Tope Folarin joins me to talk about the importance of a name, double-consciousness, and different kinds of privilege. Tope’s book A Particular Kind of Black Man was published by Simon & Schuster in 2019.

Our Friday readers are devouring Slow Dance by Rainbow Rowell, Like Mother Like Daughter by Kimberly McCreight, By the Lake of Sleeping Children by Luis Urrea, and Site Fidelity by Claire Boyles.

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens is debated in this week’s Canon or Can It. Does this novel about love, friendship, quarrels, and class live up to canon expectations, or should it be canned forever?

This week, my Six Recs are: The Bridgerton Cookbook by Regula Yeswijn, Love and Marriage in the Age of Jane Austen by Rory Muir, The Time Traveler's Guide to Regency Britain by Ian Mortimer, Georgette Heyer's Regency World by Jennifer Kloester, Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire by Amanda Foreman, and The Secret History of Georgian London by Dan Cruickshank.

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The Book Maven: A Literary Revue is hosted by Bethanne Patrick, produced by Christina McBride, and engineered by Jordan Aaron, with help from Lauren Stack.

All titles mentioned: A Particular Kind of Black Man, by Tope Folarin, Slow Dance by Rainbow Rowell, Like Mother Like Daughter by Kimberly McCreight, By the Lake of Sleeping Children by Luis Urrea, Site Fidelity by Claire Boyles, Happiness Falls by Angie Kim, The Devil's Highway by Luis Urrea, The Wedding Singer directed by Frank Coraci, Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, All the Year Round by Charles Dickens, Bleak House and The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens, Bridgerton by Julia Quinn, The Bridgerton Cookbook by Regula Yeswijn, Love and Marriage in the Age of Jane Austen by Rory Muir, The Time Traveler's Guide to Regency Britain by Ian Mortimer, Georgette Heyer's Regency World by Jennifer Kloester, Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire by Amanda Foreman, and The Secret History of Georgian London by Dan Cruickshank.