The Stacks
Books
Every book, essay, poem and scripture mentioned in conversation, with who brought it up and why. 145 entries.
#
- 1984
Grant's example of science fiction shelved as literature because of the author's skill.
- 1Q84
Tamir calls it Murakami's only real romance: unrequited love from page one.
A
- A Grief Observed
Lewis's account of grieving his wife, the love of his life. Tamir reads the opening ('No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear...') because grief, like love, is crazy-making and…
- A Wild Sheep Chase
Mentioned as Grant tries to recall which Murakami book involves twin girlfriends; the twins are actually in Pinball, 1973.
- Abandoning a Cat
Murakami's autobiographical essay about his father, published in The New Yorker. Salih recounts the story of the family abandoning a cat at the beach only to find it home before them, and…
- Absalom, Absalom!
Read in Grant's university literature class.
- After Dark
One of Tamir's honorable mentions.
- After the Quake
Murakami's story collection responding to the 1995 Kobe earthquake; the first Murakami short story collection Tamir read.
- Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Where Grant says dragons and fantasy belong.
- An Artist of the Floating World
Tamir won it in Grant's Patreon lottery; Grant urges him to read it for its light touch, where meaning lurks beneath the sentences.
- Anna Karenina
Tolstoy's novel. Grant was on the edge of his seat during the officers' horse race, proof that a 150-year-old classic with 'the aura of boredom' can still thrill.
- As a Man Thinketh
Poetic prose using the metaphor of the mind as a garden: what you sow, you reap. Tamir counts it among the books that built the 'infrastructure and superhighways' of his mind.
- Atomic Habits
Named by Tamir as the kind of direct self-improvement book busy readers reach for instead of Murakami, setting up the closing argument for reading fiction.
B
- Bad Blood
Investigative book about Theranos. It is alluded to when Elizabeth Holmes comes up ('bad blood for people').
- Bhagavad Gita
Hindu scripture Tamir calls entirely dedicated to treating triumph and disaster alike; he highlights its reconciliation of conflicting desires and Krishna's teaching that you have a right…
- Bible
Cited for Joseph's dreams and his interpretation of Pharaoh's dreams, which saved his life and made him second-in-command in Egypt. Tamir's example of how much ancient cultures valued…
- Birthday Girl
Murakami story published in Germany as an illustrated standalone edition, Salih's example of single-story gift books.
- Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman
Murakami short-story collection; Tamir points to the 'sleeping woman' in the title. He gave Samantha its story 'Sleep' as homework within hours of meeting her.
- Book of Jonah
Jonah in the belly of the whale appears in the Murakami passage Tamir reads, as an image of Tsukuru having fallen into the bowels of death.
- Book of Proverbs
Biblical book Tamir tentatively cites for Solomon's counsel that some questions aren't worth seeking answers to.
- Brave New World
Grant's example of science fiction shelved as literature.
C
- Catch-22
Heller's war novel about the horror of war, told with irony and sarcasm. Grant's model for laughing at pain in order to stay human.
- Childhood (Hesse poem)
Poem Tamir reads ('My farthest valley... O dark gate, O dark hour of death, come forth') about longing for death as a return home to one's dreams; Mia hears in it someone letting themselves…
- Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage
Tamir loves the scene where a friend tells Tsukuru a strange story about a man his father met at a mountain inn, an example of Murakami's one-on-one conversations that feel like portals.
- Compensation
Emerson's essay on the law of compensation (do good, get good), which Tamir says shaped early self-help like The Master Key System.
- Confessions of a Shopaholic
Tyler's tongue-in-cheek example that any book, from the Odyssey to chick lit, introduces you to worlds your own choices have steered you away from.
- Consolation to Helvia
Seneca's letter from exile to his mother telling her not to weep for him, cited by Tamir as an example of Stoic consolation as practice.
- Cream
Opening story of First Person Singular, one of Tamir's favorite Murakami short stories: the narrator climbs a hill to a concert invitation, finds no one there, and sits in a park.
- Creative Dreaming
A dream-control book Tamir picked up at a random used bookstore in California. He hasn't fully read it, but reads its back cover's big promises: lovemaking with a partner of your choice…
D
- Dance Dance Dance
Tamir's example of Murakami women as vanishing conduits rather than true romance.
- Dead Babies
Amis novel Grant loved in his twenties for prose that grabbed you by the throat.
- Dhammapada
Buddhist scripture Tamir cites (paraphrasing its opening) as saying you suffer because you desire; Ian counters that resistance, not desire, creates suffering.
- Divine Comedy
Dante's epic in which Beatrice has a clear role. Tamir mentions it with La Vita Nuova as Dante sharing a piece of his heart with the world.
- Dracula
Read in Grant's university literature class.
- DSM-5
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Ian predicts social media addiction will eventually be listed in it, as video games were.
- Dune
Mia just finished it and calls it the pinnacle of science fiction, full of 'cheat codes to human psychology' and philosophy, an escape from mortgages and an Orwellian world into one where…
E
- Ecclesiastes
Biblical book named as the alternative source of Solomon's advice to leave unanswerable questions alone.
- Elon Musk (Isaacson)
Biography Mia uses as her example of nonfiction that people wrongly treat as more serious than fiction.
F
- Fahrenheit 451
Grant's example of science fiction shelved as literature.
- First Person Singular
Short story collection that both name as their least favorite Murakami book, though Tamir counts its opening story 'Cream' among his favorites.
G
- Galatea
Miller's short story based on the Pygmalion and Galatea myth, published as a small hardcover. Tamir picked it up as the perfect gift: substantial enough to feel real, short enough that…
- Galápagos
Vonnegut novel Tamir brought to the recording as one of his favorites. He offers it as an example of Vonnegut's flawed, hubristic characters, the kind of imperfection that makes people…
- Generation X
Coupland's novel, which named Grant's 'sadly named' cynical generation.
- Going to Canada
The first story in Grant's collection, about returning from Budapest to Canada, family trauma, and an old friend who finds the narrator's blunt observations off-putting. Tamir reads it as…
H
- Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
The book-club pick that made Tamir think 'I didn't know a book could do that to me' and pulled him into fiction.
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Samantha recalls the King's Cross scene where Harry, near death, meets the dead Dumbledore and asks if it is a dream; Dumbledore says being in your head doesn't make it not real. She also…
- Hear the Wind Sing
Murakami's first novella, one of his 'kitchen table' novels written by hand at night after running his bar. Grant liked it and could see a young writer still finding his way.
- Hermann Hesse poem on night
Tamir paraphrases a Hesse poem in which the speaker fears the night, when the quiet forces you to face your fears, and longs to lie in a sunlit field before he can dream of the night.
- Honey Pie
Story from after the quake that Salih says exists in Germany as an illustrated standalone edition.
- Horror Hall of Fame
Another handmade anthology Tyler assembled and lent to Tamir, shown briefly on camera.
- How to Win Friends and Influence People
A classic Tyler flipped through in his 30s; he found most of it was things life had already taught him.
I
- If—
Poem Tamir quotes ('meet with Triumph and Disaster and treat those two impostors just the same'); Ian's wife has an 'If' tattoo and knows the whole poem by heart.
- Invictus
Poem whose closing lines ('I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul') Tamir quotes as one of the 'sources of truth' Sheela embodies.
K
- Kafka on the Shore
Both find it absurd: fish falling from the sky, Colonel Sanders as a pimp. Tamir only recommends it to die-hard fans.
- Killing Commendatore
Salih's entry into Murakami: on his 30th birthday in April 2018 he opened it in a bookstore and recognized his own wish to flee the city and paint, then finished it in three or four days…
L
- La Vita Nuova
Dante's first book, about his love for Beatrice. Tamir cites it as an example of turning unrequited feeling into art instead of victimhood.
- Landscape with Flatiron
Short story from after the quake that Salih likes for its vibe.
- Letter to His Father
Tyler cites Kafka's letter to his father to explain how his father crippled Kafka's ability to look at himself 'without wincing'.
- Life of Pi
Booker-winning novel; Grant saw the film and dislikes how it becomes ridiculous towards the end, though he cites Martel's idea of coaxing readers along.
- London Fields
Example of the heavy, stylized 1980s prose Grant loved in his twenties and now can't stand.
- Love
Tamir mentions Emerson's 'essays on love' in passing.
M
- Makers of Empire
Prose-poem about dreamers as 'the architects of greatness' whose visions outlast crumbling empires; Tamir reads it aloud and it frames the episode's question of reconciling greatness with…
- Man's Search for Meaning
Raised as a non-fiction touchstone on choosing your response to circumstance. Tyler read it in university; for him, as a closeted teen who felt locked into a bad fate, it taught that…
- Masks (poem)
Short poem (from Falling Up) about two people with blue skin who each hide it, search their whole lives for another blue person, and pass right by each other. It is used to show what we…
- Meditations
Tamir's example of speaking with the dead: opening Meditations is talking to Marcus Aurelius, because books are how people become immortal.
- Meeting the Shadow
A collection of essays subtitled 'The Hidden Power of the Dark Side of Human Nature', which Tamir holds up while asking Sheela whether love has a dark side. She says she doesn't think in…
- Men, Women and Other Adventures
A handmade anthology Tyler gave Tamir for his birthday, assembled by cutting stories out of other collections and rebinding them with Bible onion-skin paper, with images and captions…
- Moby-Dick
Mentioned as a novel built on Melville's real experience aboard a whaling ship.
- Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont
A nearly forgotten novel about a recently widowed woman living in a London hotel for the elderly. Grant calls it heartbreaking and gets emotional thinking about it; he believes it was…
N
- No Longer Human
Dazai's quasi-memoir about a man who clowns, drinks and ends in a double suicide. Tamir likes it; Grant finds it too self-indulgent and without desire.
- Norwegian Wood
The Murakami novel Grant likes best; Tamir notes it is his only novel without magic realism.
- Notes from Underground
Grant compares it to No Longer Human: an equally negative narrator who still aspires, absurdly, to be part of a barroom brawl so his life won't feel futile.
- Novelist as a Vocation
Murakami's book on how he writes novels, which Tamir gave Tyler and Tyler is working through.
O
- Oedipus Rex
The Oedipus myth that Tamir identifies as the backbone of Kafka on the Shore.
- On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
Tamir's example of poetic prose you have to be in the mood for.
- On the Road
Kerouac's novel of 1950s American hitchhiking. At 19 it filled Grant with a wild spirit; 30 years later it had lost its resonance. His example of a book that must come at the right time.
- Outwitting the Devil
Hill locks himself in a hotel during a dark period and 'interviews' the Devil, who demands to be called 'Your Majesty' and calls God 'my opposition'. It had a huge impact on Tamir, who…
P
- Pinball, 1973
Murakami's second kitchen-table novella; Tamir misremembers the year in the title as 1984 or 1983.
- Poems (Hermann Hesse)
Hesse's well-known poetry collection in a bilingual edition (German on the left, English on the right) that Tamir reads from.
- Psalms
Tamir describes reciting the Songs of Ascents from the Psalms, traditionally attributed to King David, at the mourners' home for seven days after a Jewish death.
Q
- Quran
Colin lists it with the Torah, the Bible and Buddhist texts: books with great words in them that human beings twist.
R
- Ramayana
One of the spiritual classics Tamir read before turning to modern fiction.
- Rat Trilogy
Murakami's first three novels (Hear the Wind Sing, Pinball 1973, A Wild Sheep Chase), which Tamir recently finished; cited for its unnamed protagonist torn between partners in the real and…
- Recursion
Sci-fi novel Tamir had just finished. Researcher Helena builds a chair that records memories, and a billionaire funds it. Combined with a deprivation tank that briefly kills the user and…
S
- Siddhartha
Part of the philosophical fiction Tamir read before getting into modern fiction.
- Slaughterhouse-Five
The only Vonnegut novel Colin has read, and one he loves. What he takes from it is how the protagonist, despite the firebombing of Dresden, learns to make friends in the course of the story.
- Sleep
Murakami story about a woman who stops sleeping for weeks. Samantha read it while she herself was struggling to sleep and with a protagonist her age; it shook her out of self-absorbed…
- Solaris
Tamir asks whether Grant has read or watched Solaris, pointing to a poster behind him.
- South of the Border, West of the Sun
Salih's example of Murakami pushing the double-life theme to its limit as the protagonist nearly leaves and betrays his wife. Also the book at the center of the Literarisches Quartett row…
- Space Trilogy
Tamir says he began his reading of C.S. Lewis with 'some of his sci-fi', not knowing Lewis wrote science fiction.
- Sputnik Sweetheart
In both guests' top five. Tamir's most indelible visual is Miu on the Ferris wheel seeing herself in her apartment; also the pan-flute music on the Greek island. Salih reads the Ferris…
- Steppenwolf
Grant calls it fantastic but 'dripping in imagery', in contrast with the sparing imagery of Japanese prose.
- Steve Jobs (Isaacson)
Biography mentioned alongside the Musk book in Mia's defence of fiction.
- Super-Frog Saves Tokyo
Story from after the quake, due out in October as the first illustrated standalone Murakami short story in English, which Salih sees as a way to introduce people to Murakami.
- Synchronicity
Jung's essay on meaningful coincidence, which Tamir describes as Jung tracking the strange coincidences in his life; offered as evidence that Jung, like Murakami, was no nihilist.
T
- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Mentioned by Tyler with Carnegie as self-help classics that mostly confirmed what he had already learned.
- The Alchemist
Mia calls it a complete, timeless work of art in defending fiction against nonfiction; also a parallel to her own search for a publisher. Tamir uses Coelho to recommend reading little-known…
- The Alexandria Quartet
Four novels (Justine, Balthazar, Mountolive, Clea); Grant's example of a work so inspired it intimidates him as a writer.
- The Bell Jar
Plath's 1963 novel. Tamir reads its fig tree passage, where the narrator starves in the crotch of a fig tree because she can't choose a fig, as the episode's picture of decision paralysis…
- The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are
Watts's 1966 book. Tamir is still reading it and wants Ian to have it, saying the 'taboo against knowing who you are' is literally the work Ian does, since self-inquiry goes against the…
- The Catcher in the Rye
Grant suspects that on rereading it would feel too self-indulgent, like other books of youthful angst.
- The City and Its Uncertain Walls
Murakami's new novel, due out November 19 (2024) in English, his first in six years and a kind of sequel to Hard-Boiled Wonderland.
- The Dark Forest
Second book of the Three-Body trilogy. Tamir's favorite example of fusion: it opens like a romance, with a writer inventing and falling for his ideal woman, then turns into an existential…
- The Drinker
A very depressing novel about a man who takes one drink and becomes an alcoholic. For Grant it still has desire, unlike Dazai.
- The Elephant Vanishes
Short-story collection; Tyler has read Murakami short stories including the elephant story.
- The Flowers of Buffoonery
Dazai's novella about a man recovering in a sanatorium after a failed double suicide. Tamir notes it was written before No Longer Human yet works as its sequel and has a more hopeful tone.
- The Forbidden Worlds of Haruki Murakami
Matthew Carl Strecher's study of Murakami's metaphysical realms, the episode's organizing theme: why does Murakami send protagonists into wells, through walls, and across portals, and what…
- The Forgotten Language
Fromm's 1951 book on dreams, fairy tales and myths, the likely source of the cold-open line that we are wiser and capable of better judgment asleep than awake.
- The Friend from Budapest
Grant's short story collection, which Tamir read as a Patreon member. Grant printed 100 copies and sends one to anyone who joins his Patreon. Its introduction describes his enthusiasm…
- The Game
Neil Strauss's book, mentioned to identify Strauss when Tamir describes the online book club that led him to Murakami.
- The Ghostly Blue Stallion of Dorchester Cabin
Tyler's unpublished short story about a blue roan stallion that appeared on his fenced Alberta property and vanished; he wrote it in one three-hour sitting and says everything in it is…
- The Gospels
Ancient texts Tamir says he has lately been fascinated by, though he isn't Christian, leading into Gnostic Christianity.
- The Grapes of Wrath
Cited by Grant as great literature that treats pain as a beginning, not an end.
- The Grief Trip
Mia's memoir in progress about losing her mother and her psychedelic journey with that loss; the centrepiece of her work, unveiling her methodology. She is seeking an agent and hopes for a…
- The Lathe of Heaven
1971 science-fiction novel about George Orr, a Portland man whose 'effective dreams' change reality, and the psychiatrist who exploits them. Tamir opens the episode by reading its jellyfish…
- The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
Mentioned to introduce C.S. Lewis (and the Narnia series) before Tamir turns to A Grief Observed.
- The Makioka Sisters
One of Grant's all-time favourite Japanese novels: 500 pages of trying to find a husband for the third sister, yet unbelievably compelling.
- The Master Key System
1912 New Thought / self-help course; Tamir has had its 'Makers of Empire' excerpt on his wall for over a decade, from his bare startup studio to his current office, and reads it to open the…
- The Odyssey
One of the classic works Tamir read before turning to modern fiction.
- The Power of Now
Tolle's book on presence. Tamir mentions it to show how much of our lives we actually spend living in the past through rumination and memory, which is why Tolle wrote a whole book about…
- The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life
Goffman's 1956 book on the dramaturgical view of social life. Logan refers to it as the 'infamous book back in the '50s' about life as performance and masks. He does not name the title.
- The Prophet
Tamir guesses this was the Gibran book Sheela's father read to her at age five. Sheela says the love in the reading, not the book, is what stayed with her.
- The Redemption of Time
Fan-written fourth book of the Three-Body saga, officially blessed by Liu Cixin, that answers fans' questions. Tamir alludes to its treatment of the brain sent to space (Yun Tianming) to…
- The Second Bakery Attack
Murakami short story Tyler has read, which he remembers as 'a robbery one'.
- The Secret
Referenced in passing as the modern version of As a Man Thinketh's idea that whatever you think within becomes what is without.
- The Sirens of Titan
Vonnegut novel Tamir brought to the recording alongside Galápagos, both among his favorites. It illustrates characters so flawed they seem almost alien.
- The Sun Also Rises
Hemingway's first novel. Grant once disliked the slow trout-fishing interlude in the Spanish mountains between Paris and Pamplona; now it is his favourite part.
- The Three-Body Problem
Liu Cixin's sci-fi trilogy (Remembrance of Earth's Past), which Tamir strongly recommends in print or audiobook. He brings it up for its idea of dreams as the most severe form of torture…
- The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying
The book Mia actually draws on (correcting herself from the Book of the Dead) when she teaches grievers about the bardo states and how Tibetan lives are ended.
- The Truth
Strauss's answer to The Game, about his sex addiction, cheating on his girlfriend with her best friend, and therapy with Esther Perel. Tyler wants to read it.
- The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
Grant loves the opening (which grew from a short story) but quit caring once the narrator sits in a well and astral-projects, which he calls cheating.
- Think and Grow Rich
Tamir notes that this popular business book has a chapter on dreaming in which Hill describes dreams and imagined meetings with mentors such as Thomas Edison and a U.S. president, and…
- This Is It
Alan Watts's essay collection 'This Is It and Other Essays on Zen and Spiritual Experience'. Tamir reads its preface aloud: it argues that the spiritual can't be separated from the…
- Tibetan Book of the Dead
Mia first names it before clarifying she means the similar Tibetan Book of Living and Dying.
- Tokyo Ueno Station
Novel narrated by the ghost of a homeless man in Tokyo whose family has died, struggling to reconcile the point of his existence. Tamir reads a passage asking whether death is where time…
- Tony Takitani
Murakami short story, one of Salih's favorites ('a pretty messed up story', Tamir agrees); also adapted into a film the two discuss.
- Torah
Colin lists it among the scriptures that contain great things but get distorted by people.
- Town of Cats
The tale-within-a-tale in 1Q84 (also published separately in The New Yorker), which Tamir 'really loves'.
- Troll
Logan's 2023 novel about Peter Riley, an aspiring actor who becomes the online provocateur and cult leader 'Petrol'. It's written as short, dated fragments (forum posts, lectures…
U
- U.S.A. Trilogy
A huge three-novel series Grant calls beautiful, fantastic and creative.
- Ulysses
Widely considered the greatest novel of the 20th century; Grant calls it masterfully built but unpleasant to read without notes, asking whether a book that is that much work is good.
- Upanishads
Tamir, who is Jewish but loves the texts, paraphrases a line saying rituals and prayers are 'a poor raft to cross the sea of samsara' and that true devotees come directly to God. He uses it…
V
- Vedas
Mentioned with the Bible and Greek mythology as ancient sources where dreams are everywhere and significant.
W
- War and Peace
Logan's shorthand for the wrong first book for someone trying to rebuild a reading habit.
- Wicked
Samantha's comparison for The Redemption of Time: an authorized spin-off retelling of an existing story world, like Wicked to The Wizard of Oz.