Wondermine
Wondermine
Bonus Episode: Books! (Part 1)
On this bonus episode, Larissa and Elizabeth discuss their favorite books as children, what they read for now, and who's on their shitlist in 2022.
We mentioned a lot of authors and books! Many of these links are to Bookshop; we'll receive a small affiliate payment if you purchase through these links.
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Little House on the Prairie (series)
Brené Brown, Atlas of the Heart
Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones
Loulou & Yves: The Untold Story of Loulou de la Falaise and the House of Saint Laurent
Music by ZakharValaha from Pixabay
Music by ZakharValaha from Pixabay
Follow us on Instagram @wonderminepodcast
Larissa Parson 0:01
Welcome to a bonus episode of Wondermine. I'm Larissa Parson, I'm a joy coach, a movement teacher, a mom to twins, a bit of a hippie and of course, an avid reader.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 0:14
And I'm Elizabeth M Johnson. I'm a parent, a partner, a rape survivor and writer. I talk and write about relationships, trauma and decision making. And I'm a heavy library user.
Larissa Parson 0:26
And if you're new here, hello, we're the duo behind this feminist podcast that looks at the Wow. And the how of living a life rooted in curiosity, community and liberation. If you've ever felt like something was missing, or you are missing something, Wondermine is the podcast for you.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 0:45
And if you would like to support the show, thank you, you can do that by visiting patreon.com/wondermine. There are three tiers of support. And in the interest of equity, and community, all offer the same perks which include things like bonus episodes, periodic meetups, exclusive updates and other behind the scenes content. And if you don't want to support us, that's fine, too. We're just glad you're here.
Larissa Parson 1:14
Yes, exactly. So today for this first bonus episode, we are talking about books. Elizabeth and I are both big readers. And at the start of every episode last season, we talked about what we were reading. So we thought for a bonus episode, it would be fun to do a deep dive into books. We're going to be talking about things like what we read for and who's on our shitlist.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 1:39
Let's get going. And I wonder if before we get into those big questions, we want to start soft. How about what we loved as kids? Larissa, do you want to start us off? What did you read as a child?
Larissa Parson 1:55
So the question is really, What *didn't* I read as a child? I started reading when I was three, according to my mom. And there are a few books that I distinctly remember reading and loving as a kid. And I just want to say that it is really hard to restrain myself to just talking about a few books. My dad loves to tell the story of how I used to sleep with piles of books in my bed, like on them and under them. But anyway, so my earliest memories of being read to are about poetry like Paul Laurence Dunbar and Langston Hughes. And then I remember being older and poking around my parents' bookshelf, to reread those poems over and over again. But in terms of what I really was drawn to, as a reader, like with the identity of reader, as a child, I have this vivid memory of devouring all of the Little House books in one day when I was home sick from school, just, like, I read for nine hours straight or something like that. It was amazing. I also remember loving Island of the Blue Dolphins and Julie of the Wolves, and I haven't revisited either one of those in decades. Yeah. But I love stories about badass women who live alone now and I think that is really clearly derived from the books I loved as a kid. How about you Elizabeth? Did you read a lot as child?
Elizabeth M. Johnson 3:20
Yes, yes to all of that I did read a lot as a child and actually I wonder if this is like a mom thing. My mother told me to I started to read at three also. But I had seizures as a small child and the reading and some other some other skills went away. And so I lost the ability to read and then I got that back later on when I was like in kindergarten. I guess that's the usual sort of time. I remember being read to and reading a lot. I remember as soon as I could bike, biking down to the library and just loading up my basket with tons of books. I, too, really loved books about badass women before they were women. Those tough and ready and ambitious and outspoken girls. So I loved Ramona I loved a lot of Beverly Cleary. I did also love Little House On the Prairie and I felt like I wanted to be more like Mary but I was definitely more like Laura like just getting into the muck of things and just never quite doing the right stuff. Or what was I guess what was expected of me? Yeah. Then I kind of graduated on to Judy Blume and Nancy Drew. I don't have a lot of like my childhood things but I have a bunch of my Nancy Drew's which I still look at periodically, and they're still great. She's zipping around in her convertible solving mysteries minutes. There's just no stopping her. At that point, I read a lot for escape. I read to just be in a different place, doing different things, having different abilities and having different resources. But that kind of got me thinking about what do we read for now? So what do you feel like you read for now? Larissa,
Larissa Parson 5:31
I want to answer that question. But I want to touch on this, the idea that you brought up of what did I read for as a kid too? Like, that reading for escape, and that there is just this spark of an idea that I got around to kind of...what is the literature that our kids are consuming now too? There's kind of like that. And when I think about my kids favorite shows, it's all very similar. It's all like, I would like to live in a different place, I want to have different abilities, or, you know, all of these different ways of conceiving of what it means to be a person. And what it could mean to be a person in lots of different contexts. I mean, it's just, it's kind of interesting to me. And I'm like, Oh, we could talk all day about children's literature, but we won't! (laughs)
What do I read for now is the same thing as I just described. I read for all kinds of reasons. If I were to really break it down, I definitely read for escape. I love the idea of reading that takes me to a place or a time or a setting a reality that's a little bit different from the one I live in. Sometimes it's better. There's more representation. There are people like me, there are people who are not like me who are not white men. There are settings where people who are not white cis men are in power. There are things like better communication among friends and lovers. This is kind of why I love things like romance and fantasy, and urban fantasy, and paranormal romance, and like, all kinds of sub genres in there, and some sci fi and just lots of different kinds of fiction that create these places that are just a little bit different, or where people have different abilities, different powers, different magical skills, or whatever, or shapeshifting, or any of those things that we could read in some ways as allegorical, but also things that are just like, here's another way to human, here's another way to be a person, because they're not always people. Sometimes, like in theory, I could be reading a book with, you know, a lion who talks. And that would be also another way of thinking of being a person. But generally in, I, I gravitate toward fiction, almost all of the time. And most often my favorite stories have women protagonists, and involve their badassery, but also community.
So it's kind of a lot of different things that I like to see in my fiction. That doesn't mean I don't read literary fiction, sometimes it's just that like, I often need a palate cleanser of several romance novels to like, work my way through. And what you all might not know who are listening is that I spent 10 years teaching high school English. So I spent a lot of time in literary fiction. And I'm just like, oh, I can choose what I want to read and read just for fun. Like I would say, escape and pleasure. Which doesn't mean, again, not saying that literary fiction isn't pleasurable, it's just that sometimes it takes more work to get there. Or that you're in a language bath, which is delightful. And takes a lot more work and isn't something you can casually pick up, you know, at 1130 at night and read for five minutes, and then put it down.
Um, let's see, what else do we read for? what else do I read for? I read the Internet a lot. I read a ton of essays, lots of newsletters. I read for information there. I read for perspective, I read for people to challenge my thoughts a little bit. Sometimes I read to have my thoughts reinforced, and my beliefs reinforced? Well, I don't think, you know, I think that, as much as I would like to say I'm super open minded about a lot of things, I am not always very open minded about a lot of things. And so sometimes I like the echo chamber of the internet a little bit too much. And then I read, when I read nonfiction, when I read off line, when I read books that are nonfiction offline, I read them to learn things. I read to dig into ideas that I'm into. So right now I'm reading a bunch of bell hooks. And I have a really extensive anti-library that's full of nonfiction that I can dig into whenever I have the time. And it's kind of like, Oh, I feel like having a little bit of this today, so I'm going to read a little bit of this book about breath. And I'm going to put it aside. Or I'm going to read a little bit of Atlas of the Heart. And then I'm going to put it aside because it's not really the kind of thing that I can immerse myself in. It's just not the way that my brain tends to work. Though I will say that bell hooks is incredibly compelling as a writer. And that a lot of my nonfiction I do on audio, because it's a little easier for me to process that way. So that's what I read for, to learn stuff, and to get away.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 10:31
Yeah, it's making me question why I don't read to escape more. I used to read to escape, why don't I anymore?
Larissa Parson 10:46
You've just grown up more than I have Elizabeth. (laughter)
Elizabeth M. Johnson 10:48
Oh, I'm not sure that's it, Larissa. (laughter).
You read a lot more fiction than I do. And we've talked about this.
Larissa Parson 11:03
Yeah.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 11:04
And when I was thinking about who were we in our late teens, early 20s?
Larissa Parson 11:17
Yeah.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 11:17
And I was wondering about what I was reading then. And I was much more inclined to pick up any kind of fiction at that point. And I think that one of the, perhaps one of the reasons I don't read as much right now is. I have a very low tolerance for gratuitous violence for any kind of trauma that's sort of thrown in as a plot twist. And when I was thinking about what I was reading, my first thought was "well, that wasn't bad..." and I then I thought, "oh, no, that was really awful." I read a lot of VC Andrews. And that's really awful in any capacity. And when I think about the work that I do, and I would never go back to that right now. There's a lot of like, violence, and there's a lot of abuse going on, and a lot of things that are really questionable. But I think that --it's only in the past year and a half that I've really gone back to fiction at all--I became kind of burnt out on how much I had to really cull through things.
Larissa Parson 12:28
Yeah.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 12:29
To find books that were not really painful to read, for one reason or another. And I'll say that, as I've gone back to it, the Black authors that I have been reading over the past year, --and we've talked about this before on Wondermine - they do a much better job of managing and mitigating the trauma that they are putting into the story. So it is not a shocker of someone in the closet when you open it, so to speak. So that's something that I've really noticed as I've gone back to reading fiction. So for me fiction --that's kind of a long, roundabout answer -- but I read for like a big juicy story. I want the big story. I love the saga. I love the epic if I can get there. We've talked about Clan of the Cave bear which, so again, I feel like that's one of those things that we that we read that in our early 20s.
Larissa Parson 13:41
I was 13 Maybe 14 Maybe I was young. I was too young. Yeah,
Elizabeth M. Johnson 13:47
Maybe I was in high school? I'm trying to think about where I would have read those books because I didn't own them. So they would have come from a library of some sort. I read the Harry Potter series as an adult because that's when it came out. But I also really like stand alone stories. I just finished Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones, which is fantastic and, and then of course love songs of WEB DuBois, by Dr. Honoree Fannon Jeffers. I love a good juicy story. I'm also much more inclined at this point to put down a book if it's not working for me. I'm just I don't have the patience and there's too many good books out there. So I would say like, you know, 30% of what I'm reading is fiction for a really, really good story. I read a lot to find out what other like how other writers who write something like me in some capacity, how they are writing what they are writing about. So I can be a better writer based on what I'm reading and how they're telling their story. That's really an important piece to me. But I also get down these rabbit holes like you and like Alice, we're just kind of tumbling down into this piece where I'm just like, where did how did I even get here? I'm researching Andre Leon Talley life right now. And I found this really odd reference to someone who I'd never heard of. And so I looked her up and then found a book. And now I'm looking at this whole book. Loulou & Yves: The Untold Story of Loulou de La Falaise and the House of Saint Laurent which is told through like this series of quotes from conversations and books. And it's like nothing else I've ever picked up. It's research. And then I'm not sure necessarily, what I'm going to do with it. But it's funny how sometimes things tie together.
Larissa Parson 15:56
I, I love how you like, go down those rabbit holes, it is so totally fascinating to me to see where I end up and to listen to you tell me about your rabbit holes is always very interesting. Like, oh, yeah, that was that's a whole fascinating thing that I had no idea existed. And maybe that's the beauty of having, you know, a relationship where we talk about books a lot, because then we get to find out all kinds of fascinating things about the world that we wouldn't otherwise research on our own. And, yeah.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 16:29
I think there's, I think one of the joys also, in having these conversations with you around books, is that you give me the permission --because you were already doing the thing-- to go down that rabbit hole, and it's not a problem, or you don't always have to know what you're going to do with it. Because that is something I often struggle with.And for those who are listening closely, you could likely hear me qualify my last sentence. "Oh but I can sometimes use it in when I'm writing, like, really
Larissa Parson 17:10
(laughter)
Elizabeth M. Johnson 17:11
And it doesn't always. It's so important to surround ourselves with people who are doing something something similar, because then we can talk about it. And it becomes, "oh, you're doing that. I'm not the bonkers one." It's okay to put down this book so early. It's okay to go down this rabbit hole where I might not actually use all of the things that I just learned.
Larissa Parson 17:39
Yeah, yeah, completely. And I feel like that, to pick up on the it's okay to put this book down, I have, I have like three books I need you to tell me to put down now. But it's, it's very hard for me to do this. I feel like that is one of those things that keeps a lot of people sometimes from reading as much as they would want to, because they feel like they have to keep going with some book. And it's actually not compelling. Or you feel like oh, well, I spent all this time reading and learning about this thing, I should be doing something with it. You know, this, like, the idea that everything you do should be purposeful, or, quote unquote, productive, or generate income in some way? Is this real fallacy that we need to try to get away from as a culture? Let's see.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 18:26
This is exactly one way we can just do that is just to put down the book or put away the piece that's not working for us. I think this is also one of the reasons I am a big library user. Sometimes we feel compelled to finish the thing because we just purchased it or it was just always given to us. It's here and I feel like I need to do something with it. But this is also another great reason to listen to it as an audio book, right? You don't have to own it doesn't have to take up space. You don't have to have an anti-library if you don't want to. Or go to the library and check out a bunch of things, read some pages, bring back the stuff that's not working for you and move it along.
Larissa Parson 19:09
Yeah, yep. Or, yeah, I'm a big, I'm a big user of the e-library book, because I do read so much fiction that, like, I don't actually need to have on my shelves, like, the 20 romance novels that I read every year. Not all of them. Some of them are so good that I'm like, hmmm, but I don't need to own them. And because for some books, I'm not going to reread them. You know, I'm not going to go back and, like, revisit a passage in there. Most likely.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 19:38
Yeah, yeah.
Larissa Parson 19:38
Yeah. All right. I was gonna...I was just, okay, I do want to pick up on this one thing you said when you talked about loving sagas and epics. I think that's also part of why I like reading, often, often fantasy novels, all kinds of different settings, whether it's kind of like a classical fantasy setting where it's medievalish, or a more urbany setting, something like that. I, part of the reason I love those is because those are often told in multiple volumes of like thousand page books, and it's deeply immersive. It's deeply like, complex, you get these characters who develop over years, as opposed to this quick arc of a few months. And it's just really, it gives you this deep experience that you don't really get by binging a show on Netflix. You know, it no matter how good it is, the show may be great. I love lots of TV, but it's just not quite the same.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 20:37
Yeah. I so appreciate your language and how you're talking about this. It's this is probably what it means to have an English teacher for 10 years. It That's exactly right. And I'm thinking so "what are my words around why I love the saga so much?" It is deeply immersive. You do get to know these characters so well. And see all of their nuances that you don't necessarily get in a 280 page, standalone book, which is totally fine. I love those too. But there's something just absolutely beautiful and rare, I think to find something I can fall into so deeply like, like a saga or like an epic.
Larissa Parson 21:27
I agree. It is rare to find a real saga a real epic, like something that's super long, but I can immerse myself in. But when I find it, I'm like, I pre order the next book when it comes out. You know, I just really... like this is my, these are my people. I'm invested. I'm in for it. Alright, I yeah, I just wanted to pick up that thread. Because I feel like that's really important. It's important to think like, if we're reading, what are we reading for sometimes we're really reading, not necessarily, I wouldn't even call that escape. But for immersion, which is a little, you know, it is escape, but it's also like, I want to go to there. It's not just I want to get out of here.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 22:07
Mmm...that's a good distinction. That actually resonates with me because I don't want to get out of here; I want to go there. I want to go and do that thing and be right in their pocket as they're doing all of these things, as they're learning all of these bits, and going on all of these travels, and all of these revelations that they're having. I just want to be right there.
Larissa Parson 22:34
Exactly. It's like, it's not that you don't like your home, it's that you want to go to the beach sometimes. Or, you know, to a setting 1500 years in the future whatever.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 22:45
Yes, yes. Yes.
Larissa Parson 22:46
Or, or any other alternative world? Yes. So, um, I could keep going about this, but maybe we should move on to our last question for today because there's, there's no way we're only doing one books episode. Who's on our shitlist? So, who do we not want to go hang out with in their pocket while they're doing things? Who's on your shitlist, Elizabeth?
Elizabeth M. Johnson 23:16
Actually, I have some people. Right now. All the white male fiction writers are on my shortlist right now they are like they are on a shelf that I may go back to in January 2023. And everyone needs to hold me accountable on this one! Because I am so done with the mediocre fiction that I am reading when it's given to me, or it's a book swap. But I'm so out of patience. I'm not even willing to give the book a try any longer. I just see that it's by a white male author and I'm like, "okay, I'm done with this." I will give it to my husband and see if he's interested and or I will send it on to the next person. But I am done with the mediocrity. And so that's whose on my shitless right now. I am not sure I'm going to hold myself to the same thing for for the white male nonfiction writers. So I'm going to I'm going to give myself some space on that one. For right now. It's all the white men writing fiction, beware I'm not reading yours.
Larissa Parson 25:04
I'm here to cosign on that. I don't think I have much to add really. Okay. Since I hardly ever read any nonfiction by white men, that's not a hard one for me. And fiction by white men, there's one exception that I can think of off the top of my head and, and he's a fantasy author. And I'm waiting for the last book in a series. And there are other than that, like I just didn't generally don't tend to read, I don't tend to read very many men to begin with. But especially not white men. So that's an easy one to cosign on to and yeah, I don't have any particular authors on the shitlist. But um, I'm here for let's not read a whole bunch of white guys this year.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 25:49
Yeah.
Larissa Parson 25:54
I guess that wraps us up. I guess that wraps this episode on books.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 25:58
It does.
Larissa Parson 26:02
We want to thank everyone for listening. And if you'd like to support our work, this is a reminder that our patrons find out first when the new season drops and get bonus content. You'll find us at patreon.com/wondermine.
Elizabeth M. Johnson 26:17
We are so grateful every time you share Wondermine with friends. Writing us a review will help others find their wow and how of living a life rooted in curiosity, community and liberation.
Larissa Parson 26:31
And in the interim, you can follow us @Wonderminepodcast on Instagram. Thanks again everyone. We're so delighted you've been listening.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
