Skipping Christmas by John Grisham w/ Jonathan Fernandez

There's a lot of stuff that's very two thousand and one in here. There's a lot of we're going to get into it, like diet culture and the tanning bed.

Transferring your airline tickets to someone else.

Why was this book written and who was it written for?

Get her at the airport, make dinner, invite fifty people to a holiday gathering.

It was surprising to me. I was like, that's something I could Is that something I could do?

Yes, you could, but you would No human would ever do it the way Luther Crank did it.

Did read a book in the third grade called The Big Orange Spot and it felt very similar to that.

Yeah, it's almost one step below like Peter Rabbit.

Yeah, hello everyone, and welcome back to Mean Book Club. This week we read Skipping Christmas by that old man who's a lawyer.

John Grisham.

It wasn't written at the top of the outline. It was enough to throw me. Yeah, that old far John Grisham. A classic, a Christmas classic. And this is our big finale. Woo hell yeah, hell yeah, hell yeah. If you guys haven't listened to us, we are Mean book Club, where you read New York Times bestsellers that you tell us maybe shouldn't be as always. I'm one of your hosts, Sarah Burton, I'm Jonas Gravis, I'm Sabrina b Jordan and Clara Morris will be joining us shortly, but we have

Oh, I would love to introduce our very special guest, Jonathan Fernandez. Jonathan is an Afro Latino actor slash filmmaker from Brooklyn slash the Poconos.

You you're not from the Poconos.

You're from Pennsylvania. I can you know?

Okay, that's fair.

You've seen Jonathan on Gossip Girl, Lethal Weapon, Younger Girls, Bull other stuff on stage.

In your wildest dreams.

Yeah, standing behind you right now?

Oh, look behind you.

I'm here everywhere.

Oh my god, Jonathan. We're so excited to have you here.

So I'm so hyped.

It's really nice to to do this kind of thing in general, but when you're doing with friends, it's even it's very special.

We have known you for a long time. I sure get into that. And I also want to say I appreciate the Christmas spirit you brought with the whole Santa outfit.

You're wearing it looks really good.

Yeah. Well I haven't taken it off in like two months. It's gone a little weird and people have been asking me a question about it.

But it's dirty. It's very dirty looking.

It started off as a Halloween costume. I was just like, I don't know, I think I can write this out.

That would be a fun social experience, wouldn't it be?

All right? Okay, So, Sabrina, how why.

Are we reading Skipping Christmas?

Oh, I'll tell you.

We're reading Christmas because of STEFFI And she said, Hi, y'all, hope you're having a good holiday season. I was just discussing the movie Christmas with the Kranks with some friends and learned that it is based on a New York Times bestseller by John Grisham called Skipping Christmas. This might be a good one to cover next holiday season. Happy Holidays from Houston, Texas or Houston.

I knew it, I y'all, I heard. I knew. I knew it, had knew.

And I have to say that it wasn't until I was making this outline forty five minutes ago that I knew that this became oh no.

Sorry, Christmas with the Cranks.

It was three hours ago, and I learned it became Christmas with the Crank.

But no, you put it on.

Oh and tried to watch. You did not figure it out by the name. I said, exactly. Harker's last name was Crank, Wasn't it yet?

I guess struck you as familiar.

Not even the recommendation from Stephie, which I guess you're hearing for the first time now.

No, I mean I guess I heard it when we talked about it months ago.

To map out this you forgotten.

But I've got to say, Christmas with the Kranks is not one that really stuck with me.

So I've never seen it.

I've never seen it.

I will say it definitely is like an like a ben Kenobe versus obi Wan Kanobe situation, where like Luke is like I'm not even the biggest Star Wars fan, where he's like ban Kenobe.

I wonder if that if I wonderful obi Wan bank Knobe.

I know.

It's all the time.

Yeah, yeah, it's gotta be the Crank, Christmas Christmas skipping Christmas Crank.

But I was I was similar to that when I was like, Cranks is a very specific surname. I wonder if it's Christmas and Cranks, but I didn't look it up until the end of the book and I.

Was like, oh, yeah, it is that exact same.

And as I was reading, though, I was like or I was listening, I was like, this is starting to feel like just a movie. I've never seen it, but it felt so much much like like a trailer I've seen.

I was like, it has to be.

I didn't know who was in it or anything. I did, well it Well, no, you'll get to it, so bread it. You get to it. But first, how did everyone consume this book?

Did you do audiobook?

Did you read it?

Did you how did everyone find the time to do the four hour audio book?

Okay, and he really killed me.

I did do audiobook, but I was I saw it was four hours, and then I think I like dawdled a little bit, like I was like four hours easy. And then I was like, oh shit, we're got to record this. How did I not? It was the first half of it was slow for me, so it took a while.

But yeah, audiobook, yeah, I was audiobook as well. Used the subscription I now have and it was three time speed two times when I was driving, because you have to multitask in a different way when you're driving.

Yeah, it was like not enough time for you.

I know for a fact you were doing this driving to and from Pittsburgh. You couldn't have spared four you had four hours.

Yeah.

Well, I had another book that I had to listen to, and I also finished that book on that drive as well, and that book was longer.

What did you listen to that book on same same.

Same Okay, kept least you're consistent, Jonathan. How did you consume this book?

So?

I consumed the via the og way.

Oh it was.

It was told to me by a fire.

Old oral cats as well.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, and so that to interpret a lot from these cave drawings.

But the Yeah, it was interesting because it's like even just like two weeks out and I was like, oh man, it's already kind of like a little late, like I should have started this already, and I had not opened the book. And then when I opened it and look at it that it was like seventy two fonts and I was like, oh, this is fine.

It was.

It was.

It was one of our best recommendations in terms of book length, Like we've gotten some that are like killer.

And this was yeah, thank you, Steffie.

It's one step below like Peter Rabbit.

Yeah, and it was a beautiful Christmas present for us, Stepfie.

It really was like, wow, wow, Yeah.

This was a This was a fun one to uh to read and listen to.

I'll see the audiobook narrator, I think did not did not really make any attempt to do many voices. It just felt like everything felt pretty.

From Luther Crank's mind, which is.

Like the different usually I feel like I'm like, I'm guessing this because it's from like two thousand and one or whenever this book is from.

But uh, yeah.

We knew how to do voice.

I feel like the audio books weren't a big thing as big of a thing maybe and they were just like, yeah, just do the same voice for every character whatever. I will say.

I'm I'm not even an actor, but there were certain line deliveries where I was like, really, you're just gonna miss that whole joke, like that whole.

Yes, he was not my most favorite narrator.

Narrator, but we'll go, We'll keep going to do us.

I used to nu be into audiobooks and then I had gotten. I started the one for the uh, the the spy who came in from the cold, And that's like one of the og spy thrillers written in like by a guy who was actually a spy, John Lecare, but he's like a pen name because he was a real ass spi drant time, so he couldn't write under his own name. Wow, and it was like cold War,

This is delightful. I was like super supper into it.

Oh that sounds great.

And honestly, thanks for the wreck, because I feel like we have to listen to so many bad things.

It hurts us nice to share a good wreck. It's people ask for them all the time, so we say mush of the author's name.

They get it, Sabrina doing to sum it up for us? Or what have you scripted something something?

I had a crazy idea that I think you'll lash out at me for.

Yeah, okay, but but we don't have to do it.

But I was just thinking, and I think a season finale is the perfect time to change up the format of how we do things. Okay, go ahead, but okay, here's just the pitch is, like, what if we did the other stuff the author and then the book summary, and then like did the summary?

Sure?

That's a great really sure.

Because I feel like this memory really flows into talking about the book.

Okay, are we stupid?

How did we never do this before?

I don't know, do that?

Okay? Yeah, of course you're.

Listening to it two times to speed other bandwidth.

Exactly.

Okay, gang, here's what we're pairing with this book. It is a new Trail brewing co. No idea where that's from or how you could possibly get it. A sticky Imperial milk porter. The can is designed to look like snow is falling along the top, sort of sitting on the eat.

It falls on Christmas, you know, just for all the listeners, it seems like beer foam to me, or milk maybe ship.

Okay, it's a stretch.

It's a stretch where let's let her. Let's let her do the stretch letter.

Because it's brewed with coffee, maple syrup and bakingnose is snow on the ten percent and it's a sixteen fluid out so I'm gonna be pretty toast.

It's all right. I got some like the.

Term baking spice.

What is that? It could it be?

It's a random spice. It is like a bunch of spices together. It's like not mags, and it's.

Like but just like I don't know, just one of them.

You're letting people take a lot of liberty with your recipe if you go like it's cookies, just a yeah, maybe just yeah.

You're just trying to keep it hidden.

You're like, I'm not telling you what. It's a baking spice, bitch. So yeah.

And the reason we're drinking this is it obviously fits out with the Christmas theme. There's all that snow on the roof that's not beer foam, and it was in my mom's fridge and I'm in my mom's house right now, and they have quite the beer fridge. Oh my goodness, anything you.

Could, thank goodness, thank goodness.

Wow.

I'm mostly very old from parties that it didn't get consumed at years old.

But it's there. It's anything you want, all right.

That sounds great?

Yeah, so pair it up, folks.

Great, pair it squawks.

I'm sorry, what.

For me? Okay, okay, go ahead, Sabrina, do the thing you wanted to do now?

Yeah, okay. So I'm gonna talk about the author.

It's going to be an abridged author summary because we've read this man before. But John grishamish American novelist, lawyer, and former politician known for his best selling legal thrillers. He, according to many Internet websites, is a top ten most wealthy author, which is something I personally admire, loving money. And he practiced criminal law for about ten years and then he served in the Mississippi House of Representatives from

Independent, but you.

Looked it up. Okay, you don't get to guests.

I'm going to say Republican.

Yeah, well you're you're both wrong. No, he's a Democrat.

From Mississippi representative.

Wow. Yeah, sure.

And it's actually in the eighties when it was like, you know, I guess that's.

When it started to fall apart for the Democrats in Mississippi. I feel like they were at theirs. It was like the last gasp of breath there.

Well, he became a politician actually because he was appalled at Mississippi's national image.

So I thought that was interesting.

Is that where that the this the McConaughey Sam Jackson movie.

Yes, that was in Mississippi.

I don't remember if it was based in Mississippi, but I do know that it was like based on on something. It wasn't a case of his, but it was like he had heard the girl testify in court when he was an attorney.

What if this movie we're talking about, it's called A Time to Kill?

Oh, thank you, thank you.

That was his first But I tried to look up some Christmas related facts about John Grisham, and all I really found was that he's a member of the University Baptist Church in Charlottesville, Virginia, but he opposes a literalist understanding of the Bible and endorses separation of church and state.

Very Christmas yeah, interesting, Like his his opinions are interesting to me, Like, it's not surprising that I was sort of like, I think he might be a Republican and Jonathan was like, I think he's a dependent because I feel like he is able to capture like the nuances.

It was Sarah, that's it.

It was, Oh my god, your voices are really similar.

It's gonna be hard for people listening to tell.

You that's favorite audiobook.

Yeah, yeah, I don't know.

I feel like he has a good understanding of like all different types of people. Like obviously he's written political thrillers that sort of touch on like the unjustice of the world and people that have been wronged through the legal system. And then this book was all about like a very clearly Republican neighborhood and he knew it inside and out.

Yeah, which is interesting.

I mean, we'll talk about it more later, but part of me wonders if it was commentary on what he'd experienced.

But perhaps so.

Anyway, some non Christmas max about him.

He was and is really into baseball, and he kind of wanted to be like a major league player. He in community college, however, was he wanted to play, but he got benched, and then to him and two of his friends whose names are Logan and Parker Pickle no yes, and John Grisham. They all transferred to another school so that he could like re up his baseball career.

That also did not work.

What good friends they packed in their lives grish could try to get on the baseball.

How how did they help them? What did he They just like throw him easy pitches and one was a pitcher and every time I don't understand what they were doing.

I think potentially they too wanted to be wanted their little baseball take off and it didn't happen.

Bid things like that. That's too bad, very.

Very They're great baseball names, all of them. Parker Pickle, I mean I draft him.

Yeah.

Pickle is a game and that you play in baseball?

Is it?

Yeah? It's like pickle is or you get in a pickle. And I wonder actually where that's where the phrase comes from. Where it's like if you runner is caught. This is actually going to make me seem like I'm the biggest baseball slash jock fan or jock person.

I'm two hundred years old, like I was the first baseball game.

What if this stands yelled at.

When there's a runners stuck between a base two bases and you see you've seen it happen before, and you like they throw it at each other like the to try to tag him. That's in a pickle.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, Parker pickle, I mean practically invented it.

Yeah, amazing.

He should get royalties.

Also, I do think that using the phrase a jock person will assuage people's concerns that you are.

Okay, but you.

Are a jock person.

I try to.

I try to, like any time that I could squeeze in a little bit of masculinity that I don't have, I just try to, like, you know, shoehorn that in.

Is this the time we should mention you were a big ten cheerleader.

Yeah, I grew up.

I mean I was.

I was a code switched to the max.

Like I was a jock and a nerd and artist and I would just like floated through Yeah, I floated through a lot of different circles.

That's impressive.

Good one like me too, me too, So the readers know I puffed my hair.

Anyway. John Grisham. He is on the board of Directors of the Innocence Project.

That sounds good.

That sounds good, Well, I think it.

I like Jonah thought he was probably a Republican and being on the board of directors of the Innocence Project. I don't know for certain, but I would bet all the money I have that they are not any of them Republicans.

And he thinks, I this is just me.

On parts of his Wikipedia page that I liked, he thinks that the prison population is too high. He cites examples including black teenager and minor drug charges, and then he goes on to cite those who had viewed child porn online.

Okay.

He controversially added that he believed that not all viewers of child pornography are necessarily pedophiles.

I will say that there is.

Additional information that part I was like, oh my god. But then digging a little bit further, he.

Says, what did you find out? Yeah, I don't know if.

He was Basically like, he thinks that there are people who think that they're watching adult pornography and they're duped and its children.

And it sounds like something that happened to his friend, and his friend tried to be like.

You didn't have no, I didn't have no.

All right now, sorry, Park got himself in a que.

Yeah, but he did say real pedophiles should be prosecuted to the full extent.

Okay, great, Great.

It's interesting to like reform or restorative justice for this. But like it is interesting because like our society often wants to have it both ways, which with like things that are less than.

Things that are bad, I'll say that.

And so like because it's like, hey, look at all the money that we spend on advertisement for like you know, fake snow on beer mugs or whatever, and like just like alcohol and all that stuff. But then also like the person who is an AA, it's like, well, that guy couldn't handle it, right, you know what I mean.

Like eighteen plums y, Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And then so when you do catch it in different ways that are like, well, I don't even know where this comes from, and like that doesn't mean that this is also per and who's like trafficking people slash trading like actual child pornography and like it has hard drives of it and all that stuff.

Yeah, so you're defending Pickle, like what He's like.

Hey, remember you guys followed me to a whole different university so we could play ball. Do you guys want to also join the House of Representatives Mississippi.

Built Yeah yeah, And they're like yeah, sure, dude, Oh my god.

Yeah no, this is such a complex, nuanced thing and like I'd love to just you know, turn the podcast off, have a big long conversation about it.

Oh, let's do it now. I'm just kidding, Uh, Sabrina, what else? Wait about him?

Oh? So okay.

As of twenty twenty, he had written thirty seven consecutive number one fiction bestsellers.

He's written more books than that total.

That's just hunny.

Number ones though consecutive? Wow wow, I know it's almost like he wasn't right all of them, probably, but probably yes.

They're probably, I don't know.

I don't know.

My friend John Grisham, I think he was.

I love how you were, like, we've already done, John, We're on point G on your list now.

Yeah, that's a through G were Yeah.

Okay.

His first novel, A Time to Kill, which was not immediately a bestseller, was published the month I was born.

You want to say that, sure, you want to say that? Yeah, all right, yeah, great, I'm glad. It was published in nineteen ninety eight, yes, nineteen.

Ninety eight, twenty five or twenty.

Six, I am twenty seventy legal, fairly legal, and then Ten of his novels have been adapted into feature films, and six projects have had some form of TV adaptation as well.

This book was published.

On November six, two thousand and one, also the month I was born, and it's a holiday comedy.

It was number one.

Yeah.

Well, so most of his books are like legal thrillers. This one is not.

That is audible for that, Okay, Sure.

I will say I'm surprised, like especially if he had written thirty seven consecutive number one fiction bestsellers, that's not the amount of books he's written.

Yeah, no, he's won more so partially, I think it's because the citation was from twenty twenty and I wasn't going to do the research on the rest of his books.

But my poem is going to be that Like that, like ten movies, six TV adaptations, feels like of what I know of him, or I thought I knew of him.

That feels like a low number to the amount of place.

That's fair.

I totally agree. I was shocked because.

I was looking up. I was like, oh, yeah, movie, movie, movie, movie.

Yeah. I thought basically everything he wrote became a movie.

Yeah, but fewer than I hadn't imagined.

Jonathan, maybe can pitch some things, pitch.

The Pelican brief This time it's about underwear.

Yeah, I think that's a good start.

Pelican briefs.

This one from me.

This book in particular, was a number one New York Times, which makes sense of thirty seven consecutive number one New York Times bestsellers. It's a part of it I did. I did that research into the reverse. So I was shocked that this one was a number one. But if knowing that basically everything he's doing consecutively is it does make sense.

It was interesting. It stayed so it was the like December that it came out.

Basically, it was a number one New York Times bestseller and it stayed on the list and later, like in February of the next year, there was another John Grisham book that was number one on the New York Times bestseller list at the same time. And this is the same time that The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen was another list.

Jonathan, that's another book we did this season.

I've not read it, and well, Jona thinks it's a masterpiece.

It's good, it's good.

But it's just funny to me that that book was number eight the same week that this book was number ten, which like, yes, this book was lower, but the comparison is so incredible.

Okay.

And then yeah, this book was adapted to be the Christmas movie Christmas with the Crank.

When did that come out?

And it came out, I want to say in two thousand and four with Tim Allen and Jamie Lee Curtis.

Really picturing Tim Allen the whole time I was reading that.

Yeah, Okay, I was it, but I see it.

Maybe I don't know, I don't quite it wasn't.

It wasn't Santa Claus like he's done so many that he does.

It is easier for Christmas. But I didn't feel this.

I wasn't picturing him.

I wasn't how and Dan Ackroyd as Vic Fromyer.

Oh I heard Dan Fackroyd was in it. Oh.

Yeah, it was a small role in the film.

Okay, big role in the book.

Big role in the book.

I was picturing Tom Hanks the whole time because I felt like the lead character was so similar to the guy.

And a man called, Oh, yes, that's.

More what I was feeling too, the kind of yeah. But I guess he really wanted to kill himself. I feel like this guy made jokes about killing himself but didn't actually wasn't actually ever that close to killing himself.

Yeah.

When you all read a book, do you often picture movie stars, isn't it?

Oh?

This was because Tom Hanks is in that movie. And so when I read the book that time, I didn't know he was in the movie. Then I watched the movie afterwards, so that has him in my mind for that character. And then this character reminded me of that character.

So I don't always but it's it's a fun thing to do to think about when you're talking to people. Also helps get people to understand a.

Character, I guess. But all the characters are the characters.

All the characters are like me.

When I'm reading it, It's like I'm the main girl.

Yeah, and then I'm like the main boy.

Basically just me as a boy, I'm the bad guy.

I didn't. I didn't really, I didn't have. I feel like some people might really like Luther Crank the main character because I feel like I saw people comedy like it was like my dad or whatever, and I was.

Like, I don't know this person, but I don't know he was he was. Okay.

There's a lot of stuff that's very two thousand and one in here. There's a lot of we're gonna get into it, like diet culture and the tanning transferring your airline tickets to someone else.

Yeah, there's there are few.

Most of it was just like, man, this is dated in a way that I'm like, we either have not gone past this in a way that we should have, or like we or just like feels like forever ago. But that was one where I'm like, yeah, so many movies like prior to September eleventh, it is like, yeah, their premises just would not work.

No, right, right right the whole. It's also just hard to imagine someone being so rude as to not give their parents heads up they decided to fly home.

A lot to say about that, Okay, all right, Hilaria.

Yeah, it sent me on a little like spiral of trying to I immediately left the spiral, So I don't have an answer for this, But I was like, how do people know how to buy airline tickets before the internet? Which I like the Internet call numbers probably kind of exists, but I was like, did you did a little one?

Did you have to call airport? You look at the schedule, you to call the airline.

That's why the travel agency was such a great uh uh service, because it's like you had a person who like, I've used one. I mean now it's a billion years ago, but like it was really nice being like, hey, where should I go?

They're like, well, what are you looking for?

They're like these places, this is the most affordable, and when you're there. I stayed at this resort and it's lovely. You would like blah bla blah blah, And I went there last year and they just like have done all the things.

Yeah, it's really nice to get that.

It's way better reading like a a shitty review and like trip advisor.

Yeah, and you have no idea who wrote it and what their contacts are. But okay, but wait, before we keep going, I want to just we got to do the summary.

Yeah, pushed it back.

Let's go back to you. Ready to go to it, Serena? Yeah?

Hell yeah?

Okay, Wait, and I got to listeners. Let us know did this work for you? Did it make you mad?

I know how I feel, but I don't want to.

Okay, I So here, here are the roles. I thought Clara.

I would give Clara a little more time, but you're still not here.

So the roles are up for grabs.

Luther just a standalone role, Norah a standalone roll, Blair and boy scout, and then random persons A neighbors and firemen are paired together.

So I'll do Norah.

Oh that's the best role. I think.

It was gonna be my role.

But I'll let you have it, all right, Jonathan, I'm gonna let you pick next.

I mean, have a lot, all.

Right, good, yeah, good, great?

Okay.

I can be Blair and boy scouts.

And I'll be random person, bully, neighbor and Fireman.

Great, let's gone, we got it and Blake some Christmas music, some jingles, you got it, put it behind us, Let's do it. Ho ho ho. I can't wait for Christmas this year, but it will be so lonely with our only daughter off to Peru for the Peace Corps.

I think that we spent too much money on Christmas in general.

I love this.

I'm so sorry.

No, no, no, there's very grunny.

But I was very just improvise the whole time.

Sorry, Jonathan, we do imbrov. It makes sense that you assumed we were talking like we were going to do imbrov, but.

We didn't tell you where it was.

But I actually am wondering, Sabrina, would you be mad if we just did this with us? Like you know, what is that called gravid water? Where we did like we read the script but the other day, oh yeah in New York.

Yeah, well not grabbed water, but there's one that that Brian Morbido does.

A cat Oh okay, okay, okay, or Sabrina, do you want to tell them where the script is? You're called you wrote it script?

I mean we can do we can do it either way.

We'll do any product down later we should do one.

Yeah, I can't have seen, but you know it shows that you just did gravit water because you were basically word perfect already often when all of us started laughing, you truth.

Yeah, alright, right, all right, start that Christmas music up again, Blake. Let's go ho ho o. I can't wait for Christmas this year, but it will be so lonely with our only daughter off to Peru for the Peace Corps.

More like, ho ho humbug. I have a great idea.

Let's give Christmas aalt again there and go on a cruise that takes off on December twenty fifth.

Oh you mean like we would still do our favorite things like trim the tree, invite our friends over for the annual party, get each other kiss, and then cap it off with a delightful Caribean cruise.

No, I mean we don't do a single fucking merry little thing. We take these couple of weeks of diet and tan.

Instead, we'll save boo coo box.

Okay, this sounds good, No questions asked.

H Hi, I'm mister crank. You excited to buy Christmas tree from us?

Cute little boy scouts only seventy five dollars.

Buzz off, I'm skipping Christmas. I'll give you three hundred bones in the summer instead.

Hey there, mister crank, can I put you down for ten fruitcakes from the fireman this year?

Haven't you heard? I'm skipping Christmas? You can put me down for zero?

How does that sound bad?

It sounds it's bad.

Thank you for choosing our services today. We hope you have a merry Christmas, sir, I.

Won't because I'm skippy Christmas.

Hey, Nora, are you gonna put up Frosty this year? You're the only house on the whole block that doesn't have the decorations and it makes us look like shit.

We are a skipping Christmas, and I've been told that means we are not doing a Frosty this year. Y'all rue the day.

Hello, Hi, Mom, it's me. I have great news.

We're coming home tonight for the annual Christmas party.

We Who is we?

Oh? Me an Enrique? Who is Enrique?

My fiance?

A South American fiance.

Okay, honey, we will see you tonight.

We are so excited.

What do you mean we'll see her tonight?

You're Christmas?

Listen here, you little curmudgely. Fuck our only daughter is coming home and bringing our further son in law with her future son in law. You bitch, you cook your ass all around this town because we're gonna need a tree, a turkey, a ton of gifts, and fifty guests in the next four hours. We're not skipping Christmas. I repeat, we are not skipping Christmas. Now.

USh really great, Jonathan.

The way you played Luther was so frightening and serial killer.

I love Halloween. It was Halloween and Jimmie Lee Curtis would be in a movie.

It was very really coldness that just really penetrated.

And there was but honestly, there was so much of this book where I was fully like I was like Luther's crazy, but like Luther's right because like the people around him are crazier, Like shut the fuck up, stop asking.

Truly truly like that. It's it's it's funny, like this is probably a longer conversation for some other time, but it's like it's been really interesting to really work on. Like, uh, it's gonna make this I don't know what's gonna make you sound like I'm not going to qualify it further.

It's all people not knowing how to communicate correctly.

And there's and there's times where you're just like no, they're like the writers choosing not to communicate what the person would say in real life in this situation just so they could get more time out of this like gag or like.

Yeah, yes, that's definitely happening in this book.

Oh yeah, this one.

The way it was like.

So the same thing over and over. Yeah, and then I was just waiting because I mean we all knew Blair was coming back right, like, we're just waiting for that shoe to drop, and I was like, for it took so long for that shoe to drop that.

I was like, I didn't I didn't know Blair was coming back. I didn't think about it.

I watch over me.

I mean, the whole movie was or the whole book was over for her in forty seven minutes.

There was no time to think about whether Blair was coming or going.

That's the trip to make the trip.

Yeah, you're pacing is all over. No, but I tried.

I try to do that too, Like I'm you know, based on like you know, being like a writer and an actor. Like I tried to walk into things with no preconceived notions. I don't watch trailers and I don't read blurbs and stuff like that. Oh so it's really interesting to be like I didn't look anything up about the book, but like I had read half of it in one sitting, and I was, you know, like like what Sabrina just said, like I try not to think about what may happen in the future, just as if

Like the fire. I couldn't believe how late it happened. I was like, yeah, really, if this happens, it will happen earlier, because what is interesting about him doing what he's doing.

I think it added to the chaos of the end of the book, which made it feel like there really were only four hours until the daughter was coming, because I was like, there's not much book left.

Yeah, so a lot's gonna happen here.

I will say that at one point, when I did allow myself to think alone, I was like, I was like, wait a second, Like this book camp, the second half of this book cannot be them on this cruise like.

That yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly exactly.

And they're just like having a greade that they'd learned all their lessons or like better people now, like you're just enjoying themselves.

Well, every six years, I think we'll do something like this those other years, people, we're jealous.

I did also feel attacked by this book because as oh, you know, two of you know, my family goes on pretty much like flies Christmas and goes to Hawaii and like doesn't do the cruise but does like the Essential does that, but we also do Christmas like I do all the I don't like, we don't like not do the tree.

You're the trog duns.

Yeah, I get, yeah, I get you're right exactly.

But I was just like when he was talking about like, no, we're going to do this and we're not going to do this stuff, I just kept I was like, that's a choice, Like it was surprising to me. I was like, that's something I is that something I could do?

Yes, you could, but you would no human would ever do it the way Luther Crank did it, which was The book began with Luther writing a letter to everyone in his office explainating that he was skipping Christmas and no, he would not be attending the office party, and no he would not be attending the office dinner. And just like this like kind of nasty letter.

It's like once you go to that, that's also isn't that free? Kind of you know what I mean?

Like you couldn't go, But also just like I doubt it seems like he's a bad man that has zero friends anyway.

I doubt anyone's gonna miss him if he just doesn't try fairly.

It was surprising when they said, like, oh, the closest friends that we have that are in town that we would invite normally to the Christmas seve that they had not mentioned the book. And it's like, it doesn't seem like you had friends, right, And I will say too that like the if it did feel like a Larry David thing were like almost always with with Larry, you're like, hey, man, I guess this thing, why do we do that as

WHI was just like, Okay, you don't have to do all this other stuff.

But like there's like to say, you're skipping all the societal things that people that are.

Also fun for you potentially, Like yeah, just go.

Or even like tipping people. It's like, yeah, yeah, give people. It's end of year, like end of year tip. Doesn't you can say it's not skipping Christmas and still give people an end of year tip for I don't know. It was just crazy.

Yeah, it's not just like, oh, I'm not tipping you for what you're not doing for me in December only, and so I'm not gonna give you tip at all. Yeah.

No.

It was a classic example of like there were elements they both wanted to keep.

They were both kind of like they both were.

Like, let's just buy a tree from the boys else, and they wouldn't do it because they had put on this rigid expectation on themselves. And honestly, reading it, I was like, it's good to remember that you can just do the.

Things you want to do as an adult. Like you can be like, okay, yeah, I'm gonna go.

Vegetarian this year, and then your husband Okay, maybe this is a personal story. Your husband makes a really great look at steak on the grill and you're like, you know what, I'm gonna have.

This one steak. I can go back to the oditarian.

Yeah. It's also because it's like I don't.

I mean, hey, holler and the comments and stuff, but it's like these cats have a fireplace, and like I feel like the person who hates the most Christmas ever would still enjoy a Christmas tree by the fire.

Right that it's like and you, I guess they're buying a Christmas tree, but they could at least, like there's stuff if it was all about money, there are things that he could have done. You gonna play Christmas music at the very fucking least, you know what I mean, Like they're free things you can do. If it was.

Really say Merry Christmas to people.

The thing of all it was, it was like, yeah, it was just like you don't you can say we're gonna save money this year, we're not getting each other presents, but you can still like do some other I don't know.

I'm also so glad you mentioned the fireplace, Jonathan, because at the end of the book, they have four hours to get ready for Claire's homecoming, and so, as Sabrina said, it's like four hours to like get her at the airport, make dinner, invite fifty people to a holiday gathering, clean the house, put up decorations, and in the midst of all this in the book, they had them like light a fire and they were sitting by the fire as they like prepared for Blair to come home.

And I was just like that alone.

I am someone who grew up in a house with like a wood burning fire.

The lighting of the fire alone thirty minutes.

Yeah, you have to take care of it. You have to provide for this.

Thing, to get the wood, you have to get the newspaper.

Like it's like such a task. It was just so funny. That was this flipped thing that was thrown.

Into the very end. It was like they sat down inside next to the lit fireplace, ating fires indoors.

There's snow here, so yeah, I guess it's colder. I don't know where this took place. Where the same place.

I don't think they ever said it was like generic town that gets not as much as Connecticut does.

Yeah, I didn't think that it was quite like Chicago or Minnesota or New York, Illinois.

Maybe yeah, it felt maybe New York like a suburb though, because street had the Christmas decorations.

Their street was frosty.

So obsessed. I've never heard of that. Is that a thing? Sorry? It's like each I mean, I mean, I'm assuming it must be, but I've just never seen that where it's like we as the street are doing the same exact decoration.

I've never heard of that.

So I haven't heard of that.

But I did read a book in the third grade called The Big Orange Spot, and it felt very similar to that, and the whole idea was that every house in the street always looked exactly the same. But then there was this one guy who painted a big orange spot on his house, and everyone in the neighborhood one by one went to convince him to eliminate the big orange spot, and one by one they all realized, Wow, we could make our house cool and whatever we want. And at the end, the house has really cool the

I do know that, like I do know that, like you know, when I've gone to like my parents' house or the holidays and like the Poconos, Pennsylvania, like there you do see like people there are like competitions and stuff, and like, you know, you could be an Internet sensation if you have like your your lights that are like you know, in the rhythm or like you know, in sync with.

Like music that plays from speak speakers or something.

Yeah, and they do them sometimes through like radios, So yeah, yeah you can.

Put so they do. I know, actually you l I should say that there's like candy cane Lane, there's like, I know a few places that you like drive through and there's they. I guess there are areas that do lights. I guess I just didn't know about this like competition part of it. But I guess there would be a competition. I guess that makes sense that there'd be a competition I just as a kid. I didn't ever experience as

I do feel like having like, essentially the same decorations is less attractive than a cohesive theme among all of them. Everyone having a prosty on top of your roof, you'd plus, yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, it is a little bit.

It's not classy, No, I don't think, but the candy kne Lane sounded classy.

I vote, that's what I say.

Kendy lay Wonder, But It's.

One of those things too, where it's like I kept on, I'm sure we'll get into it, but like they racially and like ethnically and culturally. This book was really interesting because it's like, yeah, it's like they did mention the one house that like doesn't participate because they're like Pakistani or something. And then it's like, yeah, it's like one of those things where it's like, also, you know when your kids are are like move out or like it changes the whole Christmas vibe and like I saw it

They were doing it for the kids. Yeah that makes sense.

Yeah, once they're gone and it's like, are you gonna like and yeah, he's an older dude and like having to do all this stuff by himself or whatever. It is just like it's a lot of it's like not easy nor super safe to like put all these things up totally.

And this also died many times.

One of my biggest issues with the book, which is like, so there's another family on the street. There's forty two houses on the street, and there's another family on the street, the Sheen family, I think, and basically the sel the shield and the woman in the family is like dying of cancer, we find out, which is always a tough thing.

To incorporate into a book out of nowhere.

Hey, but you got it. You got it at some point.

But they did put their decorations up this year, right, I'm right right, they didn't have.

That, they had it. They hadn't the when she went through the first battle cancer.

Okay, but they hadn't been Maybe they had somebody else help.

I can't remember this time.

Go ahead, sorry, So they hadn't that time. Then this time around they did. And I think they were like because of his beef with Luther, it made him, the husband, go even extra with what they don't usually do.

Got ya got yeah? Okay, alrighty.

I think like one of my issues with the book was like at the end of the book, basically the whole neighborhood comes together to help them throw this party, and the whole time, I'm just like, what about this other family. It's like going through this horrible crisis and they Blair.

They're no Blair, They're no Blair.

It was just sort of a funny, like not not funny, but it was just this open ended thing for me of just like what about the Shields?

We do.

Up with them in the end, but I was worried about them the whole book.

I just want to say. I was like, is there any community spirit for the Shields plead?

But Jonathan bringing up the Pakistani family, it was like something that because they kept asking like, how are you not celebrating Christmas? It's like, well, anybody, like a lot of people don't even celebrate Christmas. I was like, I guess they don't even heard of like Jewish people, they haven't heard of it. Like I don't know. It's just like there's really no one except for this one. And

I know what I'm like too, where it's just like I didn't I go there's some seasons where like I don't have children, Like there's sometimes where like you don't feel it as much, you know, and like you don't go all out with this one thing or you don't whatever the season is whether it's like Halloween or whatever. And so to be like I have to answer for a why I don't feel like participating this way with this is like absurd.

Yeah, in wild it made me think, like the whole neighborhood is evil.

Like all these poms, they all felt able people well like I feel like you at the first place.

None of them have any depth I mean as characters at all. So if it's like funny, it's like a it's like a neighborhood of villains that don't have.

A good motivation.

I mean, even like the cranks, like lying to their daughter and like treating her like she's not even a human being.

It's okay. I understood that a little bit more that they were like, let's not we don't want to make her feel bad like I just they said that, and I was like, I know that type of person like that, they would just take everything super personally, like I ruined, you're not going on that vacation for me?

I could you?

And it's like I get keeping that from her.

I have to compliment John grisham To on the detail of she's coming home suddenly unexpectedly to celebrate Christmas and not alone she's coming with her fiance and Rique, because at first I was just like, so have cleric come on the cruise or like yeah, and then this moment where it's like and she's bringing her Peruvian fiance.

Who's never.

Christmas Christmas, he's never seen Snow You're just like, okay, all right, that's so good writing. As far as I'm concerned, I see why frantic, like we got to fix this?

Is it fine if we're jumping around like Timeline ones?

Totally?

Oh yeah, I don't think this book is complicated enough that we need to.

Know about Okay, because now that like the now that and do you guys come up like for real? It was wild because like all right, so they they're like everybody's like rushing to make this party happen for Blair. So the parents can't go pick her up at the airport, so they have the police go and pick them up there.

Yeah yeah, and like he doesn't.

And so that means like whether wherever he got his education, whether I mean later on they said it was in London, but if it wasn't, yeah, you.

Know, I feel like they were trying to be like he's like an anglifier. Though he's an anglifier, oh for sure.

And even before they really dug into that where it's like all you knew what he was, that he was a doctor, and so like he's automatically going to like look at the world very differently and for them to still make him try to seem like a third class citizen or someone from the third world or whatever, it's like, but he's a doctor, so he's not going to be like and he's married or he's going to marry this person.

So it'd be like, hey, is this normal.

She's like no, It's like okay, so we're just gonna get into this car because that's what's happened. But he's not gonna be afraid of doing this because why would he like his he's not a peasant or something that's like.

Yeah, yeah, that's like I'm gonna get i'm doing this, I'm illegal in this country or you know, I don't know.

Also, highly educated man that's like studied abroad in London. It's like he's if he has a question about something, he's probably just gonna ask it and be like.

Yeah, Like he's not.

Just gonna be like and then the police won't say anything, right Yeah.

Also his name was like the police had a sign that said their name, so it's not like they're just waltzing into some the back of a cop car. Like it that makes makes sense.

I do think it would have been a more fun touch if it had been a fire truck.

That's just me.

I think that would have been cute and fun. Since we're also talking about the reception of Enrique. Also we already know that Luther is raised. The whole town is racist because they like can't accept that like someone would celebrate Christmas. But there's also that awful moment where they see Enrique, and I think the line is Luthor goes uh.

He looked at his looked at his skin color.

He wasn't nearly as dark as he. It was like he wasn't dark at all. That's what it was.

He wasn't.

Lighter than Luthor.

I had been channing for months at a time and his Mediterranean skin really, yeah, it was.

It was fucked up. I'm saying. It was like, oh, it's in regue. But like we're gonna also go to lengths to tell you like he's yeah, he's he's you know, he's not white, but like you know, skin's so light, yeah, lighter. Feel comfor you guys, can all feel comfortab That's one of.

My questions was like is the racism authorial or is it a commentary on Luther as a person, because I do.

Think sounds like a John Grisham apologist.

No, but I think to a big degree, like the whole book is a critique on all of these people, Like he's not trying to make any of these people look like good people. He's not necessarily trying to make them look like bad people, although they are. They're like it's about Christmas and they're just trying to like sell their fruitcakes and stuff. But everyone is like so selfish and so out of touch, and I do think that that is on purpose.

That's why the thing with Enrika did it makes sense to me when it's like from his perspective, why would he be otherizing himself when he's like a highly educated.

Person of it's that's almost like too, like he was being too liberal or like he was like trying to be like, well, have you ever thought about how a police make someone from South America feel like?

I don't, Like he was like, sir, I'm a doctor, you exactly. And then also but it was funny too with like the skin tone thing. I was like, I couldn't the way he had written.

I couldn't understand if he was saying, like like when Luther was like, oh, he's not him and the wife were like, he's not dark at all, and then in his head he was like, in fact, he's like two shades lighter. I was like, I couldn't tell if they meant that it was good or bad, Like I didn't understand what they I felt like.

At first, I didn't know if I thought he was like thought that they were worried that they would they were like darkening their skin and be like offensive, like they were doing like blackface or something that was confused.

I just had the joke, but I don't think that was it.

I think it was like just yeah, I felt like it was like I took it from the dark and he wasn't as dark as we were because we've been the tanning BDS.

I felt I took it as they like were racist.

Yeah, you have a South American fiance and.

They're like have this vision of a darker person in their head. It felt like the like I don't know if this was real, but when the news was reporting that, like the Queen or somebody had asked how dark people thought the baby with Megan Markle and her husband Harry would be?

Is it Harry? I don't know Markle is the important and beautiful.

I thought it was Prince Charles, by the way, not the Queen.

I think it's the queen or somebody.

I don't know, but that's how I took it, is that they were like, how dark do we think this baby's going to be? They were like, how dark do we think in Riguez.

That's how I took it as well.

But now that you're saying, was it the authorial voice or was it the character Serena. That's interesting, and I think one thing that makes it hard for me is that was written in two thousand and one, So some of this stuff I was like, I guess that's just how the author and people and the character thought. And another example for me that stood out was he agreed to do something. Oh, he was like, and then I'll

His wife would take on the chore. And I was just like, oh, what a dick?

Yeah, what did so?

But again I'm like, but is it is he supposed to be a dick or is this just like, of course in two thousand and one the wife would take on the chorea.

Right, well, they were well they also were just like So.

This is something I think about a lot with like any kind of like family dynamic, especially like sitcoms, even to the state which Tim Allen is in many of these of just like it's just like they're so nasty to each other, yes, you know, and like uh, and even when things were like end of fine, it just like they didn't. It was like almost surprising when they were like dancing around.

The like the one sweet moment to try to make it.

Almost felt like it was out of characters.

I was like, at some point it was just like, you haven't done shown anything else that they like kind of like each other and so so it was just weird to be like, Okay, here's a sweet moment, but I'm like, you haven't had any other sweet moments like that even a little bit.

Yeah, well, I guess I relate to that.

No, it was over the top sad depiction of like what a marriage could become, like what a failed marriage could become.

To lay the trap of like convincing her to do the cruise and stuff, I couldn't just be like, hey, this is where we're at, like like we do it for the kid. The kid has gone what do you think it was funny?

He's going to play the music and everything. Yeah. Yeah.

Also I looked I did the right I did the inflation rate and in today's dollars, the sixty the six dollars that they spent on Christmas in what would have been two thousands, I guess yeah, in today's money would be eleven and twenty seven dollars.

I'm great to look at what we would spend we spent on Christmas. But I also felt from this book that I was like, oh, I don't do nearly enough charity or whatever, Like I don't buy from the boy Scouts, you know what I mean. Or I don't buy well, I don't know if I want to buy, like the police calendar, but you know what I mean. Like, I'm like, oh, I supposed to like I know, the like you know, giving people the gardener, the trash, like giving people tips and bonuses. But I was like, am I supposed to

The thing too with the sorry were gonna say some na it.

Was gonna be so dumb.

I was just gonna say, inspired by this, Like I rent in my apartment and they every time there's maintenance, we had maintenance today, every time there's maintenance, I'm like, I don't pay these people, so like the people who pay them should tip them.

And then I started to think, like, oh my god, is that totally wrong?

And then I was thinking about this one guy who comes all the time and he's just so great and he like fixes everything.

And again I'm like.

It's a battle because maybe things he's not responsible for things needing to be fixed.

That's my building's problem.

But then, inspired by the spirit of Christmas, we we gave him a tip today as though it were like an end of your tip, because we never do.

You don't know if it would be the end of the year. You don't know if he's coming back. Yeah, I have the same thing for the right I'm like, are they tippy? I give a tip, But I'm like, is this a double tip?

Whatever?

I guess that's fine. I guess I shouldn't double. I shouldn't think about that. Yeah, but I don't know.

I don't know the protocol all the time.

But he should, you know, Luther Crank should you know?

But like, I've always been sensitive about like cop stuff in general as a as a black man's a yeah, well, I guess you said that in the beginning after Latino, But like, uh, it's really.

Interesting to see how like the like when they like the.

Fun and games that they have, when like Luther gets arrested by the cops, and it's like a misunderstanding because it was like he's the he's burglarizing the.

Yeah, but he had the keys.

Yeah yeah, yeah, but he had the keys, which he just forgets to say.

And I was like, I wonder how much of this is just like a privileged thing to be like I don't even need to talk about the evidence I have because I shouldn't even be in the situation like yeah yeah yeah, whereas immediately be like, I have the keys.

The guy called the guy call the.

Guy yeah yeah yeah yeah. Such a different, such a different interaction.

Yeah, this was if this couple, the couple was like if they were the Pakistani couple and or they were.

Like uh oh yeah, they would they would be because you knew the cop also didn't really think he was burglarizing, like he was just fucking with him, Whereas yeah, it would be a completely different like no, I really yeah.

Also the whole the whole book would be like the they would be otherwise so quickly We're just like, this is yet another thing that they're trying to like not be like us with.

Ye yeah, and they were, they would not make the skipping Christmas decision like like that like it would be no, they would.

Be like they're like, yo, for the path of least resistance. It's like we still have to put.

The frost Yeah, exactly, the frosty, like we do these things.

Yeah, well, the.

Cruise leaves on Christmas. I mean I get that the whole point.

Look, it is the commercialization of Christmas, blah blah blah.

But like it's not like you're missing the whole season, right exactly, Like.

The day you're leaving is when all the stuff is done, right exactly.

Yeah, true, it.

Just made it was just so they could give it to someone else at the end. But I I agree because I was like, there's absolutely no reason why I can't do both. But then I'm like, Okay, the money save part I get. But then it was like it didn't even make sense because just like you pointed out in the summers, Abrena, like often he'd be like, oh, police officer, I'll buy all of your I'll date it, donate money to buy your like baseball uniforms for the orphans or I don't even remember.

But it was like, so you're not.

You're all like you're an accountant, you're trying to save money. But like, that's not saving money. Why don't you just buy the fucking thing and don't say you're gonna buy them? Yeah you.

I thought.

He was promising a lot of later spending and I really thought that that was going to be wrapped up and like, uh, that was gonna be a point that was made. It was like, Oh, I ended up spending just as much money on Christmas this year because we bought the cruise. I promised to spend three hundred dollars in the Boy Scouts in the summer.

Blah blah blah.

And I mean maybe I missed it in the three and two time speed that I was listening, but I feel like they never did circle back to that. But maybe maybe John Gersham was just like, my readers are smart and they'll get it.

I also felt like he could have gone they could have gotten something other than smoked her out. I didn't believe it.

Well, that's the thing, that's what this was. Was really funny about this or interesting about this book. And it's actually I'm gonna give John Grisham his flowers right now. Even when I was just like, oh, I hate this, I hate this book, I hate this prime, I hate like how annoying these people are They're so nasty each other, like everything about it, Like it just feels like, you know,

To be like don't break anything. I was like, that's that's funny. So it's like interesting to have like those things.

Where it's like it's a worse this is the simplest statement of the year, but like a worst writer would have made a worst book.

Yeah, yeah, that's true.

I had the true.

Exact same experience as you, Jonathan. I was like, I hate this, hate the characters. I hope my life is never like this. God Damn, that's a good choice for the book.

Like everything was like textbook the right move to make as an author.

You're just like, yeah, all right, plot wise, yeah I could see why.

Well that would make a fun movie, huh.

Like you agree, but I do. I did think the opening, like the until like the third act where everything happened. I did find it like slow and like I feel like I could have I thought he was really trying to like spread that out. Please talk about the dieting and the tanning. I mean, I'm not going to criticize youngers from too much for that because I honestly think it is a reflection of the time. Like two thousand and one, did you guys know, like you know tanning, but did you guys do tanning? Bets?

I did, and it's oh yeah, he's insane. Like the seventh grade before.

We went on the vacation, we did it.

Tanned for prom and spring break.

I just as before vacation so you didn't get burned, which was.

It was like its like you're going to prom, like you're going you've been in winter all day or all season long, the in Pennsylvania, Like why are you getting tanned for your dress?

Yes, it's like you kidding.

We never did spray tans. It was always the tanning bed. I didn't even know boy.

But the funny thing is, I actually that was one thing I took issue with the veritas of the book. I was like, tanning beds are fucking awesome, and the only reason I don't do them is for skin cancer. But like the way they described them was like they're sweaty, you have to clean them with a windows. You just have to get it done. It's like that twenty minutes that bed was heaven on. Yeah, it was chemicals in your in your brain.

It's smelled coconuts so good.

You know, I thought your.

Skin, your skin get turned up if you're like maybe if you're like fourteen, you have some macnie.

That's hilarious.

But also it's funny that she talked. He talked to the I was surprised this curmudgeally old man was doing it because it was like he even asked about skin cancer and the woman was like, no, and it's in my head. I'm like, no, it definitely is. You're definitely cancing, Like it's definitely like not. But he was like it was. It was hard to imagine an old man doing that, Like my my dad would never choose to go to a tandy bed, do you know what I mean?

So I wonder imagining that character doing it.

I wonder how much of it was because of like like accountants are so logical that it's like I feel like he can maybe done because it's like, no, this is the thing that I should do practical or practicality wise. But I agree with you. I was, but then he would be he's more man than he has accountant.

Yeah.

But like also when he was describing their dinners, they'd be like boiled chicken and cottage cheese.

Oh.

I was just I was laughing so hard because like you love cottage fats, I do. I love cottage cheese because my algorithm fed it to me as being like, this is the health answer to all of your problems, cottage cheese, and so then I was like, yeah, I'll have cottage cheese all the time. And then seeing it in this book, I was like, oh my god, I forgot that that was a fad in the nineties too, and now it's back at it.

I need to tell used to read it. Your memory was wrong.

Also, it wasn't chicken and cottage cheese, which would have made sense. It was plain pasta noodles and cottage cheese.

And I was just like, the pasta is the problem?

Really? Did we not know that?

Two thousand and.

Yeah, there's protein pasta. Maybe maybe that's now that's.

Something else, something else I had That was a friction point for me was at the was that the travel agent's female travel agent's name was Biff.

Yeah, I remember that.

I didn't notice.

Ridiculous.

I was like, how could that possibly be? There's two very famous Biffs.

One is Biff Tanner from Back to the Future and then also Biff and uh that's the that's of a salesman. And it's like hilarious that there's just like this woman travel agent named Biff.

Is like, I can't believe this. I will not believe this. I won't believe this character.

Yes, that's a very that's a good one.

She was just I love that, And is John Grisham hilarious?

Is that?

One of the sweet moments in the book too, was when like a bunch of bullshit was happening in uh Wild and Back or whatever the accountant firm was called, and then he was just like having a glass.

Of wine with Biff down on the first floor.

Of the.

Wait wasn't no dialogue.

There was another secretary called docs Dogs Yeah dogs yeahary names.

Also, so a lot of mall work because you know, like the Tanning slum was in the mall, no reason to keep going to the mall.

And seeing everyone at the mall.

Damn, I loved malls.

Well me too.

It's the same.

And it's one of those things too where it's like in when we mentioned the smoke trout, it's funny to me because it's like they were going to great lengths to try to make it the best like facsimile of like a regular Christmas Eve dinner, but the smoke trout is not regular Christmas Eve dinner. But I guess it's more regular than it would be had to gone to like a Chinese food place, right, because that would have been like way more ringing alarm bells than like the trowel, which is hilarious.

And actually, to be honest, when I heard smoke trout, I was like, yes, oh my god, what a wonderful addition to the Christmas.

I couldn't imagine it. I don't think it's anything ever.

I think gets home.

Hey, try the smoke. Try this the canned smoke trout from Trader Joe's. It's unbelievable.

All right, all right, I'll try it.

I'll get in there, I'll try it.

I believe that unbelievable accurately describes how I'd feel, but I can't say in what direction I would not be.

I never tried it, so I guess it's very good.

But that's what's funny too, where it's just like it's interesting to like get to that point of like how much are we trying to make it seem like we're still having this party all for Blair? But it's like you don't have to, Like I feel like it's one

That's very true, but like I guess in her call, she's like I told him about this, this and this, so excited, but like to me, when she did that I was like, why would she assume it's like her parents tumb alone that they would do everything the same, Like it's crazy that she didn't call ahead to be like I was. I know, I wasn't going to come back for Christmas, but looks like we're gonna try it. I'm going to try to come just head like it's just crazy to me. There was no heads up.

I would say, I think Blair when she goes back to Peru is going to die.

She just seems like really naive how to navigate the world.

So like, I think this is probably the last like happy Christmas for this family.

Why do you think she married a doctor? She's straight?

Yeah, yeah, but it is funny to think about, like how like the I did like the choice of Grisham saying or Luther rather being like, why is everybody losing their mind? She's only been gone for a month.

Yes, that was fun.

Yeah, there was another fun observation that someone was like, oh man, I can't make the party, but god, I want to see Blair, like I missed her. And it's like he makes the observation of like the man hadn't seen Blair years, but sure, yeah, we'll get dinner.

One of my favorite parts is when Noura invited the uh the man grocery store.

What was the deal with that?

I feel like such a big.

That wasn't a buch of a ba. I just found it relatable to be like I should know you. You're talking to me like we know each other and you know Blair and I'm gonna he was like on a hemlock and I'm gonna hope that it comes to me, but it never came.

Like I relate to that so.

Much, but at the being like, oh, he's just like they never knew and he I thought.

I don't think they ever figured it out because then he was just like hanging out with Enrique. It's just like they related to each other because he had some background.

And worked in Peru and like no Spanish and no Peruvian folk songs and stuff.

Yeah, I was like, Okay, well, I guess good thing invited him. But no, I don't think there was like, oh we knew that or we knew him.

I wish I thought that was going to be one more big story move because of the way was like, so there was so much patting to that was just like yeah, yeah, I thought for sure, he's gonna be somebody who should not have been there because he either was like a guy who had previously like ruined Luther's career or something like that, or like or that.

Would have been John, that would have been that would been so good.

Or was like the or was the guy who like this this would not be in this book but like took Blair's virginity and she couldn't remember that, you know, or like her first boyfriend or something.

That yeah, yeah I could see that, yeah.

Jesus her pickle, but something like that that was just like, oh, this guy should not be here, Like how could I not have remembered him?

I wish that it had that had come up? I do. I wish that would have been better. You know, you will have to John.

Grisham sudden yeah, like yeah, John at John Grisham dot com, be like, hey, just read your folk.

I know.

I think if anyone said the email you can.

Let me start this by saying the subject line is like I didn't hate it, I would love.

I would love to get that email.

All right.

I think we got to do final thoughts if there's any big thing anything, but like I think we got to wrap up we're getting getting towards.

All right, all right, all right, do you have anything, uh Sabrina? Did you have, like a ask the aucers or what did you feel like something we should Yeah, I do have an ask. This is an improvised segment. There you go, Jonathan, This segment where uh Sabrina is going to be an interviewer and we will each play the author and answer the question, and then she will reveal what the actual author said.

Okay, and I will also elect a winner among three.

Okay, all right, John?

Do you ever want to skip Christmas?

Me? No, I I've never wanted to skip Christmas, you know, the holiday spirit and such. But I've definitely wanted to get the commercialism and the you know, capitalism out of it, you know, the money, because you spend a lot of money on Christmas. But I think the spirit is something I always want to keep with me. Also, sometimes pedophiles aren't actually pedophiles.

Thank you, thank you.

John.

Do you ever want to skip Christmas?

No?

I absolutely love Christmas. I just think it's a joyful holiday.

The cheer, the shopping, the gift giving, and actually reminds me there was a brutal crime committed against Santa Claus nineteen ninety six. And actually the person that committed the crime is still at large, but an innocent man went to jail or that crime. I'd love to spend a little more time getting into the details of that.

If you have about three hours.

Think think we don't have three hours. But thank you.

I like that. I like that because it assumes that that's what you're supposed to be talking about, asking asking questions off base.

Remember, I'm here to promote a different book entirely.

I'm here for the nice project.

John, John, do you ever want to skip Christmas h M all the time?

Because because I am actually Jewish, and it was and it used it used to be Grishansky and then we have to change it for a lot of a lot of familial reasons. And I shouldn't even be telling you this because we're also in witsac in the witness of protection.

I would say, stop stop talking, stop talking.

You know well, you know sometimes you know true. There's a lot of good stories in truth. And I'm actually writing a new book about it.

Feels like you're about to live in so I just want to I want to stop you there.

Well, thank you, thank you, so much.

I think the closest was Sarah until she diverted into the pedophelia.

Sometimes I guess what's the answer.

So the real answer is every year. Yeah, I'd love to skip Christmas. Well not every year, but at some point during the whole Christmas season, you get sick of all the excess and the commercialism and all the stuff we pour into Christmas and we lose sight of the big picture. And every year I'd say there should be a better way to do this, and I think about it. Sure it'd be nice to skip it, but you can't skip Christmas, right. I transcribed that from a YouTube video.

She was doing researched very good.

I was doing research very good.

How about some hate reads?

All right, wads we do in?

I put it an improv act out, but it is good.

Right, let's do some good. Just let's hear what the people think.

Okay, K says I almost missed out on one of the funniest holiday books.

I can't believe.

I borrowed this last year and returned it after listening to just one chapter. For some strange reason, I just didn't get it.

Then.

As crazy as it may sound, this quote d NF, which I assume means do not fuck.

Not finished last year.

We all know, we all know different version of the same thing.

I did not fuck.

That's true.

Last year is now proudly on my favorite shelf. I laughed so hard that I was in tears. I didn't know John Grisham can be so funny. This is what the holiday is all about. Love love this book, heart Emoji Christmas, Kate.

You said, ka, I think K tried LSD for the first time in the last year and has into it changed everything for her.

Good for her, good for K good it really?

Yeah, you know what my favorite comedy is Skipping Christmas.

The book.

Special shelf space just for it, and she almost skipped it.

Wow, Wow, she almost skipped Skipping Christmas.

Also, whenever you ever revisit, like, I haven't books that I only start a little bit of because they're dense or whatever, it's like watching the I watched the pilot of the Wire four times and then it's like, but.

Usually if you hate it, why would you ever go back to that book?

Yeah? I know you wouldn't.

What inspired her to go back I don't know.

Maybe enough people loved it and they kept talking about and she wanted to be.

Everyone was talking about enough.

This wanted to.

Sherry says, who hasn't at some point thought about skipping Christmas. There's so much time and effort that goes into a festive and merry holiday season. The planning, cooking, baking, buying, hiding, wrapping, decorating, well, the lists. He is seemingly endless each December. This fun read makes one think about who we celebrate Christmas, for

People really like the Christmas one. Yeah, I guess there's a.

Lot of emojis.

I did another one, but it was just about how this woman had watched Christmas. Christine also okay, the two themes that I saw in the reviews a lot of women, a lot of emojis. Christine had seen Christmas with the Cranks numerous times and finally dove into the book and said, it's the book is very similar. I am reading it now.

I am.

The book is very similar to the movie, but of course the book is so much better. Why because you can see inside of Luther's mind.

Luther is wonderful.

That was crazy, big Luther fan. Well, maybe Luther's better in the book than he is in the movie.

I don't know.

I haven't seen the movie.

He is so okay.

When I copy and pasted this, I was like, that's a crazy thing to say.

Luther sucks. And then I was like, but the book is a lot better than the movie. And it is because you could just see him. But there's mind that's hilarious.

Well, it's like, I'm not the biggest word.

I'm not a fan of Tamelan at all, but like I do know, I mean, people have like there's a thing about him that people like and so and I know that like Tim the Toolman, Taylor was like also really annoying and frustrating and so like, but people still liked him because he was funny. So I can imagine that in the movie he would have made Luther way more charming.

Also, is probably way younger than the fifty five that Luther.

Was, you know, having just watched the movie, he could have been fifty.

There's no way he was five in two thousand and four.

I will say visually he might have for fifty five.

Listen, this is coming from someone who as a shame. I think, well, I don't want to say a shame. I don't want to put the man down. I had a celebrity crowd.

Oh wait, wait, how old?

What year? What year?

Think he was born? Actually, Jonathan? Jonathan?

What you actually? I think I would say he's born in nineteen I would say he was launched. He had a successful stan of career by the time. He's probably a catching, a characterizing star, or a rising star when he was like twenty five, which would be like eighty five. So I didn'd say he was born in nineteen sixty five.

Ish nineteen fifty three.

Oh, my father, I'm just going to get to June thirteenth. Sorry, he was fifty exactly.

Wow almost when the movie came out.

Holy shit, wow shock never mind good good for him world.

He was he was pasted. What I crushed on.

To crush? Did you have a crush on John Goodman? Am I making that up? No?

He was my okay, fair, what why that's that?

You know that?

That person?

Well, it was it was me.

No, I've heard other people say it, wait what wait, no, no, no, Sabrina, You've been saying it, and then you made other people say it.

What's happening.

Yeah, I'll I'll find the like side by side image that I did.

It was like when everyone was doing their.

Uh that was mine. I'll find the picture and I will send it and you'll you'll all say like, no, no, but you'll think to yourself.

I'm gonna be completely honest.

We Jonathan was just talking about being honest and candidate at the end of this podcast.

I think we should all be honest when we see it. How does it make us feel?

We'll be honest?

Wait, did you were Was he your crush during Home Improven? Yes, which is hilarious because one of the most famous teenage Charthurrobs of all time Taylor.

Well, interestingly, one of my first crushes was Simba Child Simba.

Play by Jonathan Taylor Thomas.

So it's like I had a crush on Jonathan Taylor Thomas, but it was specifically the cartoon.

Line did you always go after the dads? You know?

In high school?

You were always like In fact, it is strange that I had a crush on Tim Allen, and not just because he is a Republican and was busted for dealing cocaine, but because when I was a child. I'm sure I've told this story before. I I had such intense crushes on like boys my age, and I remember thinking that adult men were so heinously unattractive, and I started to

Yeah, I think, yeah, I will say that's normal, but an interesting fear to have interesting fear to What did you read that this podcast today? If we're we're back with Pickle all right, let's do our let's do our hate rates. So, Jonathan, we do these out of five. We rate them in terms of the world of mean book club books. So we're not comparing it to shake spear. Whatever you think is like your best literature you've ever read. It's kind of just like of these New York Times

Yeah, I'll go.

It's just so hard for me to like not rate somebody compared to Shakespeare.

I mean, also, it's just my mind. It's on top of my mind. I'm like running through quotes.

You know, how much would you hate? How much would you hate the person who is like, oh, who's your favorite author?

Likespeare William Shakespeare?

I mean to be insane, but probably something I said in like eighth grade when I read my mind, maybe.

Like is that just as bad?

I was Johnte Aligary for a long time. Whoa and people would be like, oh, you like the Inferno. I'd be like peasant, I like the Divine Comedy and the Inferno.

Is only a third.

I was.

I think, yeah, I made a few friends. Okay, So my journey with this book. As I was listening to it, I was like, why was this book written?

And who was it written for?

I like, I can't imagine that it has a target audience.

I don't know why I wrote it. And then as the book.

Went on, I gotta tell you I I was. I was so moved by John Grisham's words, so I guess well, and also not to mention, this book was real short. So it's given a three point five from me. It was, Oh my gosh, which emojis?

Would I use? Three point five hard eyes spaghetti plate from Getty Plain?

Interesting?

Yeah, three point five?

Okay, you're making this is.

This is probably right right down the middle for me. Look, it's an it's I bunted like this is. It was a good pitch, an easy hit.

The book was short. Uh, it wasn't too.

Awful like we've read just some god awful, really horrible, offensive, mind numbing books.

This one.

Look, end of the day, I said, with pelican.

Brief, I'll say again, John Grisham's a good writer, you know, he's just just a readable writer.

So let's let's call it a three.

But I know that I did dislike it immensely from start to finish.

If that makes sense.

Okay, that'd be a devastating thing to hear as the author.

Yes, like she did say like I was a good writer, like I'm a readable rite.

That's cool, I am doing it in English mostly, and like then okay, but it's like I did hate all of it.

But end of the day, this made my life worse, and I'm sorry I read.

It three Yeah, it was fine. I know I'm having a lot of trouble landing where I want to land. I think I can tell you, like if you love Christmas and you're nostalgic for a time, or like everyone on your block being you know, a Christian white person that decorates their house and super into Christmas and you live in the Northeast or something. I don't know, Uh, this is gonna be five out of five for you because in the end that's who wins. And it's like

I'm gonna give it.

I'm gonna give it a three out of five because it was short, and again Grisham wrote, well, there are some parts I like, the plot worked, but it was like, really for four hour audiobook, the first two hours were excruciatingly slow for me. And of course there was some you know, there was the you know, fucked up diet culture and racism and stuff, but it felt very two thousand and one, So I don't even I'm not even knocking it so much on that. Yeah, they're gonna five for me.

It was fine.

I think that this book is I don't know if I've said this about a book before, but I think it does benefit from reading it versus audiobook because like when you see how it like it moves, especially because like it's like because the fonts so big that there's like four words of page, you just.

Like are flipping.

It really is flipping quickly, so it feels like you're making good Well yeah, it makes you feel like you're making a lot of progress very quickly. So like even if it does feel like plot slow or like writing slow or whatever, it is just like, oh, I'm already a third through this book.

Somehow I feel like nothing is like I just started it.

But I do think that, like as compared two books that I as compared to Billy Shakes, I think that like for what it is, like you were like, basically it's this is a Malcolm of like what Sarah said and what Jona said, where it's like, yeah, I also did dislike it.

For I went from like.

Not liking it to not liking it a little less to then really not liking it, but then being like, you know what, but I did enjoy it. It's still was somehow entertaining journey. Yeah, and it's like it still

I want Christiam to come out with like a crime novel like legal, you know, thriller, but for Christmas. I would love him to marry different yea, yeah, I would love to see that.

Yeah, I'd love that.

Yeah.

Oh, man, we'll never know what Clari said.

She never joined some just not that.

Lara, Well we missed you. We'll we'll see you next season. This is our big ender, this is our big season.

Yeah, still have to do you have to.

Do sorry little, we do a little.

And uh we'll skip Prettiest Princess, but I want to know, Jonathan, we won't to skip that, Jonathan. Where can people catch you? Like, do you have stuff you want to plug? Do you want to talk about anything?

Oh?

That's good?

Yeah yeah, yeah, I man, And stuff's real weird right now. So I'm kind of like waiting on so many things that like actually happen or green full Green Lights Full budget.

Come out November, so if that helps.

That's true.

Even then, I don't know, things are real weird. Uh could be in Yeah, I have a couple of things I'm really excited about doing that are just like they're just in a holding pattern like some movie stuff. Like otherwise it's like doing stuff at UCV again, which has been really fun. I have a show. Uh yeah, I mean that that's kind of like an ongoing thing so that you catch me doing sketch comedy at UCUD in New York I also have. There's a few short stories

Yeah, thank you?

Oh my god, Hey, well you get that? Well, I mean, we'll definitely, we'll set it out, we'll talk about it, we can do a bonus.

That'll be amazing. And then you as long as I get a review that says d N about my romantic, you've made it romantic.

Oh my god, Wait what is can you tell? Can you give us a little like tease about what?

Yeah?

Well, I don't yeah, And I don't know the best way to tease it yet because I don't know how much of it is.

Just like I'm trying to keep this type of the chest. So it's still like a.

Surprising romanticy, is there fucking.

I mean, yes, there hasn't iound that part. I haven't that part yet, but I will say that there's no fairies. It's not medieval.

A little bit. Okay, well, now you're not selling me what's going on?

Yeah, So it's like, but it is, it's a lot of mythology.

Oh okay, really excited for this.

There's going to be like if you need any test readers for the fucking yeah, we're really.

Going to read.

Well, yeah, it's gonna be I'm actually exploring a lot of like ethnicity stuff and like lineage stuff through this, and it's gonna be a lot of like Norse mythology as well as Mayan mythology, which is never really tough.

Yeah that.

I am so excited about this, Like I'm not over selling this.

I can't wait to read it. I think it's going to be really good.

Yeah, thank you.

Like it's one of those things where I've loosely told people like, oh this is these are the four or five main beats, and everybody it just immediately feels fun and I'm like, great.

Great, I got that's good.

We've read a lot of romanticies over the years for the podcast, and then sometimes you know, work becomes pleasure and you read a few more and.

Then if it comes to.

Your life something amazing.

We get it. Well, Yeah it's a good. Yeah, jump in, jump in the water's warm exactly. All right, all right, let's do our little of the cast.

We're just gonna name the second last someone, all right, a little of the cast.

Great, so real quick, I'll just start. It's Sabrina because she moved summary later, but I told you last, So okay, I'll go next.

It's Sabrina. She's insisting we're gonna do another segment after this. It's we've gone on such a long time. The podcast is over.

It's you. You're the little fucker.

We're gonna do it, Sabrina. I'll I'll vote.

It's such a hard decision between Johnna and Sarah.

Just too no, he did nothing wrong. I think I'm gonna have to go with Sarah because I.

Think move in the summary was brilliant, genius and you should recognize that respect my brilliance.

I'm gonna go with Sabrina because I think she's doing herself a massive disk service with the John Goodman stuff.

Wow, it's the nicest little Frida.

You're gonna see the photo photo and you'll untext to us tonight.

She wasn't so bad.

It's so weird.

We'll put it up all right, all right, and then pretty little fun.

Jesus, we're doing okay, and we have one final segment and it's you have to vote for who the prettiest princess of the cast?

No, nobody, you, only you can right.

Well, And unfortunately, because of how the very complicated rules around it, only someone who was an original pretty princess can be voted. Johnna was in the original episode where it happened, but she got herself kicked out of the running somehow. So I'm I'm gonna be the prettiest princess.

Okay, great princess, sure whatever, All right, guys, please mean book club on all the socials. Please join our patreoon. Become a patron of the mean arts we are. This is the last big finale of the season. We will have some bonus EPs coming out, maybe some Christmas theme, who knows, maybe Christmas is the Craig hint. But yeah, yep, yep. But please start sending us your book reres so we can start planning for next season.

And yes, we'll see then anybody.

I mean, last word, thank you, Jonathan, You're so funny.

I've missed.

Yeah, this was such a great.

Yeah, this is great, and you're all very very smart and funny and it's.

Yeah, thank you. Yeah, but not enough people say that. I think I would love to see a lot more like you know, five star reviews of our podcast.

Let's say this is important.

This is important work, yeah, especially as everything else on fire. This one, this is very much not.

This is important.

Yeah, well hell yeah.

We do recommend some books to be burnt, but.

That's not that we can live for now.

Not this one.

This one didn't.

This one's fine, all right.

Thanks for listening everybody, Thanks Steffy for the rack, and we'll see you guys next season.

Bye bye bye