123 Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield — Monsters of the Deep Subconscious
Julia and Victoria learn what the word “flannel” means in British English and formulate their own theories about what happened to a stranded deep-sea researcher in the devastatingly beautiful novel Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield.
122 How High We Go In the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu — Throw the Baby
Julia and Victoria conclude that How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu is a very good book–Julia is just sad.
121 Whale by Cheon Myeong-kwan — Gossip and the Grotesque
Julia and Victoria grapple with the grotesque narrative choices in Whale by Cheon Myeong-Kwan, translated by Chi-young Kim. Julia incorrectly uses the word “epigraph” when she means “epitaph” approximately 25 times.
120 Eight Billion Genies by Charles Soule & Ryan Browne — What Would You Wish For?
Julia and Victoria try to decipher the rules of Eight Billion Genies, the newest comic book series from Charles Soule and Ryan Browne, because Julia likes rules. They also learn about how one random French guy playing fast and loose with a One Thousand and One Nights translation made up most of what the “Western” world “knows” about “genies.” Tale as old as time.
118 Carmilla by Joseph Sheridan LeFanu — The One with the Lesbian Vampire
Julia is truly bamboozled, Victoria embraces that she is a vampire girlie, and they both dig into the context of Joseph Sheridan LeFanu’s Carmilla, edited with commentary by the absolute legend Carmen Maria Machado.
116 The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin — ‘70s Sci-Fi in Context
Exploring anarchism, feminism, and the Cold War, Julia and Victoria unpack the context of The Dispossessed by the brilliant and sassy Ursula K. Le Guin. Join for the sci-fi, stay for Barbenheimer, alien Jesus, and a confusion of Ursulas. Also Julia has minor microphone problems. (She sincerely apologizes).