We’re staying alive with Ashely Alker and 99 Ways to Die
Dr. Ashely Alker is a self-described death-escapologist–or, in more familiar terms, an emergency medicine doctor. She has seen it all, from flesh-eating bacteria to the work of a serial killer to the more mundane but no less deadly, and her work keeping people from dying (or being unable to) has uniquely prepared her to write […]
We’ve been infected by The Faculty (Peculiar Movie Club)
Welcome to the Peculiar Movie Club, a bonus podcast linked to our main show the Peculiar Book Club through common themes in media. This week, in honor of the book Rise of the Zombie Bugs, we are reviewing the high school horror film The Faculty. Join Davey Berris and Darren Cross as they take a […]
It’s a sinister tale with Hallie Rubenhold and Story of a Murder
On February 1, 1910, the vivacious, diamond-adorned music hall performer Belle Elmore suddenly vanished from her home, causing alarm among her friends, the entertainers of the Music Hall Ladies’ Guild. Their demands for an investigation would lead to the unearthing of a gruesome secret and trigger a fevered international manhunt for Belle’s husband, medical fraudster […]
We’re puckering up for Eileen G’Sell and Lipstick
Lipstick today is as messy—and fascinating—as changing attitudes towards femininity. Mining the experience of women across culture, class, and generation, this book tosses out expired ideas about beauty and power like so many tubes of melted wax. From Max Factor to Glossier, from Marilyn to Chappell Roan, lipstick is as shape-shifting and elusive as femininity […]
You better hold your breath with Matthew Gavin Frank and Submersed
Have you ever wanted to build your own submarine? I admit, I was a little shocked to find out how many men and women—but mostly men—who feel almost obsessively compelled to sink into the deep sea. Despite the 2023 fatal implosion of Stockton Rush's much more highly funded submarine, Titan, these amateur backyard enthusiasts are […]
We’re getting extra Peculiar with Jessica McCann and Peculiar Savage Beauty
Jessica McCann is an award-winning historical novelist and has worked as a professional writer and journalist for more than 35 years. One of her earliest assignments as a freelance writer was covering a new surgical radiation technique for destroying brain tumors, during which she donned scrubs and observed inside the operating room. Since then, her […]
We’re bugging out to talk to Mindy Weisberger and Rise of the Zombie Bugs
You’ve seen the movies. But did you know that zombies are in fact all around us? Insect zombies, that is. In Rise of the Zombie Bugs, Mindy Weisberger explores the eerie yet fascinating phenomenon of real-life zombification. The truth is stranger than fiction: these parasites reproduce by rewriting their victims' neurochemistry, transforming them into the […]
It’s an Unchained conversation with Ghost (Peculiar Movie Club)
Welcome to the Peculiar Movie Club, a bonus podcast linked to our main show the Peculiar Book Club through common themes in media. This week, in honor of the book When We Spoke to the Dead, we are reviewing the romance film Ghost. Join Davey Berris and Darren Cross as they take a deep dive […]
We’re Inviting you to listen to Sarah Weinman and Without Consent
From Sarah Weinman, author of Scoundrel and The Real Lolita, comes an eye-opening story about the first major spousal rape trial in America and urgent questions about women’s rights that would reverberate for decades. In December 1978, Greta Rideout bravely testified that her husband, John, whom she still lived with, had raped her. She was […]
We’ll Bring the Christmas Ghosts with the Lady Aye and WHEN WE SPOKE TO THE DEAD
Ghosts spoke. Women listened. Everything changed.It began with whispers in a dimly lit room. In the 1840s, the Fox Sisters―and the legions of mediums they inspired―ignited the Spiritualist movement that swept through Victorian parlors and presidential campaigns alike. Contacting the dead wasn't merely a parlor trick: It was a political statement, a declaration of self […]