A Meal of Thorns

@mealofthorns.bsky.social

2874 Followers 156 Following

A speculative book club, where critics, writers, and scholars join us to talk about thorny, interesting titles. A podcast from the Ancillary Review of Books. https://ancillaryreviewofbooks.org/amealofthorns/

A Reverend Mother from Dune saying "Our plans are measured in several weeks I guess."
A clip from our episode on Ready Player One.
The cover of Max Payne, a stencil spray-paint-style portrait of a guy with a gun on a brick wall behind yellow police tape that says Do Not Cross A Man With Nothing To Lose.
A black and white image of Tracer Bullet, Calvin from Calvin & Hobbes' PI alter-ego, a shadowy smoking figure with a fedora.
A short clip of the episode, showing the book cover for the DEEP SEA DIVER'S SYNDROME, Kilgore Trout's VENUS ON THE HALF SHELL, and an image of J.R.R. Tolkien smoking a pipe labelled "Cordial Dislike Alert".
Image of graffiti that reads "sous les podcasts, le tableur
A short clip from the podcast, with Casella contrasting the post-scarcity vibes in Diaspora with those of Banks' culture novels, and Eden bringing up the idea of the coherence theory of truth as a way to think about how Egan is approaching knowledge.
A short clip from episode 41, with Casella and Marisa comparing shape-shifting & devolution in The Beetle with Dracula, the Island of Dr. Moreau, Jekyll & Hyde, and Heart of Darkness.
Greg Egan's DIASPORA, a mostly-black background with scattered star-like points clustered around a central point, with a skeletal octahedron in the foreground.
Jon Tattrie, a man with black-rimmed glasses and a purple sweater, and one of the covers of Saunders' IMARO, showing a muscular Black man with a bloodied sword standing triumphantly over a crowd of figures and a lion.
Image of graffiti that reads "sous les podcasts, le tableur."
the famous photograph of Churchill, FDR, & Stalin (and various others) at Yalta, but faces have been replaced with the icons of By-the-Bywater, Hugo! Girl, Critical Friends, and A Meal of Thorns.
Tiffany Pollard "Beyoncé?" meme but instead it says "Igjarjuk?"
A table with bookmarks, flyers, and free books, with one square sticker with the Meal of Thorns logo.
Charles Keegan's Tor cover for Fire Logic, showing a white-looking woman in mail armor and a ripped red cape with a big curved sword, like a falchion-scimitar thing, standing in a rocky pass. Great fantasy painting, doesn't really set you up for this book.
A Meal of Thorns, hosted by Jake Casella Brookins - Hands down the most exciting new podcast project of 2024, this virtual book club from the Ancillary Review of Books
The cover of Kim Stanley Robinson's AURORA, a spaceship that's two rings around a central cylinder, against a field of stars, and a picture of Hilary Strang, a white woman with glasses and long brown-blonde hair.
The "brazil mentioned" image of the anime character Yui Hirasawa, in a pink and beige hoodie with a snail on it, arms raised with a bottle of champagne in one hand and a glass in the other, but instead of her face it's a cartoon portrait of Ernst Bloch by Pascal Kirchmair.