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The following podcast contains explicit language. Hello, and welcome to the Slate Audio

Book Club for the month of December. I'm Katie Waldman, Slate's Words Correspondent, and I'm joined

today by Slate Books and Culture Columnist Laura Miller.

Hey, Laura.

Hi.

And from New Haven, we have New York Times Magazine, writer, and political gabfester, Emily Bazelon.

Hey, Emily.

Hey, guys.

On the agenda today is Lauren Graff's novel, Fates and Furies, and the normal caution about spoilers applies. So if you don't

want certain plot twists and character revelations spoiled, please read Fates and Furies and then come back when

you're done. All right, so this is normally where I go into a long spiel summarizing the novel,

but I was actually wondering if you guys wanted to help me out. Fates and Furies, it has kind of a high

concept, it's a bifurcated structure. It's about a marriage, and the first half is about the

husband, and the second half is about the wife. Does one of you want to jump in and sort of flesh out

that summary? Well, I could jump in a little bit here. It's helpful to know that Lauren Groff originally thought of writing this novel as two separate small books. So the idea that they necessarily have a whole lot to say to each other is sort of an interesting question. Maybe she meant them to be read together.

Maybe she meant them to be read in any order. Or maybe ultimately she decided that they

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