100 episodes
Two Month Review Three Percent
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- Arts
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4.8 • 35 Ratings
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Each “season” of Two Month Review highlights a new and amazing work of world literature, reading it slowly over the course of eight to nine episodes. Featuring a rotating set of literary guests—from authors to booksellers, critics, and translators—each episode recaps a short section of the book and uses that as a springboard for a fun (and often irreverent) discussion about literature in a general sense, pop culture, reading approaches, and much more. Talking about great books doesn't need to be deadly serious, and 2MR makes it fun to everyone (even if you’re not reading along).
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TMR 23:6 "Upon This Spot King Edward Had Lunch After Stalking" [Lanark]
If you want to send Chad through the roof, simple crap on his conceptual publishing project five years in the making . . . To that end, everyone reading this should preorder Attila by Javier Serena and Attila by Aliocha Coll and prove our distributor wrong. And then, after you do that, listen to this discussion about art and audience, the frontispiece for Book 4 of Lanark, parallax views expressed in the novel, the pull (or non-pull) of the Unthank sections, and much more.
This week's music is "I Touch" by Jockstrap.
You can find all previous seasons of TMR on our YouTube channel and you can support us at Patreon and get bonus content before anyone else, along with other rewards, the opportunity to easily communicate with the hosts, etc. And please subcribe and rate us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tune in next week for more banter and analysis live on YouTube where we will be discussing pages 398-454 of Lanark by Alasdair Gray.
Follow Open Letter, Two Month Review, Chad Post, Kaija Straumanis, and Brian Wood for random thoughts and information about upcoming guests. -
TMR 23.5: "His Brain Rotten with Resentful Dreams" [Lanark]
Duncan Thaw feels like he's on the brink in this week's episode which includes conversations about incels, kind fathers, painting and art, perfection and Aliocha Coll, and much more.
This week's music is "Here's Your Future" by The Thermals.
You can find all previous seasons of TMR on our YouTube channel and you can support us at Patreon and get bonus content before anyone else, along with other rewards, the opportunity to easily communicate with the hosts, etc. And please subcribe and rate us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tune in next week for more banter and analysis live on YouTube where we will be discussing pages 335-397 of Lanark by Alasdair Gray.
Follow Open Letter, Two Month Review, Chad Post, Kaija Straumanis, and Brian Wood for random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.
All our large images are AI generated. -
TMR 23.4: “Homo A Se Coctum Esumque Crustum Est Hoc Fecit Separation” [Lanark]
Chad and Brian break down the loss of Duncan Thaw's mother, his entrance into art school, his reasons for creating art, religious imagery throughout the book, fathers who are better than Bandit, mispronounciations, the "engine" that drive the two distinct parts of this novel, and much more.
This week's music is "It's All Gonna Break" by Broken Social Scene.
You can find all previous seasons of TMR on our YouTube channel and you can support us at Patreon and get bonus content before anyone else, along with other rewards, the opportunity to easily communicate with the hosts, etc. And please subcribe and rate us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tune in next week for more banter and analysis live on YouTube where we will be discussing pages 268-334 of Lanark by Alasdair Gray.
Follow Open Letter, Two Month Review, Chad Post, Kaija Straumanis, and Brian Wood for random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.
All our large images are AI generated. -
TMR 23.3: "Normal Underworlds" [Lanark]
Come for the book discussion, stay for Thaw's unproven remedies for asthma! One of the most fun, and conventional, sections of the book so far, Chad, Kaija, and Brian follow Duncan Thaw through his childhood, discussing his reasonable dad, why math sucks, school journals, and a tinge of sinister violence that might presage things to come.
This week's music is "Isimo" by Bleachers.
You can find all previous seasons of TMR on our YouTube channel and you can support us at Patreon and get bonus content before anyone else, along with other rewards, the opportunity to easily communicate with the hosts, etc. And please subcribe and rate us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tune in next week for more banter and analysis live on YouTube where we will be discussing pages 71-129 of Lanark by Alasdair Gray.
Follow Open Letter, Two Month Review, Chad Post, Kaija Straumanis, and Brian Wood for random thoughts and information about upcoming guests. -
TMR 23.2: "Can He Help Lanark Out of Hell?" [LANARK]
As mentioned from the top, we had severe technical difficulties, so the sound quality on this is janky. (Mostly Chad's voice is quiet, which, for many, is likely to be a relief.) Nevertheless Chad and Kaija power on, talking about "The Institute" as a metaphor, the allusions to Duncan Thaw, dragons, dragon scales as metaphor, the prologue and stories within stories, and then the opening "quest" of "Book One."
This week's music is "Holy Moly" by Young Fathers.
You can find all previous seasons of TMR on our YouTube channel and you can support us at Patreon and get bonus content before anyone else, along with other rewards, the opportunity to easily communicate with the hosts, etc. And please subcribe and rate us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tune in next week for more banter and analysis live on YouTube where we will be discussing pages 130-189 of Lanark by Alasdair Gray.
Follow Open Letter, Two Month Review, Chad Post, Kaija Straumanis, and Brian Wood for random thoughts and information about upcoming guests. -
TMR 23.1: "Book Three" [Lanark]
Mostly a set-up episode about Alasdair Gray and Lanark, in which Chad, Kaija, and Brian discuss the introduction (weird), the start of the novel (which opens with "Book 3"), the influence of Dante's Divine Comedy and Kafka, and much more. There are some good laughs, a bit of insight into where we are, all building toward next week's episode, which will finish Book Three, cover the Prologue, and start Book One.
This week's music is "Anna" by Will Butler, the video for which features Emma Stone.
You can find all previous seasons of TMR on our YouTube channel and you can support us at Patreon and get bonus content before anyone else, along with other rewards, the opportunity to easily communicate with the hosts, etc. And please subcribe and rate us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tune in next week for more banter and analysis live on YouTube where we will be discussing pages 71-129 of Lanark by Alasdair Gray.
Follow Open Letter, Two Month Review, Chad Post, Kaija Straumanis, and Brian Wood for random thoughts and information about upcoming guests.
Customer Reviews
Best Literary Podcast
The only book podcast you'll ever want. They actually offer in-depth analysis of the books they're reviewing. It's basically like all the conversations you wish you had with friends about the books you read. The people who host the show & the guests they have on are funny, entertaining, and knowledgable. The podcast overall allows for a more interesting reading experience if you keep with each episode. Highly recommend giving it a go.
This Should Be So Much Better
The hosts deserve credit for promoting challenging/unusual fiction, especially in translation, but the delivery is hard to listen to. Analysis is minimal and rarely goes beyond “best bits” and inarticulate, chortling college-boy-level enthusiasm. The co-host, Brian, has little to say; Chad can occasionally be roused to make interesting connections about the text at hand; but both can just as easily spend half an hour on what Pink Floyd meant to them in high school and other topics only distantly related, if at all, to the text being discussed. And, despite constant appeals for thoughts and questions from listeners, they appear to ignore them—YMMV. Guests on the podcast are usually scrambling to keep up with the inane chatter — Rachel Cordasco (2017) was an exception in this regard, as she was successful at making interesting observations about the book being discussed and didn’t get diverted by the boys’-club hi-jinks — no doubt the show could use more female guests. I realize the show generally promotes books Open Letter or Dalkey are publishing, so one can’t expect much in the way of discussion of the books’ weaknesses, but listening, you’d think all of the books covered were equally good and without flaw. The books —and their authors — deserve better.
Best literary podcast
Truly one of the best book podcasts out there! In depth, meaningful discussions of awesome books in translation paired with a lot of fun banter between the hosts and invite guests.