talk about Drake and when it comes, guests will be ready. But I was able to wait until. Until now. I mean, maybe some of the discrepancies that you're feeling are also an indicator of the author who I don't know and haven't read any interviews with or any. I mean, I'll listen to the one that you all did or did you record it or.
- [33:31]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah, yeah. Okay, so I'll listen to it.
- [33:33]
Jay Wortham
Great. So I'll listen to the feed. But maybe she's also a little complicated about her mixed race identity and she doesn't know what she wants to say. I mean, I thought that you could really feel that in how Sommelia wasn't really fleshed out. Like, I don't even have a mental picture of what she looks like or what her voice is like or anything about her. Like, the descriptions of her weren't really that rich, which is always a tragedy when there's a black woman in a work of fiction. But, you know, and she doesn't really. But I also kind of chalk that up to like the main character not really being able to see her as a person because she can't really even understand herself as a person.
- [34:09]
Tracy Thomas
Right, Right.
- [34:10]
Jay Wortham
But maybe that's too generous. I don't know.
- [34:12]
Tracy Thomas
I know you're such a generous. I'm literally sitting here being like, Jay's such a generous reader. But let's take a quick break and we'll come right back. Hey y'all. Happy New Year. Same book as you, I hope. I wanted to quickly tell you about what's going on and how you can support the work of this show. As you may know, I have a Patreon it's called the stacks pack@patreon.com the stacks and it's a bookish community complete with a very active discord where you get monthly bonus episodes of Virtual Book Club Meetup. And right now we have some special offers going on all month through the end of January. When you join the Stacks Pack, you get our reading tracker, you get to vote in the Stacky Awards, and you get a shout out on the show. That perk is going to be no longer starting February 1st, so now's the time you get all of that for just $5 a month at patreon.com the stacks. If that doesn't sound like you, I also have a newsletter called Unstacked over@tracy thomas.substack.com where I tell you about all the books I'm reading. I give you personal hot takes about Pop Cult. I even rank every book I read each month. And In December of 2024 I actually ranked every single book I read from least to most favorites. You can find that and so much more over @tracy thomas substack.com if you love this show and you want to make sure that you hear it every single week, those are two incredible ways to support my work and I really appreciate it.
- [35:38]
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- [36:41]
Tracy Thomas
Okay, we're back. I. I want to talk about. This is like maybe one of the most important sort of pieces of the book, story wise, if you're worried about timelines, which is the 9 11, Auschwitz, Hiroshima, turning on a dime changes the fate of, of Graham, of our narrator, of Adela, of everything. So what happens in the book is that we find out that like Adela, we've eventually. I think this actually comes after what I'm talking about. But we find out that Adela has come back in time to like, fix things loosely. Things are bad. She's come back to sort of like, sort it out. She's married to Graham. They have a child named Arthur, after the Arthur who died. She's talk, she's. She becomes the boss of Adela. Unnamed Adela, youthful Adela. And as they're talking, they're talking about something that happened. And she's like, you know, I, I told him about Auschwitz. Or she's like, she's like, oh, I told him about a thing. And she's like, oh, yeah, 9 11. She's like, no, I told him about Auschwitz. And she's like, oh, okay. Then we find out later that that will alter the path of Graham Gore, right? And he will become a different person because 9 11, sort of militarized, radicalized him. And what we find out now is that Auschwitz sort of off the grid, like he wants to escape, go off the grid to Alaska. But we also are told that, that it could have been like, there's also a reference of like, Hiroshima is the other thing that could have been a turning point for him. And so my question to you is one, what do you think Graham Gore becomes if she tells him about Hiroshima? And then two is do you think that finding out about Auschwitz would actually have a huge different impact on Graham Gore?
- [38:38]
Jay Wortham
Mm. How believable is that? Well, my understanding is that. And also like the fact that Adela is like, wait, not 9 11. And the main character still doesn't realize that Adela's travel through time. I'm just sort of like listening. I live in the future. If someone comes to me and is like, time travel is possible, My first question is going to be, are you from the future?
- [39:06]
Tracy Thomas
How do you know? How do you know to take specifics? Is it you?
- [39:10]
Jay Wortham
Can you Take me back one hour in time to prove it.
- [39:13]
Tracy Thomas
Prove it.
- [39:13]
Jay Wortham
I'm just like, where are the critical thinking skills here, girly? But anyway, so there's so many moments like that, and I feel like Adelia. Like, there's the fight scene, too. And Adelia's like, show me what you've learned. I want to make sure your tactical skills are up to date. And she keeps, like, dropping all these hints, and she just, like, never gets it anyway. It's like. And Adelia just gets more and more, like, disappointed in, like, punching her because she's just sort of like, wake up.
- [39:35]
Tracy Thomas
But anyway, she's like, you are the worst version of me. How am I this?
- [39:39]
Jay Wortham
I'm so embarrassed by myself. Okay, so my understanding of that interaction is that Graham Gore hears about 9 11, and he, you know, immediately starts working for the government. He's like, in this other timeline, and he's like, oh, my God. You know, I've been. You know, like, I'm really terrified. I want to protect people. Like, I believe in government. We've got to do it. He hears about World War II, and he's like, no. Like, how could the government let this go on? Like, I no longer believe in the vision and the force of ministry, like, or whatever. Like, it just. It, like, it really repels him. I think it's a really interesting idea. Right? Like, I think that Graham is being asked, in a contemporary sense, to reckon with his actions in a completely different time. And I think part of it is meeting Sommelia and being like, you're the descendant of these people that I encountered who were enslaved. There's a moment where he describes encountering a slave ship and being asked to count the people in the hold and taking note of their condition, understanding what's gonna happen to them, feeling really uncomfortable. But he does nothing. And he just. He just does the job that he's there to do. And he's like, yeah, he's like, it's really, you know, something. And he. And then after he meets Sommelia, they all go out for drinks, and he spends some time with her, and he's like, you know, how do you think she would see me if she knew I had experienced this? You know? Like, he. It's like there are these moments where he's really grappling with, like, the longstanding legacy of. Of the actions that even if they're not his alone, that he takes part in. I mean, I think this book really would have really benefited from, like, a multiple narrator perspective. Like, I think it would have been really fun. Throughout the book, there are these historical flashbacks where you kind of find out what happened with Graham's expedition, which I didn't really find that interesting. I found myself skipping past.
- [41:34]
Tracy Thomas
So bored. So bored. But I'm glad they were short.
- [41:37]
Jay Wortham
They were short. And at first I read them, but that was like, they're not actually providing any clues about his experience. And it would have been great to have, like, you know, been, like, doing a ride along with Maggie as she's having her, like, you know, lesbian Adventures in Contemporary London. Or, like, Arthur and His Longing. Or just, like, Grant, like, what's he thinking about? So I do think it's possible, but I don't think the book earns it. Like, I don't think they earn that explanation. I think what's more compelling to me is her betrayal of him. So at the end of the book, you know, shit starts going sideways. There's a mole in the company that's been leaking information. They think it's one person who gets assassinated. They find out it's Smellia, and they're just like, shit is hitting the fan, basically. And the ex pats escape, and they go to this tunnel that they've been scouting out, and she's like, I have to tell you something. That there are these trackers embedded in you. We need to get them out. And Graham is just looking at her like, you idiot. Again, like, we're already in the hiding place. So, like, what is taking them out now going to do? So he agrees. They take him out, but then she further betrays them. And she calls in for reinforcements. And she's like, they're all here. Because she's still like, you know, they'll be.
- [42:47]
Tracy Thomas
This is a moment for me where I'm just like, girl.
- [42:50]
Jay Wortham
Yeah, well, she still doesn't get it.
- [42:52]
Tracy Thomas
She still doesn't get it, Dom. I'm like, we need a slightly smarter protagonist so that I can go along with you. She was so dumb that I was like, girl, stop, stop.
- [43:02]
Jay Wortham
Well, here's my counter to that, though, which I'll get to in one moment, which is okay. But in the moment when she. The double betrayal of that moment of both not telling Graham about the tracker and then also giving up their coordinates. I think that is really the moment where he's like, none of you can be trusted. Not my lover, not the government. Like, I can't believe anything. He's also been working more with the government. He's privy to stuff that even she may not know about.
- [43:29]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah.
- [43:30]
Jay Wortham
And we find out from Adela that the Graham in her timeline is also like a more ruthless Graham. And Adela at the end of the book is like, burn it all down. Here are the passcodes. None of this is working. Just like, you know, like, abort, abort, abort, abort. Because she even comes back to be like, I want to make sure things. I just don't want my friends to get killed. Like we're supposed to think Adele is this like wise inversion, but she's actually there in a very self serving mission. She's like, I just don't want anybody else to die. And it's like, what? And Somalia is like sub Saharan Africa's underwater. You know, it's like future Adela is still only concerned with her immediate world. So it does kind of track for me that like Graham has these series of awakenings that lead him to kind of completely abandon ship. But I will say this. I also recently read the Book of the Unnamed Midwife, which I don't know if you've read, but it's like a. It's like I've been reading all this dystopian books. I mean, this is also a dystopian book, but I've been reading all these futuristic dystopian novels for research for something else. And it's been really interesting to think about how people categorize and document fictionalized narratives of how we would respond to catastrophe. And for the most part, in my experience of reading a book like Station 11 or I who have Known Men, who have Never Known Men, the Book of the Unnamed Midwife, all of the protagonists and narratives of those books are just like incredibly self sustaining, incredibly smart, incredibly wise. They make all the right decisions, which is why they're still here to tell the tale. And they kind of look upon people who don't make good decisions and they kind of record their stories. And it's just like, to be honest, if things really go down, like it's gonna be really hard to get it right. Like, I probably won't make it and I feel pretty prepared, but I probably won't make it and I probably won't make the right decisions. So I think I kind of appreciated that. It's hard to prioritize the collective over the individual and it comes up again and again in the book.
- [45:28]
Tracy Thomas
That's why I was so taken. I, I read Handmade the Handmaid's Tale for the first time last year and I was so taken by that book because I had seen the show at least the first season. I don't know, I, I Always stop things after a little bit. So I saw some of the show. But what I was taken about in the book that I don't think gets talked about enough is that Offred, the, like, main character, she is not a radical. She is not leading a resistance. She is taking butter for lotion. Like, that's her resistance, right? She goes along with everything. And I find that to be a really compelling dystopian story. And I know people often compare Margaret Atwood and Octavia Butler and. And Parable of the Sower and the Handmaid's Tale, but what I find so interesting about both of them, and I think tracks in both of them, is that this white woman in the Handmaid's Tale is very much going along to save herself, to hopefully make it out to tell the tale. And I think in Parable of the Sower, we have this young black girl who's, like, very idealistic, who is, like, this smart leader. And that. That is refreshing for the reader in a way that reading a white woman who just, like, goes along to get along is. Is very accurate in the Handmaid's Tale. And so I do appreciate sort of, like, these different perspectives of, like, how. How would you respond? Because everyone likes to think they would be a Lauren and the Parable of the Sower, but I think most of us would be an Offred or a Adela or whatever, young, young, unnamed narrator. So I do. I always appreciate when it's like, a dystopian thing and the main character is actually just, like, not a revolutionary or, like, not the smartest person in the room. Because I do think that that is often what happens. Which sort of takes me back to this thing about, like, does learning about Auschwitz actually change Graham Gore? And my thinking is like, okay, maybe, yes. But the other version, the more, like, realistic version, to me is like, no. Like, a lot of people were cool with what the Nazis did enough. They were cool enough with it. A lot of Americans were. A lot of British people were. I think, you know, in retrospect, 80 years later, 90 years later, there's a different narrative. But what happened in the Holocaust happened because most people were like, yeah, we're fine with it. So this idea that, like, Graham, who we know works for Empire, who we know follows along in the footsteps of the British government, would have this huge awakening. It would fundamentally change who he is and change the course of history. While that's a lovely idea, I also could see a version where he still works for the ministry. He's still. He still supports the government. Like, that's who he is through and through to his core. We see that's who he is in his original time. We see that's who he is in Adela's timeline. And the idea that, like, unnamed narrator would change that or that this one piece of information would change that so deeply is. Feels a little bit like a reach to me.
- [48:19]
Jay Wortham
Yeah, I'm hearing you, but.
- [48:21]
Tracy Thomas
But I understand it in the context of the book, but that is the thing I thought of. Of, like, oh, do we actually think, like, we literally just had Elon Musk doing a fucking Nazi salute in 2024 on. On stage at the inaugurational address party or whatever the fuck? So, like, this idea that now that everybody knows about the Nazis, they're gonna change who they are just doesn't feel historical to me in any way. Especially a straight ish white guy who works for the government. Yeah.
- [48:51]
Jay Wortham
And maybe that's. Maybe that's the hopeful part of the book that despite timelines, that he could change. Because you're right. I mean, I think that there's more evidence to support your theory in the world that we're grounded in, that he might be completely disaffected or he might be like, you know, he might come up with some excuse to justify it, but the notion that he has the capacity for empathy and moral righteousness is maybe supposed to be hopeful. But if that's the case, then I do think the book kind of tilts into an interesting kind of white savior model that is not that helpful. Like, I would much rather have Sommelia. You know, I love her kind of partying speech when she's just like, there will be more and more and more of us. I mean, that's what I found to be hopeful in the book. It's like that there is this kind of way in which people abandon the safety of the promises of government as security. And, you know, we are going through this moment as a. It's a nonpartisan. I don't know, policy, or it's just like a nonpartisan awakening of how much we cannot trust our government, you know, and that is just becoming so apparent. I mean, it's been for so many of us for so many years, but it's just becoming, like a pretty universal thing in a way that I find really interesting. And I think that's also true in the book, especially the British government, like, come on, y'all.
- [50:19]
Tracy Thomas
But I. I definitely find that ending for Somalia to be probably the most hopeful part of the book.
- [50:24]
Jay Wortham
Satisfying, too.
- [50:25]
Tracy Thomas
I also, like, I had so many Questions about, like, what was going on in the future. Because there's, like, so many people when they talk about Adela, they're like, do you know who she is? Like, And I'm like, is she Hitler? Like, how bad is she? I wanted to know who she had become. I. I so desperately wanted to go forward in time because I so desperately. I wanted to know. I wanted to know what 2400s was like. I wanted to know what Adela was. Like, how bad was Graham? Like, I just wanted more. I think, overall, like, I know we're at the end of the conversation. Overall, my biggest takeaway is, like, there were so many things I wanted more information on in this book, and I got too much of all the things I really didn't care about. Like, I really didn't care about Little Cat, and I really didn't care about, like, once the twist in the book happened, I was like, okay, I'm now interested. I Wish this came 200 pages ago because I am interested in time travel, and I am interested in these ideas of, like, what happens and who do we become given where we are now. Ish. And. And that was really. That was really fresh frustrating for me of, like, take me to Somalia. Like, let's go with her. Like, what does she know? What did the brigadier and Selassie or whatever tell her?
- [51:40]
Jay Wortham
Her. That was the part. That was the part two at the end. I totally agree. Like, I wish the second part of the book had just been exploded into, like, 200 more pages and, like, lose.
- [51:49]
Tracy Thomas
A lot of the.
- [51:49]
Jay Wortham
Like, the romance stuff didn't bother me, but I would have read another 200 pages just to understand, like, what is actually happening because it's so condensed. And then you realize, like, oh, wow. Like, it's not just Adela or whoever else Gorr decides to send back in time that's got the capacity to change the future. Like, other people are using these. These tools and this technology to change the future, which is so fun. I'm like, okay, now, this is the thriller. Yeah. This is the tenet of it all, which is a movie that many people hate, but I really enjoy. So that's. I should have said at the beginning. That's very revealing for me as well. But, you know. Yeah. So, like, what did they tell her? And also, can they be trusted? Can any of them be trusted? That's the other question. That's the question, like, how do you know what. You know? The last thing I'll say is that I wanted to come up with, like, a reading and watching list for this book because I love that. I recognize that it is very controversial and people don't like it. And so I wanted to be like, in case you don't want to read this book or dnf you didn't finish it here. Other books, I think books and works of art and films and shows and, you know, albums that I think explore these themes. But that Brit Marlin movie, the Sound of My Voice, which is also about someone who comes back from the future telling of climate change and catastrophe, and they want to enact these big radical moves. And, you know, this woman that's working with her is all of a sudden like, well, can I trust her? Like, how do I know that she's really for my future? And it's so interesting because, like, what's the proof? Yeah, what is the proof? So, you know, and it's also a very seductive idea to think about that we can change the future, that things aren't predetermined. And maybe that's also what I find kind of hopeful. But I just, I really, really. I think the thing for me, I keep coming back to is the just like the heartbreaking question at the center of this book book, which is, like, what would you do if you found out you were aiding and abetting a government organization that was going to take down the world? And also, what if all of us are doing that right now? Yeah, I mean, like, we all use Facebook. We, you know, we all use meta, we all use Amazon. We're eating and abetting Elon, we use X. Like, how do we think about that? And it's like, well, I'm just posting. I'm just doing this. Well, when you're Googling, you know, an AI response is coming up and that's depriving the world. It's enabling these pyro ecologies. I mean, we are all complacent. What are we doing about it?
- [54:08]
Tracy Thomas
And I think, Jay, if the book did more of that, I would have loved it. Like, I love all these ideas. I love all these questions. I do want to ask you. I want to end on this note. So this book was on Barack Obama's famous reading list. It was on his summer list in 2024. And I want you to sort of just do a thought experiment. What do you think Barack Obama liked about this book?
- [54:39]
Jay Wortham
Let me ask you a question, though, to start. Do we think he really makes lists?
- [54:43]
Tracy Thomas
So I firmly believe that he reads the books on the lists because I think it's such an unforced error to publicly post this like, information that nobody actually asked you to do year after year if you're not reading them. Because like, what if somebody comes up to you and is like, so Adela administrative time and you're like, what? Like, that would be such an embarrassing for no reason thing.
- [55:04]
Jay Wortham
So doesn't get embarrassed by that. He just smiles and laughs and moves on.
- [55:09]
Tracy Thomas
Why make the list if you're not gonna like, it's just like no other president's doing it. It's not like, oh, this is a tradition of a book list from like George Washington. It's like Obama was like, hey, this is what I'm reading. And it picked up. So I do believe, believe he reads them. I think he probably gets advice from other people. I think there's probably people who should read this. Like, you don't have any romance on your list. Like, add this in. But I think if he puts it on the list, he's at least read it and enjoyed it. I don't know. I'm just like, I was thinking like, why would Obama like this book? And the one thing that I was thinking is like, he is hopeful that we will have recontextualized. We have the ability to recontextualize history and like have generous readings of history because he's done not great things like that. It might like change his legacy or like that in 150 years of someone time traveled back to his time. Like, there might be a more generous reading of him.
- [56:00]
Jay Wortham
Sure. I mean, that's a very generous reading of maybe his own reading habits. I honestly, I feel like what he probably was drawn to as well as the things you've mentioned. But I think he might have liked the dad jokes. There are a lot of dad jokes in the book. Like when the main character introduces Graham to Spotify and he's like, he's just like mind blown. And then he hears one song and then she's like, should I play it again? And he's like, that would be disrespectful. And it's just like so funny. And then there's another part when he's like talking about tv and he's like, what are these horrendous dioramas of people doing wretched things? And she's like, no one's forcing you to watch Easters, which is like a trashy show. And he's like, don't talk to me like that. You know, I just, it's like stupid. Like, I think, I feel like that is the stuff Obama. I could see him laughing out Loud at these little, like, bantery jokes about an old guy who's. You know what I mean? Again, it's like he probably grew up loving Splash or, you know, he probably watched Frosty or like movies like that about like a person who had to acclimate to modern times. He was like, lol. That's what I think.
- [57:13]
Tracy Thomas
I like it. I like it. Last, last, last, last one. What do you make of the title and the COVID Well, you know, there's.
- [57:19]
Jay Wortham
This whole controversy right now. I just googled and kind of read about it where there's like another. There's like a Spanish language book or show that's very similar. So I. I'm still like kind of parsing my way through that because I do think people can have simultaneously really good ideas at the same. You know what I mean, that don't involve plagiarism. So I don't know exactly the details of it. It seems really unfortunate, but I thought that the. The COVID I mean, it feels like it's designed by the same person who did Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, and it just gives the same sort of. But, you know, it wouldn't have grabbed me.
- [57:54]
Tracy Thomas
No, to be honest.
- [57:56]
Jay Wortham
Yeah, it doesn't feel indicative of the book. But I don't think book covers do that anymore. Like, they don't really tell you what the book's about anymore.
- [58:03]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah, I think that's true sometimes. I think for me, the title is quite grabby. The Ministry of Time. I'm curious about that. I think that's a great title. I think the COVID design is pretty lackluster to me. I mean, I think you can see the, like, two or three different shadows of the same. Like, I think it's like, supposed to be giving us like, different parallel whatever. But I don't think this cover does much to tell you what's in the book. And I think, you know, I think some covers really can and do, but I think some don't. I think that's just like, designer stuff.
- [58:37]
Jay Wortham
It also might work better in the uk, right? Because like, if this book was called the Department of Time, we might immediately be like, oh, that's weird, you know, but like, minute. Like, we don't call our branches of government or like, I don't know, we just don't call them ministries. So it's. I think it's a little bit. It was lost on me. I'll say. And then I got it. I was like, oh, okay. But wait, Tracy, like, what was a book? What's the last book you read? That you loved?
- [59:00]
Tracy Thomas
I love the book. Book? The fiction or non fiction?
- [59:02]
Jay Wortham
Well, I'd love to hear both.
- [59:04]
Tracy Thomas
Okay. Well, I loved James. I loved Martyr. I loved Colored Television by Dancy Senna. I loved Come and Get it by Kylie Reid. These are all books from last year. Nonfiction. Last year, I just loved the Challenger of the book about the Challenger disaster by Adam Higginbotham, the guy who wrote the Midnight in Chernobyl that became the Chernobyl TV show.
- [59:22]
Jay Wortham
Okay.
- [59:23]
Tracy Thomas
He wrote a book about Challenger disaster. That was my favorite book I read last year.
- [59:26]
Jay Wortham
I'll read that.
- [59:27]
Tracy Thomas
It's so good. It's very Patrick Rad and Kefian and stuff.
- [59:30]
Jay Wortham
Okay.
- [59:31]
Tracy Thomas
So those are all books I've loved recently. New books.
- [59:34]
Jay Wortham
Okay. Okay. That's helpful. Just why?
- [59:36]
Tracy Thomas
Why do you want to know?
- [59:37]
Jay Wortham
Because I do think that books like dishes like Amaro, like, you know, Bitters, like, they. They're really specific to a palette. So I think maybe I've never really done a book club before, but I do think it's really helpful to sort of get a sense of, like, here are the books that work worked for me. Here's the book that don't work for me to see if that person's pick is going to work for you. That's. That's my last thing. Yeah. Because I don't. I don't really recommend books to people because I'm just like, I don't think I know what you're gonna like unless I know the person very well or have some very specific sense of what they want to read. I'm like, I don't know, because my brain's different. My brain is real weird.
- [60:17]
Tracy Thomas
No, I think that's right. I think book. Recommending books is definitely, like, a skill, and, like, it's hard to do, and you have to, like. Like, really be able to understand the person that you're talking to. Yeah. And I think what's been fun for me about the show and the book club here is that I often let the guest sort of pick because I want them to be excited and want to talk about it, and I'll read anything. I don't. The only rule I always tell people is it just has to be something you're willing to talk about critically. And you won't feel like it can't be your friend's book because then you're going to be defending it and you're going to be like, oh. And I'm going to say, I didn't like this. And then you're going to Be like, Well, I think they were trying to do.
- [60:50]
Jay Wortham
Yeah, of course.
- [60:51]
Tracy Thomas
And I. I've had that happen. That's a rule that I had to put in place after a few different times. And that's really it because it's my job to read, so I'll read anything. And I also think it, like, helps me to refine my palette to know what I do and don't like. But. But I do think it's different when it's not your job to read a new book every month and talk about it. But yeah, this is definitely outside of my comfort zone of reading, like, time travel. Even though I do. Like, I did love Station 11. And I do. I did love Perfect Book.
- [61:22]
Jay Wortham
Station 11, sorry.
- [61:23]
Tracy Thomas
Station 11 is a perfect book and I've read it.
- [61:27]
Jay Wortham
And then she's written before or after has come close. So we have to also acknowledge that.
- [61:32]
Tracy Thomas
Yes. Yeah, I read it before COVID And so I had so many romantic feelings about it that I think are different now. Like, all the Shakespeare stuff and, like, how they held on to Shakespeare. Like, I love Shakespeare so much. Just like this. And like, there was. I can't remember the exact detail. Yes. Like something about the toilet, like how they got the toilets to flush or something that I was just like, this is so good. But that book took me two or three starts to actually get into the beginning about.
- [62:02]
Jay Wortham
I was like, no, but that's a book I've probably read at least 10 times now. I'm rereading it right now. That's a book that I read. I like it is a book. I'm like, the structure is incredible. The pacing, once you get into it, the pacing's incredible. The way that, like, Clark's character, who's one of the characters, you know, he's one of the characters who's like, living at the airport. The way he kind of imagines the end of the world. I mean, it's so poetic, like Miranda's whole journey, which you kind of can do without Miranda's perspective. But it's so interesting. That's a perfect book, in my opinion.
- [62:36]
Tracy Thomas
So, yeah, I think that's right. I think, like, because I'm new to sci fi y future dystopian stuff, I really like it when it's really good, but if it's just mid. It's very hard for me.
- [62:47]
Jay Wortham
Well, I'm reading. I know we're over time, but I'll just say that I'm. I'm reading a lot of dystopic novels right now because I'm Thinking a lot about survivalism, and I'm thinking a lot about how people prepare for the future and how we imagine the future. And I'm really interested in kind of if we're obsessed with the apocalypse and, like, in a way that prevents us from understanding that we're already in it and that many people in current timelines are already experiencing apocalypse. LA is experiencing an apocalypse right now.
- [63:16]
Tracy Thomas
I mean, I'm here, you're there. Yeah. So I think that's right. I. You know what's funny? I am not a person who plans in this way. I've had so many people recently be like, are we. Are we moving countries? Like, what's the plan? I don't. I don't have the plan. I don't know. I could never be a doomsday prepper. There's too many things you could possibly plan for. Like, I just. I don't have that impulse, that peep some people have. I'm never like, okay, if X happens, we do this. I'm just like, we'll cross that bridge when we get there. Yeah, but I don't.
- [63:54]
Jay Wortham
Probably a fine response, right? Like, you'll. You'll.
- [63:56]
Tracy Thomas
But I won't be ready. Everyone else will have bought all the water and the toilet paper, and I will be drinking, like, days old, you know, milk, and I'll be wiping my butt with leaves. Like, I will not be ready for whatever apocalypse comes because I just don't believe it's coming. I'm like, yeah, well, I guess if it burns down, it burns down. And I don't know if that's, like, cultural. My mother is Jewish. My father is a descendant of slaves. Like, I don't know if that's, like, we've lived through sort of the worst and we're still here, and so maybe, like, it's going to be fine. And I've just been taught that. Or if it's like a me thing. I don't know. But anytime people bring up, like, yeah, so do you have a. Like, my husband was like, oh, like, we should have a earthquake bag. I'm like, okay, why don't you figure that out?
- [64:38]
Jay Wortham
Yeah, but that's. That's adaptive and that's iterative. I mean, you. You preparing because, like, someone in your household is like, this experience we've gone through has made me realize we need the following things. And, like, I think that's an appropriate way to respond, I think. And to each their own. Like, I'm. I'm trying to figure out what kind of prepper I'M going to be right now. But I think that kind of constantly preparing for an event that may or may not happen is also, like, a really stressful way to live. And I think it's also like a. It's. I don't know. So I don't. You're right. There's no right way to do it. But. But I do think also your particular lineages also prepared you for adaptability and like, well, we'll get there when we get there. Because, you know, so you. There is some preparedness. It just might look different from someone else's. Yeah, there's like an emotional and a spiritual preparedness, which is also really important.
- [65:27]
Tracy Thomas
It's important. I needed you to say that. As I'm living through the apocalypse and I have unpacked my go bag, I'm like, the winds are picking up just a dread, dreadful, dreadful time here. Sorry. This was amazing. Thank you, everybody listening. Make sure you listen to the end of today's episode to find out what our February book club pick will be. If you have not read Black Futures yet, which is Jay's book with Kimberly Drews. It is an anthology. It is one of. Talk about a book. I loved one of the books that I hold so dear to my heart. I revisit sections and past passages all the time. It is both beautifully written and also a gorgeous artifact. It's like a gorgeous thing that I love so much. I know that there's a paperback that is silver, but the hardcover that I have that is black with the silver Black futures. It is one of my favorite looking things in my home. So if you have not read this book, people, I cannot stress enough that we can never be friends until you do. Okay? That's the bottom line. If you want to be friends, you've. You have to read Black Futures, period the end. So you all can get that book wherever you get books. Jay, thank you so much for being here. This was a dream.
- [66:42]
Jay Wortham
I'll come anytime. This was so fun. I love talking about books with you because we have polar opposite tastes and it makes it really fun.
- [66:47]
Tracy Thomas
It's great. Except for we agree on station 11.
- [66:50]
Jay Wortham
Yeah.
- [66:51]
Tracy Thomas
And everyone else, we will see you in the stacks. All right, y'all, that does it for us today. Thank you so much for listening and thank you to Jay Wortham for being our guest. And now it is time to announce our February 2025 book club pick. It is Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. This book is one of the most famous and controversial novels of our time. From one of the great writers of the 20th century. This 1955 novel tells the story of Humbert Humbert and his obsession and victimization of a 12 year old girl, Dolores Hayes. We will be discussing this book on the podcast on Wednesday, February 26th. Be sure to tune in next week to find out who our guest will be. If you love this podcast and you want inside access to it, head to patreon.com the stacks to join the stacks pack and check out my newsletter at Tracy thomas.substack.com make sure you're subscribed to the Stacks wherever you listen to your podcasts and if you're listening through Apple Podcasts or Spotify, please leave us a rating and a review. For more from the Stacks, follow us on social media at the Stacks pod, on Instagram threads and TikTok, and check out the website@thestacks podcast.com this episode of the Stacks was edited by Christian Das with production assistance from Megan Caballero. Our graphic Designer is Robin McRite and our theme music is from Tagirigis. The Stax is created and produced by me, Tracy Thomas.