Bonus Episodes: What We Love About…
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What We Love About Regency with Julie Anne Long
We’re between season of Hot and Bothered, but that doesn’t mean we’ve stopped reading Romance novels. On the contrary, recently Vanessa has been binge reading the Pennyroyal Green series by Julie Anne Long. And because Romance novelists are the nicest kind of people, we were lucky enough to get Julie on the phone. We asked her all of our questions about her books, how she got started writing, and regency romance. Enjoy this mini-episode!
What We Love About Audiobooks with Justine Eyre
We’re following our interview with Julie Anne Long last week with someone else who Vanessa is obsessed with: Justine Eyre, the woman who reads Julie Anne Long’s audiobooks.
Justine Eyre is a classically trained, multilingual actress who has narrated well over 400 audiobooks and received an Audie Award and multiple AudioFile Earphones Awards. We talked to her about her process of preparing to record a book, the joys of romance, and whether listening to an audiobook counts as “reading.”
What We Love About Hopeful Endings with Emma Straub
We’re between seasons of Hot and Bothered, so to keep you company we’re bringing you interviews with our favorite writers and thinkers. This week, we’re bringing you the wonderful writer and bookstore owner Emma Straub. Together we talk about how women’s books are marketed, her love of writing hopeful endings, and why it’s important to surround yourself with young people.
Her books, All Adults Here, is recently out in paperback. Go check it out!
What We Love About Being Stuck in a Cabin with Nichole Perkins
This week we’re excited to share a conversation with Nichole Perkins about Romance Thrillers, the pleasure of competency, and her podcast This is Good For You. Stick around after our conversation to hear an episode of This is Good For You all about baking bread. And if you like the show, be sure to subscribe wherever you find your podcasts!
What We Love About Women’s Liberation with Lauren Sandler
Next week, we’re launching our new series On Eyre. But before we jump into 19th-century England, we wanted to spend some time introducing you to our new co-host Lauren Sandler. Lauren’s recent book This is All I Got: A New Mother’s Search for Home is recently out in paperback. We talked to her about the process of writing her book and the similarities she sees between Jane Eyre and the continued vulnerability of women on the margins.
Holiday Bonus: An Interview with Jasmine Guillory
We’ve been sitting on this lovely interview with Jasmine Guillory for a while, and we thought we’d share it with you as a special holiday treat! We discuss the personal and political as they relate to romance novels, and her latest book While We Were Dating.
We hope you’re taking care of yourself this season! To quote Jasmine in this episode “thinking of yourself as a person worthy of care is one of the hardest things.”
Live from Pemberley: Fire Island (with Tobin Low)
Last month, a new Pride and Prejudice adaptation dropped – Fire Island directed by Andrew Ahn. As your go-to place for all things Pride and Prejudice, we felt it was our duty to watch the film and report back on how it compares to the original. And we were lucky enough to get Tobin Low, the co-creator of the Nancy podcast and current editor at This American Life, in the studio to break it all down. We talk about our favorite moments and how the themes of family, class, and pride translate from the book to the film.
Live from Pemberley: The 2005 Movie (with Helen Zaltzman and Jenny Owen Youngs)
We're taking a quick break from reading Pride and Prejudice to watch the 2005 movie adaptation with one of our favorite podcasts, Veronica Mars Investigations.
Vanessa is joined by Helen Zaltzman and Jenny Owen Youngs to dig through the movie, comparing it along the way to the BBC mini-series and, of course, the original text. They ask important questions like: How does Elizabeth hear Darcy's insult at the Meryton Ball? Is Mr. Bennet the true villain of Pride and Prejudice? And is Matthew McFadden wearing a wig in this movie?
Special Edition: It Ends with Us (with Julia Argy)
We're taking a brief break from Pride and Prejudice, to read one of the most popular romance books of our current moment: It Ends with Us by Colleen Hoover. Vanessa is joined by former co-host of Twilight in Quarantine, Julia Argy, to dive into the novel. Together they discuss the abuse narrative in the text, the love story at the heart of it, and why they think this book is having a moment.
This episode does contain spoilers, but we do our best to explain the book for those who haven't read it. And please be advised that the novel itself contains the topics of suicide, gun violence, sexual assault, physical assault, and domestic abuse – all of which we touch on in the episode.
Live from Pemberley: Sexuality in the Regency (with Emily Nagoski)
This week we're sharing a special bonus interview with Dr. Emily Nagoski to talk about Lydia and the cultural norms around sexuality in regency England. Emily is a best-selling author, sex educator, and the host of a new podcast – Come As You Are. Stay tuned to the end of the episode for an excerpt of her episode "The Science of Horniness."
Live from Pemberley: The Life of Mary Wollstonecraft (with Charlotte Gordon)
We're taking a quick pause in reading Pride and Prejudice to deep dive into the life and ideas of Mary Wollstonecraft. We've been bringing up Wollstonecraft a lot throughout this series, wondering how Pride and Prejudice reflects (or rejects) the feminist ideas of the era. This week, Lauren talks to Dr. Charlotte Gordon, author of Romantic Outlaws: The Extraordinary Lives of Mary Wollstonecraft and Her Daughter Mary Shelley. Lauren and Dr. Gordon discuss Wollstonecraft's life and radicalization, her influence on Austen, and why Wollstonecraft didn't become an enduring celebrity like Austen.