subscribing<\/a>. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.<\/p>\nBri, thanks so much for coming on to chat with us. Would you start by just telling our listeners a little bit about what you do at SciAm and, of course, how it involves books?<\/p>\n
Bri Kane: Well, my day job is helping our contractors, writers and illustrators with their contracts and their invoices, but as everyone in the office knows, I\u2019m constantly bullying people into reading more books and shoving books in their hand.<\/p>\n
Feltman: [Laughs] Yes, and we love it. We love that you do that [laughs].<\/p>\n
Some of our listeners who read Scientific American might already know that you can get awesome book recommendations from there\u2014and not just nonfiction science books: we also talk about science fiction and just our favorite books of the year\u2014so we thought we would have Bri on to talk about some exciting summer reads as a way to give you some stuff to read this summer but also introduce you to the concept of getting book recommendations from Scientific American, because our editors and reporters read a lot [laughs]. Our expertise is: we\u2019re nerds [laughs]!<\/p>\n
Kane: Yeah, I mean, Scientific American has been reviewing books for over 100 years. I\u2019ve been spending a lot of time in our archive this summer in anticipation of our 180th anniversary this August, and we\u2019ve had some really spicy takes on books over the years, and I\u2019m really excited to offer listeners my own spicy takes on books now.<\/p>\n
Feltman: Amazing, so why don\u2019t we start with the more obvious Scientific American book recommendations, the low-hanging fruit: those, like, nonfiction science books that we just have to read this summer. What do you have to recommend to us in that department?<\/p>\n
Kane: So the first one is Clamor by Chris Berdik. It\u2019s a really interesting deep dive into sound and hearing in a whole new way, beyond just the decibel count: how loud our human nature is and how loud we are making nature. It\u2019s a really interesting way to think about your own hearing, and as someone who is spending a lot of time on the New York City subway and trying to go to shows with my friends on the weekend, I\u2019ve never been more aware of my long-term hearing health.<\/p>\n
Feltman: Yeah, that sounds great. And I think if listeners wanna get a little bit more information before they read it, I believe you recently reviewed this one, right? Where can folks find that?<\/p>\n
Kane: Oh, yeah, I\u2019m reviewing books every Friday in our Today in Science newsletter.<\/p>\n
Feltman: So what else do you have for us today?<\/p>\n
Kane: The next one is Empire of AI by Karen Hao. It\u2019s a really buzzy book this year, but it\u2019s really good. It\u2019s an investigative reporter\u2019s deep dive into how AI and the companies that have built it have sprung up so fast and are making millions of dollars. I need to catch up on what\u2019s going on with AI in Silicon Valley, but this is a great one.<\/p>\n
Feltman: Yeah, I love when a book comes along that allows me to rectify the fact that I have been willfully trying to know as little about a subject [laughs] as possible. AI, I haven\u2019t quite been able to do that because it, it is too involved in my life and my job and this industry, but there are definitely things in the tech world where I\u2019m like, \u201cNope.\u201d Everything I\u2019ve learned about NFTs has been against my will. So when an incredibly talented science and technology reporter comes along and is like, \u201cHere, this is everything you need to know about this,\u201d I\u2019m like, \u201cOkay, great. Thank you.\u201d [Laughs]<\/p>\n
Kane: I\u2019ve never been to Silicon Valley, but I still wanna know what they\u2019re up to.<\/p>\n
Feltman: [Laughs] So what other recommendations do you have?<\/p>\n
Kane: I also wanted to recommend Waste Wars by Alexander Clapp. He spent two years living out of a backpack, traveling to the smelliest places of the most beautiful countries in the world, with hidden dump sites in jungles and millions of dollars being exchanged in black market economies just to move our garbage all around the world.<\/p>\n
Feltman: Wow, that sounds great. Do you have any fiction to recommend?<\/p>\n
Kane: There\u2019s a lot of really exciting fiction coming out this year, but one I wanted to talk to you [about], Rachel, is Lucky Day by Chuck Tingle. I know we\u2019re both big fans.<\/p>\n
Feltman: I love Chuck [laughs].<\/p>\n
Kane: Lucky Day, coming out in August, is shockingly funny, and it\u2019s really scary. It\u2019s very existential: What is the meaning of life, and if there\u2019s no meaning in life, what\u2019s my meaning, and where am I going? It\u2019s really funny and really heartfelt in a way that Chuck Tingle can really handle: making you laugh and asking those big, existential questions.<\/p>\n
Feltman: Yeah, I haven\u2019t read that one yet. I know there are, like, ARCs floating around, and I\u2019m, like, saving it, but I, I can\u2019t wait. I love all of his other books, so really excited.<\/p>\n
Kane: Yeah, another really weird and exciting fiction book out this year is Harriet Tubman: Live in Concert by Bob the Drag Queen.<\/p>\n
Feltman: Yeah, that one sounds really interesting.<\/p>\n
Kane: This one no one saw coming, but it\u2019s such a great take on historical fiction. I don\u2019t really read a lot of historical fiction, but I love the idea of taking a historical figure and bringing them to our modern world and [letting] the plot go from there. There\u2019s a lot of real history in this book, but Harriet Tubman has really been put on a pedestal for so long, and she\u2019s treated as a real person, with an incredible history and a searing, intense personality. It was so fun. This one is a great, really fast read\u2014perfect for a beach day.<\/p>\n
Feltman: That sounds great.<\/p>\n
Kane: Another more interesting take on classic sci-fi is Metallic Realms by Lincoln Michel. It\u2019s a really funny and cringey story about someone who desperately loves their best friend and just wants to join their really cool science-fiction writing group\u2014except he can\u2019t \u2019cause he\u2019s not really a writer and he\u2019s really annoying and weird. It\u2019s so funny to be stuck in this protagonist\u2019s head who just doesn\u2019t understand why they are being the cringey one, but they love science fiction, and it\u2019s a really creative version of the story within the story.<\/p>\n
Feltman: Yeah, that one sounds really interesting.<\/p>\n
Kane: And then for my own summer reading this year, I\u2019m working on Octavia Butler\u2019s Lilith\u2019s Brood series. My book club made me read the first one, Dawn, and I absolutely fell in love. It\u2019s a really brilliant and disturbing first-contact story. I\u2019ve never really seen one that handles not only who am I when I interact with an alien, but what is humanity, and where does the line between human and alien blur once we start\u2014copulating, I\u2019ll say?<\/p>\n
Feltman: Yeah, that series has been on my list for a long time. Over the last couple of years I finally picked up Parable of the Sower, also by Octavia Butler, and I was like, wow, I always knew this was a good book; everybody says it\u2014it\u2019s a great book, and I believed them, but it\u2019s also so prescient, you know? Her speculative-fiction writing was just brilliant and forward-looking, so I\u2019m also looking forward to reading more of her this summer, and you have inspired me.<\/p>\n
Kane: Yeah, I mean, Octavia Butler is awesome. The hype is real. Like, if you haven\u2019t checked her out yet, I really recommend checking out the backlist, and if you\u2019re more of a straight science-fiction reader, I highly recommend Dawn and the Lilith\u2019s Brood series; it\u2019s really unique science fiction.<\/p>\n
Feltman: Amazing, well, Bri, thank you so much for coming on and giving us these amazing recommendations. Would you remind our listeners where else they can find info on SciAm\u2019s book lovers and the amazing stuff we do [laughs]?<\/p>\n
Kane: Yeah, I\u2019ll be reviewing books every Friday in our daily newsletter Today in Science. And keep an eye out later this year for our three end-of-year books lists: our staff favorites as usual, but we also have some best-of coming out.<\/p>\n
Feltman: And I am also participating in making that list, so\u2014I\u2019m constantly behind on my reading assignments for Bri, but I [laughs], but I\u2019m working on it.<\/p>\n
And if listeners do wanna sign up for Today in Science<\/a>, which they absolutely should, we\u2019ll have a link in our show notes today.<\/p>\nBri, thank you so much for coming on today.<\/p>\n
Kane: Thanks for having me, Rachel. I can\u2019t wait to see what you end up reading this summer.<\/p>\n
Feltman: That\u2019s all for today\u2019s episode. Don\u2019t forget to subscribe to Today in Science so you can get more of Bri\u2019s recommendations.<\/p>\n
Science Quickly is produced by me, Rachel Feltman, along with Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was edited by Alex Sugiura. Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck fact-check our show. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Subscribe to Scientific American for more up-to-date and in-depth science news.<\/p>\n
For Scientific American, this is Rachel Feltman. See you next time!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rachel Feltman: For Scientific American\u2019s Science Quickly, I\u2019m Rachel Feltman. You might not know this, but Scientific American…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":31100,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[223,88],"class_list":{"0":"post-31099","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-books","9":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}