#45 Reading Sarah K's favourite books

Welcome to the 45th episode of The Bookcast Club, a book podcast for people who love to read and talk books. Today, Sarah T and Jenny read and discuss Sarah K's favourite books, The Secret History  by Donna Tartt and Grief is the Thing with Feathers by Max Porter.
Content warning: we discuss grief in detail in the second part of this episode, which some listeners may find upsetting. We have included chapter markers so you can skip our discussion on Grief is the Thing with Feathers.

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Books mentioned:

The Island at the End of Everything by Kiran Millwood Hargrave
The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave
Small Pleasures by Clare Chambers
Inglorious Empire by Shashi Tharoor
Earthlings by Sayaka Murata
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
The Little Friend by Donna Tartt
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
Grief is the Thing with Feathers by Max Porter
Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed
Option B by Sheryl Sandberg
Lanny by Max Porter

We encourage you to shop with your local independent book store. Many have gone to great efforts to develop an online presence and we're sure most, if not all, will take orders over the phone. They can order whatever book you want. You can find a list of independent bookshops to support on our website, many of which do home delivery.

Other mentions:
Dr Shashi Tharoor MP - Britain Does Owe Reparations
The College Admissions Scandal

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Transcript

File:                 45-reading-sarah-k-s-favourite-books.mp3

Duration:          1:05:55

Date:                23/04/21

START AUDIO

00:00:00 Sarah K:         Hi, welcome to The Bookcast Club, a fortnightly podcast by 4 bookish fiends. I'm Sarah, and today I'm joined by Sarah.

00:00:08 Sarah T :        Hello.

00:00:09 Sarah K:         And Jenny [Jenny says hello], and we're going to talk about me, and specifically my favorite books. So Jenny and Sarah have read a couple of my favorite books and we're going to discuss them. And we're going to go around and do Sarah's favorite books as well. And Jenny's favorite books and Alice’s favorite books in other episodes.

[theme tune]

00:00:42 Sarah K:         Shall we talk about what we're reading at the moment first?

00:00:45 Sarah T:          Yeah

00:00:45 Jenny:            Yeah, let’s do that 

00:00:47 Sarah K:         So what are you reading at the what are you reading at the moment, Jen?

00:00:50 Jenny:            Well, I'm going to talk about one that I've just finished.

Now. I could have sworn that Sarah K read this, but I couldn't find it on your Goodreads to see what you thought. 

00:01:00 Sarah K:         Oh, my Goodreads is super are not up to date so…

00:01:05 Jenny:            Oh, I meant Sarah T! [laughter]

00:01:09 Sarah T:          And my my Goodreads is also I didn't even know I haven't updated it for yonks and yonks.

00:01:16 Jenny:            So this might be why I couldn't find it, but I've just finished THE MERCIES by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

I have read one of her middle grade books, which was called THE ISLAND AT THE END OF EVERYTHING which I really enjoyed and I remember liking her writing in it.

So this is her first adult fiction, so it is about a small island in Norway. All the men of the island have been killed in like a freak storm, so it's an island of women, essentially. The only male left is the priest and I I didn't know this, is it a spoiler?

I mean, this is almost a little spoiler 'cause I think it maybe added to my reading experience, but I guess if you don't want any spoilers at all and don't listen to the next like 30 seconds, but it's about witch trials.

So I knew that and I knew it was based on a real life witch trial and these women are left to kind of fend for themselves.

There's one male left on the island who's the local priest. Aas the book goes on, a new commissioner is sent to go and live on this island with his new wife who becomes kind of one of the main protagonists in it.

I really, really enjoyed it because I really enjoyed the, like fore -  and this is what I'm saying about kind of knowing what what it's about. I really enjoyed the sort of foreboding and attention that built up because you kind of you know what's going to happen, and I can't remember at what point you probably find this out in the book anyway, it's probably not that far into it.

You know what's going to happen and you can also tell just 'cause we knew, you know, we know the nature of the sort of women that were trialed for being which is you know which women are going to be targets as well.

So I just thought it was really really good. It took me a little while to get into 'cause her writing is very lyrical and I think before that I'd been reading something that really wasn't so it did take a little bit of time , it is a bit slow to start with, but after a while I really really enjoyed it, so I thought it was great and it's one that I guess I feel like it's a little bit hyped up, but that's 'cause I watch a lot of Booktube, it might not actually be.

But yeah, I really loved it and I loved the sense of danger in it was I was very tense reading it.

But yeah, I thought his thought was great.

00:03:36 Sarah K:         When is it set Jen?

00:03:39 Jenny:            Oh God uhm.

00:03:41 Sarah K:         Because I was thinking like…Norwegian witch trials.

00:03:45 Jenny:            I want to say… so he's Scottish, so the Commissioner that goes is something like Witch Hunter from Scotland.

I wanna say 16-something right? [laughs] But I could be completely making this up, I might be being factually incorrect.

00:03:58 Sarah K:         Interesting! Witch trials.

00:04:02 Jenny:            Yeah, I thought it was very good, and she’s a very good writer, definitely. I’ll read more of her adult stuff.

00:04:07 Sarah T:          It's 1621!

00:04:08 Jenny:            Oh it was 16 something. Yeah, it’s very good and one of the women said like so, you know all the men are dead. It's clearly a fishing village 'cause they're killed in a big storm at the start. One of the women like at one point she turns that she gets some of the women to go fishing to start with, which is a big no-no. And at one point she turns up wearing trousers to the main protagonist’s house, and [the main protagonist] is like appalled and thinking what are you doing?

                                    So it's just it's, yeah, it's really clever. I really, really enjoyed it.

00:04:34 Sarah K:         I like the sound of the setting. Very much.

00:04:36 Jenny:            It reminded me of BURIAL RITES and the setting in there. Yeah, so you might like it actually it's got the same vibe to it.

00:04:44 Sarah K:         Cool, I like the sound of that. So what about you, Sare?

00:04:46 Sarah T:          I have just picked up… well.  I have to admit I've been in a bit of a weird, I've been really struggling to read recently and I'd started about three different books and I haven't been able to get into any of them, and I don't think it's, I don't think it's the books.

It's it's not you, it's me. [laughs]

            I don't know, I just think my concentration’s all over the place.

I've been so distracted by things. So I've been a little bit struggling a little bit. But I did start yesterday I thought, OK, maybe I'll give myself something slightly easier… not “easier”, but you know what I mean.  So I picked up SMALL PLEASURES by Clare Chambers I think… Yeah, I'm doing quite well, I'm further than I made it on the other 3 books so I think that's a good indicator and it's got a lot of hype recently or it's been around a lot. It got quite a lot of traction when it first came out and then it's got a lot more 'cause it's on the Women’s Prize for Fiction Longlist, and I think quite a lot of people back this book. 
 It is set in suburbs of London 1957. It follows a reporter called Jean Sweeney or Swinny? She is investigating this story about a young woman who's saying her daughter was… do you say “miraculous conception”? It was a virgin birth.

00:06:06 Jenny :           Yeah, miraculous.

00:06:08 Sarah T :        So she is sort of like the only woman on the paper and she ends up following the story, but she sort of felt like it's quite a good opportunity and the story unfolds from there, really.

Uhm, it's quite an interesting concept. I sort of haven't really come across a story like this before, so that's quite cool and yeah, I think it deals a lot with I know woman in a sort of quite male-dominated workplace, but more just to sort of this whole story about, is it possible and the book was inspired by a true life piece, true life article because there's a scientist back in the day that worked out that female fish can sort of procreate by themselves. Then there was this whole kind of study about whether that could happen in mammals, and then they sort of escalated it and they asked women and sort of thing like that and someone came out with the fact that they believed their daughter was created through a virgin birth. 

So she’s using that real life story. But yeah, it's good, it's quite a a quick… I'm getting through the pages quite a lot. It's very readable. But yeah, I'm excited to see where it goes.

00:07:16 Sarah K:         God that is nothing like what I assumed that book would be about. I don't know.

00:07:20 Sarah T:          I know, right?

00:07:20 Sarah K          As you were describing that I was like what? and then we were talking about fish, I was like it's like a fever dream, this book. 
 
 

[laughter]

00:07:26 Sarah T:          I know! That's the thing I had, I had no idea when I saw like 1957 like suburbs of London I was like, oh OK, and then it just goes on to this like slightly mad yeah, virgin birth theory.

00:07:38 Sarah K:         Yeah, I I kind of assumed it was about abortion or something that seemed like. [laughs]

You know what Sare, I'm interested to hear what you say when you finish it, because I've heard kind of the same review from a lot of people that I have that I follow and they've also there loved it until the end.

00:07:51 Sarah T:          Oh, really.

00:07:54 Sarah K:         Sorry, I'm very interested to hear what you say.

00:07:56 Sarah T:          Oh OK, interesting. Yeah I will I will report back, I don't, I really don't know where it's going to go, like I'm really not sure what this story is about.

I mean in my head I'm like I don't think a virgin birth is possible, but it's not set up to be a sort of like psychological thriller where it's like find out where the lie is.

00:08:13 Sarah K:         [laughs] Is it a Virgin birth? Yes or no. Find out.

[laughter]

00:08:17 Sarah T:          Yeah, it’s almost like, I don’t know, I guess it's a bit more sort of philosophical than that, and what people believe in and because there's this whole back story that she was her alibi, alibi, I guess as it is means that she couldn't possibly get pregnant.

It's a bit more, sort of… yeah I, I'm really, really intrigued, but it's helping me get back into reading. So thank you!

00:08:34 Sarah K:         Thank you Clare. I'm kind of not struggling to read, but I’m reading like 4 or five different things and I'm just sort of flopping around between them. I can't really get into, I don't know, it’s kind of weird. 

00:08:44 Sarah T:          Do you know what I would call that Sarah? 

00:08:47 Sarah K:         What?

00:08:47 Sarah T:          Robin Hobb syndrome.

00:08:48 Sarah K:         [laughs] Well, one of them is Robin Hobb, don't worry! 

So I'm continuing my Robin Hobb journey. I'm on DRAGON KEEPER now, if you're following where I am in this world, which is the first book in the Rain Wild Chronicles.

00:09:00 Sarah T:          And like a week ago, she was not that far, she has just read Robin Hobb continuously.

00:09:06 Sarah K:         You guys, come on. But I'm slowing down now 'cause this is not as good. this one is like the weaker one of the group of trilogies. 

So anyway, that's where I am with Robin Hall for people that are keeping up to date with that. I'm reading this intense nonfiction book called INGLORIOUS EMPIRE: WHAT THE BRITISH DID TO INDIA by Shashi Tharoor.

So this was recommended to me by a very good friend of mine who was Indian and he was really interested in this particular, he's a politician Shashi Tharoor and he has done a lot of like talks and stuff about colonization and things like that sounds really boring things like the cotton trade and how that has affected like India and the UK and stuff, and I have had this book for a long time and I really wanted to read it.

But a) the friend of mine who recommended to me has passed away so it was a bit of a weird like thing to be reading and b) it's quite like a complicated serious book and it's one of those books with when it's a nonfiction that you know is quite important I always find it a bit hard to like decide that now is the time that I'm going to read it.

And when you read through it, it's very detailed and he has loads of facts and it's all very dense, so yeah, these kind of books I find it more difficult, but a really, really good friend of mine in Australia he wanted to read it with me so we're reading it together a chapter at a time and we [laughs] it's so dense that we read one chapter a week and then discuss each chapter.

So it's pretty [laughs] pretty detailed.

00:10:27 Jenny:            How many chapters is it? It might take you a while.

00:10:29 Sarah K:         It's like 200 pages or so. I have to read sort of five to 10 pages a day is about the speed. 

00:10:32 Jenny:            OK, no, it's not that long.

00:10:35 Sarah T:          That's doable.

00:10:50 Sarah K:         Like I.

00:10:50 Sarah K:         So yeah, it's it's doable, but it's one of those books that's like fact fact, fact, fact, fact and you're like… And you know, there's like all this information about what different people were doing at these times, and like how they interacted with each other. And I, I always feel like, oh, I can't remember this, I get a bit stressed, but yeah, it's all good.

So yeah, I've been reading that with a friend of mine who is he's a sociologist actually so he is, he has a very good like macro understanding of like how people interact with each other and and so it's been a bit of a study group. Yeah, really, really good. Pretty intense.

00:11:10 Jenny:            Ooh.

00:11:11 Sarah T:          It's one of these books that I want to say I want to read, but maybe, maybe not today.

00:11:16 Sarah K:         It's intense. It's a very like sobering and intense book and you have to be like I think in a certain place to be able to read it and you want to be at a point where you can like digest the information in a way that's helpful 'cause it's it's really sobering and it has a lot of implications for like how you think about like the Commonwealth and that kind of thing.

So for me and my friend, of course we're Australian, so it's so it's it's one thing for us to be reading it and we sort of talk about how India and Australia are connected and we have these conversations. But I think if you're British you would really need to be in like a certain headspace to decide that you want to read it.

Yeah, it's incredibly well written that I can put in this we can put in the show notes. He did a kind of like a Ted talk type thing at you know, those like intelligence squared debates and stuff? They do at Oxford and that kind of thing he did a little 10 minute thing in one of those which is really good.

So if you want to get like a flavor of how he talks and stuff. 

Sorry to drop this very serious topic on you with no warning [laughs] 

And I just finished EARTHLINGS by Sayaka Murata, which I talked about a bit in the Patreon episode 'cause we were talking about Sayaka Murata in the last episode 

00:12:25 Sarah T:          Yes. I’ve got, EARTHLINGS is ready to pick up at the library, which I'm excited about.

00:12:30 Sarah K:         EARTHLINGS is intense, like it's way more intense than I thought it would be.

00:12:33 Jenny:            Yeah, that's what I've heard.

00:12:35 Sarah K:         Yeah, it's so the way it's described, you probably seen it Jen
                                     People are like oh, it’s quirky, it’s weird. I had this sort of like kooky vibe from it.                                       Do you know what I mean?

I reviews this is about it's about sexual assault like it's pretty serious.

Yeah, so I found a much, much heavier going than I that I thought I would and the first couple of chapters. Really a content warning if sexual assault is something that you find difficult and particularly sexual assault in children 'cause this girl is she's in primary school and she's assaulted by her teacher and the way that that Sayaka writes it, you feel so like it's so tense and you feel so stressed for her and she goes and tells her mother what's happening to her and the mother doesn't believe her.

And then later all this weird stuff happens and she does all these weird things and she doesn't really process things in the way that the that that most people do. But it all starts with this sort of horrific sexual abuse.

So I found that…I didn't find it kooky and fun at all actually I found it…

00:13:30 Jenny:            No, that's why I think I've listened to one person like that and say I don't understand all these other reviews that don't point it out because it’s a huge part of the story.

00:13:42 Sarah K:         Yeah, I would give a strong content warning for it because it's I mean I'm not really someone who's normally affected by that kind of thing and I read it and I found it quite difficult to get through and I read it with my book club and almost everyone said that they had to read like a couple of pages at a time for those bits 'cause they just found it like really heavy going so and it's not graphic, it's the, it's the mood of it.

[laughs] 

What a cheery vibe I’m bringing I'm talking to the podcast.

00:14:06 Jenny:            [sarcastically] You’re reading such light books, Sarah. 

00:14:08 Sarah K:         [laughs] Sorry guys. No wonder I'm struggling to get through stuff! 

00:14:12 Sarah T:          Yeah, I was going to say. 

00:14:12 Jenny:            Go back to your Robin Hobb. 

00:14:15 Sarah T:          No, don't tell her that Jen! 

[laughter]

00:14:16 Sarah T:          No, she doesn't need any bloody encouragement when it comes to Robin Hobb.

00:14:22 Sarah K:         I think I might read THE MERCIES next actually, Jenny’s talked to me into it.

00:14:26 Jenny:            Yeah, I think you'd like that. Just that's not that light and cheery either so.

[laughter]

00:14:32 Sarah K:         What's wrong with me?

[theme music]

00:14:39 Jenny:            This is where we take a little break in proceedings to tell you all the different ways you can support the podcast. A really effective and free way of showing your support is by rating and reviewing us on iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

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The link will be in our show notes, but however you choose to show your support, we want to say a huge thank you, we appreciate each and every one of our listeners.

Before we move on with the episode, we just wanted to flag the content of the next section we talk about grief in detail, and some of you may find this upsetting. 

We have included chapter markers for this episode, so if your podcast player supports them, you can choose to skip the books we discuss.

Thank you.

[theme music stops]

00:15:49 Sarah K:         Let's talk about THE SECRET HISTORY, which is my favorite book of all time.

Number one, I don't know how I can really elaborate on this. All time.

Number one, favourite book.I mean yeah.

00:16:01 Jenny:            Did you feel the pressure of us reading it?

00:16:03 Sarah K:         No, because I'm so confident.

[laughter]

00:16:07 Sarah K:         Ah, it's all like I, I am obnoxious about this book, I even, I used to do this and then I had to stop myself.

I would reply to people on Goodreads who would give it like negative ratings and explain like why they're wrong [laughs]

00:16:16 Jenny:            Oh, no, you’re one of those people! [laughs] 

00:16:20 Sarah T:          Sarah!

00:16:20 Sarah K:         Not normally, normally I'm very like oh you know, different strokes for different folks. If you didn't like it, that's totally fine.

You know, not everyone likes everything. This book is the one exception I'm like “incorrect”.

[Jenny laughing]

00:16:32 Jenny:            That really makes me laugh. It’s so funny. 

The other thing that makes me laugh at poor old Alice. I know this is basically her favorite book as well, but she's not going to be able to choose it for her, let's read her favorite books.

She’ll have to choose something different, bless her. 

00:16:47 Sarah K:         Yeah, poor Alice, she’s double suffering because she couldn't record this episode and she couldn’t choose THE SECRET HISTORY

[laughter]

00:16:55 Sarah K:         I think I read it for the first time a couple of years ago and I've read it about six or seven times something like that.

00:17:01 Jenny:            And you read the physical copy each time.

00:17:03 Sarah K:         I sometimes read the physical copies, sometimes read the audio book.

I have a couple of I have a couple of physical copies, and then I also have the audio book.

The audio book is really really good actually.

00:17:13 Jenny:            Yeah, that's how I, that's how I read it was listening to the audiobook.

Donna Tartt narrates it herself, doesn't she so?

00:17:18 Sarah K:         Yeah, so I guess I'll summarize it for people who don't know what THE SECRET HISTORY is.

THE SECRET HISTORY was the debut novel by Donna Tartt, who is an American writer, came out in 1992.

And it is about a group of college students who are studying ancient Greek, and they become they're very into the ancient world, and they sort of live in this sort of odd reality where the ancient world is a bit more relevant to them than the current day. Like, for example, one of them didn't know that people had landed on the moon, even though it's like the 80s. So they sort of live in this sort of odd world and they end up killing a fellow student which you know from the beginning. And the way that she does it is that she at the prologue, she has them doing this murder and then when you start chapter one it goes back in time and she writes how they got to this point and then what happens afterwards.

00:18:07 Jenny:            I love that, by the way, that's one of my favorite things in books where the reveal happens at the start and then they you get like the back story.

00:18:12 Sarah K:         Yeah, it's really interesting. Yeah, I think she did this because that's the way that it was done in like Greek plays and stuff. And so the whole premise, when people went audiences in like ancient Greece, were going to these plays it wasn't about what happened in the end, everyone knew the whole plot and you were going to see like how it would be done this time and like what would be different and how good these people were at doing it, so that's like how she got that that like structure from and so I've heard her interviewed and people ask her about this structure and she like it doesn't, she's like, oh, I can't imagine doing it any other way, so she's kind of one of these characters herself.

But it's interesting. People describe it as a whydunit, rather than a whodunit.

00:18:52 Jenny:            There's a little bit of whodunit as well isn't there, but yeah, definitely.

Yeah, I enjoyed it. I can't remember how long ago that I listened to it now so you have to bear with me that I'm not going to know it in as much detail as you do, Sarah. 

00:19:05 Sarah K:         Oh, no one does [laughs] 

00:19:08 Jenny:            Yeah I I really enjoyed it. I remember really loving this structure, just really loving her writing and her characterization.

Just I can still remember, and I don't know why I must have thought this was significant, but there's a bit where she describes the curtains billowing in the room and I'm sure she just describes them as ghosts, but I did like that's just really stuck with me, so there's elements of it that, yeah, you're writing that really stuck with me, which doesn't happen very often like my memory is the worst.

I literally read something and it'll just two weeks later I've forgotten what it's about completely but yeah, I did really, really enjoy it. And I listened to the audio 'cause I didn't…I think we were going to record this a lot earlier than we did and I didn't think I'd get through it and I still listen to the audio, but I thought it was great 'cause obviously she narrates it and I think that added to it, I think the character that's murdered, he obviously had a very distinct voice in her head, so she does all the voices and stuff and I just thought, yeah, I'm really listening to how this book is supposed to be because she narrates herself.

00:20:11 Sarah K:         Definitely

00:20:13 Sarah T:          I love it when an author reads their own stuff. I think it makes so much more sense. Everything clicks into place.

I think certain narrators can do that, it depends how intimate they are with the text. But I think yeah, I'm quite keen to give it a listen to her because Sarah will be horrified to know I enjoyed this book, but don’t personally get the whole cultish following around Donna Tartt and her stories.

00:20:39 Sarah K:         Yeah, I'm not horrified. I'm just happy and prepared to educate you.

[laughter]

00:20:45 Sarah K:         Yeah, it's interesting 'cause Bunny, sorry, I just want to go back to what Jen said,

Bunny has like a used car salesman vibe from the way that she voices him and I would never have got that from reading the text and it makes the things he says, he says all these things so Bunny is the character that's killed eventually and throughout the book he says like horrible things really racist things, really homophobic things, and the way that she voices him, he says it in this sort of like light cheerful way, which makes it really chilling, especially when he's talking about Francis, who is one of the friends who is gay.

And he says all these horrible things about Francis and it like comes across in such a different way when he says i.

00:21:24 Jenny:            They meet his dad, don't know at one point and his dad's like the identical version of him just older. Just don't think you'd get that from necessarily reading it either. So yeah, it's very clever and I'm ready for you to educate Sarah now.

00:21:40 Sarah K:         So what, why, Sare, what's the story?

00:21:43 Sarah T:          So for me the characters are just a little too unbelievable. I find them too, I don't know, I it really, I just like a little bit too pretentious, like a little bit like everything, just like a tiny touch stuff just hammed up just a bit too much for me.

The whole kind of just spouting off Latin and Greek, and I don't know, I just find it a touch over the top.

00:22:11 Jenny:            Just before Sarah asks more questions in my review on Goodreads, that's the one thing I wrote is that I enjoyed the book. I loved her writing and loved the characterization, however, I don't enjoy really pretentious settings like I just don't enjoy books like that, so I think I was never gonna enjoy it as much as Sarah does.

But I remember and Sarah, we’ll probably go on to talk about this, but there’s something about, what's the lead character called Sarah?

00:22:41 Sarah K:         Richard

00:22:42 Jenny:            There's something about Richard being a little bit removed from that situation that made me think is this slightly ironic, like is she taking, is she taking the piss 'cause that's, well, it's one of those books that I read that was like kind of annoys me. The arts, super pretentious to the point of irritating. But is she doing that on purpose?

00:23:02 Sarah T:          I think so.

00:23:03 Jenny:            That was my feeling.

00:23:04 Sarah K:         Yeah, I think it is. I think it wouldn't have worked as well had she not used Richard as the main character because he's an outsider, right?

So if you had so, Richard is the main character and he meets this group of people at the beginning of the book.

He comes from California and then they're in New England somewhere Vermont I think, and so he meets them so you get to know all the rest of the characters as Richard, so he's introduced them at the same time as you are, and I think if she had set it from like Henry perspective, for example, or Francis, it wouldn't have quite worked 'cause they're so absorbed in their own world.

He wouldn't have been able to see like how ridiculous they are. I think they are supposed to be ridiculous, and if you the second time I read it, I remember at the beginning when Richard first meets them, I was really surprised by how funny it actually is. Once you know the characters already.

So if you don't know them at the beginning, it's not funny 'cause you don't, like it doesn't mean anything to you, but the way he describes them at the beginning is actually really funny in a like like you're supposed to be laughing at Richard like he's not making jokes, and so they're all sort of unaware of how ridiculous they each are.

So like he spends in the first chapter, he spends like, well maybe the second chapter he spends like pages and pages and pages describing to in detail like the color of Francis’ coat, how Camilla wore her hair, which hand she holds a cigarette in.

And then he's like ‘but I don't mean to imply that I was obsessed with these people’

Which I find really funny the second time around.

Yeah, and then like Henry is a character I think is like supposed, I mean, Henry is ridiculous the way that he sort of works through the problems that they have and the way that he comes to conclusions, it's like madness, yeah, but I think it's really intentional and I think she's kind of 'cause she's from.

She's like studied this herself and it's like her own sort of academic world.

So and she wrote it when she was in University, actually, so I think she's kind of making fun of the people that were at the time her peers. 

00:24:54 Jenny:            It's also so far removed from my University experience. I think that's probably why I struggle with any books like I don't enjoy campus books really like any books in a campus setting because it's so far removed from what my University life was like.

I mean, not that anybody would want to read a book about what we were like in University terrible really, didn't go to lectures and just basically spent the whole time being drunk, which is also not very exciting to read about.

But yeah, it's so far removed that I always end up thinking God really do people exist like this in the University world?

And yeah, I always get a little bit squirmy about anything overly elitist, I think.

00:25:37 Sarah T:          Yeah, I mean if I went to a campus University and I definitely met people like this.

Yeah, and I fully understand that it's intentional, I just found it was just a touch too much. I don't know. Maybe just because I've had that experience and I've been around those people then I was like, oh, I, I get it but I think there's a line where it slightly becomes I just found it a bit too it crossing into like caricature rather than that was but just personally I just found it just crossed that line a bit too much and but it did make me laugh that the twins were called Charles and Camilla and this, you know the book came out at a time when round royal divorces and things like that.

I you know she's not, she's not a naive woman, she's incredibly smart and witty writer and I really love her writing.

I just think for me upon like rereading, I just sort of I don't know, I didn't, I think problem I I think first reading I was just like really swept up in just the way that she writes.

And the way she does it, and like the structure and everything like that like that. But when I revisited it, I just found it a bit, icky, I don't know, just it, but like a really like almost just like such a sliver, like not, it's always just like chance put the volume up just a bit too high like it's not kind of like shout it it's just so it's such a marginal thing that didn't sort of enamor me towards the book as much as I guess other people.

00:27:02 Sarah K:         Hmm, I read it as because at like elite universities at like Ivy League, or like Oxbridge universities, if you're in the UK there's this real sense of like sort of superiority and like elitism and like pretentious and power, right? And I think the way that she does it is that she's almost she's showing that it's ridiculous really like that it's utter nonsense like all of them are super smart, most of them are super wealthy, but at the end of the day they're ridiculous people and they like.

Yeah, so I thought she was like making fun of the structures of these universities and showing like how dumb it is like, how it doesn't really make any sense.

Yeah, I have a friend who studies, uh, who did a Masters of literature at Cambridge and she loves THE SECRET HISTORY and she thinks it's like extremely accurate in a way that she finds hilarious because she's Australian and she thinks a lot of her classmates, she's like they're ridiculous.

They're like stereotypes, and she and for a long time when she, when she arrived at Cambridge she was like is this, are you being serious, is this genuine, are you really dressing like this? Or is this like funny, is this a costume like I don't understand why you're talking like this and after a while she was like, OK, you really think this is like a cool and normal thing to do. 

She reads THE SECRET HISTORY as being like very mocking, and that's also her perception of the people that she studied with. Yeah, so I guess it depends.

I guess it also depends how you feel about elite universities like for me I actually started at a pretty elite university when I did my Masters, so it's it doesn't feel it's not like a super removed world for me, so I don't feel like it's an unattainable or whatever, but I guess it yeah depends how you feel about that 'cause it can be a bit complicated.

00:28:41 Jenny:            Yeah, definitely, I'm like I don't know, just quite bitter about my education in general. I'm from a small town in rural South Wales and your chances in life were not good even if you came from a good that's a bit harsh.

Like obviously I have a very good life and I went to uni, I’m middle class. I don't come from a wealthy family but we were fine growing up, but my experience with education throughout my life has been, you know, it's a battle.

I went to University on not a loan. I had a student loan that was it was huge but also got my tuition fees paid just because I was eligible to have them paid 'cause my sort of family circumstances.

Yeah, so I, I've got quite a bitter relationship with education which always makes me struggle with books set in any kind of elite environment I suppose 'cause it just makes you reflect on your own education. I had a shitty time at school, I  nearly failed my A-levels, nobody gave a shit, you know I didn't go to school in sixth form, I just didn’t turn up, I just didn’t bother going. And yeah you can peg that down to somebody being a bit disillusioned and just being a pain in the arse but really I think it's 'cause I had no supper, we didn't have any support at all. I had no help choosing my A levels. I had no help choosing my university, had no help with my forms like I did geography, I thought it was alright so I went to uni did that and then hated my degree so it's and then I went and did my PVC because I didn't know what to do with my geography degree other than become a geography teacher.

So it's yeah, it's I will always struggle with it, I think. So it's quite proud of myself to be able to see past all that and sort of yeah, just enjoy the book for what it was without getting too bitter about the setting. 

00:30:32 Sarah T:          yeah, her ability to capture a setting is remarkable. I went to a university that sort of pretended it was a lot more elite than it was.

00:30:44 Jenny:            Where did you go?

00:30:45 Sarah T:          I went to Exeter. It’s like Russell Group vibes.

It's one of those universities that is really great, but it sort of tries to emulate the sort of older universities a bit and so that ridiculousness is there but there's also a lot of other cool stuff in there as well, so it's kind of it's kind of funny it’s one of those universities with like a split personality of like, there's those that feed in to the ridiculous campus vibes, and I like whoo yeah uni, yeah yeah it's gonna be great and those that are like actually like let's just go to uni and get a degree and like you know achieve what I want to achieve and you know, use it to get the career I want to get and some of that.

It's kind of, yeah it's quite a splitt vibe, I would say yeah and I was, I'm very fortunate to be privately educated, so I guess I just had, yeah, I've had exposure to that thing and exposure to the ridiculousness it's just I think she captured, I think she captures it really well.

I don't know why on the second reading I just found it a bit much, but maybe I’m just getting older and more cynical. 

00:32:02 Sarah K:         I found super interesting, so yeah, these people who are going to like very elite universities and our who think like this and who live in this world where you can just study whatever you want and then pay and you get money from your parents and it's all fine.

This like does exist and it's ridiculous and it's funny to like, make fun of them and that's what she's doing I think, but then there's also this very real problems that are in most, I think, most countries which you've just sort of, that you've touched on so well Jenny, which is that we don't have equal access to education and not everyone is able to do whatever the fuck they want and which is what these guys are doing.

So it's like a brilliant book and she does it amazingly well, but there's this real problem in education that, uh, my guess we're really aware of in the 21st century, so it it's you're aware of that as you are, it's hard to sort of let go, I guess, and appreciate, but not appreciate, but it's hard to let go and I forget about all that and just sort of like focus on the book itself. 'cause this is, I mean, this is a massive problem that we have.

00:33:00 Sarah T:          Ohh, I'd really recommend the College Emissions Scandal documentary on Netflix because it feeds it's very much about this so.

00:33:08 Jenny:            Oh, is this the like one paying their parents?

00:33:11 Sarah T:          Yes, your parents like just like giving that huge amounts of money to people to like fake CVs and fake.

00:33:16 Jenny:            In like Sports Club when they like sports.

00:33:18 Sarah T:          Yeah, it's it's about like your extracurriculars and making you more appear like appealing and you're twisting the fact that maybe if a kid did water polo, they changed it to like something else to make it more appealing 'cause the school I, it's one of those things, I mean, I mean, the system in the UK is bad enough.

It's rotten to the core and there's still that huge amounts of elitism, but it is stupid and America is just like even more complicated. This elitism is even more kind of vast, and I mean we're a little country, so it's like you can see it happening.

Yeah I, this college admissions thing, just like blew my mind and I'm probably sure it's happened in this country. Yeah, it, I think it's a really good thing to watch if you're interested in the, that the system, I guess.

00:34:04 Jenny:            I’ll put it in the show notes.

00:34:07 Sarah T:          Yeah, I don't know what it's actually called it's it's slightly dramatized which is a bit annoying, but it's the baseline facts are that, yeah, there's some seriously dodgy morals around, but amazing what I think is what is in remarkable is what length parents will go to to educate their kids.

And they, and if they've got the means to do so, how quickly the corruption sets in and I guess that's what she's touching on, you know, people don't just go out and murder, and I think that sort of group herd mentality and the sort of untouchable we are untouchable theme is it's quite scary really, cause, I mean, it's definitely what people think that they you know they could throw money at any situation and boom, the problem goes away.

So it's very dark.

00:34:59 Jenny:             I want to read it again. I'd like to read it next time I read the physical.

00:35:03 Sarah T:          I think I'd like to listen to it, actually.

00:35:04 Jenny:            Yeah, definitely listen to it. I just I find I can absorb myself into a world a bit better with a physical book. So I definitely would like to invest the time and read it properly.

00:35:18 Sarah T:          I think it be interesting to listen to Donna Tartt tell the characters because the characters are who I have the biggest problem with.

So be interesting to listen to the author show me how she sees the characters rather than attach my own ideas to it so.

00:35:31 Sarah K:         Sorry, I’m trying to just switch lanes now, I’m in this really deep train of thought now about class.

00:35:35 Jenny:            End on a high end on a high.

00:35:40 Sarah K:         What else do I love about it? Love the setting. The descriptions of like Vermont of like New England, the weather changes the way she describes the seasonal change as the snow comes in, love it especially yeah especially the audio book I think the way that she opens up describing the the snow melting and stuff.

The visualization is just like perfect which is as you know, very important to me in a book and I love the I love the like imperfect characters like there there's no sort of great ending for them all. It's not. It's not really a story in that respect, it's just sort of – Donna Tartt does this sort of thing where she just like take someone's life. She does this in all of her books and she just tells you about that person. And it's not like a classic beginning middle end all wrapped up nicely. She's just like she's very interested, and if you read her later books, she's she totally changes gear in terms of actually…..Maybe that's why I don't find it so difficult because I've read all II've read a lot of her other books [laughs]

I mean she's written 3 hello. She is obviously very interested in people from all different areas of society and if you read like THE LITTLE FRIEND for example, totally don't do you're talking about like people in the South of the US who were treated like shit so I can so totally different approach I guess. What was I saying? Oh yeah, I love how she's just sort of like investigates people and how they interact with each other, how they deal with different issues, how they respond in different ways to problems that happen, and how this all kind of like resolves at the end.

So yeah, that's what I really like.

00:37:09 Sarah T:          What's your ranking of LITTLE FRIEND, GOLDFINCH, SECRET HISTORY?

00:37:13 Sarah K:         I think it's SECRET HISTORY, GOLDINCH, LITTLE FRIEND, maybe? LITTLE FRIEND and GOLDFINCH maybe could switch. 

So SECRET HISTORY is definitely my favorite and then little friend and goldfinch are kind of very similar.

00:37:28 Sarah T:          I loved THE GOLDFINCH.

00:37:31 Sarah K:         It's good, it's good.

00:37:33 Sarah T:          And I prefer it over SECRET HISTORY.

00:37:37 Sarah K:         It’s not as good, there’s not as much meat in there. 

[indistinguishable]

It's not as much in there as THE SECRET HISTORY, and THE LITTLE FRIEND is amazing, like there's so much in there. 

00:37:48 Sarah T:          Yeah, I must get to THE LITTLE FRIEND.  Oh, just you know what I'm like I love a good sweeping drama and THE GOLDFINCH I mean, it's still a little bit too long, but when I read THE GOLDFINCH, I read it so quickly.

                                    Yeah, I think I read it on holiday and then I came back and sort of read it again quite quickly so for me GOLDFINCH gets my top position, sorry.

00:38:14 Sarah K:         THE LITTLE FRIEND is a lot of people don't like it and think it 'cause it's slow and the whole premise is about a family whose boy is killed. He's 12 and he's and he's killed and it's about this family how they cope with it. And then the main character is his younger sister who's trying to find out what happened to the boy and she never figures it out, because she's like an 8 year old, she's not a bloody detective and a lot of people, I think expect her to be able to figure out like this thing that the police couldn't solve.

And then you finish and you're like, oh, she didn't figure it out, well of course she didn’t figure it out, she's a 8 year old with like with like bike that she's riding around the neighborhood with like streamers on it. 

[laughter]

00:38:51 Sarah K:         So it's really about like grief and the mother of this boy is one of the most incredible characterizations I've ever read because she is a broken woman in a way that's, it's like a heart wrenching and it's like 20 years later even – oh no, that's not true. It's years later and the way that she writes this mother and how that she's how she's trying to raise her remaining children. 

Yeah, the boy's name is Robin, though Jenny, so I don't know if you would. I don't know how you would feel about that. It's very intense, so I don't know if yeah probably might not be that - that's the name of Jenny's kid, by the way, if you don’t know

Yeah, so yeah, it's an incredible, but it's a very introspective book. It's not really like a oh what happened to Robin? 

God, I'm really going heavy today, you guys. I'm so sorry. I don't know why.

00:39:43 Jenny:            Well, this one’s particularly happy.

[laughter]

00:39:46 Sarah T:          Yeah, thanks for that, cheery, cheery subject.

00:39:50 Jenny:            Go on Sarah, what's your next book?

00:39:52 Sarah K:         Next book is GRIEF IS THE THING WITH FEATHERS by Max Porter.

You guys, next episode I'm going to be reading like all these contemporary novels I'm going to get some Sally Rooney out like you guys!

00:40:04 Sarah T:          Oh my God, if you read the next Sally Rooney, I will pay you money. 

[laughter]          

00:40:07 Sarah K:         I'm sorry!

This is one of my favorite books ever, I love it. It's a poetry like novel in verse I guess.

Lots of death today. 

It’s about a family and a father and his two little boys and that his wife, their mother has just passed away and it's about how they deal with the grief of losing this mother. [laughs]

I guess you’re really getting an inside view into my mind. 

00:40:35 Jenny:            Okay, before we tell you what we think. What do you think we're going to say?

00:40:40 Sarah K:         I don't think either you if you would have liked it very much, am I right?

[laughter]

00:40:46 Sarah T:          OK, actually I if I could dissect this work and take out the Crow, I would really like it. I think there are some really amazing.

There's this one bit that really, really I've I just want to read the Dad chapters, if I'm honest.

00:41:02 Sarah K:         So, it's broken up into sections. So the dad has these sections.

And then there's the boys have their own section and then there's a section by the Crow and the Crow is the weirdest bit of this book. So the Crow is like a metaphor for grief. But it's weird, it’s like poetry.

00:41:17 Sarah T:          I don't really get it if I'm honest and is the Crow real? Is it all in their heads?

I don't really, I don't know, I was just thinking maybe... I'm not very intelligent so I didn't really get it.

I don't know, I just I really like the dad bits. I felt from someone who's experienced grief. 

Yeah, it's this bit: [reads] “The doorbell rang and I braced myself for more kindness. Another lasagna, some books, or cuddle some little potted ready meals. The boys of course. I was becoming an expert in the behavior of orbiting grievers. Being at the epicenter grants a curiously anthropological awareness of everybody else. The overwhelmed, the effectively lackadaisicals, then nothing so far,  the overstayers, the new best friend of hers, of mine, of the boys, the people I still have no fucking idea who they were”

Just like that really. Oh my God it just yeah, that really reminds me of my own father's funeral where we just met people up on people upon people, and as a 15 year old I just had no idea, but it's just part of the you know process is, you know, everyone grieves differently, everyone is a way of showing it is very different.

But you know, I'd you know you meet all these people and they're expressing all this sympathy and thing and you just… 

Yeah, and it was just sort of a really bizarre situation, especially as someone I guess as a young person experiencing that. So the dad chapters and I think the boy chapters for me made a lot of sense and I I know there's lots of things in there that I connected with.

I just didn't need the Crow. I don't know. Maybe that's because I've experienced grief and I just found it a bit too like I don't know… I've had a much bigger connection to the human element of this book.

00:43:11 Jenny:            So…I really liked it. And I really liked the Crow!

00:43:14 Sarah K:         Yeah!!

00:43:16 Sarah T:          One for Crow, one for not-Crow. 

00:43:16 Jenny:            But then I like we, I really like weird stuff like I have to say you're right about the dad parts because there is one bit and I'll read a bit from that section.

I think these he definitely connects with the human side of grief.

So it was I don't know if I want to read this, I feel like I'm going to get emotional. Right. [reads]

“She won't ever use makeup, turmeric, hair brush, thesaurus. She will never finish Patricia Highsmith novel, peanut butter, lip balm. And I will never shop for green Virago Classics for her birthday.” [voice breaking]

00:43:54 Sarah T:          Oh, that got me.

00:43:56 Sarah K:         Yeah.

00:43:57 Jenny:            [continues] “I will stop finding her hairs.”

00:44:00 Sarah T:          Oh bless you, Jenn.

00:44:02 Sarah K:         [laughs] I’m so sorry Jen. Yeah, it's way it says like she will never finish the Patricia Highsmith novel that's like on her bedside table, Oh my God, I underlined it about three times.

00:44:15 Jenny:            [sniffing] Ah, I shouldn't have read that bit. Yeah, so it's like…Oh my God.

Yeah, I really loved it and it's.

00:44:24 Sarah T:          It resonates

00:44:25 Jenny:            Yeah, really resonates 'cause it's such human emotions. But I tell you why I love the Crow bits, because my best friend died of cancer like two years ago.

And he's just so wildly inappropriate, but it really reminded me of those times where you are, uou're laughing and joking and someone will say something inappropriate and you all find it really fucking funny.

And and then you then you stop with your own thoughts and you think my God, I shouldn't be laughing right now and it was, I felt the Crow bits really touched on all those things that happen and how life moves on and how you do have to keep living and you will find things funny and that's OK.

So I just yeah, I really, really loved it. I want to read it again. I've actually just had to use up an Audible credit because I could only get a book for my book club, different book club on Audible and I was like I'm going to use a free trial and I returned one book and got another book and then said I was quitting.

Then they gave me another credit so I've used which is supposed to be really really good 'cause I think it'd be really nice one to listen to.

But it's not sad while you read it, like I didn't find this, I haven't got that upset while reading it. Apart from maybe the odd bits like that, which I probably shouldn't have chosen.

It's not really, really sad to read, I don't want people thinking 'cause I've got upset and now trying to read like 1 little passage from it, I think it's 'cause that bit particularly resonated that it's a really, really sad book 'cause I didn't find it, I didn't find it sad to read.

00:46:09 Sarah K:         I agree.

00:46:10 Jenny:            I think it's quite a happy book like you follow their sort of journey and, 'cause the boys are sort of. They're quite grown up towards the end, aren't they? So you do follow this journey of grief that obviously the point he's trying to make is that it goes on for a lifetime. But in a really like really short book, what is nearly just over 100 pages, isn't it?

00:46:32 Sarah K:         Yeah, I yeah, it's not sad, like if you think of like a sad book. I immediately think of books like HAMNET or something where where you feel really sad for these characters, someone dies and is really sad.

This is more about - I would only recommend this to someone who has experienced grief themselves because it's not really about that, it's about like it's yeah, it's not about like the sadness of someone dying, it's like this sort of insanity of what happens afterwards, and I think it's really, it will be really meaningful to you if you have experienced grief yourself.

And if you haven't, I think yeah, you know it's really hard to relate to I think if you or like find meaning in it. 

00:47:10 Sarah T:          I think it hits at a deeper level. If you’ve experienced it, I think you just like exactly like you were saying Jenny about the inappropriateness.

Like if you've experienced it, you know that all really kind of all of that goes out the window, because like, of course, you're going to laugh again, and like you might you know in times when you're like how to be sad like it's that's what is so bizarre about grief is that it's in your head it’s one thing and then when you're what you actually feel is completely different and it really taps into just yeah like all the when this friend says like, oh, I think you're becoming obsessive and it's like, well, actually is he or is he just, you know, he had his wife has just died.

Like I, I kind of know that feeling, not that my wife has died, but you know, people that I have lost. 

You know you do think about them more than probably you admit to or you know, or that some people that maybe haven't experienced would say that's like healthy, but actually, you know, unless you've felt it, unless you've been through it, I don't think you quite get how much it resonates on such a such a deep level, and I think what is so excellent about this book is that he absolutely again like Donna Tartt, you know, absolutely perfects the feeling and you know what they're trying to sort of achieve it resonates so beautifully on a really like deep emotional level.

But like you said, it's not sad, it's more, almost like a validation of just kind of how desperately wild, the ride of grief is, I guess, for want of a better expression. 

00:48:56 Sarah K:         It's like that line that you read up before, say about the lasagna, people bring lasagnas around this halfway up so my dad passed away a few years ago and this happened, people brought loads of lasagna around which no one in the house could really eat.

Because we have food allergies so that was great and my dad was a minister and we had so many people coming around and they would come and like tell us how sad they and they would start crying and we were like we counselors. So we actually had to like get someone in my dad's church to tell everyone in like during a service that they couldn't come to our house anymore. And then people got really offended like it was just ridiculous.

00:49:28 Sarah T:          I yeah, it's uh, it's amazing, isn't it? They're kind of like grief competitions and yeah ,it’s quite bizarre what happens when someone dies like yeah.

00:49:40 Sarah K:         The things that people say to you, you're like what is happening, what is happening, yeah.

00:49:44 Sarah T:          Yeah, I mean it's brilliant, but I think for me I didn't need the Crow, but I do get that, now you’ve said what you said Jen, I also really get how he flags up all the completely and utterly strange bits of it.

00:50:00 Jenny:            It's like this sort of light relief [laughs] I say light relief, it’s not really. But he swears like a trooper, and he's completely inappropriate, but he is because it's only told from obviously the boys perspective and the dads perspective, I do feel like he's the sort of I think it's just when the boys and the dad don’t know where or how he’d have – it’s not really a story, it’s a really bizarre book to talk about. But I don’t know how he’d have progressed things other than to do it quite formulaically and go through the stages. 

                                    Whereas there’s a bit towards the end, and I couldn’t quite work out what was happening. It sounded like there’s a bird of prey display [laughs] and the vultures are riding the, what do they call it, the thermal waves. And the Crow goes and joins them, and the dad and the boys really cheer for the Crow. And you know that bit isn’t real, but it was that that moment for me really captured the sort of when you have been through the rough part of grief and you're coming out the other side and you can have these moments. So you're actually just really fucking happy.

And I don't know how he'd have done that without, maybe he didn't need to use a really wacky Crow, but I just thought it's really clever.

00:51:19 Sarah T:          Does it represent like the universal part of grief? The fact that like if it was the boy, if it likely saved it was just about the boys and the dad, then it's their story, whereas that the Crow kind of creates that universal, you know we will all experience this, this is accessible to kind of everyone and anyone.

It almost, I guess it almost makes it everyone story rather than just another retelling of someone’s sad tale I guess. It goes sort of beyond that.

00:51:49 Jenny:            There’s also more…it’s one of those books that got me Googling, as I do, because there's also more to the Crow than just it's a weird character in a book like 'cause it was to do - Ted Hughes Crow and he had he brought out a poetry collection called Crow or The Crow after oh god, who wrote THE BELL JAR? 

00:52:06 Both Sarah:     Sylvia Plath!

00:52:23 Jenny:            God. After Sylvia Plath died he was devastated and wrote the Crow, which is a poetry collection. So there's obviously more to this Crow character than just a weird bird in in this book and crows, quite symbolic of grief anyway, isn't it?

00:52:41 Sarah K:         Yeah.

00:52:42 Sarah T:          Is it symbolic of grief, or is it symbolic of death? 

00:52:45 Sarah K:         I think grief.

00:52:45 Jenny:            Death and grief as well, it can be seen as like a spirit guide as well, to guide you through something, so I do think there’s an element of that in this. 

00:52:57 Sarah K:         It's also made meant throughout history as a sign of death, right? Like 3 in Scotland, like 3 crows means someone will die or someone will be killed. 

00:53:04 Jenny:            Yeah, something like that, bad. 

00:53:06 Sarah K:         Yeah, I won't pretend to even slightly understand the significant like the way that the significance of the Crow in terms of like poetic history, I have no idea but for me I read the Crow as like, that you know when someone has a died and there's at like a moment in grief where it's kind of madness and you're like crying and laughing and you kind of get hysterical and they like your nose is running and it's snot everywhere? But then afterwards you feel a little bit better for me like that's what the Crow represents, that sort of like insanity which is normally triggered by something ridiculous happening and then.

Like when my dad passed away, he for some reason just before he died my dad died very unexpectedly and for some reason he changed the safe code, it must have been like two days before he dies he died, which he'd never done before. 

00:53:50 Jenny:            [laughs] and you’re like Dad, why? 

00:53:52 Sarah K:         And so, we needed…

00:53:53 Sarah T:          No one could get in.

00:53:54 Sarah K:         Yeah, we so we needed some like, his Will! That’s what we needed. And he had  bloody changed the like code and we and my dad had all of these sort of like set pins that he would use and it wasn't those and he would, he was one of those very like he wrote down every password and you know very record and for some reason he hadn't done this and we couldn't believe it. So that my dad's sort of weeks after my dad passed away became like this safecracking mission, and we had to try and find someone to break into the safe

[laughter]

00:54:22 Sarah K:         And someone had to come and cut the wall out. Ridiculous. It was like it was madness and my mom was like what is the first time we've done that?

00:54:23 Jenny:            What was thinking? 

00:54:30 Sarah K:         The whole time that I've known him, it was just, yeah it reminded me of that.

00:54:34 Sarah T:          Oh, I love that.

00:54:36 Sarah K:         Ridiculous.

00:54:36 Jenny:            Have you read any of his other work, Max Porter?

00:54:39 Sarah K:         I've read LANNY, I really I liked LANNY a lot.

It didn't, iIt wasn't as like super meaningful to me as this one was, but it's yeah, it's really good. You would probably find it very funny because it's about have you read it?

00:54:51 Jenny:            No this is the first one of his I’ve read. 

00:54:53 Sarah K:         Oh, it's about a boy who goes missing and he they're in a small English village.

And there's, uh, like a Greek chorus, you know, which is like the villages and they're all like looking through their net curtains like making judgments on their parents like Oh well if they'd only done this the boy wouldn’t have gone missing and so it's got this like funny got not the Crow exactly, but it's that kind of like a funny thing throughout which is like the villagers judging these poor parents who are desperately trying to find their missing boy and they're like, well, well, well, you know.

It's funny, but they find him in the end, he's just like at a neighbor’s house. 

00:55:26 Sarah T:          And so had you, do you only read this after your father passed away?

00:55:31 Sarah K:         Yes, yes, I think it only came out, yeah.

00:55:35 Jenny:            Is it 2015 or 16?

00:55:37 Sarah K:         OK, so it's actually long ago, yes.

00:55:39 Sarah T:          That's a while ago, Sare.

00:55:42 Sarah K:         It was like man, I don't know if you guys the last episode where I said that that adaptation of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was a recent release, and Alice was like uh

00:55:49 Jenny:            Oh God, that made me laugh, I was what is she talking about was like 20 years ago.

00:55:49 Sarah K:         It was 2005! Whatever. 

[laughter]

00:55:53 Sarah K:         Whatever, anyway. I've read it many times and I for me it just is the closest book that I've ever read that sort of writes and like explains the sort of just weird madness of grief that isn't super sad like it's not sadness. It's not quite right.

It's this sort of weird mix of insanity so that's why I like it so much.

00:56:18 Sarah T:          Do you find yourself picking it up when like you, you are feeling sad or like you're thinking about your dad or thinking about like do you find yourself sort of, not referring to it, but is it something that you pick up time and time again?

00:56:34 Sarah K:         It's so I might pick it up like around his birthday or something like that is like if I'm thinking of him a lot. If I'm super sad, I probably wouldn't read it 'cause I would probably just cry, yeah, but it's certainly something that I would read if I was like…

00:56:44 Sarah T:          Reflecting

00:56:47 Sarah K:         reflecting, exactly, not feeling super sad. 

00:56:48 Sarah T:          Sad, yeah, I'd be really interested to hear from someone who hasn't experienced grief what they think of it, I think would be really fascinating conversation.

00:56:58 Sarah K:         Yeah, I would be surprised if you liked it to be honest.

It's sort of…Yeah. [laughs]  Yeah, you know that scene when he starts dating, or he likes that woman and then I think they have sex or something. Or they hook up in some way and the Crow is in the background like humping something.

[laughter]

00:57:19 Jenny:            I just loved him he was my favorite bit about it.

00:57:22 Sarah K:         And it's like that thing where you're trying, you're like, oh, is this disrespectful like we're just trying trying to move on.

00:57:28 Jenny:            It is that I really think that's what the Crow, like those bits for me, that's what the Crow is all about, like he's just completely inappropriate, but life does go on and you do have to do these things again, and…But there's always something there like should we be doing this, should we be laughing should, you know, should I be carrying on with my own life right now like it's just always there, isn't it?

And I felt like that's what he represented in a very inappropriate way. [laughs]

00:58:01 Sarah T:          I think it's also interesting because people, actually, you know, grief and death. It's still not very, it's not still not talked about. I think that's what I did enjoy about the book is the fact that actually it was dedicated and not in the sad way, you know, not in the oh here, let's tell a story about someone who dies and it's really sad. it's like, OK, we're beyond that point. Like, let's tell the story afterwards and you don't get that a lot.

I mean, there's a book that it's a book, but it's actually a collection of essays called TINY BEAUTIFUL THINGS by Cheryl Strayed who wrote WILD and she used to be an agony aunt, and there's one particular column that she wrote to, actually, there's a couple that touch on grief but there's she her own mother passed away when she was in her 20s, there's certain things in there in the way that she describes grief that really resonated with me, and it's something that I pick up and I read sometimes when I'm feeling reflective or struggling and there's one, there's like there's one column that's from a fiancé has written in and said like I'm trying to connect with , he's talking about his upcoming wedding to his to his bride, and the fact that the bride doesn't have a mother and he's like asking advice like how do I approach this?

Like I don't understand her grief and stuff like that and the way she talks about it is really fascinating, but there's another one from the point of view of a father has lost his son and I think the way that Cheryl Strayed writes about grief is that you can 100,000% know that she has experienced it. She has experienced this kind of devastating grief, but before its time like someone has died in her life like before their time. I think that it's a very particular kind of grief, as well as a comparison to like someone having lived a very, very full long life.

But again, it's just I don't know, I just think you can really, it's just tapping into something different that not a lot of people talk about. You know it's not people think it's like strange to sit and talk about death, but actually it's like the one thing that unites us all and it doesn't have to be, it's not morbid, it's not…There's so much more to it, and I think like you said, Jenny about the Crow being all those sort of like things that would might be deemed inappropriate, but actually you go through them, we all experience it. You know it's all part of being human.

So I think the book does a really incredible thing in talking about it.

01:00:19 Jenny:            We talk about it well, we just should talk about it because the older you get, the more you experience it, yet you lose people around you and it just you get more and more and more of it as you get older and I think it's a very strange thing not to talk about

01:00:37 Sarah K:         I think often people are afraid. They don’t know what to say, they’re afraid of saying the wrong thing. You guys have probably heard this a lot, people will often say to me, oh I didn’t know what to say I didn't want to mention it because I thought I didn't want to remind you and you're like I've not forgotten.

01:00:51 Jenny:            [laughs]  I think about it all the time. [laughter] Yeah, well I didn't or they don't want to upset you and you're kind of like. Well, that's on you absolutely. Because if I get upset like you shouldn't avoid it because you don't want have want to have to deal with me being upset. 

01:01:07:                       Who's the lady? Is it Sheryl Sandberg, who's like was like the CEO of Facebook? Oh yeah, she’s also called Sheryl, but with an S. 

She read a book called OPTION B which looks her husband had suddenly died whilst they're on holiday and she had like a really sort of catastrophic kind of reaction to it in terms of like it was completely devastating, he went to the gym in the morning whilst there on holiday with friends and their kids were there and everything and like he just didn't come back.

And she talks about… and then she does have kind of thing of them relating it's like workplace and then like the whole like idea of compassionate leave and you know how it's so skewed and how people she would say like no one asked me how I was and it was exactly that.

And she goes on and says, like, because people were so afraid and she's like, but I felt so lonely and I felt so isolated and I felt like a leper.

And it was that kind of thing she's like, I felt like I'd been branded and I'd been suddenly, you know, people I've worked with for like 20 years suddenly stopped asking me how I was and all I wanted for someone to just ask me how I was and so I really recommend her book, because she really goes into that again, the fact that no one talks about it, so therefore, everyone gets the approach wrong and she's like no one necessarily to blame, it's just society and it's, you know we have closed this.

We have made it a taboo subject, but she was just like no one asked me how I was and I just needed to be asked how was I doing and it's like there's some really simple things like that and there was really some really powerful thing to read, especially someone who's experienced it.

And like, yeah, I mean I when my father died I was in school and school’s approach was like don’t mentioned it and I'd never felt more lonely, especially as a 15 year old girl. I was like oh cool so does that mean I don't mention it?

Then I didn't really know how to approach it. But then I the minute I got home I was like it was our whole world. Our whole world was the fact that my dad had died. And then I went to school and it's like, oh, OK, let's pretend like everything is normal and it just drove me crazy and people that know me know, I talk about my dad regularly, and it's partly, I think, just to like he's not just because he's gone doesn't mean you just can't talk about it.

It's like one of my absolute bugbears. It's like just talk about it, like, please do share. It’s amazing how we've gotten to a point in society where we don't when it's the one thing that yeah connects us all.

Sorry. Rant. Deep.

01:03:47 Sarah K :        No. Very, very good. And yeah, I would say if you're… Listeners. If you have a friend who has lost someone like don't be afraid you're not gonna you're not gonna say anything that makes them feel worse than they already do like just say it and be like you can even say I'm sorry I don't know what to say but, this is really shit [laughs]. That’s fine. 

01:04:06 Sarah T:          Yeah, but that's so much better than not saying anything. That's the thing, isn't it.

Just say I'm really sorry, I'm sorry you're upset. This is shit. I think that is it's acknowledging it, isn't it rather than ignoring.

01:04:18 Sarah K:         Yeah, don't bring them a bloody lasagna [laughs] unless you know they want one, or a casserole. 

01:04:22 Sarah T:          Unless it's their favorite food.

[laughter]

01:04:27 Sarah K:         I think I might - there's one quote that I really like from this book, so I might, I might read it out loud and then we can…

So towards the end, when the dad is starting to feel a bit better, he says: [reads]

“Moving on as a concept is for stupid people because any sensible person knows that grief is a long term project. I refuse to rush. The pain that is thrust upon us, let no man slow or speed or fix.” 

It's my favorite line from that.

01:04:50 Jenny:            Very good, I love it.

01:04:51 Sarah T:          Oh, what a beautiful note to end on, actually.

01:04:54 Sarah K:         Yeah, thank you very much for listening. Thank you guys for reading my my sad books. 

01:05:01 Jenny:            There was a heavy episode, but that was good.  And then yeah, I hope please pick that book up, feel like I've made it sound sadder than it is. It's really not that sad. So yeah, I loved it.

01:05:16 Sarah T:          Yeah, good choices Sare, well done.

[theme music starts]

01:05:18 Sarah K:         Thank you guys. Thank you for reading them. Thank you very much for listening. We hope you enjoyed the episode. If you would like to support the podcast, we do have a Patreon. Please let us know what you thought of these two books if you've read them or what your favorite books are, you can contact us @bookcastclub on Instagram and Twitter or email us at thebookcastclubclub@outlook.com.

Thank you for listening!

01:05:38 Jenny:            Thanks, bye!

01:05:41 Sarah T:          Bye!

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