Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda and books we wish had growing up

This week we are joined by two guests  — Martha's roommate Zach and MJ's brother Marc — to chat about 'Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda,' A.K.A. the book that inspired the movie 'Love, Simon.'Then, inspired by Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda, we talk about books we wish we had growing up, including The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi, Call Me By Your Name by Andre Aciman, and The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chobosky.And as always, we close the show with recommendations:
Zach, Martha's roommate, recommends the Netflix show The Words Most Extraordinary Homes. "The show is perfect because one: it is British. There are two British co-hosts and they are just lovely people, because they are absolutely the most genuine. They just go around and look at beautiful homes and talk about the architecture. It's so simple and so perfect."
Marc recommends Bravo's reality TV show Vanderpump Rules. "It is pop culture junk food. It's an awful, awful show. But you see yourself in it, in a strange way." He also recommends Scaachi Cole's essay on Buzzfeed “'Vanderpump Rules' Is The Worst Show On TV That You Should Be Watching." "It's super, super funny read, and it's just a super well written essay."
Martha recommends Vince Staple's Go Fund Me project "Get Off My D*ck or Fund My Lifestyle," which was a response to critics saying that Vince Staples raps over low quality robot beats. "I love the song first of all and I love him. But it made me think about the larger cultural conversation about people's critiques about black art, and how a lot of people who write online, or talk about hip hop, don't get it."
MJ recommends "I wore Adidas tracksuits for week like Armie Hammer," a first person story where Elle writer Estelle Tang, well, wore Adidas tracksuits for a week like Armie Hammer. "The story she wrote is phenomenal, it's so funny. It's just this really great hilarious article about someone doing this ridiculous stunt."
Also mentioned on this podcast: our interview with Tomi Adeyemi, author of Children of Blood and Bone and Alim Kheraj's article for GQ "The Bright Future of Queer Literature Is the Young-Adult Novel."
And be sure to check out MJ's review of Love, Simon here.Next week, we're reading A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L'Engle. We hope you'll join us. If you're looking for more books coverage, be sure to follow MashReads on Facebook and Twitter.

This week we are joined by two guests  — Martha's roommate Zach and MJ's brother Marc — to chat about 'Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda,' A.K.A. the book that inspired the movie 'Love, Simon.'

Then, inspired by Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda, we talk about books we wish we had growing up, including The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi, Call Me By Your Name by Andre Aciman, and The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chobosky.

And as always, we close the show with recommendations:

Zach, Martha's roommate, recommends the Netflix show The Words Most Extraordinary Homes. "The show is perfect because one: it is British. There are two British co-hosts and they are just lovely people, because they are absolutely the most genuine. They just go around and look at beautiful homes and talk about the architecture. It's so simple and so perfect."

Marc recommends Bravo's reality TV show Vanderpump Rules. "It is pop culture junk food. It's an awful, awful show. But you see yourself in it, in a strange way." He also recommends Scaachi Cole's essay on Buzzfeed “'Vanderpump Rules' Is The Worst Show On TV That You Should Be Watching." "It's super, super funny read, and it's just a super well written essay."

Martha recommends Vince Staple's Go Fund Me project "Get Off My D*ck or Fund My Lifestyle," which was a response to critics saying that Vince Staples raps over low quality robot beats. "I love the song first of all and I love him. But it made me think about the larger cultural conversation about people's critiques about black art, and how a lot of people who write online, or talk about hip hop, don't get it."

MJ recommends "I wore Adidas tracksuits for week like Armie Hammer," a first person story where Elle writer Estelle Tang, well, wore Adidas tracksuits for a week like Armie Hammer. "The story she wrote is phenomenal, it's so funny. It's just this really great hilarious article about someone doing this ridiculous stunt."

Also mentioned on this podcast: our interview with Tomi Adeyemi, author of Children of Blood and Bone and Alim Kheraj's article for GQ "The Bright Future of Queer Literature Is the Young-Adult Novel."

And be sure to check out MJ's review of Love, Simon here.

Next week, we're reading A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L'Engle. We hope you'll join us. If you're looking for more books coverage, be sure to follow MashReads on Facebook and Twitter.