Dark humour - do you love it or hate it? Do you find it cathartic or macho? Can humour ever be too dark, and is it a useful political tool? This month our guest is the one and only Lorrie Moore, who joined us to talk about her latest novel, I Am Homeless if This is Not My Home, a story about grief and ghosts and history that is equally funny as it is philosophical. It follows Finn, who in 2016 is visiting his dying brother in a hospice in New York. Finn's stay is interrupted by the news that his ex-girlfriend Lily, who worked as a therapy clown, has killed herself, which sets off a road trip with her talking corpse. All this is punctuated by letters from a boarding house proprietor in the post-Civil War American South, about a mysterious lodger that has come to stay… Tune in for all of this, plus the usual recommendations.

Recommendations on the theme, Dark Comedy:

Octavia: Hot Milk by Deborah Levy

Carrie: My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh

General Recommendations:

Octavia: Open Throat by Henry Hoake

Lorrie: Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck

Carrie: The Forbidden Notebook by Alba de Céspedes

Find a list of all recommended books at: https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/july-dark-comedy-with-lorrie-moore

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Octavia has been away on her book tour, so today we’re bringing you a re-run of one of our earliest minisodes from April 2019. It was a fun one, inspired by a viral tweet about literary red flags, in which we got into books as cultural capital, literary snobbery, and whether it’s ever ok to judge a person by there reading habits. Plus, the usual cultural recommendations, which are all still accessible to you in some fom even though it's four years later. Enjoy, and we'll be back soon with a brand new full show!

From Pride and Prejudice to Detransition, Baby, the romcom can be an enduring source of great pleasure, fun and comfort. This month we’re thrilled to welcome the American writer Curtis Sittenfeld to talk about her latest novel Romantic Comedy, a smart and funny story about how love can upend all kinds of preconceptions and expectations. It also gave us the perfect opportunity to think about the possibilities of the genre more generally, and whether it can ever escape the imprint of the patriarchal and heteronormative structures that underpin so many classic love stories.

Recommendations on the theme, Romantic Comedy:

Octavia: A Room With A View by E.M. Forster

Carrie: Standard Deviation by Katherine Heiny

General Recommendations:

Octavia: August Blue by Deborah Levy

Curtis: Everything's Fine by Cecilia Rabess

Carrie: Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton

Find a list of all recommended books at: https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/june-2023-romantic-comedy-with-curtis-sittenfeld

Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/litfriction

Email us: [email protected]

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Today’s show is an author special, and in the hot seat is our very own Octavia Bright. You probably know by now that Octavia’s first book This Ragged Grace is coming out - and is published today in fact! So Carrie couldn’t resist the chance to grill her about it. This Ragged Grace tells the story of Octavia's journey through recovery from alcohol addiction, and the parallel story of her father's descent into Alzheimer's. Looking back over this time, each of the seven chapters explores the feelings and experiences of the corresponding year of her recovery, tracing the shift in emotion and understanding that comes with the deepening connection to this new way of life. But it’s about so much more than that, and in the interview we’ll be getting into things like the form of the memoir, structure, the writing process, voice, and writing about life. We hope you enjoy listening!

Do you like reading about writers? What does good writing about the act of writing do? And what happens when you write a real writer into a novel? Our guest this month is Tan Twan Eng, who joined us to talk about his third novel The House of Doors. Based around the writer W. Somerset Maugham’s stay on the Island of Penang, in what was then Malaya, in 1921, it's also about the stories he learns from the couple he stays with there, and the interplay between their fact and his fiction. We’ll be talking about the real and imagined writers that we’ve loved in fiction, the art of writing about writing, and the authors we’d most love to read a novel about - enjoy!

Recommendations on the theme, Writing About Writers:

Octavia: Aliens & Anorexia by Chris Kraus

Carrie: Asymmetry by Lisa Halliday

General Recommendations:

Octavia: Greek Lessons by Han Kang

Twan: Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively

Carrie: Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez

Find a list of all recommended books at: https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/may-2023-writing-about-writers-with-tan-twang-eng

Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/litfriction

Email us: [email protected]

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Also, very excitingly, O's memoir This Ragged Grace has been selected as the Bookshop.org book of the month for June! So, if you'd like to read it, they're offering all wonderful Literary Friction listeners free shipping and 10% off if you pre-order it from them at the following link, using the code Ragged10: https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/this-ragged-grace-a-memoir-of-recovery-and-renewal-octavia-bright/7400323?ean=9781838857462

How do you feel about cities? Do you love the thrust and thrum of them, or are you more interested in escaping it? Do you like to read urban histories, or stories set in the heady metropolis? Our theme this month was suggested by our patron Alycia, who asked us to talk about cities in literature, so listen in for our favourite literary cities, captivating cities we've only encountered in the pages of a book, plus all the usual recommendations.

Also, very excitingly, O's memoir This Ragged Grace has been selected as the Bookshop.org book of the month for June! So, if you'd like to read it, they're offering all wonderful Literary Friction listeners free shipping and 10% off if you pre-order it from them at the following link, using the code Ragged10: https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/this-ragged-grace-a-memoir-of-recovery-and-renewal-octavia-bright/7400323?ean=9781838857462

What's the relationship between feminist writing and feminist activism? What does it mean to be a feminist killjoy, and what can we learn from her? This month, we're joined by scholar and writer Sara Ahmed to answer these questions and more, as we talk about her brilliant latest book, The Feminist Killjoy Handbook. In it, Sara shows how although the label ‘killjoy’ has often been used to dismiss feminism by claiming that it causes unhappiness, in fact, assuming the identity of the feminist killjoy is a path of liberation and change. We’ll also be talking more generally about the intersections of feminism and literature, the feminist writers who have inspired us, and thinking through what books can do when it comes to the continued struggle for gender equality.

Also, very excitingly, O's memoir This Ragged Grace has been selected as the Bookshop.org book of the month for June! So, if you'd like to read it, they're offering all wonderful Literary Friction listeners free shipping and 10% off if you pre-order it from them at the following link, using the code Ragged10: https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/this-ragged-grace-a-memoir-of-recovery-and-renewal-octavia-bright/7400323?ean=9781838857462

Recommendations on the theme, Feminism:

Octavia: The Penguin Book of Feminist Writing, edited by Hannah Dawson

Carrie: Your Silence Will Not Protect You by Audre Lorde

General Recommendations:

Octavia: One Small Voice by Santanu Battacharya

Sara: Our Sister Killjoy by Ama Ata Aidoo

Carrie: Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson

Find a list of all recommended books at: https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/april-2023-feminism-with-sara-ahmed

Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/litfriction

Email us: [email protected]

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Today our theme is… kinda judgy! Everyone says you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but we all know everyone does. So, this month we thought we'd get into it - we partly covered (lol) this topic in our Rediscovery episode for Picador with Jamaica Kincaid and cover designer Stu Wilson, but we wanted to come back to it because there was so much more to say. What makes a book cover good or bad? Have you ever been totally put off reading a book by its cover? What are your major turn-offs, and what about any enduring faves? Listen in for all this and more, plus the usual cultural recommendations.

Also, very excitingly, O's memoir This Ragged Grace has been selected as the Bookshop.org book of the month for June! So, if you'd like to read it, they're offering all wonderful Literary Friction listeners free shipping and 10% off if you pre-order it from them at the following link, using the code Ragged10: https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/this-ragged-grace-a-memoir-of-recovery-and-renewal-octavia-bright/7400323?ean=9781838857462

Dancing can be about escape, about pleasure, but it can also be about protest. It can be a powerful means of expression, but how does writing capture all that movement and rhythm? And what does good writing about dancing do? With us this month is Jaqueline Crooks to talk about her dynamic first novel, Fire Rush, an intoxicating story about the dub reggae scene in 70s and 80s London. Told from the perspective of a young Black woman named Yamaye, it’s also about love, loss, freedom and finding family. In honour of Crooks’ evocative depiction of the dub scene - and especially the dancing that goes on in it - we’re dedicating this show to dance in all its forms. We’ll be talking about dance subcultures, our favourite dance scenes in literature - from balls to clubs - and lots more, plus all the usual recommendations. Enjoy!

Recommendations on the theme, Dancing Time:

Octavia: At The Old Place by Frank O’Hara

Carrie: The Instant by Amy Liptrot

General Recommendations:

Octavia: Older Brother by Mahir Guven, translated by Tina Kover

Jaqueline: Radical by Xiaolu Guo

Carrie: Cassandra at the Wedding by Dorothy Baker

Find a list of all recommended books at: https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/mar-2023-dancing-time-with-jaqueline-crooks

Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/litfriction

Email us: [email protected]

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Our theme this month was inspired by a recent story in New York magazine about, as they described it, “How to text, tip, ghost, host, and generally exist in polite society today.” The idea behind this list of 140 rules is that the last three years have completely changed the way that we live and work, and also that everyone seems to have forgotten how to be in society, so we need a new code of conduct. This got us thinking about etiquette, advice more generally, and how it relates to literature. So, we’ll be getting into our thoughts on etiquette lists and advice columns(including our favourite agony aunts), what the novel has to say about manners, plus all the usual recommendations.