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Booked Up with Jen Taub

Booked Up with Jen Taub

Jennifer Taub & Politicon LLC

Booked Up with Jen Taub features intimate interviews with nonfiction authors. Jen’s guests include writers of current bestsellers and beloved backlist books. Conversations cover love, money, politics, early dreams, writing habits, reading tastes, procrastination techniques, self-doubt, and news of the day. Creator and host, Jen Taub is a law professor, advocate, and author. Her nonfiction books include BIG DIRTY MONEY (Viking 2020) and OTHER PEOPLE’S HOUSES (Yale Press 2014). She focuses on “follow the money” matters— promoting transparency and opposing corruption. Jen’s favorite poem is Prufrock (and yes she knows that Eliot held abhorrent views. She contains multitudes and can separate the dancer from the dance.) Taub was the Bruce W. Nichols Visiting Professor of Law in fall 2019 at Harvard Law School and is now a professor of law at the Western New England University School of Law. A former associate general counsel at Fidelity Investments, she is a graduate of Yale College and Harvard Law School.

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Top 10 Booked Up with Jen Taub Episodes

Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best Booked Up with Jen Taub episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to Booked Up with Jen Taub for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite Booked Up with Jen Taub episode by adding your comments to the episode page.

Booked Up with Jen Taub - 51: Andrea Chalupa on DICTATORSHIP IS EASY
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11/12/23 • 57 min

Today Jen’s guest is journalist, filmmaker, author, and activist Andrea Chalupa. You know Andrea from her award-winning podcast Gaslit Nation that she founded with Sarah Kendzior. Fake populism. Demonizing the press. Scapegoating. Propaganda. Personal militia. All ingredients for a successful dictatorship and topics of their conversation.
Andrea and Sarah collaborated on the book we are discussing today called DICTATORSHIP: IT’S EASIER THAN YOU THINK. They describe DICTATORSHIP as “a wild ride showing the perks and pitfalls of becoming a dictator, and how to overthrow one.”
Part of the book focuses on Soviet leader Joseph Stalin’s genocidal famine in Ukraine in 1933. Andrea is also the writer and producer of the award-winning journalistic thriller that was produced by MGM called Mr. Jones that came out in 2019. Mr. Jones was directed by three-time Academy Award-nominee Agnieszka Holland (known for her work on Europa Europa; The Secret Garden; House of Cards; The Wire) and starring James Norton, Vanessa Kirby, and Peter Sarsgaard.
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from Jen Taub:
Twitter| Money & Gossip Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY

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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 43: ALI VELSHI: Banned Book Club

43: ALI VELSHI: Banned Book Club

Booked Up with Jen Taub

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09/17/23 • 62 min

Ali Velshi is Jen’s guest today. You know him as an anchor and business correspondent for NBC News and MSNBC. His show Velshi appears every Saturday and Sunday from 10 - noon. Ali is also the host of the podcast Velshi Banned Book Club. And, in keeping with the focus of Booked Up, Ali is a nonfiction author himself. He wrote Gimme My Money Back and co-authored How to Speak Money. Plus he has several new books forthcoming. On September 25th, is the publication date for The Trump Indictments comes out with his preface, and then in spring of 2023, Ali’s book Small Acts of Courage: A Legacy Of Endurance And The Fight For Democracy is coming out.
Ali Velshi has covered a broad range of breaking news events and global affairs throughout his career, including US presidential elections, the global financial crisis of 2008, and recently on the ground in the war in Ukraine.
An award-winning journalist, Ali Velshi has been honored with two National Headliner Awards. The first was for “How the Wheels Came Off,” a special on the near collapse of the American auto industry. And, recently last year for his coverage of Hurricane Ian. His work on disabled workers and Chicago’s red-light camera scandal in 2016 also earned him two News and Documentary Emmy Award nominations, adding to a nomination in 2010 for his terrorism coverage.
Born in Kenya and raised in Canada, Ali graduated from Queen’s University in Canada, which awarded him an honorary doctorate of laws in 2016.
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from Ali Velshi
Twitter| Velshi Banned Book Club Podcast | Website | Author of THE TRUMP INDICTMENTS
Get More from Jen Taub:
Twitter| Money & Gossip Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 31: E. Jean Carroll and Mary Trump on their Backstory Serial
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06/25/23 • 61 min

As featured in The New York Times, Mary Trump and E. Jean Carroll are collaborating with Jen on a serialized romance novel called THE ITALIAN LESSON. Mary is writing the novel, Jen is editing, and E. Jean is advising and responding to readers’ questions. The trio is releasing Mary’s novel in segments on backstoryserial.com (which is on Substack). You can read everything in one place through chapter two by linking: https://www.backstoryserial.com/p/the-italian-lesson.
Get a taste of the ITALIAN LESSON with this opening passage:
The last time I saw him, I wanted him dead. Now here he was. Standing by the door, very much alive. When I opened my eyes I couldn’t see him clearly –– the muffled sounds of the EKG and the low thrum of the fluorescent lights made my head hurt and he hung back in the shadows.
Still, I thought I saw the corner of his mouth curved upward in the beginning of a smile, the kind of smile he flashed at me when he knew he’d won.
He moved toward the bed. I pretended not to notice and turned away as best I could, feigning disorientation. The closer he got the further away my life seemed. My life, the idyllic life I had built away from him, was slipping away. Then I remembered once wanting him dead—I had felt such horrible guilt afterward. It just wasn’t like me. But I was a different person now, to the extent that that’s possible. He reached for my hand and, before I lost consciousness again, I thought, “Instead of wanting him dead, I should have been more proactive.” And I felt no guilt at all.
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get Backstory Serial and the Italian Lesson
Press | Backstory Serial on Substack | THE ITALIAN LESSON
Get More from Jen Taub:
Twitter | Follow the Money Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 36: BARBIE Book club with George Hahn & M.G. Lord
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07/30/23 • 67 min

Today is all about BARBIE. The new film, the doll, the legend. Too much hype? No, not enough. This month’s new blockbuster film directed by Greta Gurwig starring Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling has more than just the best one-liners “She’s everything. He’s just Ken.” It also provides theater audiences the opportunity to share howls of laughter delight about the humorous send up of the patriarchy, and also sob openly about what our lives could have been if more girl’s imaginations were able to flourish as grown women, instead of us becoming accessories, enlisted in service of the ambitions of powerful men.
Because Booked Up centers on books, our Barbie Book Club members today include M.G. Lord author of Forever Barbie: The Unauthorized Biography of a Real Doll, originally published in 1994. Plus, M.G. has a fresh 3-part podcast series out now called "LA Made: The Barbie Tapes” which includes audio from her one-on-one interviews with Barbie inventor and Mattel founder, Ruth Handler, among others. We’ll get into that. M.G. has written for numerous publications including the New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. She is an Associate Professor of the Practice of English at the University of Southern California.
Also joining the Barbie Book Club today is George Hahn. Cuter than a Ken Doll, more awesome than Allan, there is no better example of how to live an urban bon vivant life while on a bicycle than George Hahn. George – in his own witty words – “ is a self-made thousandaire playboy who wears tailored clothing, drinks coffee, talks on podcasts and occasionally writes and does TV.” You may know George from his screen roles in “Sex and the City,” “Law and Order: Criminal Intent,” and Miramax’s “Kate & Leopold.” He also has a new podcast called Hahn: Solo and website GeorgeHahn.com that’s spelled H-A-H-N that features menswear, grooming, lifestyle essays and advice.
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from M.G. Lord:
Podcast | Website| Author of FOREVER BARBIE and several other books
Get More from George Hahn:
Twitter | Website| Podcast Hahn: Solo
Get More from Jen Taub:
taubjen on Threads| Money & Gossip Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 35: Ben McKenzie

35: Ben McKenzie

Booked Up with Jen Taub

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07/23/23 • 62 min

Jen’s guest today is Ben McKenzie, author of the new book EASY MONEY: CRYPTOCURRENCY, CASINO CAPITALISM, AND THE GOLDEN AGE OF FRAUD. In this incredibly fast-paced, relatable book, Ben, joined by journalist Jacob Silverman, takes us on a journey into the dark side of crypto. You don’t need any kind of expertise to follow along.
Plus, even if you’ve been around the bitcoin block before, you will appreciate the jaw-dropping encounters with the key players including FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried (before his indictment and extradition from the Bahamas), and Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky (before his indictment) who admitted to Ben at South by Southwest in early 2022 scope of this scam. Mashinsky said that only “ten to fifteen percent” of the crypto system was real money. “Everthing else,” he said “is just bubble.”
Ben has been an outspoken critic of the cryptocurrency craze. Perhaps you saw him on C-Span in December of 2022, when he testified before the Senate Banking Committee for a hearing on the topic: The Crypto Crash: Why the FTX Bubble Burst and the Harm to Consumers.
During the hearing, Ben called FTX “the biggest Ponzi scheme in history” and told the senators that the 40 million Americans who have invested in crypto “have been lied to, in ways both big and small, by a once seemingly mighty crypto industry whose entire existence in fact depends on misinformation, hype and, yes, fraud.”
Not a C-Span cable network fan? You may also know Ben McKenzie from network television, the big screen, or more recently in his 2020 Broadway debut. He starred as Ryan Atwood on the teen drama “The O.C.” and as James Gordon in the hit series “Gotham.”
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from Ben McKenzie
Twitter | Website| Author with Jacob Silverman of EASY MONEY
Get More from Jen Taub:
taubjen on Threads| Money & Gossip Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 33: Kathy Griffin is back, bitches!
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07/09/23 • 66 min

Kathy Griffin is Jen’s guest today. They cover everything from her life on the D-List to her cameo in Pulp Fiction (while she was dating Quentin Tarantino) to how Donald Trump tried to destroy her, to her SOLD OUT show in Vegas at the Mirage. Plus a chills and ugly cry-induscing story about Stevie Nicks. No spoilers. You’ll have to listen.
Kathy is “The Gays” favorite two-time-Emmy and Grammy award winning comedian. (Half-way to an EGOT). And, Kathy made the Guiness Book of World Records. That is the f’ing holy grail for a Gen-Xer like Jen. She got it for writing and starring in 23 televised stand-up specials. More than any other comic.
Kathy also acts. And writes. And tweets. And gets sued for tweeting. And gets cancelled and rises from the ashes to perform in Vegas. Live at the Mirage! October 6th. Get your tickets now.
Today Kathy and Jen talk about her book OFFICIAL BOOK CLUB SELECTION: A MEMOIR ACCORDING TO KATHY GRIFFIN. They also cover with honesty and compassion some difficult topics including addiction.
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from Kathy Griffin:
Instagram | Website|
Author of OFFICIAL BOOK CLUB SELECTION
Get More from Jen Taub:
Threads| Follow the Money Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 58: Norman Lear: Even This I Get to Experience
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12/31/23 • 56 min

Welcome back to Booked Up, a podcast that features you, me and our favorite authors. We release a new episode every Sunday morning.
Today for the December book club, we are discussing Norman Lear, the Hollywood legend who passed this month at the young age of 101. There are gazillion people who have a thing or two to say about this ground-breaking writer, director, producer, activist. So, to anchor our conversation, Jen selected his best-selling memoir Even This I Get to Experience, published by Penguin Books in 2014.
With a blend of sheer luck, immense creativity, and epic perseverance, Lear created programs for television and film that transformed television for the better. Known best for situation comedies: All in the Family, The Jeffersons, Maude, and Good Times, Norman Lear brought diverse, complicated families into our living rooms night after night, year after year.
His films include cult favorites like This is Spinal Tap and The Princess Bride. May his memory be a blessing. Less known is his work in founding the non-profit People for the American Way.
Here to talk about Norman Lear today on the Book Club are two friends of the show and a new for us here at Booked Up. First the new guy: David Kusnet. David was one of the first staffers hired by Norman for People for the American Way where he was the VP for communications.. After working there, David went on to chief speechwriter for former President Bill Clinton during the 1992 campaign.He is the author of Speaking American and Love the Work, Hate the Job and co-author
Also returning to the show today are Dr. Bridgette Baldwin and Comedian Judy Gold. Bridgette teaches courses in criminal law and also Critical Race Theory. Her scholarly work has examined the intersection of the 9th Amendment and social movements, as well as, the convergence of race, class and gender on welfare reform legislation. She is a Professor of Law at the Western New England University School of Law.
Also joining the book club today is two-time Emmy-Award winning comedian Judy Gold. Judy is a comedian, actor, and writer. She’s the author of: Yes, I Can Say That: When They Come for the Comedians, We Are All in Trouble. You can see Judy live doing her stand up schtict in on January 12 at City Winery in New York. Then the next day, January 13 at City Winery in Philly. Of course there are more shows. Look them up yourself. What am I, her booking agent?
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from Bridgette Baldwin
Facebook | Website | Author of WISCONSIN WORKS?
Get More from Judy Gold
Twitter | Website | Author of YES, I CAN SAY THAT
Get More from Mark Tushet
Twitter | Money & Gossip Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
More from Jen Taub:
Twitter | Money & Gossip Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 13: How We Win The Civil War with Steve Phillips
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02/19/23 • 62 min

This week best-selling author Steve Phillips opens up about the very recent loss of his remarkable wife Susan Sandler and their shared goals on how to move America toward a multi-racial democracy.
In the dedication to her of his new book, How We Win the Civil War, Steve writes, “The reality of cancer forces one to a more spirtual place of contemplating life, meaning, and legacy. That reflection has fueled my work on this book to try to make it a lasting legacy for both of us.”
Steve notes that the post 2020 election coup “was not the first time a large percentage of American people chose whiteness over democracy in the wake of an election whose outcome they did not like.” He uses humor when he writes about the urgency of facing America’s anti-democratic drift. “Imagine if Revere had instead ambled down the street saying, ‘We’re going to invite the British to dinner and see if we can reach a bipartisan agreement. Sinema and Manchin are bringing the clam chowder.’”
Steve Phillips is a New York Times bestselling author of How Brown Is the New White: How the Demographic Revolution Has Created a New American Majority and political expert. He is the host of "Democracy in Color with Steve Phillips," a color-conscious political podcast, and founder of Democracy in Color, a multimedia platform on race and politics.
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from Steve Phillips
Twitter | Website | Author of HOW WE WIN THE CIVIL WAR and BROWN IS THE NEW WHITE

Get More from Jen Taub:
Twitter | Website | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 11: Lisa Guerrero

11: Lisa Guerrero

Booked Up with Jen Taub

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02/05/23 • 68 min

This week, Jen’s guest is the award-winning journalist Lisa Gurrero, on to talk about her new book Warrior: My Path to Being Brave. Lisa is a pioneer in the field of sportsbroadcasting enduring verbal abuse and sexual harrassment. She began her sports career in the 1980s as an NFL cheerleader, then directed entertainment including the cheerleading squads for the Atlanta Falcons and New England Patriots. At the Patriots, the boss’s son told her to remove all of the “Black music” from the playlist and put the cheerleaders in skimpier outfits and high heels instead of sneakers. She refused and was fired but fought back with a lawsuit.
Lisa was a pioneer sportsbroadcaster who later broke ground as the first woman sidelines reporter for Monday Night Football. In that role, she strained to put up with a toxic, hostile boss and suffered a miscarriage while at the game, but only shared her story now.
Smart, focused, and persistent, Lisa built her entertainment career in sports as well as in acting, starring in the Aaron Spelling soap opera Sunset Beach in the 1990s, among other roles. In 2006, Lisa begcane a reporter for Inside Edition and has used her platform to make a difference. Now as the Chief Investigative Correspondent at Inside Edition, she exposes scams, child abuse and cold-case murders for an audience of 5 million viewers.
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from Lisa Guerrero
Twitter | Website |Author of WARRIOR: MY PATH TO BEING BRAVE

Get More from Jen Taub:
Twitter | Website | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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Booked Up with Jen Taub - 12: Servants of the Damned by David Enrich
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02/12/23 • 58 min

This week Jen speaks with David Enrich about his nationwide bestseller, Servants of the Damned, praised by David Cay Johnston in the Washington Post as “A powerful and important picture of how mega law firms distort justice."
While other large corporate law firms appear in Servants of the Damned, David explains why he made one firm in particular the centerpiece. He views Jones Day as one of the chief enablers of the most corrupt actors over recent decades. Clients include Big Tobacco whom the firm continually represented in efforts to avoid products liability. Jones Day also represented Pudue Pharma, maker of the highly addictive OxyContin, the Catholic Church in efforts to minimize consequences for child-sexual-abuse, and Russian oligarchs. Jones Day even “laid some of the legal groundwork for Trump to challenge the legitimacy of the 2020 election,” David explains.
David is the business investigations editor at The New York Times. His previous books were Dark Towers, about Deutsche Bank and Donald Trump, and The Spider Network about UBS trader and apparent fall guy, Tom Hayes.
Contact Booked Up:
You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: [email protected] or by writing to:
BOOKED UP
P.O. BOX 147
NORTHAMPTON, MA 01061
Get More from David Enrich
Twitter | New York Times Webpage| Author of SERVANTS OF THE DAMNED, DARK TOWERS and THE SPIDER NETWORK
Get More from Jen Taub:
Twitter | Website | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY
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FAQ

How many episodes does Booked Up with Jen Taub have?

Booked Up with Jen Taub currently has 59 episodes available.

What topics does Booked Up with Jen Taub cover?

The podcast is about News, News Commentary, Podcasts, Books and Arts.

What is the most popular episode on Booked Up with Jen Taub?

The episode title '51: Andrea Chalupa on DICTATORSHIP IS EASY' is the most popular.

What is the average episode length on Booked Up with Jen Taub?

The average episode length on Booked Up with Jen Taub is 65 minutes.

How often are episodes of Booked Up with Jen Taub released?

Episodes of Booked Up with Jen Taub are typically released every 7 days.

When was the first episode of Booked Up with Jen Taub?

The first episode of Booked Up with Jen Taub was released on Oct 27, 2022.

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