Episode 80: Facing the Void

How do you fill the yawning chasm that arises after you finish a great book or a long group read? Is it a time of excitement and possibility, or a daunting and overwhelming trial? Fresh off of finishing several doorstops ourselves, we discuss how we approach what we want to read next.

Summer Book Club

The Mookse and the Gripes Summer Book Club 2024 is coming up fast! This year we are only choosing from William Trevor novels. After losing for the last two years, he will not lose again! But what will the book be? As in the past, we will be holding a vote over on Twitter / X! Watch my account on May 21!

The Books:

The Children of Dynmouth (1976)

Fools of Fortune (1983)

Felicia’s Journey (1994)

The Story of Lucy Gault (2002)

Dates:

Voting starts May 21 and runs through the early hours of May 25 for us in the mountain time zone.

We will announce the winner in the next episode!

The episode discussing the winner will be Episode 86, coming out on August 8.

Shownotes

Books

The Peregrine, by J.L. Carr

Flights, by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Jennifer Croft

A Little Life, by Hanya Yanagihara

Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry

Butcher’s Crossing, by John Williams

Miss MacIntosh, My Darling, by Marguerite Young

Ulysses, by James Joyce

The Ambassadors, by Henry James

Tone, by Sofia Samatar and Kate Zambreno

The Rings of Saturn, by W.G. Sebald, translated by Michael Hulse

Austerlitz, by W.G. Sebald

The Anatomy of Melancholy, by Robert Burton

Urne Burial, by Robert Burton

Reinhardt’s Garden, by Mark Haber

The Mill on the Floss, by George Eliot

Silas Marner, by George Eliot

The Eustace Diamonds, by Anthony Trollope

O Pioneers!, by Willa Cather

War and Peace, by Leo Tolstoy, translated by Anthony Briggs

Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: A Journey Through Yugoslavia, by Rebecca West

Grand Hotel, by Vicki Baum, translated by Basil Creighton with revisions by Margot Bettauer Dembo

The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated by Michael R. Katz

It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over, by Anne De Marcken

The Peasants, by Władysław Reymont, translated by Anna Zaranko

Parade’s End, by Ford Madox Ford

Collected Fictions, Jorge Luis Borges, translated by Andrew Hurley

The Hour of the Star, by Clarice Lispector, translated by Benjamin Moser

The Complete Stories, by Clarice Lispector, translated by Katrina Dodson

Too Much of Life, by Clarice Lispector, translated by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Patterson

The Murderer, by Roy Heath

The Oppermans, by Lion Feuchtwanger, translated by James Cleugh with revisions by Joshua Cohen

Green Equinox, by Elizabeth Mavor

Twice Lost, by Phyllis Paul

Betrayed by Rita Hayworth, by Manuel Puig, translated by Susan Jill Levine

Elena Knows, by Claudio Piñeiro, translated by Frances Riddle

A Little Luck, by Claudio Piñeiro, translated by Frances Riddle

Lies and Sorcery, by Elsa Morante, translated by Jenny McPhee

A Dance to the Music of Time, by Anthony Powell

Anniversaries, by Uwe Johnson, translated by Damion Searls

The Extinction of Irene Rey, by Jennifer Croft

The House on the Strand, by Daphne Du Maurier

Links

Miss MacIntosh, My Darling Substack

Jonathan Golding and Mark Haber on Instagram Live

The Mookse and the Gripes Podcast is a book chat podcast. Every other week Paul and Trevor get together to talk about some bookish topic or another. We hope you’ll continue to join us!

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