Hey, y'all, it's me back with another book to tell you about. If you love contemporary retellings of

classic novels like James by Percival Everett, then let me tell you about your next favorite book.

It's called The Great Man and it is a retelling of the Great Gatsby, but it is set among the black upper class of post-war Los Angeles

and is inspired by real-life historic events. It follows Charlie Tremel, a young veteran who is

lured by his cousin Marguerite to the esteemed West Adams Heights, L.A.'s newly recristened Sugar Hill, a place for black elites. As Charlie

navigates a landscape rife with ambition, betrayal, and societal turmoil, he soon finds himself

beside the dazzling James Reaper man, facing a pivotal decision that could end in tragedy.

Whether you've read or not read

the Great Gatsby, you're going to like The Great Man. The Great Man is out now. It is by

Kira Davis-Lurie, and you can find it wherever books are sold. I didn't even know that

bookseller is this like craft. And yet it is. That's what I've

learned over the last like, you know, four years of doing the show that it's like, it really is a

craft and that hand-selling books to people doing these kinds of recommendations are such a

beautiful part of like our literary world. And they, and mostly they're like young people who

are nerds and love books, you know? And that's like,

that's the nerd book, love and job out there, you know.

Welcome to the Stacks, a podcast about books and the people who read them. I'm your host,

Tracy Thomas, and today I am joined by Alexis Madrigal.

Alexis is a journalist. He is also an author. His new book is called The Pacific Circuit,

a globalized account of the battle for the soul of an American city. The book is all about

Oakland, California. Alexis lives there. I am from there. We dig into the city and our love for it.

And also talk about how this book expands the lens on Oakland to tell a bigger story about the world.

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