Kate, Medaya, and Eric look back at a year that many of us can't wait to put behind us. Against the background of the pandemic and the politics, the hosts review the books, movies, TV shows, podcasts, and quirky new hobbies that helped them get through this year in their annual best of round-up.

Eric, Kate, and Medaya talk with Kiese about the struggle to buy his work back from the original publisher in order to revise and republish them, an experience that highlights the imbalance of power in the industry and the commodification of a writer’s work. The gang also chats about how the intervening years, including the Trump presidency now coming to a close, shaped his revisions. 

Also, Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum, author of Likes, returns to recommend Theory, a novel by Dionne Brand.

Medaya and Eric are joined by Alex Ross, the New Yorker's longtime music critic and author of Wagnerism: Art and Politics in the Shadows of Music. Wagner's wide reaching influence across centuries, thinkers and artists reaches far beyond the realm of music. As they explore the complexity of his impact, the conversation wrestles with the stain of anti-Semitism, in Wagner’s thought and the Nazis embrace of his work, on his legacy. 

Also Tom Zoellner, author of The National Road: Dispatches From a Changing America, returns to recommend John Gunther's 1947 classic Inside USA.