If you’re a fan of Greek mythology and women's voices in particular, you will love These Great Athenians. The debut novel from non-binary writer Valentine Carter, gives voice to 16 of the oft-forgotten and misunderstood female characters of Homer’s epic The Odyssey.

Valentine and Lou talk about LGBTQ+ representation within the world of mythology and the limitations of heteronormative interpretations of its characters, as well as Valentine’s research for their book, their writing process, and why Scylla a.k.a. the “rockstar sea monster” is their favourite.

Buy a copy of These Great Athenians via the Nobrow website.

Books mentioned by Valentine during the episode:
Autobiography of Red (Anne Carson)
The Seep (Chana Porter)

My first guest of Season 4 is Sylvia Whitman, owner of Shakespeare and Company Bookshop. In 2004, Sylvia took over the running of the bookshop from her father George Whitman, at 23 years old. She now runs it with her partner David, and together they have started a literary festival, a writing competition and opened a café next door to the bookshop.

James Baldwin called Shakespeare and Company the old curiosity shop while Anaïs Nin described it as a house of gentle warmth with walls of books and tea ceremonies. I certainly picked up on both of these qualities when I sat down with Sylvia in the bookshop a few months back.

We spoke about what Sylvia Beach and Adrienne Monnier did for France and publishing, the many writers who’ve been associated with the shop, Sylvia's father George Whitman, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Sylvia the Tumbleweed, navigating the bookshop through a global pandemic, and lockdown reading trends. And of course, lots of book recommendations!

Shakespeare and Company Bookshop on Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/shakespeareandcoparis/ 

Shakespeare and Company Bookshop on Twitter
https://twitter.com/Shakespeare_Co 

Friends of Shakespeare and Company 2021
https://friendsofshakespeareandcompany.com/ 

Gifts and Merch
https://shakespeareandcompany.com/15/online-store/19/gifts-merchandise 

Books mentioned by Sylvia:
Daughter Of Earth (Agnes Smedley)
https://shakespeareandcompany.com/I/9781936932788/daughter-of-earth

On Connection (Kae Tempest) 
https://shakespeareandcompany.com/I/9780571354023/on-connection 

Humankind A Hopeful History (Rutger Bregman)
https://www.littlebrown.com/titles/rutger-bregman/humankind/9780316418553/ 

A Life’s Work: On Becoming A Mother (Rachel Cusk)
https://shakespeareandcompany.com/I/9781250828255/a-lifes-work-on-becoming-a-mother 

Transcendent Kingdom (Yaa Gyasi)
https://shakespeareandcompany.com/I/9781984899767/transcendent-kingdom-a-novel

Circe (Madeline Miller) 
https://shakespeareandcompany.com/d/9781408890042/circe 

The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop
https://www.graywolfpress.org/books/yellow-lighted-bookshop 

Show Notes:

In The End, It Was All About Love

http://roughtradebooks.com/books/in-the-end-it-was-all-about-love-2/

The Good Agency

https://www.thegoodliteraryagency.org/ 

https://www.instagram.com/thegoodagencyuk/?hl=en 

Rough Trade Books

http://roughtradebooks.com/ 

https://www.instagram.com/roughtradebooks/?hl=en 

Musa’s next book - One Of Them (out on April 15th)

https://unbound.com/books/one-of-them/ 

The Good Immigrant

https://uk.bookshop.org/books/the-good-immigrant/9781783523955 

Follow Musa on Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/okwonga/?hl=en 

Your Passport - Live Performance

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hbk11RWQ8oM 

IG Live with Nikesh Shukla

https://www.instagram.com/p/CKwzA3aiVvb/ 

Stadio Football

https://www.instagram.com/stadiofootball/?hl=en 

Jessica Horn - ‘East African feminist activist, writer, doer, interpreter of the ordinary’

https://www.stillsherises.com/ 

Songs My Enemy Taught Me - a poetry collection by Joelle Taylor

https://www.poetrybooks.co.uk/products/songs-my-enemy-taught-me-by-joelle-taylor 

Jennifer Neal on Twitter 

https://twitter.com/ladygodiva83?lang=en 

Buy a copy of The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney
https://www.littlebrown.co.uk/titles/okechukwu-nzelu/the-private-joys-of-nnenna-maloney/9780349701028/?v2=true

Follow Okechukwu on Twitter
https://twitter.com/NzeluWrites

Okechukwu’s Recommended Titles:

Diamond Hill by Kit Fan
https://www.worldeditions.org/product/diamond-hill/

The Prophets by Robert Jones Jr.
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/622773/the-prophets-by-robert-jones-jr/

That Reminds Me - Derek Owusu

SAFE: On Black British Men Reclaiming Space

Poor - Caleb Femi

Pepper Seed - Malika Booker

If Beale Street Could Talk - James Baldwin

CALM www.thecalmzone.net

Show Notes

Buy a copy of The Mercies

Discover more of Kiran’s writing

Follow Kiran on Instagram

Witches, Witch-Hunting, and Women (Silvia Federici)

Whale, Woman, Smoke: Kiran Millwood Hargrave on 'The Mercies'

Dark arts: Peter Zumthor and Louise Bourgeois’ brooding Steilneset memorial

Books that Kiran loved in 2020:

Mexican Gothic (Silvia Moreno-Garcia)

Inland (Téa Obreht)

Shuggie Bain (Douglas Stuart)

A Ghost In The Throat (Doireann Ní Ghríofa)

The Fever (Megan Abbott)

SHOW NOTES

Buy a copy of The Animals at Lockwood Manor
https://lighthousebookshop.com/products/9781529014174?_pos=1&_sid=339af3040&_ss=r

Follow Jane on Twitter (@Healey_Jane)
https://twitter.com/healey_jane

Follow Jane on Instagram (@jane_healey_)
https://www.instagram.com/jane_healey_/?hl=en

(Some of) Jane’s favourite reads of 2020 include:

The Ensemble (Aja Gabel) 
https://uk.bookshop.org/books/the-ensemble/9780735214774 

The Possessions (Sarah Flannery Murphy)
https://uk.bookshop.org/books/the-possessions/9781911344667 

To thank Jane for her time, we donated to the Lighthouse Books Pay It Forward Scheme
https://lighthousebookshop.com/products/pay-it-forward-voucher

@idlereaders

@idlehandscoffee

The Reading Agency
From their website: The Reading Agency’s mission is to work towards a world where everyone is reading their way to a better life. We mean everyone - from toddlers to children to young adults, prisoners, and older people - irrespective of age or economic background. We believe that reading can tackle life's big challenges, from social mobility to mental health - and we're determined that no one is left behind as we strive towards realising our vision. In 2019-20, The Reading Agency reached over 1.8 million people across the UK, including more than 950,000 children and over 900,000 adults and young people.

October’s Idlea Readers book was Burnt Sugar (Avni Doshi) - shortlisted for the Booker Prize

December’s Idle Readers books will be Supper Club (Lara Williams)

Forced Out (Kevin Maxwell)
From the publisher: Forced Out is a revelatory expose combining deeply affecting memoir with sharp analysis and a fascinating insider perspective on day-to-day life in the force. It is a touchstone for the silent many who have either tried to ignore abuse for the sake of their career or who have been bullied out of their jobs. It paints a sobering portrait of an institution that has not yet learned the lessons of the past and whose prejudice is informing the cases it chooses to investigate and the way it investigates them. And it asks the important question: what needs to change?

Animals (Emma Jane Unsworth)
From the publisher: It is the moment every twenty-something must confront: the time to grow up. Adulthood looms, with all its numbing tranquility and stifling complacency. The end of prolonged adolescence is near. Laura and Tyler are two women whose twenties have been a blur of overstayed parties, a fondness for drugs that has shifted from cautious experimentation to catholic indulgence, and hangovers that don’t relent until Monday morning. They’ve been best friends, partners in excess, for the last ten years. But things are changing: Laura is engaged to Jim, a classical pianist who has long since given up the carousing lifestyle. He disapproves of Tyler’s reckless ways and of what he perceives to be her bad influence on Laura. Jim pulls her toward adulthood and responsibility, toward what society says she should be, but Tyler isn’t ready to let her go. But what does Laura want for herself?

Some books that Lucy and Rachel have enjoyed this year:

Girl, Woman, Other (Bernardine Evaristo)

Unicorn: The Memoir of a Muslim Drag Queen (Amrou Al-Kadhi)

Notes To Self: Essays (Emilie Pine)

The Hate U Give (Angie Thomas)

Convenience Store Woman (Sayaka Murata)

Expectation (Anna Hope)

Follow Maame on Instagram

Buy Bad Love from Jacaranda

Buy Bad Love from Bookshop.Org

Listen to the Bad Love audiobook.

IG Live between Dapo and Maame about the cover art for Bad Love

Tickets for Jacaranda’s Online Book Festival (5th December) 

Headscarves and Black Lives Matter

Headscarves and Lockdown-Lite

Learn more about Warsan Shire the Somali-British poet quoted by Beyoncé in Lemonade

Africa Writes Festival 

Books Maame read and loved in 2020:

When Life Gives You Mangoes - Kereen Getten https://pushkinpress.com/books/when-life-gives-you-mangoes/ 

The Death of Vivek Oji - Akwaeke Emezi https://www.faber.co.uk/books/fiction/9780571350988-the-death-of-vivek-oji.html 

Clean-Up - Dapo Adeola and Nathan Bryon https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/308/308216/clean-up-/9780241345894.html 

In The Dream House - Carmen Maria Machado https://serpentstail.com/in-the-dream-house.html 

Follow Tasnim on Instagram (@reads.and.reveries)

Open Water (book) - Caleb Azumah Nelson 

https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/317/317654/open-water/9780241448779.html 

Jacaranda #Twentyin20

https://www.jacarandabooksartmusic.co.uk/ 

https://www.instagram.com/jacarandabooks/ 

Lote - Shola Von Reinhold https://www.jacarandabooksartmusic.co.uk/collections/jacaranda-imprint/products/lote

If I Don’t Have You - Sareeta Domingo https://www.jacarandabooksartmusic.co.uk/collections/jacaranda-imprint/products/if-i-dont-have-you 

Deadly Sacrifice - Stella One https://www.jacarandabooksartmusic.co.uk/collections/jacaranda-imprint/products/deadly-sacrifice 

Bad Love - Maame Blue https://www.jacarandabooksartmusic.co.uk/collections/jacaranda-imprint/products/bad-love 

Are We Home Yet - Katy Massey https://www.jacarandabooksartmusic.co.uk/collections/jacaranda-imprint/products/are-we-home-yet 

One World Publications

https://oneworld-publications.com/ 

https://www.instagram.com/oneworldpublications/ 

The Mountains Sing Nguyen Phan Que Mai 

https://oneworld-publications.com/the-mountains-sing-hb.html 

Manchester Happened Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi 

https://oneworld-publications.com/manchester-happened.html 

Against The Loveless World - Susan Abulhawa

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Against-the-Loveless-World/Susan-Abulhawa/9781982137038 

This One Sky Day - Leone Ross

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/53317441-this-one-sky-day?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=SGsXPnRPOE&rank=1 

@booksandrhymes 

https://www.instagram.com/booksandrhymes/?hl=en