Two Novellas, Two Unreliable Narrators: Ben Lerner & Dorothy Baker (Book Club)

Kate and Laura are back and diving in to two book club reads, one recent release and one modern classic. Transcription by Ben Lerner was published earlier this year to much critical fanfare. It's a playful, intellectually ambitious exploration of writing, memory, technology and the slippery relationship between fiction and reality. When the narrator's phone fails to record his final interview with an eminent cultural figure, he reconstructs the conversation from memory. But does the truth of an encounter depend on an accurate transcript? And what happens when a novel begins to fold back on itself?We discuss Lerner's auto-fictional project, his fascination with the act of writing, the glass flowers at Harvard's Natural History Museum, and whether Lerner's novels are genuinely profound or sometimes guilty of taking themselves a little too seriously. Laura’s book club, meanwhile headed back to the mid-20th century with Dorothy Baker’s classic Cassandra at the Wedding, a brilliantly funny, unsettling and surprisingly contemporary novella about an intensely self-absorbed young woman determined to prevent her identical twin sister from getting married. With its claustrophobic family setting, unreliable narrator, dark comedy and complicated portrait of sisterly love, it's a novel that raises questions about identity, dependence, artistic ambition and the difficulty of allowing the people we love to become themselves – but what did Laura's book club make of it? As ever in addition to the book club catch up we’re also swapping notes on recent reads and upcoming plans, including diving in to the Booker prize shortlist – the most enticing, we both agree, in years. Notes and books mentionedThe Ware Collection of Blaschka Glass Models at Harvard A Portrait of the Artist as an Artist Portraying the Artist by Nathan Anthony WestIndiana by George SandBriefly, A Delicious Life by Nell StevensThe Romantics by Pankaj MishraA Place of Greater Safety by Hilary MantelThe Great Dictator by Matthew SweetWhen the Going was Good by Graydon CarterReading Lolita in Tehran by Azar NafisiJoin The Book Club Review on PatreonBecome a subscriber for extra episodes, access to our community chat groups, and the chance to join our monthly podcast book club.Our next reads are A Severed Head by Iris Murdoch (October '26) and Helm by Sarah Hall (November '26).Find out more at patreon.com/thebookclubreviewThe Book Club Review is a podcast about books, book clubs and the books that get people tal