A Programming Update for Late August

Close Reads HQ

Panel 58 by Jacob Lawrence (1941)

Hey everyone,

This is going to be one of those updates that comes with an apology. It’s back-to-school time (you don’t need me to tell you that, of course) which means that scheduling has become temporarily very difficult. Sean is both a teacher and an administrator (plus a parent, choir member, etc., beyond his duties here at Close Reads) while Heidi is, in addition to all of her classroom work this semester, sending her oldest child off to college. In fact, as I type this, she and Scott are in Annapolis, Maryland dropping Jack off at St. John’s College. You can imagine where her head and heart are right now.

So please forgive us when I sadly announce two things:

• First, we won’t be recording a Q&A episode for Sing, Unburied, Sing. We simply couldn’t find a time to squeeze it in. We will, however, set up a thread on the chat feature here on CRHQ (here) and we will answer some questions there. Please don’t hesitate to ask away.

• And second, we won’t be able to fit in a live poetry hour before the end of August and instead will have to reschedule for early September. Subscribers, we will share a date and time soon! To (somewhat) make up for it will be dropping this month’s mystery episode on Friday of this week.

I’m sorry on both counts. Things should be more normal once September rolls around. Speaking of which: here are the schedules for the next handful of weeks . . .

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Upcoming Schedules

As always, the dates posted here are the days the episodes will drop, not when they will be recorded.

Schedule for Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont

August 26: Chapters 1-6
September 2: Chapters 7-12
September 9: To the end
September 16: Q&A episode

The next book after Palfrey will be Viper’s Tangle, which we will begin in late September. Schedule coming soon.

Schedule for Mansfield Park

Jane Austen’s third novel (considered by some people on this podcast to be her best) will be our next book on CRHQ. If you’re subscribed you’ll have access to these conversations. Austen is always a treat to read and discuss.

Please note: In order to do two Q&A episodes on Kristin Lavransdatter we have decided to bump the start of this series to September 13.

September 13: Volume 1, chapters 1-5
September 27: Volume 1, chapters 6-11
October 11: Volume 1, chapters 12-18
October 25: Volume 2, chapters 1-4
November 8: Volume 2, chapters 5-9
November 22: Volume 2, chapters 10-13
December 6: Volume 3, chapters 1-6
December 20: Volume 3, chapters 7-12
January 3: Volume 3, chapters 13-17 (end)
January 17: Q&A episode

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Monthly Mysteries

We’ve been enjoying our series of episodes dedicated to mystery stories (or as Heidi refers to them, “the murder pods”), and in August we’ll be discussing Jumping Jenny (this episode will be up on Friday of this week), an incredibly fascinating novel that turns things upside down in a unique way. This is a fun one to discuss!

Upcoming

• August: Jumping Jenny (Anthony Berkley)

• September: The Case of the Gilded Fly (Edmund Crispin)

• October: The Chill (Ross Macdonald)

• November: A Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side (later Agatha Christie)

• December: The White Priory Murders (Carter Dickson)

Past episodes

• Strong Poison (Dorothy Sayers) - Listen now

• The Mysterious Affair at Styles (Agatha Christie) - Listen now

• Post After Post-Mortem (E. C. R. Lorac) - Listen now

• The Franchise Affair (Josephine Tey) - Listen now

• Death of Jezebel (Christianna Brand) - Listen now

• Father Brown (Chesterton) - Listen now

• The Maltese Falcon (Dashiell Hammett) - Listen Now

Should you, hypothetically, wish to buy any of these titles through Goldberry, you can do so here at Bookshop.org.

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ICYMI:

• You can claim a seat at our upcoming Close Reads conference on humor in literature. Join us!

• You can pre-order Lumen now!

Happy reading!