Ep. 449 I Just Like to Make Everything Nerdy with Phoebe Robinson

Written by Traci Thomas

Today on The Stacks, we’re joined by talented multi-hyphenate Phoebe Robinson. Phoebe is a stand-up comedian; the bestselling author of You Can’t Touch My Hair: And Other Things I Still Have to Explain, Everything’s Trash, But It’s Okay, and Please Don't Sit on My Bed in Your Outside Clothes; the founder and publisher of Tiny Reparations Books; and the co-creator and former co-host of the hit podcast 2 Dope Queens, among many other things. In this episode, we get into her journey to becoming a book publisher, how Tiny Reparations resists internet book trends, and her favorite part of her multi-hyphenate life.

Our book club pick for November is Famesick by Lena Dunham. We will be discussing the book with Phoebe Robinson on Wednesday, November 25.

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

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TRANSCRIPT
*Due to the nature of podcast advertising, these timestamps are not 100% accurate and will vary.

Phoebe Robinson 0:00

When I first started Tiny Reparations books, the number of slavery manuscript we were sent, and I just was very adamant in the beginning that we weren't going to publish any of those. Not because I'm opposed to slavery narratives, but I just was sort of like, I think we have to get out of sort of saying the only thing that is valuable about Black people is how much they endure, and so I just was like, I kind of want us to publish different things that challenge us in different ways.

Traci Thomas 0:42

Welcome to the Stacks, a podcast about books and the people who read them. I'm your host Traci Thomas, and today we are joined by the Phoebe Robinson. Phoebe contains multitudes. She is the co-creator and co-host of the hit podcast and HBO series Two Dope Queens, the founder of Tiny Reparations Books, a stand-up comedian, a producer, an actress, and the best-selling author of You Can't Touch My Hair and other things I still have to explain. Everything's trash, but it's okay. And please don't sit on my bed in your outside clothes. Today, we're chatting about Phoebe's multifaceted career, how she became a publisher of a book imprint at Penguin Random House, and her incredibly wide-ranging taste in books. Our book club pick for November is Famesick by Lena Dunham. Phoebe Robinson will be back to discuss that book with us on Wednesday, november 25. If you enjoy this podcast, if you want more bookish content and community, join us over on Patreon and Substack. On Patreon, you can join the Stacks pack for access to community conversations and our virtual book club. On Substack, you can subscribe to my newsletter, Unstacked, and get all my hot takes on literary gossip, pop culture, news, and sports. And in both places, you get a monthly bonus episode. Plus, your support makes it possible for me to bring you this podcast with Stacks free every single week. So, if you love listening to this show, join the Stacks Pack at patreon.com/the Stacks and subscribe to my newsletter Unstacked at Traci thomas.substack.com. All right, now it's time for my conversation with Phoebe Robinson. All right, everybody! I am so excited today. I am joined by one of my favorite book people, who's also an everything else person. She's a comedian. She's a writer. She's a book person. She acts. She she does the best videos on the internet. Don't know who I'm talking about? Well, guess what, everybody! I am here today with Phoebe Robinson, welcome to the stacks.

Phoebe Robinson 2:43

Thanks, Traci. It's so funny because I wish I could angle my computer. Well, I can. So I have like an all white. I organize by color, and I know people are judgmental of that, but they can go. They can go fuck themselves. I agree because because people are like, how do you find your books? I'm like, I find them. Like, it's not difficult.

Traci Thomas 3:08

It's not difficult. But also, some people will be like, well, you can't like you can't take your books seriously if you have them organized in that way. And I'm like, I literally know for sure. Strange man on the internet. I read more books than you. I know that I take books more seriously than you ever have in your life. It is literally my occupation. My whole life is books, and you're so concerned that I can't take them seriously. Like, what's wrong with you?

Phoebe Robinson 3:35

It's so absurd. And then over here, this is like a gradation, so it goes like yellow to orange to green to blue to like dark blue.

Traci Thomas 3:46

Are they in different rooms in your house too? Yes. Like, do you have like like a red room or like a pink room?

Phoebe Robinson 3:51

Yeah. So I have because this is like my office slash guest room. So I have bookshelf here, bookshelf here. Then I have one in my living room, that is um, it's like pinkies and purples and reds because most of my furniture there is like kind of neutrally, so it's my pop of color. Got it. And then in my entryway, I have this really funky like, it's like this kind of color orange wallpaper that has like leopards on it, and so then I have two bookshelves that are black and gray. So it's like the yeah. So I have a whole like color story and design and theme.

Traci Thomas 4:32

I might force you to take pictures and do like a book tour, so we can post it on a carousel. So we can be like, it's cribs, but for people who don't take books seriously? Anyways, okay. Well, we're here now. We're already going, but okay. I want to know your backstory a little bit because for people who don't know, you are the publisher of Tiny Rep Books, which is an imprint at Penguin Random House. Yes, and I feel like a few. Years ago, a lot of people like got imprints, but those people are not still imprinting. And you're like still imprinting. You guys had a National Book Award finalist book two years ago or last year, two years. Magical Realism, which was so good. You have one of my favorite editors on your team, Pilar. I think she is like a genius. So I want to know how you went from like writing a few books to becoming a publisher, and like why did you want to do that?

Phoebe Robinson 5:29

Yeah. So you know I am 42, but I've just been I've been a book lover ever since I was like a little kid. Like I mean, I used to like write, you know, short stories growing up, blah blah blah. So I kind of always knew that I was going to be a writer. I just wasn't sure how to make it happen because you know everyone's like, oh, I want to write books, but like there isn't like, you know, I was born in '84. It wasn't like you just had the information accessible to be like, this is how you break into publishing, become a writer, blah blah blah. So anyway, so I just I started doing standup in 2008, and again I had like a blog. So writing was always a part of like whatever I was doing. So my my lit agent Robert Guinsler, I've been with him since 2014. He he sent me a cold email because he saw my name on a list of like up and coming, you know, stand up comics. You know those lists where it's like you're up and coming from like 20 years.

Traci Thomas 6:29

Yeah, so you're like 75. They're like brand new, just on the scene.

Phoebe Robinson 6:34

So he hit me up and he was like, "You probably already have a book deal, but if you don't, I would love to meet with you and see if we can do something. So we met, blah blah blah, whatever. It was great. He's lovely. I then sold my book proposal for my first book. You can't touch my hair and other things. I have to explain. And early, I want to say like January 2015. It's very hard actually. Most people didn't want to publish me because they were like, no one buys books written by black women. Funny black women, like there's not this is like not relatable. Like it was just, and Plume was the only imprint that was interested in me, and I was very excited because I was like, I know I'm funny, I know this is good, and you know when I was hanging out with Robert, he was like, I don't think you're one and done kind of offer, like you're trying just like do whatever to get someone quick cash. And he asked me like what I wanted to do long term, and I was you know I go you Toni Morrison used to edit other people's books. That seems like a lot of work, so I think I would just want to have it imprint instead.

Traci Thomas 7:40

You know, just cash.

Phoebe Robinson 7:41

I didn't know that was more work, baby. Um, so I published "You Can't Touch My Hair" in 2016. Everything's trash. I published that was my second book. I want to say 2019, and at that point, you know, I had two books, and I was like, Robert, I think I would, I really want to try and go with having imprint. I have a great relationship with Plume and Penguin, and then George Floyd happened, and I just was like, this doesn't seem like the right time, like this, feels a little bit like fluff when the world is so heavy. And Robert was like, We're just texting all the time, and we're both just sharing books that we're reading." He was like, "Everyone's reading right now." He's like, "I think this is a perfect time." And so I was like, "All right." So I went, you know, went back to Plume, and I was like, "I know we started talking about this end of 2019. I really want to pick this back up, and I really would like to do this imprint. And I wanted to be, you know, to publish women, people, color, people from the queer community. We're calling Tiny Reparations books, and we want this to be curated. So you know, maybe publish like five books a year, and they totally got it, and they were on board. And we are now in our sixth year, which is very exciting. Yeah, and I, it's probably a thing of everything that I've done. I think long term is the what I'm the proudest of, just because publishing is so difficult, especially if we write fiction, you're writing the whole thing before you sell. So you're dedicating at least 18 months of your life to hopefully sell this thing, and so it's very exciting, you know, when to be able to publish people's book babies. And I just see like the joy when they're like they see like they're the the cover for the first time and you know they get like the the the the copies of the book at their house like it's just like every aspect of it is so amazing and I'll just want to I just want to like give you a couple facts about Tiny Rep Books and then we I will stop talking you can keep

Traci Thomas 9:58

give us the facts!

Phoebe Robinson 9:59

I want to make sure my publisher is like you gotta mention all these things. So I want to make sure. So to date, we have published 31 titles, which is amazing.

Traci Thomas 10:10

That's amazing.

Phoebe Robinson 10:10

And we have 50 authors on our slate, which is incredible. And we do have a high retention rate, which I think is amazing. Like Dr. Latoya Watkins has written three books with us. Grace D. Li has written two with us, and I think is working on a third. Jess Gutierrez, I think, is about to publish her third with us. So I really, for me, because my experience with Plume was so great, I was like, I really wanted to make sure that when people publish with us, that they want to come back, and then sometimes authors have ideas for stuff. Like one author, she was amazing, but she has an idea for a YA book, and I'm like, we just don't publish YA yet. Like maybe down the line we will, so we passed on that. But like the fact that she was like, I still want to like do this with you guys, and we just couldn't make it work, but yeah. So Latoya Watkins, Holler Child, and Vanessa Angelica Villarreal's Magical Realism

Traci Thomas 11:09

Of course, of course.

Phoebe Robinson 11:09

Yes, they were both long listed for National Book Award, which is amazing. Grace D. Li's Portrait of a Thief's was her first book with us

Traci Thomas 11:18

And she's got her one coming out in the spring, right next year,

Phoebe Robinson 11:22

early next year. Yeah, yeah, yes. So that was an instant New York Times bestseller and was nominated for Edgar Award. And Black owned by Char Adams was a LA Times Book Prize finalist. Hello, winner of the Black. Yes, and winner of the Black Caucus American Library Association for Nonfiction. So I really do feel you know, like you know, as a black woman, that people don't always take you seriously when you embark on something. And so I'm very much a person where I'm like, I don't want to prove other people wrong. I want to prove myself right, and so I knew starting this imprint that there that this was necessary. That I want authors to have a great publishing experience, and that I'm just going to celebrate books and authors who otherwise they may be published somewhere else, and it's just like draining or exhausting to have to explain yourself. We have an editor who's like not engaged, and both Emmy and Lashonda are fantastic. They're my two main authors. Emmy does the nonfiction, Lashonda does the the the fiction.

Traci Thomas 12:36

Your two main editors,

Phoebe Robinson 12:37

yeah, yeah. Sorry, two main editors, yeah. And I just feel so happy that this has gone as well as it has, because that isn't always the case when you start something. So, yeah

Traci Thomas 12:51

and I think like as an outsider to publishing too, like you didn't come up in the ranks of publishing in the way that a lot of people who are like the heads of imprints do. Yeah, and so I think there's also that, but for people who don't, because like my audience, we we talk about like the making of books over time. Like we've had different people behind the scenes come on the show as guests, but I don't think we've ever had a publisher who isn't also an editor. So can you talk about like what your actual job is? Like what are you responsible for? What are you looking at? What is what is Phoebe's role at Tiny Reparations?

Phoebe Robinson 13:25

Yeah, so at this point, we're we're now up to trying to publish 10 books a year. Usually, land around eight, which feels like great. What's great is we have such a well-oiled machine. Is you know manuscripts, book proposals, they come in, and then Emmy and Lashonda they will you know take a first read of it. My boss John Parsley he will also take a read of it. Sometimes you will have like publicity and marketing as well. And then if they feel like it's like something that's like worth my attention, then I will read it. In the beginning, I was I was joining the sort of editorial meetings with authors, but because I'm not the direct editor, I didn't feel like the best sort of use. Like we have great editors who do that stuff, so I tend to know probably in the first 10 pages if I want a book. I obviously will keep reading more, but you could just tell if a voice jumps out, if someone has a clear understanding of what their plot is, what the characters are on a line level, what they're doing. So anyway, so I will generally say yay or nay to something with every book that comes out. I do some sort of like publicity thing, whether it's like I've done like you know social media posts, I'll do like a Zoom conversation, I'll do like a fun sort of like back and forth with fans. I always just try to engage with people just because I feel like there's so much grabbing for our attention. And so I always want to make sure that I'm like, hey guys, we love books. Here's a book box. This is why I love this book. So I'm always trying to make sure I like promote as well as I can. So I think that the books really, outside of me and Lashonda, it's like amazing work in marketing publicity. These are all books that if they weren't published under me. I would go buy them at a bookstore, and that is very important to me because I don't want to acquire something for the sake of acquiring it. Like I really need to love it, and I really need to feel like we would be the best home for it.

Traci Thomas 15:35

Yeah, you guys just did a call for open submissions, right? Like, where so for people who don't know that means like unagented books. Yes, usually if you want to sell your book to a big publisher, you have to have an agent who submits for you. It's pretty rare that like a big five will do an open submission. So what was that about? Why did you guys do it, and how did it go? Did we get anything good?

Phoebe Robinson 16:30

Yeah, I mean it's one of those things. Like throughout the years, people have asked me, "Hey, can I submit? I'm not aged," and I'm just like, "Oh, if you don't have an agent, like we can't." And so we just sort of felt like, okay, we got over the hump of the first five years. What do we want the next five years to look like? And I think we all, you know, using sort of like my story of like how I didn't know how to get into this, and thank God Robert reached out to me, and that's how I became a published author. We just sort of felt like there are so many people who have beautiful works within them, and they don't know how to get past that first step. And especially if you are a person of color, publishing loves trauma stories from you. But not everybody wants to write that. And there's nothing wrong with writing something that's somber and sad. But you know we're multidimensional like everybody else. You want to might want to write a thriller. You might want to write a story about falling in love. You might want to write supernatural. There's it just runs the gamut, and so we're kind of thinking of how can we like sort of liven things up for ourselves. And we didn't really know what to expect with this because this is kind of like we don't know how people are gonna feel about this. So we launched the keys to the Queendom program, which is amazing, and we hit our goal of 1000 submissions.

Traci Thomas 17:26

Wow!

Phoebe Robinson 17:27

In 48 hours, which is I didn't think that was going to happen. I was like, oh, maybe like 50 people submit. Not 1000. I know it's amazing, and it was like not just people in America; it's like people from all over the world. And like I said, it's different genres. There's horror, there's historical fiction, everything. So we're still all reading through stuff. But I have seen a few things that our editors are excited about, and so I I don't want to speak, but I will say, I feel like we're gonna publish more than one.

Traci Thomas 18:05

Cool, that's so exciting. It sounds like a success

Phoebe Robinson 18:09

Yeah and I think it was just like nice because I think it's so easy to doubt yourself, especially in this age where talent almost doesn't matter anymore.

Traci Thomas 18:23

Yeah,

Phoebe Robinson 18:24

and like there are people who can't get things published because they don't have a big enough social media following. Yeah, and I just am like, we are killing the arts like across the board if we're making it about social media followings and not about anything having to do with talent, having to do with like someone who's in the trenches and really wants to commit their life to being an author, it just feels like things like these are actually kind of necessary. Because for some people, how are they going to break out? How are they going to share their their work with the world?

Traci Thomas 19:04

I know. I feel like books, in some ways, like is still a place where talent does matter. But I also feel like it's really moving away from that. Like, I mean, I read so many books every year, and it's like there are some books I read. I'm like this book is really actually good, and then there's some books where I'm like, okay, let me go look them up and see how many followers they have or like how hot they are.

Phoebe Robinson 19:28

Yeah

Traci Thomas 19:29

It's just so sad.

Phoebe Robinson 19:30

It's so sad, and it's just like I don't know. I just love being surprised, you know.

Traci Thomas 19:38

Yeah, yeah, and I was just gonna say, like, I think about like famous authors from the past, and I feel like one of the things that we're losing with like the social media of it all, and like the needing to be a public figure of it all, is like we're losing the sort of disgruntled asshole author archetype, like. Like we're missing the people. I mean, not that she was an asshole, but like Toni Morrison did not fuck around. She did not suffer fools. Like she could not do that now. You know, like she couldn't. She would have to be so much sweeter and nicer because that's like what we expect from authors in a way that authors used to like just like talk to. I mean, there's the famous story of the author who spit in Colson Whitehead's face. Do you know this story?

Phoebe Robinson 20:25

No!

Traci Thomas 20:27

This wasn't even that long ago. I wish I could remember his name off the top of my head. But Colson Whitehead wrote a review of this guy's book, and he panned it. And at a party, he went up to Colson Whitehead and spit in his face.

Phoebe Robinson 20:39

That's so gross!

Traci Thomas 20:42

It's disgusting, and it's crazy. But like all of that, like disgruntled author behavior, we're losing it. Everyone's so nice and hot and charming, and they know how to make videos and do a cover reveal. Yeah, I'm like, where are the recluses who just wrote a 600-page book and just want to put it out in the world and never be heard from again. We're losing that.

Phoebe Robinson 21:05

Yeah, and I think that that's important because, and this is not to take anything away from booktok or anything, but I think it is. It's just another avenue in which only certain kinds of books are going to be represented, and it doesn't mean I don't mean necessarily like a book that has to be like super difficult to read. But if it's not fitting certain like trends of the moment, it's going to be like, who cares? And I just I'm like, I just don't know if we want to go down that path.

Traci Thomas 21:38

Yeah, and yeah, I'm a person on the book internet, but I don't trust a lot of my fellow book internet people to tell me what's good. Anyways, like I'm like we're just all gonna listen to like Billy Bob's books because

Phoebe Robinson 21:51

yeah, yeah. And I'm also like I'm like they're not reading these books. Most of them are not reading them. It's ludicrous.

Traci Thomas 22:00

Yeah, yeah. The reading comprehension slash reading at all is. I mean, you can tell. Like, you can tell who doesn't read because it'll be like a book list, and it'll be like books to help you like get through an IRS. Yeah, you know, snafu, and it'll be like the bluest eye. I'm like, okay, you didn't read that. How is that the recommendation? It'll be like books to go along with Elizabeth Holmes, and then it'll be like go tell it on the mountain. Yeah, all right, that's interesting. Say more. Say more. I want to know a little bit about like the some of the other things you do because you had a TV show. You are a runner now, which I'm obsessed with. You do these like great, hilarious shit talking internet videos. You're on tour. You do stand up comedy. What is your favorite part about being you? Like, what is your favorite facet of your life right now?

Phoebe Robinson 23:01

Oh, I mean, my favorite facet of my life right now is visiting family and friends. To be honest, like I just really went through a huge like workaholic phase and had to like come out of that and reprioritize my life. And so I really like I try to go visit my family. I'm from Cleveland, Ohio. Try and visit them like seven, eight times a year, which is a lot. But it's also like everyone's getting older, and so it's like it's actually like not a lot. You know what I mean? It's like how many more summers and winters are you gonna have with people? So that's probably my most favorite thing, and like truly like five years ago, I probably would have picked something work related. But I just feel like I just turned 42. I feel like in a really good spot. Like I'm not like look, I'm nesting. I have like all my pillows. Like I just feel like I'm in a good place mentally and emotionally, and I have perspective on my life that I didn't have when I wasn't in my 40s. And you know, I just have I have more of a take it as it comes.

Traci Thomas 24:18

Yeah,

Phoebe Robinson 24:19

and I think a lot of the hustle grind culture that I don't know how old you are, but a lot of the hustle grind culture that I came up in, it was very much like you gotta will everything to happening and into happening, and you gotta try your hardest, and you gotta just keep chipping away. And there is value in that because it got me to where I am, but I don't think that it's sustainable, and I don't think that mentality sort of allows you to live an expansive life. Yeah, because you can't go hard like 120% at everything all the time. It's just it's impossible. And so I think because of that shift in my priorities, probably the happiest I've ever been, to be honest. And my life doesn't look like how I thought I was going to. You know, so many career things like are in flux. I'm single, and I thought I would, you know, be married by now. And so all these things that I thought were going to happen haven't happened yet, and that's like okay. And I think before I would have, I would have obsessed over the lack, and that would have been where my attention was going. And my attention is so on what I do have.

Traci Thomas 25:37

Yeah,

Phoebe Robinson 25:38

and I think it just allows me take the ups and the downs better and understand that that is truly what life is. It's like that. It's never like this. It's never like that.

Traci Thomas 25:49

Right.

Phoebe Robinson 25:49

But then outside of sort of the personal, I would say like I'm working on my next book. It's an essay collection called Rich Auntie, which is super fun, and it's been a blast to write. I'm very behind. Sorry, Emily, but I have four essays done. Working on the fifth, and then I have two ideas for novels. Like I really want to transition into fiction work, which is like really fun. So I feel like I just am always, I just kind of am open. Yeah, I will say yes and see where it leads me. Sometimes it's dead end, and sometimes it's something that's really cool. So I know it was a very windy answer, but I think that's that's where my head is at right now.

Traci Thomas 26:32

I love it. You and I share something, which is we share a sort of love for objectifying men.

Phoebe Robinson 26:43

Oh yeah,

Traci Thomas 26:45

I love a crush. It's like my favorite genre of person. Yeah, I love a hot man. I'm curious if you have any author crushes.

Phoebe Robinson 26:54

No, it's really, and I feel this way about like stand up comedians, I find male stand up comedians and male authors equally repulsive.

Traci Thomas 27:08

I was an actor, so that's how I feel about male actors. Yeah, not like superstars, but just like regular ones.

Phoebe Robinson 27:16

Yeah, I'm like you're disgusting. You're self loathing. It's not interesting. You think you're so funny, and it's like I'm funnier than you. You think you're smarter than everybody. Literally, no one cares. You have trauma you have never dealt with, and I couldn't be less interested.

Traci Thomas 27:37

I love this.

Phoebe Robinson 27:38

Yeah, I've never met a male author and been like, wow! I really want to get be your friend. I've always been like, okay, see you later. Hope this never happens again.

Traci Thomas 27:48

There's a few I'm I'm partial to. Yeah, but but I just I just love. I mean, I also am obsessed with your videos when you like talk shit to the idiots in the Trump administration and/or most recently the Smashing Pumpkin Man.

Phoebe Robinson 28:04

Yeah

Traci Thomas 28:05

Where did those come from? How did you start doing those?

Phoebe Robinson 28:08

Yeah, it was random. It started like I guess yeah, like a year ago. Andrew Cuomo when he was like running, and we're like, "You're truly trash." But he did this like interview. I forget what you know, cable news network. But he was just like, "I won't even allow myself to be alone in a room with a woman because I don't want." And I'm like, "You're a sex pest. It's not the women. Keep your hands to your help yourself, you piece of shit." And so I just like I come home from a thing, and I was just like, oh, I'll just like rant about this and throw this up online, and I think anything of it. And then a couple of people were like, oh my god, I would watch you like rant about stuff every day, and I was like, oh, I love to complain, so I can figure this out. And I just like have all these wigs in my apartment. I'm like, oh, that's just like a fun way to just like pop on a wig, pop off, and then like whatever. And people really like it, and it's been fun, and it's been nice to sort of kind of like yell into the void a little bit because everything is so chaotic. And you know, it runs the gamut from politics to pop culture, and I just think that's how my brain works. I think that's how a lot of people's brains work. And I certainly didn't expect like people to love it the way they do. But it's been really fun.

Traci Thomas 29:35

I love them. I love them so much. They make me so happy. I just like because you're just like saying all the things we are feeling or I'm feeling, and then you also just like say bitch so good. It's like the delivery of bitch. Yeah, every time it works for me. Every time.

Phoebe Robinson 29:54

Thank you.

Traci Thomas 29:56

Okay, we're gonna take a quick break, and then we're gonna be right back. Okay, we are back. I did not prep you for this. We do this thing called Ask the Stacks, where somebody writes in and they're looking for a book recommendation, and we have to give them one.

Phoebe Robinson 30:12

Oooh, okay.

Traci Thomas 30:14

Alexis says. They say, "I recently read Kin by Tiari Jones, and I'm interested in any recommendations, fiction and nonfiction, about the black middle class and black women housewives? So that is what they're looking for. I have come up with sort of three recommendations. I don't know if you have any off the top of your head. If you want to go first, or I can go first, and you can just do one. You don't have to do three.

Phoebe Robinson 30:38

Yeah, you go first. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Traci Thomas 30:40

So the first one, I haven't read my first recommendation. So just being transparent, but my first recommendation is the book that I feel like most people talk about when they talk about the black middle class, which is Negroland by Margot Jefferson. She was sort of raised in that world, and this is a sort of memoir history sort of combo of this sort of place and space and her experience. My second one is Linden Hills by Gloria Naylor. She also wrote The Women of Brewster Place, and it's about like a community, a Black woman community, or community with Black women and sort of suburbia and their experiences together. And then my last one is Come and Get It by Kylie Reid, which is a is really a book about race and class. It's not Housewives, but the main character is a black RA on a college campus, and she's dealing with like the rich white girls in her dorm who don't have to have a job on campus, and like she has a side job and she's trying to make money, and like it's real. It's a really interesting book about class and race, and it's really fun and chaotic and messy. So those are my three recommendations.

Phoebe Robinson 31:48

Do you have one? So it's so funny that I also I just recently brought Negro Land because I wanted to to read that. But what I so I'm glad that we're on the same page about that. But the other thing that I wanted to say is I read. I guess this has to be last year. I read Colored Television by Danzy.

Traci Thomas 32:10

Danzy Senna.

Phoebe Robinson 32:11

Yeah, and I think that that, as someone who's in Hollywood, like I think that that was like really super fun and juicy, and it shows sort of like you know the kind of toughness of pursuing your dream, the having a relationship, all those things. So I think that was like a really fun one.

Traci Thomas 32:33

Yeah, I love that book.

Phoebe Robinson 32:35

Yeah, that was like super fun. I I I read Ken and I really I didn't like the ending.

Traci Thomas 32:42

Okay, we won't spoil it.

Phoebe Robinson 32:44

I liked everything up, and then like the last 30 pages felt so incredibly rushed, and I was like, I was like, huh, yeah. So people are like, you're gonna cry, and I was like, didn't shed a tear, babe.

Traci Thomas 32:59

I didn't cry, but I don't cry a lot. Do you cry a lot with your reading?

Phoebe Robinson 33:02

I cry. I cry at the drop of of a hat, but I don't cry when I read. To be honest, yeah,

Traci Thomas 33:06

I will cry a little bit in life, but it's really got to be like you've really got to have done something to me, or the thing you're talking about has to be the exact thing I'm going through, like in that exact moment. Yeah, it either has to just be like, write book at the right time, or you've really gotta pull on my heartstrings. And oftentimes, when I cry in a book, I don't end up liking the book. Like sometimes I just cry in a book because the thing is really sad. But I'm like, that was the only part of the book I even remember now.

Phoebe Robinson 33:34

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Traci Thomas 33:36

Okay. For other people who want to have book recommendations on the show, email ask the stacks at the stacks podcast.com. And Alexis, if you read any of our picks, let us know how we did. All right, Phoebe, you're now in the official Stacks hot seat. Two books you love, one book you hate.

Phoebe Robinson 33:53

Oh, I can actually look. I keep track of all the books I read because, of course, I do.

Traci Thomas 33:59

You're not alone.

Phoebe Robinson 34:02

I know, but it's also like I just like to make everything nerdy. It's real. I'm like,

Traci Thomas 34:09

I feel so seen!

Phoebe Robinson 34:11

Yeah, I'm like, how can I geek out about this? And you're like, well, I mean, you could. Oh, it's been going. This dated back to 2014.

Traci Thomas 34:22

Wow. Is it just a list? What are you using? How do you keep track of it?

Phoebe Robinson 34:24

I have the notes app, but then I started using this app called Basmo, B A S M O, and that this is great. I was doing this more when I was reading Dracula, because I never, I don't like to read anything scary. I'm such a fraidy cat. So this is actually the first thing that I'm reading that's kind of scary, and it's definitely been moments where I've been like, "Oh my god, oh my god!" But so what you do is you could like set whatever you want your your time goal to be.

Traci Thomas 34:53

Oh.

Phoebe Robinson 34:54

So my goal is to do 30 minutes a day. Just given how crazy everything I am, and then you could set like your. Goal for your books. You could separate like all the books you have unassigned. What you finish, what you're currently reading, what you want to read. It goes like books that you read by year. Like it's really

Traci Thomas 35:14

Very cool. I love this. Basmo. I've never heard of this.

Phoebe Robinson 35:18

Yeah, it's great. I I love it so much. So let me see.

Traci Thomas 35:23

Have you read Frankenstein?

Phoebe Robinson 35:24

No, that's next on my list. I can't wait.

Traci Thomas 35:27

It's not scary. It's amazing. It's not. We did it for a book club last October, and I was like, I hate scary. I'm gonna hate this. And then I was like, this whole book. This book is my personality now. I see Frankenstein everywhere. I like think of him. Well, not him. I think of the monster, Frankenstein's monster. But I'm just like, oh, this book is actually amazing. How come nobody told me? I've never, nobody ever talks about Frankenstein.

Phoebe Robinson 35:51

So I have a few recommendations. I'm going to choose things that I haven't posted about on social media because people have probably seen it enough already. Okay, and I'm going to choose one that I did post about. Okay, so I read this book, which I thought was great. It's called "$40 million Slaves: The Rise and Fall, and I Think Revision or Like whatever was about the history of like black athletes and and basketball, football, and baseball, and I thought that was really riveting and fascinating to sort of talk about how politically active Black athletes used to be. And then I think, and I've talked about this before with friends, but I feel like one of the the biggest ills of society is scalability, and the obsession with everything has to scale and be globally appealing. Actually, like dulls the edges, and it makes people not pursue high quality as much because you're trying to appeal to as many people,

Traci Thomas 37:01

yeah

Phoebe Robinson 37:01

And a lot of times those are in opposition because a lot of people are basic, so they're not actually going to appreciate super specific whatever. So that's a really good book. I love the Frederick Douglass biography by David W. Blight. It is very long. I just want to warn people. It is like over 600 pages, and the font is small, but it's so good. So I highly recommend.

Traci Thomas 37:29

Okay, and then a book you hate.

Phoebe Robinson 37:31

I try to. I mean, there have been ones that I that that fall under DNF, and I didn't used to do that. I used to be like, I'm gonna write it out, and and then I got to an age where I was like, life is too short, just fucking end it. I think a lot of those sort of like, especially during post George Floyd, a lot of the the white people talking to other whites about racism. I was like, we don't need it, like white fragility. Like white fragility, I'm like, this isn't it. You guys already know. You know what the issues are.

Traci Thomas 38:10

Yeah, yeah.

Phoebe Robinson 38:11

So just change your behavior. We don't need to like become a bestseller and sell a million copies. You need to like actually talk to your family about their voting habits.

Traci Thomas 38:21

Yeah, what aside from Dracula, what else are you reading right now, or do you read multiple books at once, or you a one book pony?

Phoebe Robinson 38:28

Yeah, I just finished Claudia Rankine's Citizen. I just finished that. That's super good. And then I can I go grab a book?

Traci Thomas 38:39

Sure, you can do whatever you want.

Phoebe Robinson 38:40

Okay, I'll be right back. And then I'm probably gonna read this as counter programming to Dracula. It's called Black Diamond Queens.

Traci Thomas 38:53

Oh,

Phoebe Robinson 38:54

African American women in rock and roll. Because I'm a huge, I love rock and roll so much.

Traci Thomas 38:59

Okay,

Phoebe Robinson 39:00

and I know that, like so many genres that have been overtaken by white people, there's sort of this like narrative that we don't belong. And I'm like, we created it, so

Traci Thomas 39:09

We were there first.

Phoebe Robinson 39:09

Yeah. So I feel like I try to, I don't always, but I think as I've gotten older, I like to kind of try and read two books at once, just because I might not always be in the mood to read this, or I might not always be in the mood to read Dracula. So if I can bounce back and forth

Traci Thomas 39:27

yeah. Have you ever read the final revival of Opal and Nev? Did you read that book?

Phoebe Robinson 39:33

No!

Traci Thomas 39:34

It's a it's fiction. It's like a fictionalized oral history, but it's about a black woman rock star in the 70s, and she's part of a group. It's her and a white British man, and it's like about their rise to fame. And then there's like a violent incident. And then, anyways, I think you might like it. It's sort of a fun book, and it might pair nicely with the nonfiction. Because it's it's fictionalized, but it's oral history, so it feels like a real story, and it and it pulls from a lot of the actual history of the time. So like the Altamont incident with like was that the Rolling Stones where there was like the Hells Angels were like their security like it kind of pulls from that era. It's got Tina Turner vibes. Like it's really cool. So that might be a fun one for you. Yeah. Are there any books you're really looking forward to reading?

Phoebe Robinson 40:30

Okay, so I have two. This one, somewhat I saw on Instagram, not BookTok, but just sort of. It's called Between Men by Eve Sedgwick, English literature and male homo social desire, and it just sort of talks about what's been percolating, sort of in the zeitgeist that a lot of times, you know, men if they're straight and they date women, it's like they actually are they care more about other men. Yes, and sort of just kind of like you know throughout history the various relationships that men will have with each other can often be more intimate than but there and this one is set in the and oh lonely crowds by Stephanie Wambugu

Traci Thomas 41:16

We did that for a book club earlier this year!

Phoebe Robinson 41:19

oh cool so I'm very excited. I just like the world of like '90s art, and like I just kind of this is like what one of the things I'm talking about with my imprint, where it's like this is just set. It's about regular people set in a specific world that is not because when I first started Tiny Reparations books, the number of slavery manuscripts who were sent, and I just was very adamant in the beginning that we weren't going to publish any of those. Not because I'm opposed to slavery narratives, but I just was sort of like, I think we have to get out of sort of saying the only thing that is valuable about Black people is how much they endure, and that is the only thing that is marketable and you can sell, and it's profitable. And so I just was like, I kind of want us to publish different things that challenge us in different ways, but yeah. So this this is my my current stack.

Traci Thomas 42:26

Oh, good. That book is really it's it's very messy. It's definitely definitely throw it across the room moments where you're like, "Bitch, what are you doing? Stop it! Stop it, Maria!" Are there like how do you decide what to read?

Phoebe Robinson 42:43

I try to bounce around different genres, so I try to not do back-to-back nonfiction or back-to-back fiction.

Traci Thomas 42:53

Okay.

Phoebe Robinson 42:54

So because I read Claudia, I read Citizen. I was like, okay, that was really cool poetry, introspective. I wanted to. I was like, okay, let me just go with fiction, and I wanted to do a genre that I never read, which is why I chose horror because I was like, not that anything that necessarily have an idea for for fiction is horror, but I just am like to is to expand as an artist. You have to keep sort of exposing yourself to things that you wouldn't necessarily do normally. Yeah, and so I was just like, okay, if I'm going to do fiction here, and then the the second book that I'm going to read at the same time, it probably makes more sense for me to do nonfiction, so I'm not trying to track two different fiction stories.

Traci Thomas 43:47

Yeah

Phoebe Robinson 43:47

And yeah, I my favorite thing is just going to like a bookstore and just I will I simply will buy books based off of a cover.

Traci Thomas 43:55

Yes,

Phoebe Robinson 43:55

just because I was like I, and this speaks to a larger issue in society, like the way that people are livid if they read a book and they don't like it

Traci Thomas 44:07

It's so weird!

Phoebe Robinson 44:08

Yeah, I'm like, that's the price of admission, babe. Sometimes you're not gonna like the book. Who cares?

Traci Thomas 44:15

But is that not how they also experience movies and TV shows and theater and everything? I'm like. When was the last time you successfully went to three movies in a row where you were like, "These are all bangers" ? Like, I just I don't understand. It's like, oh, I didn't like this book. Like, okay, did you like your meal? Do you like every meal you eat at every restaurant? Like, is everything you've ever consumed in your life perfect every single time? Yeah, I don't understand it, but I do think some of it has to do with this sort of like, where to your point of like going to the bookstore and just browsing and grabbing things that jump out at you. Our lives are so curated now because of social media that it's. I feel like it's hard for people to even have something that surprises them to. Go into a bookstore and genuinely be like, oh, I've never seen this book before because there's so much on book internet, and then the bookstores I think are also responding to that. It's like, well, I want to have a lot of copies of this book because that's what people keep asking for, and so maybe like a staff favorite is getting pushed to the side or whatever. And I think I'm not saying that's just books, but I just think in general people put their books on hold at the library from their computer at home, so they're not browsing the stacks at the library trying to find a book that looks interesting in the same ways that we used to. It's like everything is so curated,

Phoebe Robinson 45:35

Yeah

Traci Thomas 45:36

And it sucks because it's like, what about real life discoverability as opposed to like algorithmic discoverability.

Phoebe Robinson 45:42

Yeah, and it's sort of like whenever someone's like, "Oh, I didn't like this book. I want to be like, you'll survive. Like, you'll survive. Like, who? Like, I did love the end of Kin, but that doesn't negate the what first 260 pages that I really loved, and on a line level, the writing was phenomenal, and they were great pieces of dialog. Dialog that showed you so much about each character, and so this whole like, if you don't like something, there's no way for you to gain something from it. I find crazy,

Traci Thomas 46:22

or like that you're owed something. Like someone has personally wronged you because you didn't like.

Phoebe Robinson 46:27

Yeah, that's just how it is, and it's just like you know. I still think she's an amazing author, and I will read every book she writes for the rest of her life. And some things are going to hit with me more than others, and that's truly okay. And I think it's also like how you sort of keep honing and defining your taste throughout your life. Like people think of it having taste as like this sort of static thing that never changes and grows. And there are certainly things now that I read that probably I would have had zero interest in when I was, you know, in my early 20s when I was so just nonfiction heavy, and that's like all I wanted to read. And so I just am like, I think every book is an opportunity to not only confront yourself but learn, grow, and I feel like when people create art, and maybe this is easier for me to say because I I'm a creator. But like when you create something, the person doesn't, the creator doesn't owe you anything other than the pro the product or the art that they made, and so yes, it it is not the best feeling when you buy something you don't like, love it. But I'm like, okay,

Traci Thomas 47:51

yeah, they don't owe you if you bought a book and they delivered a book, they're good. If you bought a book and they delivered a cake, I would be like, okay, this isn't literally what I bought. Like, I I wanted a book. Like, I'm mad. This is not what I asked for. Yeah. Do you have a favorite book from childhood?

Phoebe Robinson 48:09

Ooh, I don't know that I do. I also feel like my my brain like truly like starts deleting things. Like, so anything from my childhood. I'm like, I I don't recall.

Traci Thomas 48:25

Yeah, that's fine. Yeah. Do you have a problematic favorite book?

Phoebe Robinson 48:29

Oh no, I kind of feel like like I'm not going to be person like Lolita. Like it's like just the subject matter makes me go. I never want to read this.

Traci Thomas 48:41

Okay, it's sort of good.

Phoebe Robinson 48:43

Don't want to read it. I I literally don't want to read it. We did it for

Traci Thomas 48:47

book club last year or two years ago, and I was like, oh wait, this book's actually good. It's not okay. I just in defense of Lolita, the book itself is not what the movies have made it. It's actually like Nabakov was allegedly like abused as a child by an uncle, so it's actually like a very twisted him trying to get inside the head of a person who could do that. It's not as much like objectifying a child as the movies because the movies are so that's all I will say about the book. You don't have to read it. I don't think anybody has to read it, but it's not as bad. My problematic favorite is Gone with the Wind. I love that book so much. I don't know what to tell anybody. I know, I know how racist it is. I also love to read books about how racist Gone with the Wind is. Yeah, but I still love Gone with the Wind. Yeah. Anyway, if you were a teacher in high school, you can pick the subject. What is a book you would assign to your students?

Phoebe Robinson 49:44

Oh, I really loved. I really loved Minor Feelings. I thought that was a great book. I would assign that fo sho. I've read so many books in 2020. Ah, wow! So impressed with myself.

Traci Thomas 50:00

How many books, does it tell you how many books you read in 2020?

Phoebe Robinson 50:03

63.

Traci Thomas 50:04

Wow! And you do all these other things.

Phoebe Robinson 50:08

Well, 2020, I had you know there was some downtime.

Traci Thomas 50:11

We were in the house. We were in the house.

Phoebe Robinson 50:12

Yeah, I have not.

Traci Thomas 50:14

What's a normal year for you?

Phoebe Robinson 50:15

A normal year is like 15 to 20.

Traci Thomas 50:20

Okay, that's still very good.

Phoebe Robinson 50:21

Yeah, thank you. Oh, I also liked Hood Feminism. I thought that was a really fun book. I thought that was cool.

Traci Thomas 50:29

That's Mikki Kendall?

Phoebe Robinson 50:31

yeah, yeah. So those are probably like my two.

Traci Thomas 50:33

Okay, is there any book that is like about being a comedian that you think is any good,

Phoebe Robinson 50:44

I liked I liked Steve Martin's book. I thought that was good. I felt that there was a little bit of a wall up, and so I didn't get to know him as much as I wanted to. And then I just read. Oh fuck! Black out loud by is it Jeff Bennett?

Traci Thomas 51:06

I don't know,

Phoebe Robinson 51:07

but it's about the the history of black stand up comedy.

Traci Thomas 51:12

Okay,

Phoebe Robinson 51:13

so it's like super cool. Yeah.

Traci Thomas 51:15

Last one. If you could require the current president of the United States to read one book, what would you want it to be?

Phoebe Robinson 51:23

Oh God! I mean, I just don't even know what his reading level is. Like, I'm not even. I'm like, he's really stupid. You know what, Zora Neale Hurston? Okay, their eyes are watching God. Okay,

Traci Thomas 51:42

okay, okay.

Phoebe Robinson 51:43

She's an amazing author. The men in the Harlem Renaissance did her dirty, as men often do, and I think her book is a book that literally everyone should read before they die.

Traci Thomas 51:58

die. I love this recommendation. All right, everybody. Phoebe will be back on november 25. We are discussing Lena Dunham's memoir, Fame Sick. I am very excited to read this book. I did not think this was a book I was going to read this year, but I feel like we're going to have a good time. Everybody should get the book. You can get it from Reparations Club, which is a Black woman-owned bookstore here in Los Angeles. If you use the code STACKS10 you get 10% off your purchase. They will send it to you. They usually put like a nice little note in there too. They're very sweet and very cute. So go ahead and do that, Phoebe. Thank you so much for being here. This was great.

Phoebe Robinson 52:34

Thank you for having me. I mean, I feel like we could talk for hours. I hope my answers were good.

Traci Thomas 52:38

Your answers were great. You're great. You are enough. Okay.

Phoebe Robinson 52:42

Thanks, queen! So are you!

Traci Thomas 52:45

and everyone else. We will see you in the stacks. Thank you all so much for listening, and thank you again to Phoebe Robinson for joining the show. I'd also like to say a big thank you to Oma, Jamie Knapp, and Sam Srinivasan for your assistance. Our book club pick for November is Fain Sick by Lena Dunham, and we will be discussing the book with Phoebe Robinson on Wednesday, november 25. Make sure you're subscribed to the Stats wherever you listen to your podcasts, and if you're listening through Apple Podcasts or Spotify, please leave us a rating and a review. If you love the stacks and you want even more bookish content, head to Patreon.com/theStacks to join the Stacks pack and check out my newsletter at Traci Thomas.substack.com. For more from the Stacks, follow us on social media at the Stacks Pod on Instagram, Threads, and YouTube. You can also check out our website at thestaxpodcast.com. Today's episode of the Stacks was edited by Christian Duenas with production assistance from Sahara Clement. Additional support was provided by Grace Barry and Cherie Marquez. Our theme music is from Tagiragis. The Stacks is created and produced by me, Traci Thomas.

Traci Thomas
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Ep. 448 Last Chance Live! by Helena Haywoode Henry — The Stacks Book Club (Jess Lee)