Skylight Books Podcast Series

Yumi Sakugawa explores the possibilities of a not-so-distant future where fashion can be intergenerational, Asian American, divine feminine, environmentally conscious, community building, ancestor worshipping, and possibly bring you closer to enlightenment. Originally printed as a limited edition zine for an art installation of the same name at CrossLines, a culture lab curated by the Smithsonian Asian Pacific Center in the historical Smithsonian Arts & Industries building in 2016, Fashion Forecasts also includes photographs from the exhibition, new fashion forecast drawings, fashion advice, and a comic essay on the cosmic meaning of fashion in the cycle of birth and death. 

Join internet sensation and Disney TV animator Aminder Dhaliwal as she launches her debut graphic novel Woman World. The book, first serialized on Instagram to an audience of over 150,000, is a delightful imagining of a world where men have gone extinct. With incomparable wit, Woman World is an entertaining read for people of all genders and one of 2018’s most anticipated releases. Dhaliwal is joined in conversation by Megan Nicole Dong, known for her Sketchshark comics.

The Deeper the Water the Uglier the Fish is a bold epistolary novel tracking two teenage girls in the wake of their mother’s failed suicide attempt, when they are sent to live with their estranged father, a celebrated writer, in New York City. With a sinister sense of humor, The Deeper the Water the Uglier the Fish powerfully captures the quiet torment of Edie and Mae as they each crave the attention of a parent they can’t—and shouldn’t—have to themselves. Moving from the Louisiana countryside to the sidewalks of New York City, the Civil Rights era to the trendy art scene of the ’90s, Katya Apekina crooks the lines between fact and fantasy, between escape and freedom, and between love and obsession, and in so doing heralds her arrival as a fierce and fresh new literary talent. Apekina is joined in conversation by Michelle Huneven, author of four novels, including Blame and Off Course.

Pick five people - dead or alive - to have dinner with for just one night. For Sabrina Nielsen, the five people she chose years ago for such a game just happen to show up at her birthday dinner. Sabrina’s ex-boyfriend, estranged father, best friend, favorite college professor and Audrey Heburn are all guests on The Dinner List. Through Rebecca Serle’s enchanting writing, this delicious novel combines the whimsy of first love with an exploration into what it takes to make a relationship work. With a romance impossible to resist and a vivid group of dining guests, Serle’s novel asks what really matters when it comes to love. Serle is joined in conversation by Gabrielle Zevin, author of The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry and Young Jane Young, as well as the screenwriter of Conversations with Other Women.

In Zenobia Neil's The Jinni's Last Wish, a eunuch in the Ottoman Imperial Harem has already lost his home, his freedom, and his manhood. His only wish is for a painless death, until he meets Dark Star, a beautiful odalisque who promises to give him his deepest desire. He refuses to believe her claim to possess a jinni in a bottle. But when Dark Star is accused of witchcraft, Olin rubs the bottle in desperation and discovers she’s told the truth. Olin becomes the jinni’s master to save Dark Star, but it's not enough. In the complex world of the Topkapi Palace, where silk pillows conceal knives, sherbets contain poison, and jewels buy loyalty, no one is safe. With each wish, Olin must choose between becoming like the masters he detests or risk his life, his body, and his sanity to break the bonds that tie them all. 

This isn’t your great-great-great-great grandmother’s guide to witchcraft. Inner Witch: A Modern Guide to the Ancient Craft, by Nylon’s Ask A Witch columnist Gabriela Herstik, invites everyone into the coven, modernizing the ancient craft and creating a space for all to come and express their sacred self. As uncertainty rages across the globe, many have a turned to the sacred, ancient crafts—witchcraft, astrology, crystals, and similar practices—to find balance, especially young women. Inner Witch grants practitioners from all walks of the life the freedom to assume their place in the universe while connecting with a force far greater than themselves.

Through a mixture of memoir, opinion and investigative journalism, Clementine Ford exposes just how unequal the world continues to be for women. An incendiary debut taking the world by storm, Fight Like a Girl will make you laugh, cry and scream — but above all it will open your eyes to a way forward, a brighter future, and a society where both men and women can flourish equally– something worth fighting for.

Pony Darlene Fontaine is 15 years old, on the phone with her best friend watching Teen Psychic when her mother, Billie Jean Fontaine, leaves her bedroom for the first time in months. Billie Jean walks out of the front door, gets in her truck, and vanishes. The Territory, population 400, is a settlement founded decades ago by a charismatic cult leader, and it has been cut off from the world ever since. The residents of this strange town think the year is 1985. They crimp their hair, wear shoulder pads, listen to Whitesnake on their Walkmans, and have no contact with anyone from the outside world. Except for Billie Jean, the first stranger they took in as their own. And now, Pony fears, Billie Jean has become the first resident to leave. Heartbreaker is a novel about the deeply moving relationship between a mother and a daughter—and about the dark secrets they kept from one another. When Billie Jean disappears, Pony and her father frantically try to piece together memories from the months leading up to her disappearance and make sense of her actions. The search for Billie Jean takes us on a high-voltage ride through the complex impulses of the human heart. Told through three unforgettable points of view––Billie Jean’s daughter, her killer dog, and her mysterious friend––Claudia Day's novel is as devastating as it is touching and funny. With electrifying prose, it gradually reveals a portrait of a woman who must keep secrets and reinvent herself in order to survive, and a daughter who will do whatever it takes to untangle those mysteries to find her beloved mother.

Following the Algerian war for independence and the defeat of France in 1962, Algiers became the liberation capital of the Third World. Here, Elaine Mokhtefi, who as a young American woman had worked with leaders of the Algerian Revolution, including Frantz Fanon, found a home. As a journalist and translator, she lived among guerrillas, revolutionaries, exiles and visionaries and was even present in the making of the groundbreaking film The Battle of Algiers. Mokhtefi crossed paths with some of the era’s brightest stars: Stokely Carmichael, Timothy Leary, Ahmed Ben Bella, Jomo Kenyatta and Eldridge Cleaver. She was instrumental in the establishment of the International Section of the Black Panther Party in Algiers and was close at hand as the group became involved in intrigue, murder and international hijackings. She traveled with the Panthers and organised Cleaver’s clandestine departure for France. Algiers, Third World Capital is an unforgettable story of an era of passion and promise. 

  “It’s like we’re the same person. We finish each other’s sentences. This is what we’ve been taught to desire and expect of love. But there’s a question underneath that’s never addressed: once you find someone to finish your sentences, do you stop finishing them for yourself?” As long as she can remember, Leah Dieterich has had the mysterious feeling that she’s been searching for a twin—that she belongs as one of an intimate pair. It begins with friends, dance partners, and her own reflection in the mirror as she studies ballet growing up; continues with physical and emotional attractions to girlfriends in college; and leads her, finally, to Eric, whom she moves across the country for, and marries. But her steadfast, monogamous relationship leaves her with questions she can’t answer about her sexuality and her identity, so she and her husband decide to try an open marriage. How does a young couple make room for their individual desires, their evolving selfhoods, and their artistic ambitions while building a life together? Can they pursue other sexual partners, even live in separate cities, and keep their original passionate bond alive? Vanishing Twins looks for answers in psychology, science, pop culture, art, architecture, Greek mythology, dance, and language to create a lucid, suspenseful portrait of a woman testing the limits and fluidities of love. Dieterich is joined in conversation by Sarah Manguso, author of seven books, including 300 Arguments, Ongoingness, The Guardians, and The Two Kinds of Decay.