Fabulous Misfit Book Club!

Episode 8 - Fabulous Misfit Book Club!

[00:00:00] 

Hello, you fabulous misfits. Do you get a warm, fuzzy feeling just thinking about books? Do you get excited when you think about going to a bookstore or a library? What about imagining sitting in a cozy chair with a warm cup of coffee or tea with pages in front of you? The touch and the smell and the possibility of new ideas.

If you love these things as much as I do, you're in for a treat today, this week I'm gonna share some books that have helped me become a better person, to have more hope in the world. That have helped me grow and stretch to understand myself better, understand others better, and I'm hoping that these books might also help you and also help us to start a conversation about books.

It was really hard to narrow down this list, so suffice to say this will not be the last book episode that I do. I've [00:01:00] chosen things that have impacted me kind of the most recently. so, this is definitely not an exhaustive list in any way 

If you have some ideas for things that could help me to understand you better, or something that's just been really remarkable that you've read recently, I hope that you'll engage with me and let me know what those book recommendations are. 

I feel like some of the best gifts I've ever been given have just been book recommendations. Growing up feeling awkward and outta place and nerdy as a kid. I found a great deal of solace in books and to this day, um, there's just very little that can give me as much joy as, as the thought of reading a new book.

So if you're new to the podcast, you're listening to Belonging in the South, A Guide for Misfits. And I'm Rebecca Lauderdale. I'm a physician in the South with a fascination for people who learn to be their truest selves. And the mission of this podcast is to help Southerners of [00:02:00] all kinds to find belonging and community without having to change who they truly are.

You might notice my voice is a little hoarse. I've got a cold and I went to Jazz Fest all day on Friday in New Orleans and really enjoyed Lizzo. so I haven't had quite as much time either to produce this episode, so it's not quite as polished and fancy as usual, so I hope you still enjoy it just as much.

Before I get into the list of books, I wanna make sure you listen to the end because I've got a new segment. I'm gonna start, including at the end of my episodes called Inclusive Southern Spaces. And I'm gonna briefly feature an organization or a business, some kind of place Whose values are similar to those of the podcast Inclusion and fostering diversity and understanding across difference and helping to make people feel like there's a safe place for them to be who they [00:03:00] are.

 so today will be my first feature, and that'll be at the end after I talk about the books. So, This is your cue to get cozy. Maybe grab your favorite drink and let's talk about books. You ready? So book number one is The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker

 This is the one of the books I'm gonna talk about today that you're probably the most likely to already know. Or at least have heard of. Priya has been on a lot of podcasts, high profile ones over the past year and a half since her book came out. And they are all really good episodes. Um, they're good introductions to her work, and that's how I found out about her.

She talks about her upbringing at the beginning of the book, and it's really pertinent because she was raised by a mother who was Indian and a father who was a white American man, and they were divorced early in her life [00:04:00] and then went on to have. Other lives and she split her time between their households and she talks about how she was loved and cared for deeply in both places, but that they were very different.

And it makes. Total sense that now she's the person who's helping people to unite across difference and conflict. And that's some of the work that she's done up to this point has been in conflict mediation, but also in facilitating, um, conferences and gatherings and all sorts of things. And the basic premise of the book is that anytime any number of people gather, No matter how small or large, when we put effort into thinking about why we meet and how we can make it more meaningful, it makes our lives better and things can happen that never would have otherwise.

There are a lot [00:05:00] of stories she tells about gatherings from the mundane office meeting to international conferences, to weddings and baby showers and funerals and new kinds of gatherings. So there are a couple ways this book has impacted me that made me wanna share it with you. One, her description of etiquette and ground rules and how to use those in gatherings, really has resonated with me.

And you guys may remember back in my episode about the Mississippi Department of Archives, where I talked about how etiquette. Historically has been used to separate people to signal social class and has been used as a weapon, to basically dehumanize others. And, um, she talks about using ground rules explicitly as a way to help people feel included, to establish ways, for gathering that work to help [00:06:00] people feel like they belong and to keep from having to guess what the rules are.

So, That's really great and, and certainly worth just that bit. And, uh, go back and listen to that episode ar on archives if you haven't. So secondly, some of my best friends and I used principles from this book to plan one of my favorite gatherings that I've ever been a part of last summer, our Body Positive Pool party for a group of about 50 women.

We invited. 

One of the things in the book is the idea that the party starts when people find out about the party. So the information people get in the invitation is really important in setting the tone of the whole gathering. And it's also really important that the purpose is clear. So my friends and I were clear as we planned and in our invitation that the purpose was to have fun in the pool, like when we were kids, without being self-conscious about our bodies, without having to worry about.

Judgment. And then we [00:07:00] also wanted to bring these women who knew at least one of us, but many didn't know each other to help them get to know each other and start some new friendships with people. We loved the idea of our friends becoming friends, and it was magical. Um, it was amazing. We made signs of lights on 'em and, uh, we had karaoke and French 70 fives and a.

Fun bingo game, and we are getting ready to plan another one this summer. So if you want to be inspired to infuse meaning into your gatherings, to create a new kind of gathering, no matter how small or large this book is, what you need from the conceptual parts to the technical parts, like how big of a space for a certain size group, I could go on and on about this subject.

And in some ways it's part of why I'm doing this podcast. This feels like a gathering to me. So I'm trying to use things that I've learned from [00:08:00] the book here. So, okay. Onto the next book, or I'll go on about this all day

So book number two is how Minds Change the Surprising Science of Belief, opinion, and Persuasion by David McCraney. So, David McCraney grew up just down the road from where I live. He's from Sumrall Mississippi and he started out here as a local journalist and then several years ago he launched a podcast called You Are Not So Smart, and it has become huge.

He now interviews like all the good people and he covers cognitive biases and the weird ways that people convince themselves of things that aren't true. Um, And that's when I became familiar with his work, uh, was when his podcast was fairly new. And I think that this book is maybe his third book, and I think it should be essential reading for All Americans.

especially those of us who find ourselves in the position of, of trying to [00:09:00] persuade people who have very socked in religious and political beliefs without losing our minds and being from South Mississippi, he knows that experience. 

So David shares conversations with people like a flat earth who had changed their mind, um, and, and started getting death threats from the flat Earth community, He went and worked with a group of people who have refined a method for canvassing door to door and actually changing people's minds on political issues.

This one specifically was about gay marriage in voting districts in California, and there's a chapter called Street Epistemology where he actually teaches you how to have one of these. Potentially mind-changing conversations on a controversial topic. And overall, the reason I love this book is that it feels hopeful, and I think it's an appropriate hope.

No doubt we've got a lot of work to do in the United States and especially in the [00:10:00] South, to protect the rights of all of us. But this book really did give me hope, and I think you should read it and share it with a friend. So book number three, the Perfectionist Guide to Losing Control by Katherine Morgan Scheffler.

This one I passed over when I first saw it because I thought it was another one of those books that was just like perfectionism bad and stop being perfectionist. I thought it was gonna be another one of those things that was like, you're broken if you feel like a perfectionist. And, um, I have a drive to kind of always be doing new things, achieving things and growing.

And. Having some level of excellence, in the things that I do. It doesn't make me any better than anybody else, and it's certainly at times in my life has been taken to an [00:11:00] extreme that was unhealthy and shame based, but I feel like it's gone a little too far. Um, so. It took someone else mentioning the book and talking about it before I picked it up.

But since then I have bought the Kindle version, the audio version, and the paperback. that's how much good I've gotten out of it. So, um, the author, Catherine Scheffler. Is a therapist who works, exclusively with women, and she has identified five distinct types of perfectionist and has, uh, some questions that you answer at the beginning to help define your, your sort of style of perfectionism.

And then the rest of the book is basically teaching you how this drive that you have as a perfectionist. Can be a superpower to you and helping you to see the ways that it's [00:12:00] dysfunctional in your life and how to find the balance and harness the superpower while not letting it harm you. So I think this is genius.

and everybody should read it. That's what I keep saying about all these books. Everybody should read it. No, read it if you want to read it. And not if you don't, just, if you do read it, let me know what you think. I love, especially things that have some sort of quiz in them that teaches me something about myself.

So that's one of the ways that got me hooked in the beginning. So, the book four is really two books and tho those first three books were obviously non-fiction. So the next, uh, two are fiction. this is the Monk and Robot Series by Becky Chambers. The first book is called A Psalm for the Wild Built, and the next one is a Prayer for the [00:13:00] Crown Shy.

And she won, uh, believe it was a Hugo Award for best series. not too far back. these are maybe a year or two old. Um, really, really good. And I, um, fiction books especially. I think about them in the way that they made me feel while I was reading them. And these are books that are very low stress.

There's not like a lot of conflict. There is peacefulness, but there is constant action. So there's, in no way is it slow, um, or boring at all. these are short books, so I'm, I'm counting them as two because they really are short. without spoiling anything, I'm gonna tell you this cause I know that this is in some of the descriptions of the book.

So, This takes place in a society in a [00:14:00] future alternative world where robots, artificial intelligence has become sentient, and all the robots that became sentient realized that their presence was not good for humans. And that they wanted to learn about the world for themselves, and so they just all left society.

So people have not had any contact with. Artificial intelligence or robots, you know, all these things for, I can, can't really tell exactly how long, but it seems like maybe even hundreds of years. And the story is about a person who has the first interaction with a robot, as they decide to reengage with human society.

And it's really. It's very [00:15:00] beautiful. It's also the first book that I've ever read where, uh, a gender nonconforming person is the main character, a person that goes by they them pronouns, and it's totally like not made into like a big thing It just is. And in that way it kind of reminded me of, um, if you watch Schitt's Creek, how David's character is a queer man and he just is what he is and that the show doesn't like, make a big deal out of it.

And that was the first show that I watched with a queer character where it didn't seem like they were sort of taking a political stand or anything like that. It was just this person is just living their life like everybody else and it's so. Refreshing. Um, and so if this is just, it's great, uh, both of these books, um, they tell the story of the second book as a continuation of the first obviously, [00:16:00] and I don't know if there are more books coming.

There certainly could be more added to the story, but there, this is satisfying enough ending that you don't feel like you're kind of left hanging at the end of the second book, if you know That makes sense. So, Monk and Robot Books by Becky Chambers

So Book five is also not just one book. It is the Lockwood and Co series. It is in a, a young adult fiction series that was written by Jonathan Stroud. It is, Currently streaming on Netflix is a TV show. my husband and daughter and I binged it a few weeks ago and we loved it. And when we found out it was based on a book series, my husband and I started reading it and we're about halfway through the second one.

The, this first season of the show covers the first two books, from what I can tell ends at the end of the first book, so there are five books and so far we've loved it. It's in this alternative present day [00:17:00] London, where there's like ghosts and spirits and stuff, and there's kids that have to go and fight the ghosts and spirits.

And Lockwood and Co is one of the agencies that fights the. Ghosts and stuff, but they're all teenagers, so they don't have an adult supervisor, and so it's fun and it's just the right amount of suspense without being disturbing, you know?

So again, just something good to read, somewhat light, but interesting and a new sort of concept, you know, it doesn't feel like you're reading a story that you've already heard before. So, so that was five books, which is really more than five, and.

So some bonus books that are on my nightstand that I am in the middle of but have not yet finished are

How the South Won The Civil War By Heather Cox [00:18:00] Richardson is not. Just about the Civil War, 

It's actually primarily about the 1964 presidential election, um, when Barry Goldwater was named the Republican candidate, 

 and how a group of conservatives that call themselves movement conservatives, sort of took over the Republican party and 

 They became ideologically very similar to elite slaveholders before the Civil War. They believed that the world was defined by hierarchies where most people needed the guidance of, of.

People who were superior to them, and that the wealth that those lesser people produced as they labored at menial work should funnel upward to the top of society and accumulate in the hands of people who had more knowledge and skills. Um, sound familiar. Um, so anyway, I'm about, uh, [00:19:00] 20. 5% of the way through this one, and there's a lot of mic drop moments and a lot of history that I didn't know so strongly recommend that one.

And then let's see. So the next one on my nightstand that I wanna share with you is a book called Politics Is For Power. How to Move Beyond Political Jism, take Action and Make Real Change, by a man named Eitan Hersh

I hope that I pronounced his first name correctly. E i t a n h e r s H. So this is a book, um, Written by a man who is a data analyst and political scientist. And the premise of the book is that, you can use social science and history and the stories of people who were everyday citizens who have been successful in politics, that you can use that knowledge and.

Move away [00:20:00] from just having a hobby level interest in politics toward actually accumulating power for the causes that you believe in. 

I'm just beginning this one, but I feel like it's gonna be really important. This year's a big election year in Mississippi. It's governor, lieutenant, governor, and all that stuff. And then after that, good lord, help us all. The American presidential elections the next year. Um, so getting ready. All right, that one is politics is for power.

And then the last one is, uh, another, science fiction series written by Becky Chambers of the Monk and Robot Books I mentioned before. Um, this first one is called The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet, and it's just fun. It's like all different species of. Aliens and humans living together on a spaceship and going places.

So far that's what I know, but it's good. And she was just such a masterful writer [00:21:00] in the Monk and Robot books, and I'm looking forward to this story on this one too. So I could go on for days, I could keep, keep coming up with books to talk about. And I will no doubt remember, one tomorrow that I'll kick myself for not mentioning, but I can't let this episode go on forever.

So I think this is a good time to mention bookshop.org. It is an online retailer that represents hundreds of independent bookstores all over the United States. So if your favorite independent bookstore isn't close by or you wanna buy audiobooks, you can do that through bookshop.org and you can choose your bookshop and they get the proceeds from your sale.

I have a page there with some of my favorite books, including the ones that I've mentioned today. And I will put a link to my bookshop.org page in the show notes, so you can easily find those books that I've talked about today and some others that I really love.

And this [00:22:00] also leads me into my new segment, 

inclusive southern spaces where I feature a business or organization. Somewhere that is committed to the values of inclusion and fostering diversity and making people of all kinds feel welcome. And this week for my inaugural Southern space, I wanna tell you about Friendly City Books in downtown Columbus, Mississippi, which is in the northeast part of the state, not far from Starkville for y'all at.

Mississippi State University or from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. From those of you over near University of Alabama. Um, friendly City is. Owned by Emily Leiner, who is an alumni of my high school, the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science. And she opened the store during the pandemic. And it is not only still standing, but it's thriving there.

And I had a chance to visit the store a couple weekends ago when she hosted an event for our alumni weekend. And it's just what you [00:23:00] want in a bookshop. Lots of little rooms to browse. She had prominently featured books from BIPO and L G B T Q.

Authors shed more books than you could ever read. There's a shop dog that you can pet and there's stickers and tote bags and stuff like that. And nearby, there are coffee shops and cafes you can go to for reading your new finds you will leave happy and still wanting more, and that's the best, right?

That's what we want from our, our bookstore experience. So if you are ever in Columbus, go visit Friendly City Books. They have a newly launched podcast called the Friendly City Books Podcast, where they feature authors and tell about great books, and they're also on bookshop.org, 

So you could set them as your bookstore, uh, when, if you don't have an independent bookstore that you already know and love when you shop on bookshop.org.all of those links will be in the blog post associated with this episode. So do [00:24:00] you have book recommendations?

Is there a book you've read that has helped you along your fabulous misfit journey, that helped you understand yourself better or understand someone else better, or was just a really good story? Find me on social media. On TikTok and Instagram, I'm Dr. Lauderdale, Dr. Dot Lauderdale, or you can sign up for my weekly podcast email at belonging in the south.com and just reply to the email you get.

If you guys like hearing about books, I will be more than happy to oblige you in doing more episodes like this, and I'll share your suggestions on my socials too. As always, it means so much to me that you listen and it helps the podcast a great deal if you subscribe or follow.

So if you've found some value in this, I hope that you'll share the podcast and write a review. The reason. All the podcast hosts always say that is that it drives visibility [00:25:00] in podcast apps. It's one of the main ways that this podcast gets to more people is if you review or you subscribe or you share it.

So if you could take like two minutes, maybe not even that long, and rate the podcast right now, that would make such a difference, and I would be so grateful. I hope that you have a wonderful week. I can't wait to be back with you next week. And until then, much love.