Merry Spinster and books inspired by fairy tales

This week on the MashReads Podcast, we read and discuss Daniel Mallory Ortberg's new short story collection "Merry Spinster." The book reimagines classic fairy tales but with very dark twists.

Then, inspired by "Merry Spinster" we move on to discuss other books inspired by fairy tales that we love.

And as always, we close with recommendations:
Peter recommends the video game "God of War." "It is just an incredibly well rought game in terms of basically everything. It feels great, it looks great, but I think what's captivated me most about it is how the story itself is such a mature standing for a character that had previously been an incarnation of greedy bloodbaths. I think it's symobolic of a lot of growth in the video game inudstry as a whole." (You can check out Mashable's review of the game here.)
Martha recommends the 1997 version of Cinderalla featuring Brandy and Whitney Houston. "These are all legends and it's fantastic. It's the black Cinderella. It's perfect." She also recommends doing facemasks during your flights. "You put your facemask on and so that you wake up wherever you're landing, you feel fantastic and you look fantastic."
MJ recommends the New York Times podcast Still Processing's episode about Beychella, Beyonce history-making Coachella performance. "They talk about Beychella in terms of pop culture, pop culture history, race. It's the smartest deconstruction and reading of what this performance is."

Next week we are reading "The Rosary," an essay by Alexander Chee from his new collection How To Write An Autobiographical Novel. You can find it online here and we hope you'll join us in reading it.

This week on the MashReads Podcast, we read and discuss Daniel Mallory Ortberg's new short story collection "Merry Spinster." The book reimagines classic fairy tales but with very dark twists.

Then, inspired by "Merry Spinster" we move on to discuss other books inspired by fairy tales that we love.

And as always, we close with recommendations:

Peter recommends the video game "God of War." "It is just an incredibly well rought game in terms of basically everything. It feels great, it looks great, but I think what's captivated me most about it is how the story itself is such a mature standing for a character that had previously been an incarnation of greedy bloodbaths. I think it's symobolic of a lot of growth in the video game inudstry as a whole." (You can check out Mashable's review of the game here.)
Martha recommends the 1997 version of Cinderalla featuring Brandy and Whitney Houston. "These are all legends and it's fantastic. It's the black Cinderella. It's perfect." She also recommends doing facemasks during your flights. "You put your facemask on and so that you wake up wherever you're landing, you feel fantastic and you look fantastic."
MJ recommends the New York Times podcast Still Processing's episode about Beychella, Beyonce history-making Coachella performance. "They talk about Beychella in terms of pop culture, pop culture history, race. It's the smartest deconstruction and reading of what this performance is."

Next week we are reading "The Rosary," an essay by Alexander Chee from his new collection How To Write An Autobiographical Novel. You can find it online here and we hope you'll join us in reading it.