In this episode, we dive into Laila Lalami’s The Dream Hotel — a sharp, thought-provoking novel that blends imagination with unsettling realism.
Join us as we unpack our impressions of the book and explore how its vision of AI, capitalism, and power imbalance mirrors our own world. From questions of who controls technology to what it means to be human in a data-driven age, this conversation looks at the future through the lens of literature — and asks whether it’s really as distant as it seems.
Tune in to reflect, question, and maybe even dream a little differently.
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Intro music by Leonardo Granados
This week, Dr. Jennifer Gouck joins us to unpack one of the most pressing issues in American literary culture today — book bans. What exactly are book challenges? Who’s behind them? And what might these bans mean for readers, educators, and publishers in today’s political and cultural climate?
Join us as we dig into the complex world of censorship, libraries, and the fight to keep stories accessible — and, as always, to remind everyone to read more books!
Resources and works mentioned:
📘 Unbecoming — Seema Yasmin (Simon & Schuster link)
📗 Banned Together — Edited by Ashley Hope Pérez, illustrated by Debbie Fong
🎥 Banned Together Documentary
📖 Forever... by Judy Blume (Wikipedia)
📚 WWU Münster — Banned Books Project
📸 Instagram post 1
📸 Instagram post 2
📖 Ex Marks the Spot — Goodreads
📖 Direbound — Goodreads
Let's talk about banned books!
On this episode we discuss a novel Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret (1970) by Judy Blume. It is a story of an 11 year-old-girl and her experiences with physical and spiritual changes, which is what led to the book being banned in some schools in the United States since its publication.
This is episode 6 in our Strange Land Book Club series.
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Intro music by Leonardo Granados
In this episode, Natalia, Bethany and Laura continue their discussion with Christina Neuwirth. We ask questions about their research of gender inequality in the Scottish literary scene, the culmination of which is the Quine Report, a public document that outlines the data used in their research, along with relevant insights.
Findings include datapoints such as “from 1919-2024, 12 Scottish literary prizes were won by men nearly twice as often as women” and “Scotland-based publishers published male authors 50% more than female authors in the years 2017-2019.”
https://quinereport.substack.com/p/welcome-to-the-quine-report
Imagine you come to work one day and find your office flooded. Author Christina Neuwirth joins us in this discussion to disclose some secrets of their writing process and talk about writing, reading, and hydrating in the office!This is episode 5 in our Strange Land Book Club series.
Find Christina here.
Books mentioned: The Distance of the Moon by Italo Calvino
The Distance of the Moon read by Liev Schreiber
The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
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Intro music by Leonardo Granados
Chief editors of TXT Celine Kock and Lena Ryzhova joined us today to discuss their upcoming publication. On this episode we discussed what it's like to work on the journal and why community of memories is the topic for this years publication.
Visit this site to learn more about TXT!
Books mentioned:
Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail BulgakovThe Enola Holmes Mysteries by Nancy Springer
A Sherlock Holmes Adventure Series by Bonnie McBird
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk
Dua Lipa's book club https://www.service95.com/tag/book-club
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Intro music by Leonardo Granados
How high are you ready to climb to knock on heaven's door?
On this episode Laura, Natalia and Bethany discuss Ted Chiang's short story The Tower of Babylon (1990).
This is episode 4 of our Strange Land Book Club series.
Time stamps:
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YouTube www.youtube.com/@CodEXMachina-u1t or TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@codexmachinapodcast
Intro music by Leonardo Granados
On this episode, Bethany and Laura discuss their experiences at the 2025 Thessaloniki Book Fair. Highlights include: a panel discussing the challenges of translating gender and queerness into smaller languages AND a visit to the Estonian booth, where they are celebrating 500 years since the first book was printed in the Estonian language.
We include a short interview with Priit-Hendrik Kaldma, a scholar and translator who works on Estonian-Greek-Estonian translations. On Making Book History, we discuss the Unbound fiasco and the difficulty of being an author in today’s world.
Links:
Thessaloniki Book Fair
https://www.thessalonikibookfair.gr/
500 Years of EstonianBooks
https://www.erm.ee/en/do-you-know-this-story
Our favorite translations:
Papyrus: The Invention of Books in the Ancient World by Irene Vallejo
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata
Glennkill by Leonie Swann
From Merlin to mansions…the CodEX Machina crew discusses Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (quite exuberantly) on the latest installment of Strange Land Book Club. In Making Book History, we discuss the discovery of a fragment of the Suite Vulgate du Merlin (a contemporaneously popular 13th century French telling of the King Arthur saga) in, of all things, the binding of a 16th century archival registry. Hey, when you need paper, you grab the closestbook, right? This is episode 3 of our Strange Land Book Club series.
Modern Magic UnlocksMerlin’s Medieval Secrets
https://www.cam.ac.uk/stories/merlin-manuscript-discovered-cambridge
Sex, Jealousy andGender: Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca 80 Years On
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/feb/23/olivia-laing-on-daphne-du-mauriers-rebecca-80-years-on
Time stamps:
00:38 Making Book History
4:15 Main topic
Is serialization a thing of the past? Did authors and publishers indulge in publishing serialized novels only in Victorian times? How does digital world embrace serialized publications? Our guest Swara Shukla will take us on a journey across her research subject of Wattpad and serialized publications. Stay tuned!
Follow Swara here https://www.linkedin.com/in/swarashukla/?originalSubdomain=de
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YouTube https://youtube.com/shorts/AOdLC1GoobA?feature=share
for more pictures and videos of all things books that we discuss in the podcast!
Intro music by Leonardo Granados
In this episode we talk to our first guest Swara Shukla about books she is reading. In the next episode Swars will share her research nto Wattpad and contemporary serialization!
In this episode: I want to die but I want to eat tteokbokki (Baek Se-hee), How to Kill Your Family (Bella Mackie), What Readers Do (Beth Driscoll), The One Month Boyfriend (Roxie Noir), Out (Natsuo Kirino) and some others!
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Intro music by Leonardo Granados
How do you feel when your favourite book series stops coming out? The story isn't finished and you might have to wait for years. Even this wait might be in vain. What can a reader do in such a desperate situation? Listen to find out.
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Intro music by Leonardo Granados
This episode features our rubric Making Book History (some AI shenanigans from Inkitt) and of course a discussion of Piranesi - a novel that touched us deeply and irrevocably. This is episode 1 of our Strange Land Book Club series.
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Intro music by Leonardo Granados
We begin this podcasting journey with one of the biggest bookish events of the year - Frankfurt Book Fair!
In this episode in our rubric Making Book History we talk about Margaret Atwood and mainsplainers of Twitter.
We share our impressions of the book fair (we tried to keep it short, I swear!) and compile some highlights of our visit.
Join Laura, Bethany and Natalia on this bookish journey!
Intro music by Leonardo Granados
Follow us on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube for more pictures and videos of all things books that we discuss in the podcast!
Welcome to Codex Machina, where we talk about book history, book publishing, and reading experiences!
Intro music by Leonardo Granados
Follow us on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube for more pictures and videos of all things books that we discuss in the podcast!
