Hereby Monsters is a podcast about facing the unknown. I, uh, I start to float, float away from the earth. Have you ever smoked crack before? We're all kind of frantically searching for meaning. They have the neurotransmitters. I think we're all jugglers in some way. Yo, we're not broken. Crazy delinquents. We're in our last day, young man. Listen to Hear Be Monsters.

The podcast about the unknown.

On the KCRW iTunes page.

Funds for Bookworm are provided in part by Lannon Foundation.

Boots.

Well, we've been there without booze. Foundation. Boots. Where would we be without boos?

Where would we be without good?

No, Tos in the bird.

It's a rhetorical question, sir.

But where would we be without books?

From KCRW and KCRW.com, I'm Michael Silverblad, and this is Bookworm.

I am very happy to be talking to Anne Beatt, and we're going to talk about her new book, the state we're in,

subtitled as Main Stories.

And on the cover, could you describe the cover, Ann?

Cover delighted me.

It's a wonderful chachka of a woman sitting on the back of a lobster.

She's mostly naked and very well airbrushed. And the coolest thing is I didn't know that

I got to see the flip side of that so-called art on the back. Then we get to see her butt up there on

the lobster. So this is very much my sense of humor. Yes, and it's so nuts because it essentially says kits.

Right.

It's a bizarre cover and perfect for this bizarre book.

Now, I am here to make a case for an Ann Beattie that people refuse to know exists.

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