Ep. 374 Petty Good or Petty Bad with Ceara O’Sullivan

Written By Wy'Kia Frelot

This week on the Stacks, we are joined by Saturday Night Live writer, actor, and host of the Petty Crimes podcast, Ceara O’Sullivan. Ceara talks about how writing for TV has impacted her TV watching life, the importance of editing in storytelling, and what it’s like to read a memoir by a person you know. 

The Stacks Book Club pick for June is The Art Thief by Michael Finkel. We will discuss on Wednesday, June 25th with Ceara O’Sullivan returning as our guest.

 
 

Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes and on Bookshop.org and Amazon.

To support The Stacks and find out more from this week’s sponsors, click here.

Connect with Ceara: Instagram | Tiktok | Petty Crimes Podcast
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TRANSCRIPT
*Due to the nature of podcast advertising, these timestamps are not 100% accurate and will vary.

Ceara O'Sullivan 0:00

Things hold value because of how much they matter to us, right? And that's what it's all about, like, and so that I that's been like, a takeaway, I don't know, just when it comes to pettiness, but also when it comes to storytelling, like anything can have a tremendous amount of weight, if you want to give it a tremendous amount of weight. And there's also all these studies now that will tell you, like, the importance of gossip, and, you know, just so vindicated, you know, like the banal interpersonal things that, just like, don't matter, and what and why it matters to connect about them, and also the fact that it's a little bit of, like, a female quality, you know, to dwell, to dwell.

Traci Thomas 0:47

Welcome to the Stacks, a podcast about books and the people who read them. I'm your host, Traci Thomas, and today I am joined by Ceara O'Sullivan. She's an actor, comedian, SNL, writer, and one half of the dynamic duo behind the petty crimes Podcast. Today, Ceara and I talk about the ways being a TV writer has impacted her ability to watch television, the common denominator she's discovered behind most acts of pettiness and the books that she loves, plus the thing that gave her hope that she could build a career in comedy. The Stacks book club pick for June is the art thief by Michael Finkel. Kira and I will be back on Wednesday, June 25 to discuss the book. Get your copy, read along and check back in for that episode. Quick reminder, everything we talk about on each episode of the stacks can be found in the link in the show notes. If you love the stacks and you want inside access to it, you've got two amazing options to support the work of the show, plus earn yourself some bonus perks, head to patreon.com/the stacks to join our bookish community. The stacks pack and check out my newsletter at tracithomas.substack.com, okay, now it's time for my conversation with Ceara O'Sullivan.

All right, everybody. I'm really excited today because I'm joined by someone who is fancy for a lot of reasons, but my personal favorite reason is because she likes petty things and has a whole podcast dedicated to pettiness, and I got to be on it. I don't know if it'll be out by the time you're hearing this, but you will hear it, and I am at my worst.

Ceara O'Sullivan 2:19

I listened to it today.

Traci Thomas 2:20

Okay.

Ceara O'Sullivan 2:21

It's pretty amazing.

Traci Thomas 2:23

Well, that voice you just heard, that's Ceara O'Sullivan. She is a writer at SNL. She's also one of the co-hosts of the petty crimes podcast with her friend Griff. Ceara. welcome to the Stacks!

Ceara O'Sullivan 2:34

Thank you so much for having me, Traci.

Traci Thomas 2:36

I'm so excited before we get into pettiness, because that's probably where I'm gonna spend the entire hour by accident, not really, but maybe, can you just tell folks a little bit about yourself and, like, just like a dabble into, like, your relationship to books?

Ceara O'Sullivan 2:52

Oh, of course. So let's see, I, I live in Manhattan, I write for television, and I write movies, and I am a lifelong reader. I think I'm especially keen on books because I moved around so much growing up, my dad worked in trucking, and I went to a different school for sixth grade, seventh grade, eighth grade and ninth grade, and then I became a boarding student for 10th grade. So, you know, those are, those are some years where you really should be having some friends, and, you know, sometimes you're not having friends and sometimes you're having books.

Traci Thomas 3:34

That's like, that was one of the first questions I had for you, because I heard you on the sounds like a cult podcast, talking about boarding schools, and I heard you talking about how you'd gone to all these different schools? And I was like, Oh, no wonder she's a reader. Her friends are Ramona Quimby. Like she doesn't know real kids, because every year she has to do the thing where the teacher's like, and now we have a new student. Exactly, is that? How you say it exactly?

Ceara O'Sullivan 3:58

Because my name, I mean, my name is spelled C, E, A, R, A, it's Kira. But of course, it looks like Sierra, and having this difficult to pronounce name is like, it's basically like a built in barometer for my own self worth, because I can tell depending on the day, like, sometimes the dental hygienist is calling me Sierra, sometimes a date is calling me Sierra. I mean, not anymore. I'm married now, and my husband knows how to pronounce my name. He better. He better did the priest on our wedding day. He did not, and that was too bad, but it is what it is.

Traci Thomas 4:28

Okay. Okay. Are you one of those people that if someone says your name wrong, you let it slide, or do you say it's pronounced Ceara.

Ceara O'Sullivan 4:37

Um, if it's like a one off interaction, and the person is just, you know, so and they're just being polite. I'll just let it go. But if I'm gonna have repeat interactions, I've, I've tried to get good at saying and my name is pronounced Ceara.

Traci Thomas 4:52

I feel like there's, I've talked about something about podcasts before, but there's people whose names like Steven or Stefan or something like that, and they. Don't care. They're like, Oh, either one. And I'm like, What do you mean? Either one? Those are two different names, right? And it makes me crazy because I'm like, You, I have a strong opinion about this. You should have a strong opinion about it because it's your literal name.

Ceara O'Sullivan 5:13

Yeah, that is I that is so surprising to be but my pet peeve when it comes to my name is when someone says they'd like to call me Sierra as a nickname, oh, I'm like, that saying my name wrong is not a nickname.

Traci Thomas 5:27

That's confusing. Wait, so they'll so they'll say, Oh, Sierra, and then you'll say, oh, it's Ceara. And I said, Well, can I call you Sierra as a nickname?

Ceara O'Sullivan 5:34

Yeah, yeah. I'm thinking of like boys in high school, girls, girls in college. And I was like, Oh no.

Traci Thomas 5:42

That feels very okay. That feels very bad. That, to me, is a reason to become petty. If you weren't already like, I would be like--

Ceara O'Sullivan 5:51

Definitely, yeah, definitely. I think having a difficult, pronounced name made me petty. I think moving all over the place and meeting so many interesting people made me petty. All of it, I think, I think real estate agents made me petty. I spent so much time with them, and I was like, I can't I one time in seventh grade, was looking at this house. It was an A frame house, you know, one of those houses where it's all roof, there's no house, yes, it was this brown a frame house. And you know, maybe it was kind of a vibe, but at the time, I was like, Oh my gosh, this brown a frame house full of brown shag rug. And the real estate agent was trying so hard to sell my mom on this house. And I walked up to the real estate agent and I said, this house is a crab shack. And ever since then, my family's been like, is it a crab shack? Ceara.

Traci Thomas 6:49

Wait, that's amazing. My mom works in real estate, so I also spent a lot of time with real estate agents, but because she would have to go to open houses every weekend to like network, I despise open houses. And my husband's always like, oh, let's go look at this house. I'm like, I'll never do it. You can't make funny. I hate it. I hate filling out their little sheet, writing a little name on it. When you were moving around. Was it regional, or were you all over the country? Were you International? Where were you living?

Ceara O'Sullivan 7:19

I was in New Jersey. I was in New York, I was in Michigan, I was in Ohio, I was back to Michigan, I was back to New York, kind of just, just random places, really.

Traci Thomas 7:30

And for real, were books your friends? Or did were you able to make friends? You're pretty outgoing, so I'm curious why I was like as a kid.

Ceara O'Sullivan 7:39

Yeah, books were, for sure, my friends. I am. I'm sort of your classic fantasy first, ya reader turned adult reader of fiction and autobio autobiographies. That's really where I go. But yeah, like you know your Harry Potter, your Aragon, your city of ember, your hunger games. It's like you're, I'm totally, you can now totally tell that I'm 32 years old, yes, by this, like.

Traci Thomas 8:11

So you're a little bit younger than me.

Like, all those, yeah, yeah. I loved, I would, and I would stay up all night long reading. And now the type of reader I am is that I now do audio books, because my job is so I'm so in the pages all day and every Tuesday, I write with other, with coworkers, not by myself, but I collaboratively write over 50 pages of sketch, right? And so I just am like, and then, you know, and then I'm pouring over pages the rest of the week. So I think because of that, I've now become an audio book girl, okay? And I'm all about having a book in my ear and just stomping around New York City. Or sometimes I do this thing if I haven't gotten any steps in, because I've had a really busy day. Really busy day at work, I will stomp around my apartment at night with a book in my ear. And my husband is like, Please, honey, you are doing laps around our one bedroom. It is like, please stop doing that.

That is so funny. I love book in my ear. I've never heard anyone say it like that, but I love that.

Ceara O'Sullivan 9:20

I love having a book in my ear.

Traci Thomas 9:23

Okay, I too, love a book in my ear. I am in LA so it's a lot of car book time, as opposed to, like, directly in my ear headphones time. But I'm a big, big lover of audio books. But I'm wondering, then, as a writer, are has your taste in reading changed because of what you're writing like? Can you read funny books, or are you turned off by that because you're writing funny stuff all the time?

Ceara O'Sullivan 9:52

That is such a good question. I do find myself gravitating toward books that are dis. Similar from the type of writing that I do. So for a while, I got on a Reese Witherspoon book club kick, and I was kind of just like, you know, just going beachy, easy romance, right? And then I'm sure, like, some of your listeners have had, or maybe you've had this experience, if you've read any of those, I got fatigued after a while because I was like, this is okay. I've, we've explored the themes. I'd love some new themes. Like, yeah, I'm not too critical of books that are humorous, but I am super critical of television because I write for TV. Got it so I'm more so, like, if I'm trying to watch something and it's I'm like, I'm watching the Edit, and I'm thinking, like, you used that take, you used that shot. You didn't think you needed to punch up for that line on set. Got it, got it. So and the and, I mean, this has nothing to do with books, but the way that ends up affecting me is that all I want to watch is reality TV.

Traci Thomas 11:05

Oh because you don't know the like world of that show.

Ceara O'Sullivan 11:08

Yeah, exactly. I don't know what it's like to be a producer on a reality TV show. And also those lines of dialog are, for the most part, not written. So I'm not judging the writing or the writer's choices. I'm just like, wow, look at you. Go Lindsay Hubbard on summer house.

Traci Thomas 11:25

Well, that makes total sense. I feel like that's very relatable. Because, yeah, sometimes now when I'm reading certain books, I will, I started to get annoyed with the editor. I'm like, who's your editor? You know? Because I've read too many books. I know too much about what's possible, what choices can be made. And so oftentimes I start to get really cranky about or I get cranky about what the marketing copy says on the book versus what's inside the book, like stupid things that you know a regular person who's not reading as much as me isn't really paying attention to or thinking about. So it makes total sense that in the world of TV, you would be critical of things that a lay person would never notice.

Ceara O'Sullivan 12:04

Do you are you now familiar with the work of certain editors? And you know, like, this is an amazing editor.

Traci Thomas 12:10

Look at them. Go, yeah, I started tracking editor. I have this intense reading spreadsheet, and I track every book that I read, like, you know how many pages when it came out? All that. But I also started tracking editors recently. Yeah, there's now I have favorite editors for sure where I'm like, oh, this person edited it, I'll read it.

Ceara O'Sullivan 12:28

Wow, that makes so much sense to me. Because in television writing, we have a thing that we say, which is that, like, you know, a story is told in the edit and it's, you know, and at SNL, we really tell many stories. You learn so much about storytelling, but it's in such a truncated format. And when we, when I write a pre tape, which is, like, that's one of the, you know, that's like a lonely island, or, you know, a please don't destroy video, or it's a digital short like it's the ones that don't happen live on, you know, in the studio on Saturday, and we film them on Friday, and then the editors edit all night long, and then you come in on Saturday morning to watch a first cut, and the first cut is always garbage, and you have to know how to take the and they've done Amazing work. It's actually insane that they managed to pull they managed to pull that off. Yeah, we all agree, yeah, it's not, it's not out loud, it's not ready. And you make so many changes just in the Edit to tell the story, and it has nothing to do with what was on the page and what was captured on camera. And so that I've never, I haven't given a lot of thought to editors of books, and now I'm going to.

Traci Thomas 13:43

Yeah, I had not either. And then I kept certain names kept popping up when I would read the acknowledgement of the book, yeah. And that's when I was like, oh. And I think we did a book club book that had the same editor of a book that I sort of liked, but I felt like it fell apart at the end. And that's the same way that I felt about the book club book that we did. And then someone was like, oh, you know, those two books have the same editor. And that's when I was decided I'm gonna start tracking editors, because I it's crazy that, like, the same problems could pop up, or the same successes could pop up. Yeah, I'm convinced that publishing should be marketing their editors in the same way that a rich Witherspoon's book club, because if I know that I like five books you've edited, when I find out what's coming next, I'm gonna bump it up on my list, because I know that I like the work that you do in the same way that you trust a Reese or an Oprah. And you know what those books are gonna be, but editors are weird, and they don't wanna be in front of the camera, and they don't wanna be the star, and it's a different personality type, but I'm over here screaming at every publishing person I meet, telling them, please make your editors a star.

Ceara O'Sullivan 14:47

Well, I think you are really onto something, because the more people you can introduce to the audience in connection with a story, the better. Like, I agree. You know. When a TV series comes out, and you know who the director is, and you know who the star is, like all those people are what make you excited? So, like, if you can find another person, other than the author--

Traci Thomas 15:14

Yeah, especially, I think that would really help debut authors too, because I don't know you. I don't know what to expect from you. I can read the marketing copy, but I might not be able to trust it, right, or it might not be telling me what I want to know, but if I know that Ceara O'Sullivan was the editor, all like, Oh, great. I know what to expect. I'm going to check it out. I think you're right. The more people you can introduce, like, connected to the project, the better. Yeah.

Ceara O'Sullivan 15:40

In the same way that, like, you know, publishers have great reputation, yeah, that's those are, ultimately, those are people connected to a project, Yeah, same way that, like, I know I like a 24 and the people at 824, and they have good taste.

Traci Thomas 15:51

Yeah, totally. I mean, I think that's why, when you know who the showrunner is on a TV show, and, like, if someone says, Shonda, like, Okay, well, I'll try it, she's got a good track record with me. It works for me or--

Ceara O'Sullivan 16:02

They didn't. Used to think people cared about showrunners, and now they've realized showrunners are stars.

Traci Thomas 16:06

Now I feel Yes, I Yeah. I remember growing up as a kid, I never, I didn't even know what a showrunner was, and now I feel like showrunner is such a phrase we taught Mike White, you know, yeah, exactly. That's Yes. Editors should be treated like showrunners, some of them might have to stay behind the scenes. They're new. They don't know what they're doing, but your big names, your stars, your in house, people who have been there for decades put them on some things. Let me know. This was edited by Kathy Belden, because then I'm in they deserve credit too. I know they're doing they started. Some books have started putting like cast lists, not cast lists, but credits at the end with who worked on it. And I love those. I'm obsessed with those. I wish every publisher did it, because I also think you know this from writing in a TV space that you don't do anything alone, and when it says written by this person, it sort of, you know, erases all the other people who worked on an episode, even if you know one person took the lead on it. And I just think it adds so much to know who had their hand in what, yes.

Ceara O'Sullivan 17:10

100% like in television writing, the person who created it the like first listed author, they're the person who wrote it first, but then everybody else, like, oftentimes the best ideas came about because they ricocheted off of other ideas. Yeah, like, there was a bad idea on the page and someone pointed out, like, this is really bumpy, and then they had the idea for the better idea. So, like, it's, it's so it's so collaborative, it's actually crazy.

Traci Thomas 17:42

Yeah, okay, I want to shift a little bit to talk about Petty Crimes. Because, Hello, yeah, okay, I'm obsessed with a podcast. Can you just tell people what it is? You'll do a better job than me.

Ceara O'Sullivan 17:54

So Petty Crimes, it's, it's a true crime comedy podcast where we only investigate, basically interpersonal drama. The show is episodic, so each week we have a new petty crime that's been submitted by a listener, and we investigate and deliberate and decide who is guilty, and you know to what sentencing, what sentencing they're owed. And I started the podcast because I, like, I said, Love reality television. And I was listening to some kind of, like reality TV companion podcast, like, you know, those types of podcasts that are hosted by like, a reality star, yeah. And I just found that all the stuff they were talking about, all the exciting drama was happening on the TV screen, and there's nothing left to discuss in the podcast, right? And I was thinking like, I wish there was a podcast that had all of the drama, but in in my ears, right, right? And it's new, and it's not like reductive. And so that was the impetus for the show, and Griff and I have been friends for over 10 years, and we love hosting it together, and you should check it out if you want to.

Traci Thomas 19:11

It's so great. And you guys have such a great bond and relationship, and you're so funny. And I love that you two know each other so well, because things will come up, and you know, one of you will roll your eyes, and another one will be like, I know you're rolling your eyes about this. It's like, almost like, you guys are siblings. I feel, yes, you definitely have big like sibling or high school friend like, really throwback friend vibes. I'm curious if you, in doing the podcast, have discovered anything broadly about pettiness that surprised you or people's relationship to pettiness.

Ceara O'Sullivan 19:49

I have actually so we've hosted the show for it's been, I think, close to 150 episodes. So that's almost three years, yeah, yeah, and maybe, and I guess more, if you were to count the Patreon. And something I've noticed about all of our about many of our submissions like a theme across them, is that oftentimes people write about a situation, and there's one obvious point where someone could have said something and they chose not to.

Traci Thomas 20:27

That was our entire episode.

Ceara O'Sullivan 20:29

Yes, it was, yeah, yeah, the episode that you have to check out that Traci is on, I think we're gonna call it champagne for my real friends, and it's all about these French girlies and not saying what needs to be said. Like, yeah, and so I guess I expect, like, what I like about the show is that it's like, it's all little things. It's nothing like

Traci Thomas 20:59

not real crimes. Yeah, it's not real crime. Like one of the episodes you did with beat, with Brandon Goodman, I loved was about a vibrator and whether a couple was getting a divorce and whether the wife or the husband should have the vibrator, and then something happened with the charger. And, I mean, it's not a crime, no, but it is. It is criminal.

Ceara O'Sullivan 21:21

Yeah. And like, oftentimes I think, like, okay, the amount of calories that you've burned just writing the submission and sending it in, you could have bought a new vibrator in this but it's like, things hold value because of how much they matter to us, right? And that's what it's all about, like, and so that I that's been, like, a takeaway, I don't know, just when it comes to pettiness, but also when it comes to storytelling, like anything can have a tremendous amount of weight, if you want to give it a tremendous amount of weight, like I had this, this song that I wrote at SNL that was a pre tape with Walton Goggins that I wrote for Jane wickline, his new cast member, who I love, and it's just about a woman finding a single baby shoe on the ground and basically deciding that she needs to find the baby that owns this shoe and she will be its mother. And if the baby has a mom, then now it has two moms, and that's going to be what it is. And, like, it's just about, like, this observation being blown out of the water, right? And then, and then, it turns out Walton Goggins is, like, a fully grown ass man with baby feet on the end of his legs. But, like, I don't know, just the idea that, like, you can take really small things and give them great importance.

Traci Thomas 22:37

I mean, I think that's what, that's what I love about pettiness. Personally, as an extremely petty person, I love a detail I'm very detail oriented, and so I feel for me, pettiness is a place that I can really shine, because I remember every tiny little thing, and I will make it the most high stakes thing. I love to bitch about something my brother, my brother is not a dweller on things at all, but my best friend and my mom, they both will will do that with me. And like, a year ago, I was having babysitter drama, and my mom and my best friend were out of the country, so I call my brother, and I'm like, Brady, I have a story for you. And I go on for like 10 minutes, and I'm like, and then I saw her in the blueberry aisle. And then, you know, the blueberries, felt like I'm giving him every detail, yeah, like, and then she rolled her eyes, and me the fucking bitch, right? Going on, I get to the end of my story, and I'm like, can you believe it? And he's like, No, I can't believe it. And I'm like, and then and I go back to the beginning to do a second round through. And he was like, You already told me this, can I go? And I said, No, you cannot go. I said, Are you hearing what I'm telling you? I'm doing round two now. But I like to me, that's the joy of pettiness is you can spin something that is so small to be so big. And I think, you know, the real reason I do it, and probably a lot of people do it because there's so much bad in the world, and it's too much energy to dwell on real horrible things. Yes, it's much more fun to dwell on the babies that are knocking over the blueberries at the grocery store.

Ceara O'Sullivan 24:12

Of course. And there's also all these studies now that will tell you, like the importance of gossip and, you know, just so vindicated, you know, like the banal interpersonal things that, just like, don't matter, and what and why it matters to connect about them, and also the fact that it's a little bit of, like, a female quality, you know, to dwell, to dwell.

Traci Thomas 24:38

Well, I think that's, I think, you know, the gossip part of it is funny, because we're, I mean, we're around the same age, and when we were younger, and all the celebrities and all the gossip magazines and and that was like the biggest media. But in real life, everyone would tell you, don't gossip. Don't gossip. Gossiping is rude. Blah, blah, blah. Meanwhile, our biggest celebrity industry was all around gossip, and I. Think about that so much, it's like I was trained to be a gossip because I was reading People Magazine and watching TRL and doing all of this stuff that was just like commercial gossip. Yeah, tell me I can't talk bad about someone behind their back in real life, because this is what I've been primedto do.

Ceara O'Sullivan 25:16

Exactly, exactly.

Traci Thomas 25:20

Do you feel like there's a difference between being petty and being an actual, like bad person, or are we all on the same spectrum, and sometimes we just spiral out too far?

Ceara O'Sullivan 25:32

I do think there's a difference between being petty and being an actual bad person. To me, pettiness at its core is the want to be right? Okay, yes. So I connect pettiness more with somebody who is a perfectionist or competitive, which I connected me, yeah, like, you know what I mean, and detail oriented. And so I think somebody can be petty good or petty bad, okay, but I do think, if you are a good person, you know when to let things know. I don't, and that's pretty bad, but that's like, one of the themes that we talk about on the podcast is, every so often, you know, somebody will get they'll get some great revenge, and it'll be really poetic and appropriate for the wrong that was done to them, and will say, You know what? You win today, you are not guilty of a petty crime, even though what they have done is guilt is petty right. But other times, somebody will exact some sort of petty revenge that does not fit what has been done to them.

Traci Thomas 26:37

Right, like they'll murder someone instead.

Ceara O'Sullivan 26:39

All the every other episode, no, like, you know, one time. So there was an episode where somebody, their neighbors, their upstairs neighbors, in Brooklyn, were always throwing parties, and then on the Fourth of July, they went into the basement, they used the landlord's key, and they shut the person, person's power off, okay, too far, and their AC couldn't work, and all the food in their fridge went bad, and the woman came down and said, like, can you help me? And they said, like, no, sorry, I can't. And we were like, you too far over you. Overshot, you.

Traci Thomas 27:10

Overshot. You could have like, yeah, maybe just cut the lights for a little bit. Yeah.

Ceara O'Sullivan 27:17

But to be petty is like, I feel like it. You know, to me, the perfect petty person. They know what is an appropriate serving.

Traci Thomas 27:23

Yes, they have the correct dosage, yes, for the crime. Yeah, I love this. Okay, we're gonna come off pettiness for now, but at the end of the month, you and I are doing the art thief by Michael Finkel for book club, and we I let so this is the first time I've ever let my Patreon audience vote for the book club pick, and I wasn't sure what they would pick. I picked for you know, you had suggested Ali Wong, like, I picked a mix of the things that we had gone back and forth about, and I was so excited they picked this book because I've heard that it's amazing, but also it has this true crime element, but it's not violent crime. We're talking about art, so I'm very excited for us to get to talk about that. That episode will drop on June 25 so people listening, you have until then to listen or to read the book to listen, but I'm hoping we get some petty I feel like an art thief's gotta have definitely. I feel like that's the kind of person it sounds like could be petty.

Ceara O'Sullivan 28:16

I'm so excited too. I've heard such good things about this book.

Traci Thomas 28:19

Me too. Me too. And it's so short, it's teeny, tiny, perfect, which, at this day and age, is really hard for me to do long books. So I'm very excited about it. We're going to take a quick break, and then we'll be right back. Okay, we're back. I did not prep you for this. So this is, this is your big test. People write in and they ask for a book recommendation. And this one is sort of hard, sorry, but I think it's a good one. So here it goes. It's from Gina. And Gina says, this year, I unintentionally read a few non fiction books all set during the US Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 60s. I read the autobiography of Malcolm X. Malcolm X by Manning Maribel March, the graphic memoir series, and until I'm free by Keisha Blaine about Fannie Lou Hamer. While I loved each of those titles on their own, I really loved seeing how they were all in conversation with one another, and how together, they gave me a richer overall picture of the civil rights movement than if I had just read one title. So I'm writing to see if you have recommendations for another historical event, movement or period that I could read about through multiple perspectives and books. My mind automatically went to World War Two, Vietnam. But curious, if you have any other ideas, you don't have to offer me a full reading list. One or two titles to kick me off would be great. So first and foremost, I'm gonna start here. I'm gonna give you time to think. So if you need I'm gonna Vamp for a second. First and foremost, Gina, I just released my nonfiction reading guide in May, and I did a whole section on World War Two. It's five books all about World War Two that you can deep dive on. So. So if you want that, if folks want to see that, you can get that by joining the Patreon, patreon.com/the stacks, or subscribing to the sub stack. Traci thomas.substack.com, so yes, that's my plug for the non fiction reading guide. It's 30 non fiction books, and five of them are about World War Two. Now, that being said, I came up with a topic that I thought would be fun to read into, and that is the war on terror. I feel like it's historical enough. There have been a lot of really good books that have come out about it. A few of the titles that I'm thinking of are the Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright, which one the Pulitzer friend of the pod Garrett M graphs, oral history of 911 called the only plane in the sky. There's a book called Reign of Terror. Reign of Terror by Spencer Ackerman. John Crocker, my fave, his book where men win glory, about Pat Tillman. So these are all sort of books related to 911 and its fallout. So that's something that popped into my head. But Kira, do you have any topic moment period that you could recommend a book or two for?

Ceara O'Sullivan 31:02

I do i i think there's, like, there's a really, I mean, my last name so Sullivan. So who would I be if I didn't talk about, you know, Irish immigration the United States. And I was an Irish studies minor in college, and I have, like a great love for Irish authors. And I'm thinking of Brooklyn by Colton Tobin, and I'm thinking of Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt. And I feel like there are just so many great, autobiographical, semi autobiographical, and fiction books about Irish immigrants establishing themselves in New York City, like 1920 to 1950 and just like the best books, also randomly, I feel like fever 1770 to three. But no, I think that's like a little young though. For kit, that's probably for it's probably not for adults Anyway, okay, so that's what I'm thinking of.

Traci Thomas 32:06

That's very good. I'm very impressed by you, Gina, let us know if you read any of our picks. And for people who want to have a book recommendation, read on air, email, ask the stacks at the stacks podcast.com, okay, Kira, you're on the hot seat. Now, this is the Stax questionnaire, two books you love, one book you hate.

Ceara O'Sullivan 32:25

Ooh, okay, let's see, dress your family in corduroy and denim. David Sedaris, that's a love. That's a love. Gosh, I know everybody's read it, but Devil in the White City, that's a love.

Traci Thomas 32:44

I've never read it. I've read his other deal. I read his other stuff. I like him. I just I met him. I fangirled over him. That's just one of the ones I never got to my mom, I think because my best girlfriend, who I like to gossip with, who was out of the country with my mom, not together, she read it when we were maybe in high school or in college, and it took her a really long time to get through it. And she was like, I mean, this book is supposed to be really good, but it's kind of boring. And I think that just stuck with me, even though we were, like, 16. But you know how someone says something like that, and then you're just, you never forget it. And so I just never did it, but I know that I need to.

Ceara O'Sullivan 33:19

You have to, you have to? You have to.

Traci Thomas 33:21

Okay.

Ceara O'Sullivan 33:22

Yeah, no, I loved, I mean, I guess I probably haven't read in 10 years, but I just like, when I'm that's a book I recommend to people when they say they haven't read in a while, I recommend it to guys a lot.

Traci Thomas 33:33

It's definitely a guy. He's like, a guy's author.

Ceara O'Sullivan 33:38

He's like Dan Brown adjacent, yeah?

Traci Thomas 33:40

He's like, non fiction guy, yeah, yeah.

Ceara O'Sullivan 33:45

Okay, a book I hate. Let me think. Let me think. You know what? I was all set on the Canterbury Tales.

Traci Thomas 33:53

Whoa, you read that in school?

Ceara O'Sullivan 33:56

Yes. And I was like, Oh, my God, it's like, reading the Bible, like it's in Middle English. I was like, This is so it's not even reading. It's, it's more like archeology.

Traci Thomas 34:07

I've, I don't think anyone's ever said The Canterbury Tales. I don't know that anybody's ever been on this podcast has even read it, to be honest with you.

Ceara O'Sullivan 34:13

Well, don't, and if you see a copy, burn it.

Traci Thomas 34:17

No we're advocating for burning books around here now, yeah, we're really into it. We hate books here. What kind of reader Are you? Do you read a lot? Will you sit down and read like one book and then not read again for months? Are you a vacation only reader? Like, what's your reading sort of life look like? Once

Ceara O'Sullivan 34:39

I start a book, I finish it pretty quickly, okay? And I am a summer heavy reader. Okay, okay, so we are entering this season of the book. Got it? Okay? But of course, I'm your classic girl who's like, I love to read. And then if you really press me, have I read more than one book in the last month? I haven't Okay, okay,

Traci Thomas 35:01

that's regular. I think that's normal. Do you know that it's regular? I'm regular. 46% of people. I don't know. I saw this somewhere. So who knows what the actual true number is? Did not read a single book in 2023

Ceara O'Sullivan 35:13

Jesus, crazy, right?

Traci Thomas 35:15

I don't know if it's people. It might be Americans. Let me not lump in other people from other places, because I bet they're reading. We're not reading, but not good for your brains. Y'all, yeah, it's we meet. We need to be reading. Can you read multiple books at once? No, no, even if you're doing one. Do you ever do like, one, audio, one with your eyes? Or will you do only one period?

Ceara O'Sullivan 35:39

I actually, I'm a big New York Public Library gal. Got it like, utilize your libraries, yes, and I, when possible, will get the physical copy and the Audio Copy, and I will switch back and forth me, and I will listen on him on the go, and I'll read when I'm home.

Traci Thomas 35:57

I love that's my that's my preferred way of reading. Is doing one book. What's your audio book speed? Are you one? Do you go faster? I do go one. Do you go faster? Oh yeah, babe, I go way faster. Whoa. 1.5 is my bare minimum. That's where I start. Unless someone has an accent, if the audio book reader has a British or Irish accent or something, then I have to slow it down, because my brain can't do that fast, but otherwise I go up, usually 1.5 somewhere between 1.5 and 1.8.

Ceara O'Sullivan 36:27

You know, maybe I should bump it up, because sometimes I am a tiny bit under stimulated. And also, when I'm reviewing my own podcast, I review it on at least 1.50

Traci Thomas 36:37

So I never do podcasts fast. I never don't even do my own podcast fast. I should be doing my own podcast faster. Yeah, I'm like, trying to get information. Wow, this is incredible. It never had occurred to me to do my own podcast review faster. But podcasts, I think people speak the regular speed audio books, they slow way down. Oh my god. Make sure you understand the story, you know. So for me, I'm like, I got it. We gotta go. We gotta go.

Ceara O'Sullivan 37:15

What an astute observation. I'm going to write an SNL sketch about the way audiobook readers read, oh, please do.

Traci Thomas 37:21

There's a woman who I actually love. Her when she's sped up, but when she's slow, she's too slow, but she did station 11. Her name is Kirsten Potter, I think, uh huh. And she's fantastic, like, I think she's a great audio book narrator. But at one girl, we gotta Kirsten, we gotta do it. We gotta do it. But she's she's great. Please do an SNL sketch about this, so that I can then tell everyone I know that I invented an SNL sketch. Because I will, it'll be everywhere. I'll be like, ask Ceara. Ceara knows.

Ceara O'Sullivan 37:53

I and the stack listeners will know. They'll be able to point to this episode and say, like, that's when Traci made that observation.

Traci Thomas 38:00

Oh, my God, it's gonna be in my link to bio everywhere. What are you reading right now?

Ceara O'Sullivan 38:07

Oh, right this second I'm about to start the art thief. Okay, and okay, let me look and see what I have queued up. Yeah. What do you have? Okay, so Griff, who I host petty crimes with, has been all about these sexy fairies.

Traci Thomas 38:22

Oh, that's when I did the show, yeah.

Ceara O'Sullivan 38:27

And I was like, I was thinking to myself, like, Okay, wait, I loved Harry Potter. I loved Lord of the Rings. Am I totally missing out on something I'm absolutely gonna love? And I just told you, I get through books quickly. I'm on chapter 11, and I'm, I don't know if I'm gonna finish it.

Traci Thomas 38:49

I feel like fairies fucking is a little bit different than like Katniss ever deemed. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. I just re read the first three books in the hunger game series, even better than I remember. Wow. They're incredible. I gotta read books four and five. I've never read either. I've never read four and five just came out, but I'm so excited about it. I went back. I'm now Suzanne Collins, biggest fan.

Ceara O'Sullivan 39:12

Love those books. I should do the same thing. I forgot that five just came out. That's crazy.

Traci Thomas 39:18

Five came out and it got like a rave in the New York Times, they're saying it's like their list of best books so far this year, it's on there, which I'm shocked about, not because I don't think it's good, but because the New York Times usually doesn't take YA genre fiction super seriously. Okay, how do you decide what to read next? If Griff doesn't tell you to read very smart.

Ceara O'Sullivan 39:41

I am big on personal recommendations, so trusted sources. My dad is a really big reader, but he's he's a better reader than I am, so sometimes he'll recommend something to me, and I'll find it to be a little dry, like he really recommended. Jonathan, strange and Mr. Norrell, did you ever read that? No, and I, I was like, this is a little dry. My sister, I will say, I think she's, she's reliable, and my aunt Jean is really reliable, okay? And

Traci Thomas 40:16

they're, and what are they recommending to you? What are the last great books either of them recommended to you?

Ceara O'Sullivan 40:19

My sister recommended Maid, okay, and I loved it. Wait, I sometimes do this wrong, because there's one that's Maid and there's one that's The Maid, and I've read them both, but--

Traci Thomas 40:22

Maid is the non fiction and The Maid is the fiction?

Ceara O'Sullivan 40:36

Yes, I want to be recommending The Maid. Okay, I just, I loved it. It was a little different. Like, if you're looking for something like that, kind of, like, I don't know, to kind of break up what you're listening to. I think the maid is a good one. The protagonist is autistic, and she basically, She's a maid at a hotel, and she becomes wrapped up in this event, and she's not able to pick up on social cues or advocate for herself in the way that she needs to. And so there's this really great, you know, dramatic irony. And that's, that's, I would say, like the big, the big device at play there, but the point of view is really interesting. And, yeah, I liked that. Yeah.

Traci Thomas 41:24

What about Aunt Jean?

Ceara O'Sullivan 41:27

She has a book club that is thriving in Columbus, Ohio, and so she's reading. She's shout out to Aunt Jean and her book club. She's reading whatever the gals are reading. Sometimes they're reading a classic. Sometimes they're reading something that's not that good. Kind of depends. I would say her personal taste is like, I think she read, you know, where the crawdads sing, and loved it.

Traci Thomas 41:52

But what's something she recommended to you that you loved? Can you think of any?

Ceara O'Sullivan 41:56

Not a book, okay, but the biggest recommendation my aunt Jean ever made to me that was so impactful, was it's book adjacent, okay? Is the six part BBC, Pride and Prejudice? Have you seen that?

Traci Thomas 42:12

No, you know, I'm not a Pride and Prejudice girl. Oh yeah. It's not for me. I read it. I just do Do you like Jane Austen, no, no, I don't. I really love nonfiction. So nonfiction is really my bread and butter, and when I have to go back and do the classics that that is not for me. However, she wrote Emma, right? Uh huh. I think I want to try Emma. Emma sounds like it is the one that I am most likely to like because I really like a villain character or, like, I like an unlikable woman, those are my favorite kinds of novels, and I think Pride and Prejudice was just a little too earnest for me. I needed one of the sisters to be fucking behind the back or something, you know, like I needed a little more drama. Yeah, have you read Lolita? We did that for a book club this year. Oh, okay, what did you think? Well, I mean, it's pretty unsettling, that's for sure, and it's definitely unlikable narrator. I really appreciated it. It's ick, it's icky, like it's an uncomfortable read. But I liked it. I thought it was a little slow. The Bucha love of language was a little much for me personally, as I mentioned, I like to go a little faster with my reading. Yeah, that was definitely a slow down one. I thought it was a great book club pick though.

Ceara O'Sullivan 43:32

Yeah, I do you like? Are you an imaginative person? Do you feel like, are you more of like, a concrete person, ooh, I

Traci Thomas 43:44

think in some ways, I think I would say I'm more of a concrete person. Though I am creative, I'm generative. So like, I come up with a lot of ideas, but I'm not imaginative per se, but I'm not totally rigid. I have an artist's background, right? Like, I used to dance and I used to act, and so I'm I can imagine, but I am pretty concrete.

Ceara O'Sullivan 44:09

I am, on the other hand, like, very imaginative. And so I will, I don't mind a book that forces me to, like, extend my disbelief really, really far, and has something like, like a play that I really love is the SantaLand Diaries. I don't know it's, and it's, it's a great read too, especially like around the holidays. And it's, it's a one man show about somebody who is an elf at gimbals. Okay? And there are so many times in the play, whether you're reading it or watching it, where you have to extend your disbelief as the audience. And I've heard people say like, this part to me made no sense when he inhabited this other character, and I was like, I have no problem with it.

Traci Thomas 44:53

I can I can suspend my disbelief if you can justify it, but if I feel like you've made a mistake, I. Like that to me is like, I I've said this before, but there was a book I read and the it was fiction, and I was with it, and then the author was like, and then on nine, and then on Monday, September 11, and I was like, No, it was actually a Tuesday, you know. Like, so, like, that kind of thing. Like, a mistake will make me hate your book forever, but I can go with you. Like, if the rules of the world are that we're inhabiting other people's bodies, like, let's inhabit I'm I can do it cool. So I'm sort of in between. I think, Oh, I thought of another book I hate. Oh, yeah, which one the uglies? I don't know that. What is it? Why do you hate it?

Ceara O'Sullivan 45:36

It's, I think they like, just made it into a TV show. I didn't watch it either. I don't know. It was just one of those dumb books that everyone was reading in middle school, and it was about like, You're ugly, and then one day you get to become pretty. And I was like, shut up. That's

Traci Thomas 45:50

the worst that sounds that sounds bad. Okay, you said you're a library girly. Do you also frequent any independent bookstores? Do you have any favorite bookstores?

Ceara O'Sullivan 46:02

I definitely do. I live on the Upper West Side. Not Not afraid for you to know my neighborhood. It's a pretty big neighborhood, and I love the strand, oh yeah, which is right around the corner from me. There's also this really great used bookshop near me. It's called but, and, but I love, like, I love walk. I love this is actually really, a really bad habit. But I love, like, going to different branches of NYPL that are not near me. And I like picking up a book from one place and returning it somewhere else, backing up a book over there that just, it's such a luxury. We're so lucky. Yeah,

Traci Thomas 46:40

I'm in LA, and we have a very large and thriving library, and so sometimes I'll take my kids to a different library near a park. We're gonna try so that we can get, like, different books from a different I love it. I love it. I love what's the last book that made you laugh?

Ceara O'Sullivan 46:58

The last book I read that made me really laugh and really cry, was Molly Shannon's memoir.

Traci Thomas 47:05

Okay? She had a very rough childhood. I had no idea till that book came out. I didn't read the book. My husband listened to an interview and got the highlights.

Ceara O'Sullivan 47:14

I mean, sincerely, like, it's called Hello Molly. And she really, I mean, she had a traumatizing upbringing, like was in a car accident that killed most of her immediate family, and she is unbelievably resilient. I've now had like, the pleasure of meeting and working with her multiple times, and she could not be like a brighter light. It also was you probably have had this experience because you host a literary podcast. I had, not until very recently, I hadn't had the experience of reading an autobiography, autobiography and then meeting the person in real life and being like this is interesting. Yeah, no,

Traci Thomas 47:53

for sure, I feel like that a lot. One of the things that I try to do when I'm interviewing an author is to make sure that I read the book before I ever meet or speak to them, because sometimes meeting a person can really color what I think about the work, both good and bad, and I pride myself on having, like, giving my honest opinion about things, but I am Leo, and I like attention, so if someone is nice to me, I'm gonna be like, I really try not to meet people.

Ceara O'Sullivan 48:22

It's hard not to. We all want to be like, yeah.

Traci Thomas 48:25

So people, but I feel like people know this about me now, and so they've started like, being extra nice to me. I'm not gonna read your book now, but it is interesting. I do remember the first few times I spoke to someone, because it's also like, I know too much about you. Yeah, yeah, of course, yes. It's like, I know too much about you. And I have also had some friends write memoirs, and that's been really interesting, because there'll be things in the book that I didn't know about their life, just like maybe from their childhood, or like personal stories. You know you have friends, and there's certain things that just never come up, or their thoughts and feelings about an event or something that I remember happening, but I didn't know that that's how they felt about it, you know? Just that that is really interesting.

Ceara O'Sullivan 49:11

My mom had a very similar experience of that, where a close friend, who's a very big author, wrote a memoir, and my mom, feel just had a much different memory of some of the things that happened, and she, she's really struggled with it.

Traci Thomas 49:29

That's interesting.

Ceara O'Sullivan 49:31

Yeah, I don't know. And it's, it's hard to say, but it, but I think it makes you realize, in any memoir you're reading like it's, it's that person's version?

Traci Thomas 49:41

Yeah, I think people sometimes get confused about the difference between, like, a memoir and an autobiography or a memoir, and nonfiction and memoir really lives in between those things. It is not fact check. There is no objective in a memoir. It is based on memories. It is based on your own. Creative interpretation of events. And I think sometimes people get mad when not not people who know the person, but just in general, people like, yeah, I don't believe that. It's like, well, that's not really. I'm telling you my version of events in the way that I want to tell you my version of events. And that is just the bargain you make when you read a memoir.

Ceara O'Sullivan 50:21

Which I'm so glad you said that I feel like I've been mentally conflating autobiography and memoir.

Traci Thomas 50:27

They're they're so similar Autobot. I mean, so here's like, the technical difference, if you care, memoir is based in memory. It's usually supposed to be about one event or topic. It's not in the whole life. Autobiography is usually the whole life. It's supposed to be based in fact, though, again, that can be subjective, but it also usually has a political or philosophical or some sort of message. It's trying to get across to you some sort of philosophy of the author. And I don't know if I said this, but it's supposed to span the whole life, I think, with celebrity memoirs now, they sort of are autobiographical in the sense that they span a longer period of time because people want to know, yeah, because people want to know your whole life story, and you're a celebrity but, but it used to be that like memoir, you know, a memoir should be like that time I was a writer at SNL, not Kiro Sullivan's life story that culminates with her writing at SNL, not. I mean, hopefully that's totally, totally but, you know, so So those things kind of conflate. But yes, memoir is is a little more creative writing, and is based in memory and feeling. And so that's why, in a memoir, you'll get someone being like, and then when I was two, I said to my mom, I'm like, bitch. You didn't say shit when you were two to your mom, and you don't remember it.

Ceara O'Sullivan 51:43

So how dare you know I should actually tell this. I'm gonna FaceTime my mom after we are done talking, and I'm gonna tell her, this is about memoir, and I hope that maybe it will

Traci Thomas 51:52

free her. Yeah, I hope it will wait. I have to ask you this because you said that you love Irish literature, yeah. Have you read say nothing about Northern Ireland? No, I haven't. You gotta. Need to. Okay, okay, okay. He's not Irish, from Ireland. Patrick, Radden Keefe, I think he's, like, loosely Irish. I think he mentioned at the end of the book, he's like, I'm kind of Irish. Patrick, you know, go with it. But it's about the Troubles in Northern Ireland, and it is so good. And then they just made the TV show about it. That is also incredible. I know that's not exactly Ireland. Obviously there's some tension there. I read the book, heard about it, but it's so good. And Patrick Rodden, Keith is my boyfriend. I've let him know that many times, but he's he's sort of Eric larceny, but, oh, okay. But more. John crock our Oh, great. I would say he's more in the I feel like Eric, Eric Larson is a little drier. Patrick is kind of give he's there's stuff to sink your teeth into. Oh, cool. Well, I already like Eric Larson, so Okay, and if you do the audio book, it's, it's narrated by someone with an Irish accent, which I did have to slow down. I think I was about 1.2 for that one, but the Irish accent is very, very good. Patrick Radden keep also wrote the story of the Sackler family and Empire of pain is what it was called. And he's really just good at that, like investigative journalism, like fucked up shit guy, kind of guy, that's that's your jam. I forgot to ask you this when I asked you about reading in general, what is your ideal reading setup, location, time of day, snack or beverage.

Ceara O'Sullivan 53:30

I love to read any time of day, but I would say like I want to be on my couch in the afternoon with a cup of tea and a blanket on me and a pile of cats.

Traci Thomas 53:48

That was a surprise. What kind of tea are you drinking? And how do you take it?

Ceara O'Sullivan 53:52

I take an earl gray with milk and honey. Okay, I love this. My my tea is for pleasure, not for service, and oh, my

Traci Thomas 54:00

God, I'm stealing that. I am a milk and sugar tea drinker. And sometimes people be like, that tea is very light. I'm like, Yeah, because I like, I actually put half and half in my tea.

Ceara O'Sullivan 54:10

Oh, that's such that's so good. That's really delicious.

Traci Thomas 54:13

Yeah, are there any books that you would say have influenced your professional career? ,

Ceara O'Sullivan 54:22

Definitely I read Amy Poehler and Tina Fey's memoirs, and love them both. And I'd be lying if I said they weren't they didn't impact me and make me think that I could be a television writer and be a woman in comedy and write for Saturday Night Live, particularly Amy poehlers. And I've met and worked closely with both of them now, like I worked with them on the SNL 50th in February, and had the most amazing experience and learned so much from them. And Amy Poehler went to my college. We were in the same improv group, and I don't I'm. Not a Nepo baby. I'm the farthest thing from it. Like my dad worked in trucking, and my mom was an aquatic director at a YMCA, so like there were no ties to the industry, not even remotely. And Amy, having gone to my college, because Amy went to my college, it made me think, like, Oh, I am connected. There is this thread here.

Traci Thomas 55:24

And what college?

Ceara O'Sullivan 55:27

Boston College, okay, yeah. And that was like enough for me, like, for a pretty long time, for a pretty embarrassingly long time, I was hanging my hat the fact that Amy Poehler and I had gone to the same college and we were in the same improv group, that was like, my somehow, that was my claim to fame.

Traci Thomas 55:43

I'm obsessed with that I love that. I love that. Did you tell her that when you met her?

Ceara O'Sullivan 55:46

I did. I told, I told her at an after party sometime, I was like, hi, and she goes, Kira, I love your tiktoks. You are so and she was like, You're doing so good at SNL. You were so she was such, so sweet to me. And I was like, we were in flea bag. We were both in my mother's flea bag. And she was like, No way, your fleabag. And that's it was, I basically, like, floated out of the after party it. It was honestly one of the best moments of my life,

Traci Thomas 56:20

okay, because you're a TV and film person, I would like to know if you have a favorite book to screen adaptation, and do you have any adaptations you can think of that were better than the book?

Ceara O'Sullivan 56:37

This is going to be controversial. Oh, my God, I can't wait. We love controversy. I read little fires everywhere, and then I watched little fires everywhere. I did enjoy it more on TV. Okay?

Traci Thomas 56:52

I didn't read it or see it, so I have no horse in this race.

Ceara O'Sullivan 56:56

Yeah, that's, that's gonna be, that's one I don't and, you know, sometimes it's, it's all when something hits you, you know, yeah, no, like, and I also love Kerry Washington. So it's like, you know, I love the actor. So that's one. Let's see, I know Legally Blonde is a book that I haven't read, and then it's a movie that I love, and then it's, and then it's a musical

Traci Thomas 57:22

that I love even more. The musical is so good. Wait, I'm so excited that you said that I saw it like four times on Broadway, because it came out when I was in college in New York.

Ceara O'Sullivan 57:32

It's so good. And you can find the MTV bootleg hosted by Lauren Conrad on YouTube if you want to see it. And it's, it's the whole thing is there, and it's effing amazing. And now the prequel series is coming out on Amazon Prime, which is all about Elle Woods as a high schooler in 1995 and people are saying, it's good.

Traci Thomas 57:52

I hope so. Elle Woods is one of the great characters. I The hill I will die on is that Legally Blonde is what Barbie should have been, oh, Uh huh, because Barbie, the actual Barbie, didn't have enough going on. She wasn't likable, she wasn't fighting against anything. I feel like Elle Woods is Barbie just an actual plot and character.

Ceara O'Sullivan 58:16

And yeah, it was interesting the way they went with Barbie. She was so concerned with the fact that she was a Barbie, yeah, but Barbie is not concerned that Barbie's a Barbie. Barbie is Barbie.

Traci Thomas 58:28

Barbie is Barbie. And the whole, I mean, my, my rewrite, would have been that when Barbie got to the outside world, she was concerned about all that was wrong in the world. And so then she, like, Elle Woods, like, goes out and tries to fix things, and like tries to, like, build a house for homeless people, or, like, opens a restaurant for, you know, whatever. But that she right, that we have Barbie who is a Barbie in the world dealing with the darkness of the world, but as Barbie, and it works totally because that's all woods, you know?

Ceara O'Sullivan 58:58

That I wonder, like I always now, when I'm watching movies, I think about the conversations that are being had, you know, what? What are the studio notes like, you know? And I felt like they were worried about it banging up against Elle Woods. And I think they were also worried about it banging up against Life-Size.

Traci Thomas 59:17

I don't know what life size is.

Ceara O'Sullivan 59:18

It's, it's kind of like Barbie. It's actually just like Barbie, but it stars Tyra Banks.

Traci Thomas 59:24

Oh yes, yes, yes, of course. I do. I do know that movie.

Ceara O'Sullivan 59:27

And she's kind of what you're describing, that she like, she comes to life and she wants the world to be perfect, and it's not well.

Traci Thomas 59:33

I just think, I think, you know, to your point, I think they got a little too cute with it. They tried to do something, and it's sort of like these archetypes and these kinds of stories exist, and they work. If you can bring your own barbiness to it, it's no one's gonna be like, Oh, this is just like, Legally Blonde. And also no one's like, I've had too much Legally Blonde. You know, that's true. Like nobody, we do a million Marvel movies, and they're all the same, and nobody cares. But it's like, oh, barbecue. Be too much like Elle Woods, a movie that came out 20 years ago.

Ceara O'Sullivan 1:00:03

It's true and and also, like, I'm putting words nobody else's mouth, but I really, I would bet money. But I'm so glad that we have the same thoughts about Barbie.

Traci Thomas 1:00:12

I am too, because that was an unpopular opinion I had at the time. And I was really, people were really unhappy with me when I was talking shit about Barbie. I feel like we've come around.

Ceara O'Sullivan 1:00:20

Yeah, broadly, she is a kicker. She did not much going on. She didn't

Traci Thomas 1:00:26

we both like writing. We know what was happening there. Okay, last, last, last question. I stole this from the New York Times by the book. If you could require the current president of the United States to read one book, what would it be?

Ceara O'Sullivan 1:00:39

Wow, what a tremendous question.

Traci Thomas 1:00:44

It's from the New York Times. Again, I can't take credit.

Ceara O'Sullivan 1:00:48

I'm like, thinking of that Dale Carnegie book that's like, How to Win Friends and Influence

Traci Thomas 1:00:52

People. I feel like, if he's read any books, that's the only one I know.

Ceara O'Sullivan 1:00:57

But I'm trying to think of like, the equivalent of that book that just, like, tells you, like, how to be I'm trying to cheat. This question is basically what's happening. But let me really give it a let me give it a second of thought. Yeah, I don't know. Like, like, The Kite Runner, like, just something about somebody that has nothing the fuck to do with him, that great is really full of heart.

Traci Thomas 1:01:24

I love it. I love the height runner, full of heart. That's a good way to describe it. Okay, I'll take it. That's you pass the test. I would.

Ceara O'Sullivan 1:01:32

You know what? It would just be great if you read any single book, anything,

Traci Thomas 1:01:35

yeah. I mean, that is the bar on the floor, literally under the floor. Read at least as many books as my five year old children. Yeah, that would be great. Okay, everybody at home. Kira O'Sullivan, today's guest will be back on Wednesday, June 25 to discuss the art thief with us. We will be spoiling the book. It's non fiction, but I feel like there's gonna be spoilers about what happens with the art and the thievery. So read along. Come back and see us then. Ceara, this has been a total joy. Thank you so much for being here.

Ceara O'Sullivan 1:02:09

Thank you, Traci, thanks for having me, and I'm really excited to talk about the art thief.

Traci Thomas 1:02:13

Me too, everyone else, we will see you in the stacks.

All right, y'all that. It for us today. Thank you so much for listening, and thank you again to Kira for joining the show. I'd also like to say a huge thank you to Amber Watson, Leslie Guam and Jackson Musker for making today's episode possible. Remember our book club pick this month is the art thief by Michael Finkel, which we will discuss on Wednesday, June 25 with Ceara O'Sullivan. If you love the show and you want inside access to it, head to patreon.com/the stacks to join the stack, stack and check out my newsletter at Traci thomas.substack.com, make sure you're subscribed to the stacks. Wherever you listen to your podcasts, and if you're listening through Apple podcasts or Spotify, please leave us a rating and a review for more from the stacks. Follow us on social media @thestackspod on Instagram, threads and Tiktok, and check out our website at the stacks podcast.com this episode of the Stacks was edited by Christian Duenas with production assistance from Wy'Kia Frelot. Our graphic designer isRobin McCreight, and our theme music is from Tagirijus The Stacks is created and produced by me, Traci Thomas.

Wy'Kia Frelot
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Ep. 373 Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley — The Stacks Book Club (Kara Brown)