The show for people who love to think, talk, and learn about books, Lit Talk* explores the strange, fascinating, and completely true stories behind your favorite classic novels.
Each season investigates a work of fiction, its historical influences, the life of its author, and how we can apply its teachings to our modern lives.
Scholars, industry experts, and book lovers join us in conversation to get to the heart of what makes these timeless stories so extraordinary, and why they are just as important today as they were when they were written.
The party is coming to a close. Soon the music will end, the lights will be shut off, the groundkeepers will start cleaning up, and all we’ll have left is the memory...but maybe this story was already a memory.
In the final episode of season 2, Nesha and Bobby sit down with Kait Kerrigan of The Great Gatsby Musical, currently on Broadway, to discuss bringing the novel to the stage, Nick’s fractured memory, and what Gatsby means…100 years later.
30 Jul 2025
*The Great Gatsby | Ep 8: Death on the Isle
If Chapter 7 was about the true James Gatz, the man hidden beneath the veneer of Gatsby, Chapter 8 is about the true world, the one hidden beneath the shiny exterior of the dreams we adorn it with. What Fitzgerald creates is a world without meaning, a world of raw matter, and while it isn’t a pretty sight, it's an important one.
In our penultimate episode of season 2, Bobby and Nesha sit down with book collector and Fitzgerald aficionado Sarah Goldstein to discuss the Great Depression, Bruce Springsteen, and what happens when dreams don’t come true.
23 Jul 2025
*The Great Gatsby | Ep 7: Portrait of the Artist as an Old Man
There is a distinct quality to Fitzgerald’s writing that made it so unique in 1925. It was not just that it was beautiful, but that it was cinematic. Today, we are used to reading books and imagining their scenes playing out on the big screen, but before the rise of Hollywood, this mode of reading and writing stories within the cinematic imagination didn’t exist. And while Scott could write cinematic novels better than just about anyone, actually writing for film was a whole other story…
In this episode, Nesha and Bobby sit down with comedian Beth Stelling to discuss writing for Hollywood, early 2000s pick-up artists, and whether aspiring artists are romantic heroes or delusional fools.
16 Jul 2025
*The Great Gatsby | Ep 6: The Picture of James Gatz
Nick and Gatsby’s relationship is intimate, to say the least. Of all the attendees at Gatsby’s party, it’s Nick who receives a formal invitation. It’s Nick to whom Gatsby confesses his true origins, and it’s Nick who arranges Gatsby’s funeral, meets with his father, and stays with him until the very end. Therefore, it’s little wonder that Queer readings of the novel have emerged; the book positively brims with innuendo and unspoken desire.
This episode, Nesha and Bobby are joined by novelist AJ Odasso to discuss fan fiction, crying in English class, and what Queer life was like in the 1920s. Also, the fine line the characters in Gatsby straddle between love and obsession.
9 Jul 2025
*The Great Gatsby | E5: Miss Daisy Drives Herself
F. Scott Fitzgerald identified a fatal flaw in The Great Gatsby—the novel's women. In this episode, we’ll be talking about the girls of Gatsby alongside another 1920s classic that, in many ways, is Gatsby if it were written for and by women. That novel is Ex-Wife by Ursula Parrott
Joining Bobby and Nesha is Dr. Marsha Gordon. Together, we’ll discuss the New Women of the 1920s, if Daisy is a victim or a perpetrator, and how traditional values are being repackaged for modern women.
2 Jul 2025
*The Great Gatsby | E4: To Kill a Millionaire
Hosts Bobby and Nesha interview Dr. Caroline Brown about F. Scott Fitzgerald's *The Great Gatsby* and its commentary on the shifting racial and ethnic dynamics of 1920s America.
25 Jun 2025
*The Great Gatsby | E3: Gatsby in Wonderland
Dr. Philip McGowan analyzes the carnivalesque atmosphere of Jay Gatsby's parties in *The Great Gatsby* with hosts Bobby and Nesha, revealing a darker, tragic mystery beneath the glittering surface in this interview.
18 Jun 2025
*The Great Gatsby | E2: House of Worth
Dr. Michael Nowlin analyzes F. Scott Fitzgerald's *The Great Gatsby* with hosts Bobby and Nesha, revealing the novel's exploration of class and the uncomfortable truths about the American dream in this interview.
11 Jun 2025
*The Great Gatsby | E1: East O' The Sound
Host Bobby and Nesha interview Hillary Copsey about F. Scott Fitzgerald's *The Great Gatsby*, exploring its hidden messages, unreliable narration, and status as the Great American Novel.
4 Jun 2025
*The Great Gatsby Trailer
The hosts of Lit Talk preview F Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, exploring its influence on literature and American identity.
27 Sept 2024
*Frankenstein | E5: Of Beauties & Beasts
There is one question the novel really, really doesn't want to answer. What does the Creature look like?
While Mary Shelley describes the Creature, we still never really get a good look at him. Considering the plot of the entire novel rests on his hideousness, he’s remarkably difficult to pin down. In this episode, we are going to be getting into why. Why is a novel that is so focused on beauty, or the lack thereof, so cagey about what this monster looks like, and what Mary Shelley is trying to tell us about appearance, monstrosity, and the bizarre terrain of our own bodies?
27 Sept 2024
*Frankenstein | E4: Sense & Sustainability
We read Frankenstein as a novel about science, which it undoubtedly is, but it's also a novel about nature. The natural world is fundamental to the novel, in many ways, the landscapes serve as an additional character. They impact the plot, trigger emotional insights, and reveal fascinating messages to those who are wise enough to listen.
This episode we will delve into how Mary Shelley’s romantic peers imagined nature, and how Mary, ever subtle, undermined this view and replaced it with her own unique warning. And while the views may be beautiful, be warned dear listeners, the places we will be visiting this episode are no paradise...
27 Sept 2024
*Frankenstein | E3: A Tale of Two Marys
Before there was Mary Shelley, there was her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft. She was an early founder of romanticism, a pioneering feminist writer, or as the press called her, "a hyena in petticoats". Her story is wild, wicked, and wonderful and had an enormous influence on the scary stories her daughter would one day write. You've heard of feminine rage, prepare to encounter the feminine strange, as we delve into how Frankenstein is a surprisingly feminist text.
27 Sept 2024
*Frankenstein | E2: I, Prometheus
When we say the words scientific revolution, what comes to mind? Perhaps it is the clean white lines of lab coats and test tubes, electric vehicles and virtual reality , the eccentrics and tech bros of silicon valley. Needless to say, none of these things are to be found in Mary Shelley’s scientific revolution. Hers is grimmer, grimier, full of long shadows and dark hallways. It is grotesque and macabre, sharp scapulas and operating tables and nary a washed hand. It is dangerous, lethal, even. It is this world we will be exploring today...
27 Sept 2024
*Frankenstein | E1: Strange New World
In 1818, Frankenstein broke ground by creating space for its readers to interrogate the morals of the day’s emerging sciences. Within its safe and wholly hypothetical pages, it was a place where readers could engage with their fears of new technology, anxieties about religion, and the questions of what we owe each other. Frankenstein was forged in the crucible of revolution–scientific revolution, political revolution, and social revolution. It predicted a future of unbridled scientific advancement, one that perhaps far outpaced our emotional maturity and sense of responsibility towards the earth and one another. In this episode, we reintroduce you to the story and the fascinating woman who wrote it.
18 Sept 2024
Lit Talk* ...where stories come to life
Over 200 years ago, in an old villa on the shores of Lake Geneva, a group of travelers decided to have a ghost story competition. The poet, the playboy, the doctor, the jealous step-sister, and the 18-year-old girl who would change literature forever. We speak of Mary Shelley, and her unholy creation, Frankenstein.
In the first season of our new podcast Lit Talk*, we will explore her story as you have never heard it before. All episodes available this fall.
Bond & Grace's Lit Talk* is the show for people who love to think, talk, and learn about books. Lit Talk* explores the strange, fascinating, and completely true stories behind your favorite classic novels.
Each season investigates a work of fiction, its historical influences, the life of its author, and how we can apply its teachings to our modern lives. Scholars, industry experts, and book lovers join us in conversation to get to the heart of what makes these timeless stories so extraordinary, and why they are just as important today as they were when they were written.
Who has been a guest on Lit Talk*
Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.
Dr Caroline Brown
Dr Philip McGowan
Dr Michael Nowlin
Hillary Copsey
Reach and audience
Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.
Apple Podcasts (US)
5.0 / 5
4 ratings
Spotify
5.0 / 5
10 ratings
Podcast Authority Score: 18 / 100
A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.
Quality
16
Social presence
0
YouTube
0
Engagement
51
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