Beyond the PhIrst Page

This is Chapter 6! Debut Novels and we are reading 4 great books:

The Correspondent by Virginia Evans

Upward Bound by Woody Brown

The Poet Empress by Shen Tao

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

Listen along to see which books might be up your alley! All are worth the read in our opinion!

The Siblings discuss this highly entertaining novel with Reyna a sex worker and creative writing student who was able to lend a really interesting perspective to this book club discussion. They discussed how the parallel between pro wrestling and OnlyFans was so cleverly written and how Margo was such a well written character. Reyna was able to offer insight into the "believability" which made this book club even more engaging. Listen to the end for great book recommendations for reads like Margo's Got Money Troubles.

This week on Beyond the PhIrst Page Podcast the siblings along with Michael Charles, a citizen of the Navajo nation, discuss The Round House by Louise Erdrich. This national book award winner follows Joe Coutte's a Native American boy growing up on the Ojibwe Reservation in North Dakota. This coming of age novel has many dark themes while keeping the reader laughing throughout. Listen to the end for the siblings ratings and their recommendations for books like The Round House if you are looking for something similar.

This starts off the Beyond the PhIrst Page podcast's chapter on Coming of Age Novels. They discuss East of Eden by John Steinbeck with Archivist Peter Van Coutren from the John Steinbeck Institute in San Jose. Peter is able to give a unique perspective on why Steinbeck wrote certain characters the way he did as well as shed some light on who Steinbecks intended audience was. Listen to the end for great recommendations and overall ratings!

If you are looking for three amazing books to read this fall listen to this episode of Beyond the PhIrst Page Podcast! We are reading coming of age novels and really bringing three outside the box reads for that genre. This episode doesn’t have any spoilers so listen along as you figure out which of these books you want to go beyond the phIrst page on!

Go Beyond the PhIrst Page with the Cornell siblings as they discuss Blood Song by Anthony Ryan. This book wraps up the third and final book in their Chapter on Fantasy Academy Tropes. This book is a must read for fantasy lovers and the siblings debate if the second and third book hold a candle to the first. This book has all the tropes you would want in a fantasy book including one of the most badass academy settings the siblings have ever read.

This club meeting the siblings discuss Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater with Nicole, who loves to read but by her own omission does not gravitate towards the  fantasy genre. This was the book in the chapter that the siblings thought readers who didn’t love fantasy would like. It errs more on the side of super natural and magical realism themes. The club members also talk about the young adult genre and the questions they still had at the end of book one. Listen along as Beyond the PhIrst page discusses Raven Boys.

In one of our favorite episodes ever recorded we talk to the author of one of our favorite series. Chapter 67 of the Beyond the PhIrst Page podcast finds the siblings discussing Chronicle of the Unhewn Throne by Brian Staveley with Brian Staveley. They talk about his biggest regrets and favorite characters as well as how he uses the psychic view to play with how he tells a story. As always they close on ratings which were 5/5 all around and books like this series if you are looking for more great fantasy! 

We are talking fantasy academy tropes for Chapter 4 of the Beyond the PhIrst Page Podcast! The books we will be discussing are The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater, The Emperor's Blades by Brian Stavely, and Blood Song by Anthony Ryan. Listen to this episode to see which of these three books you should read this summer!! Spoiler... it might be all three

In Club Meeting 65 the siblings talk to Dr. Shirley Samuels who is the Picket Family Chair of the Literatures in English Department at Cornell University. She discussed the following three texts from “American Women’s Suffrage: Voices from the Long Struggle for the Vote 1776–1965”:

1. Letters from Abigail Adams to John Adams, 31 March - 5 April 1776
2. Ernestine L Rose's Speech at the National Woman's Rights Convention - Oct. 15, 1851
3. The Legal Conditions of Indian Women by Alice Cunningham Fletcher 

We also discuss invisible women, the effectiveness of petitions and speeches from the suffrage movement and what we can do today to be good activists. Listen till the end for recommendations like this book!