Evolutionary biologist Zachary Blount tells us why you have to read widely to be a good scientist, as well as what makes for good horror and great bookstores.

Intro and outro music: "Your Love Hip Hop" courtesy Music_Unlimited on Pixabay

Episode artwork: Kathleen Mary Drew-Baker, image with no known copyright restrictions courtesy Smithsonian Institution and Wikimedia Commons

Want to learn more about the books, authors—and films!—we talked about on this episode? Check out the list below. You can also find us on LibraryThing, Goodreads, and Mastodon!

Mary Beard Emperor of Rome: Ruling the Ancient Roman World

Walter Benjamin "Unpacking My Library"

Barbara Butcher What the Dead Know: Learning about Life as a New York City Death Investigator

Hélène Cixous Double Oblivion of the Ourang-Outang

Johnny Compton The Spite House

Mark Z. Danielewski House of Leaves

Adrian Goldworthy Rome and Persia: The Seven Hundred Year Rivalry

Kathleen Hale Slenderman: Online Obsession, Mental Illness, and the Violent Crime of Two Midwestern Girls

Grady Hendrix Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires

Dave Hickey Air Guitar: Essays on Art & Democracy

Tom Holland Pax: War and Peace in Rome's Golden Age

Nick Hornby High Fidelity

Brad J. Kallenberg By Design: Ethics, Theology, and the Practice of Engineering

Stephen King The Dark Tower

Stephen King Holly

Victor Klemperer The Language of the Third Reich

James Merrill From the First Nine. Poems 1946–1976

David Robert Mitchell It Follows

David Morrell Thomas DeQuincy Series

Jordan Peele Get Out

Thomas Pynchon The Crying of Lot 49

Thomas Pynchon Mason & Dixon

Paul Tremblay The Beast You Are

Harry Turtledove

Gore Vidal Kalki

Anna Wiener Uncanny Valley: A Memoir