Our universe might appear chaotic, but deep down it's simply a myriad of rules working independently to create patterns of action, force, and consequence. In Ten Patterns That Explain the Universe (MIT Press, 2021), Brian Clegg explores the phenomena that make up the very fabric of our world by examining ten essential sequenced systems. From diagra…

With Sheriff Forbes officially investigating the town serial killer, not only will Damon be consulted first, but she's of course going to tell Alaric and Elena everything she knows, including that the weapon used was from the Gilbert vampire-hunting stash. While those three look into the murders, the Salvatore brothers continue to scheme to kill Kl…

As part of its recent "100 Best Books of the 21st Century" project, The New York Times Book Review is interviewing some of the authors whose books appeared on the list. This week, Isabel Wilkerson joins host Gilbert Cruz to discuss "The Warmth of Other Suns," her sweeping history of the movement of Black Americans from the south to points north ove…

Peoples & Things host, Lee Vinsel, talks to Cyrus Mody, Professor in the History of Science, Technology, and Innovation and Director of the STS Program at Maastricht University, about his book, The Squares: US Physical and Engineering Scientists in the Long 1970s (MIT Press, 2022). Many narratives about contemporary technologies, especially digital…

This July, The New York Times Book Review published a list of The 100 Best Books of the 21st Century. The top choice was “My Brilliant Friend,” by Elena Ferrante, translated by Ann Goldstein. The book is the first novel in Ferrante’s so-called Neapolitan quartet, which tracks the lifelong friendship between Lenù and Lila, two women from a rough nei…

After having recurring dreams about Klaus's coffins, Bonnie realizes her dreams are trying to show her how to kill him. They also lead her to find her estranged mother, Abby. Speaking of awful parents, Bill Forbes returns to town to force Tyler to turn into a wolf to break his sire bond with Klaus. Meanwhile, Damon is focused on proving Alaric's ne…

As part of its recent 100 Best Books of the 21st Century project, The New York Times Book Review is interviewing some of the authors whose books appeared on the list. This week, Jennifer Egan joins host Gilbert Cruz to discuss her Pulitzer-winning novel about the music industry, “A Visit From the Goon Squad,” and talks, among other things, about th…

A summer camp in the Adirondacks. A rich girl gone missing, 14 years after her older brother also disappeared. A prominent local family harboring dark secrets. Liz Moore’s new novel, “The God in the Woods,” turns these elements into a complex and suspenseful meditation on parenting and social class and the rituals of summer friendship. On this week…

Caroline is in no mood to celebrate her 18th birthday, so Elena, Bonnie, and Matt try to cheer her up by turning the celebration into the funeral she never got to have. Meanwhile, Damon and Stefan unsurprisingly can't agree on how to deal with Klaus, so Stefan goes rogue and nearly drives Elena off of Wickery Bridge. Elsewhere, Alaric gets closer t…

It’s August, which means that Labor Day and back-to-school are just around the corner. The vacation that seemed so leisurely a month ago suddenly feels a little more frantic. But there’s still time to squeeze in a last batch of summer reading. On this week’s episode, host Gilbert Cruz chats with his colleagues Joumana Khatib and Anna Dubenko about …

Now that Stefan has Klaus’s one weakness, his daggered family, he recruits Bonnie to hide the coffins in the haunted witch house. Klaus turns to his usual tactics of stalking, threatening, and murdering to get what he wants. As usual, the Gilbert family is on the receiving end of this and Stefan isn’t willing to help. After witnessing a literal beh…

In The People of the Ruins (originally published in 1920), Edward Shanks imagines England in the not-so-distant future as a neo mediaeval society whose inhabitants have forgotten how to build or operate machinery. Jeremy Tuft is a physics instructor and former artillery officer who is cryogenically frozen in his laboratory only to emerge after a ce…

As part of its recent "100 Best Books of the 21st Century" project, The New York Times Book Review is interviewing some of the authors whose books appeared on the list. This week, George Saunders — who had three books on the list, including his short story collections "Pastoralia" and "Tenth of December" — joins host Gilbert Cruz to discuss his nov…

Sarah Jessica Parker has been a familiar presence on TV, movie screens and Broadway stages for five decades. But since 2016 she has also been a force in the book world, initially at the helm of the fiction imprint SJP for Hogarth and for the past two years with SJP Lit, an imprint at the independent publisher Zando. Parker visits the podcast this w…

The little-known stories of the people responsible for what we know today as modern medical ethics. In Making Modern Medical Ethics: How African Americans, Anti-Nazis, Bureaucrats, Feminists, Veterans, and Whistleblowing Moralists Created Bioethics (MIT Press, 2024), Robert Baker tells the counter history of the birth of bioethics, bringing to the …

Stefan, Elena, and Damon scheme to lure Klaus back to Mystic Falls, and there’s no better way than to tell him Mikael is dead. While they wait for Klaus to return, everyone decides to attend homecoming, but the dance is relocated at the last minute to the Lockwood mansion. The teens quickly realize the huge party with a live band was not pulled tog…

As part of its recent "100 Best Books of the 21st Century" project, The New York Times Book Review is interviewing some of the authors whose books appeared on the list. This week, Min Jin Lee joins host Gilbert Cruz to discuss her novel, as well as the book she's read the most times — George Eliot's "Middlemarch." “I’m willing to say it’s the best …

Patricia Highsmith’s 1955 thriller “The Talented Mr. Ripley” follows a young, down-on-his-luck scammer, Tom Ripley, who is looking to reverse his fortunes. When he receives a job offer to go to Italy and retrieve Dickie Greenleaf, a rich socialite on an endless holiday, Tom finds the perfect opportunity to work his way into the upper crust. But as …

Down in the caves, Alaric works on deciphering the runes and figures out that the drawings tell the story of the Originals. Elena decides to go right to the source: Rebekah. After a mean girl power struggle, Rebekah invites Elena over for a fashion show, some snooping, and eventually a bit of storytelling. Through flashbacks, Rebekah tells Elena ho…

By The New York Times

Lev Grossman, author of fantasy novel "The Magicians" and its two sequels, joins host Gilbert Cruz to talk about writing his version of Camelot in "The Bright Sword: A Novel of King Arthur."By The New York Times

It’s the Night of Illumination and the ghosts are back to celebrate. Damon gets a visit from our absolute fave, Mason Lockwood, or so he assumes, even though the ghosts aren’t visible. So he immediately goes to Bonnie to get her to fix the problem, and her first step is to do a spell that reveals “veiled matter.” As the spell is cast, we see it rea…

This week The New York Times Book Review rolled out the results of an ambitious survey it conducted to determine the best books of the 21st century so far. On this week’s episode, Gilbert Cruz chats with fellow editors Tina Jordan, Scott Heller and Joumana Khatib about the results of that survey and about the project itself, including the willingne…

It’s the first day of senior year for the Mystic Falls teens, which means they finally have to go to class and Rebekah gets a chance to show off crazy stunts at cheerleading practice. While the girls are dealing with an assortment of boyfriend problems, Matt is talking to Vicki on the other side, and Tyler is enjoying his new hybrid lifestyle. It a…

What is data, and why does it matter for us to care about the data traces we leave behind? What are the implications for our lives of how this data is used by other people in other times and places? In a conversation with Joanne Kuai, authors Aram Sinnreich and Jesse Gilbert introduce their new book and talk about how we can rethink our relationshi…

The beginning of the modern contraceptive era began in 1882, when Dr. Aletta Jacobs opened the first birth control clinic in Amsterdam. The founding of this facility, and the clinical provision of contraception that it enabled, marked the moment when physicians started to take the prevention of pregnancy seriously as a medical concern. In Contracep…

Rita Bullwinkel’s impressive debut novel, “Headshot,” follows eight teenagers fighting in the Daughters of America Cup, a youth women’s boxing tournament staged in a dilapidated gym in Reno. Each chapter details a match between fighters, bout after bout, until finally a champion is declared. We are thrown into the high-octane theater of each fight,…

To pretend like everything is normal, Caroline forces everyone to participate in senior prank night, but the night immediately takes a turn when Klaus arrives. Desperate to make a hybrid, Klaus feeds Tyler his blood, snaps his neck, gives Bonnie twenty minutes to figure out how to save him, and compels Stefan to feed on Elena when the clock runs ou…

A nuanced, science-based understanding of the creative mind that dispels the pervasive myths we hold about the human brain—but also uncovers the truth at their cores. What is the relationship between creativity and madness? Creativity and intelligence? Do psychedelics truly enhance creativity? How should we understand the left and right hemispheres…

A probing examination of the dynamic history of predictive methods and values in science and engineering that helps us better understand today's cultures of prediction. The ability to make reliable predictions based on robust and replicable methods is a defining feature of the scientific endeavor, allowing engineers to determine whether a building …

Every family has its stories, and every family has its drama — and some families, like the one the actor and director Griffin Dunne was born into, have an excess of both. His uncle was the writer John Gregory Dunne, his aunt was Joan Didion and his father was Dominick Dunne, who became famous for his Vanity Fair dispatches from the trial of the man…

While looking for the Original witch’s necklace for Klaus, Gloria gets glimpses of Elena, Caroline, and Bonnie getting ready for the Founder’s Cookout. She of course has no idea who the girls are, but unfortunately, the images are enough for her to realize that Stefan is hiding something, so she decides to use some “old school voodoo” (torture) to …

Summer is upon us and you're going to need a few books to read. Book Review editors Elisabeth Egan and Joumana Khatib join host Gilbert Cruz to talk through a few titles they're looking forward to over the next several months. Books discussed in this episode: "Farewell, Amethystine," by Walter Mosley "The Cliffs," by J. Courtney Sullivan "Horror Mo…

To get in touch with a witch that can help with the hybrid plan, Klaus brings Stefan to Chicago, which also happens to be where Stefan spent most of his ripper days. At the witch’s bar, Gloria’s, Stefan finds a photograph of him and his bestie from the 1920s. Through 20s flashbacks, we see why Klaus wanted Stefan to come along with him in the first…

Today’s book is: More Than A Glitch: Confronting Race, Gender, and Ability Bias in Tech (MIT Press, 2024), by Meredith Broussard. When technology reinforces inequality, it's not just a glitch—it's a signal that we need to redesign our systems to create a more equitable world. The word “glitch” implies an incidental error, as easy to patch up as it …