….Please read these links so I can stop babbling.

This one’s for my Mumsy! The Kew Botanical Gardens guy talks trees.

Imani Perry considers how the global use of the word “auntie” is colliding with the term’s complicated history in Black America.

How has spoiler/anti-spoiler culture affected the way we engage with art? I cannot answer this question because I have never once felt that I understood exactly what constitutes a spoiler to other people.

The new anti-trans executive order in Texas is leading to a mass exodus of child protection workers.

The literature of billionaires (both fiction and nonfiction) is, at its heart, deeply sinister.

Killing Eve chose cruelty in its finale.

Inside the contentious world of font sizes on music festival posters.

My favorite thing about this piece by a scream artist for the movies is her description of how the world of scream acting has changed in response to the explosion of different kinds of roles (and therefore different kinds of screams) for women.

On triplethood and its difference from twinness.

“I can’t shake a sense of foreboding when I consider a Zuckerbergian pornverse.” A visit to the Erotic Heritage Museum for a talk on digisexuality.

White supremacist groups, including domestic terrorist groups, actively prey on and recruit white boys through social media. Teaching kids the truth about our history can protect them.

“they killed someone” like what are you protestant

JK Rowling was not included on a list of 70 great British books. This is not censorship or being silenced.

Amy’s Kitchen assures consumers that it’s a positive brand making positive impacts. OR IS IT? (It is not; brands are terrible; have faith in nobody except for Tony of Tony’s Chocolonely; and not even him; but oh God if it turns out he’s bad I will be crushed.) Anyway, Jaya Saxena is terrific.

Somehow, there was a time before the internet. At least that is what Hari Kunzru claims.

A McSweeney’s quiz about having a toddler in this stage of the pandemic.

Emily St. James considers the parental apology fantasy.

Twitter has been a crucial lifeline for trans people. Will that disappear now that Elon Musk runs it?

With Pamela Paul’s departure as editor of the New York Times Book Review, the renowned book review venue is at a tipping point.

“Feminism, much like BDSM, doesn’t figure into the text of the Fifty Shades trilogy itself, nor does politics more broadly.” Happy tenth birthday, I guess, to Fifty Shades of Gray.

What’s going on at Netflix?

“Am I a book stylist? I am not. Or maybe I am, I don’t know. Would it be the worst thing in the world if I were?”

I’m obsessed with this story of a Grey’s Anatomy writer who just! made up all sorts of tragedies about herself! part one (cw made-up cancer) and part two (cw made-up abuse but also a bunch of real abuse)

Democrats keep getting it wrong on abortion.

Kim Cattrall is happy with her decision to never return to Sex and the City.

This is what a black hole sounds like.

These have been: LINKS.

The post LINKS: Some Links appeared first on Reading the End.

What will football look like in the future (the far, far future)? SB Nation has a go at figuring it out.

Following the death of Otto Wambier, journalist and Korea expert Suki Kim argues that tourism to North Korea serves no legitimate purpose.

Some people get very mad when JK Rowling says stuff about Harry Potter. My pal Ben Lindbergh argues at The Ringer that there’s no point being mad about it.

This movie review is magical. I loved every word of it, from the first line all the way through to the ending. Props.

This book review is also magical. Reviews are magic. Thank you, God, for giving us reviews like these.

Three books about (kind of) One Direction fandom that sound great. And I mean, one of them is great. Cause I read it. And I really liked it.

Janet Mock on “pretty privilege,” which is for sure a real thing.

In honor of the Fourth of July, Karan Mahajan writes about the American institution of small talk (and its trickiness to master).

Juliet Litman weighs in on the mess that the Bachelor franchise has made of itself.

The Public Religion Research Institute has a new study about the way Americans in different demographics perceive discrimination in this country and what should be done about it.

This story about the Philip Pullman bid in Authors for Grenfell Tower will never not make me teary.

What are the books that colleges are giving incoming freshman to read? My main takeaway from this article is that everyone else got to read awesome stuff and we had to read goddamn Fast Food Nation.

Have a great weekend, my lovelies! I will be making homemade Oreos, editing podcast, constructing a dollhouse, and hopefully getting some reading done and WATCHING BLACK SAILS OMG.

The post The Future of Football: A Links Round-Up appeared first on Reading the End.

How to cull your books: The Awl guide. Let me tell you my method, team. Take all the books. Line them up on the floor, right to left, by how much you love them. Then draw a line somewhere in the middle of that long line of books and cull everything to the left of your line. Boom. Done.

More on fan entitlement (and a bit of side-eye for Steven Moffat, which I am never not here for) from The Mary Sue. I’m really digging Maddie Myers’s work on The Mary Sue these days, y’all! Go follow her on Twitter, I like where her head’s at.

Speaking of things I’m never not here for, Jonathan Franzen gave an interview to Slate and it’s everything I could have asked. He has never been in love with a black woman and he suspects poors don’t like him because he enunciates and wears glasses. What a great world.

Mm, Elizabeth Minkel gets real on why she doesn’t believe that The Cursed Child is fanfic.

Holy crap, y’all, Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes went on a road trip one time. They had funsies. Let’s turn that into a movie.

Aaron Sorkin’s online screenwriting class is everything you want it to be. Ben Lindbergh reports for The Ringer.

Matt Zoller Seitz on the decline of the serialized TV drama.

Why Twitter attracts trolls.

Diversity in book publishing. The last two years have seen a marked increase in books by POC authors, but the staff of the publishing industry remains overwhelmingly white.

Being stuck without a book is the worst. I believe we can all agree on that. When was the last time you needed a book and didn’t have one?

The post Demand the Hurston-Hughes Road Trip Movie We All Deserve: A Links Round-Up appeared first on Reading the End.

You can listen to the podcast in the embedded player below or download the file directly to take with you on the go!

Episode 62

Listen to Ben and Sam’s interview with Stompers alum Santos Saldovar on their podcast Effectively Wild.

This is Lil Sebastian West. I’m calling him that because he lives in the western part of the country. You get it.

You can find Ben on Twitter and at his book’s website, and you can listen to his and Sam’s baseball podcast, Effectively Wild, here. Get at me on Twitter, email the podcast, and friend me (Gin Jenny) and Whiskey Jenny on Goodreads. Or if you wish, you can find us on iTunes (and if you enjoy the podcast, give us a good rating! We appreciate it very very much).

The post Reading the End Bookcast, Ep.62 – The Only Rule Is It Has to Work appeared first on Reading the End.