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This week Blake Lively is having a shocker so we watch The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants

TW: sexual assault, suicide, grief!

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FILM DISCUSSION STARTS 21:44

This week Caroline and Jen discuss their favourite adult sleepover movie, Dangerous Beauty.

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Coin Operated Boy Tom McInnes is back and we're here to cry about Amanda Palmer.

Amanda Palmer is a singer, songwriter and performance artist who first rose to fame in the early 2000s with her band, The Dresden Dolls. After singles like Coin Operated Boy and Girl Anachronism, The Dresden Dolls became a staple of indie music and were known for their cabaret-inspired aesthetic and wild live shows. Amanda has since become a solo artist, releasing several albums under her own name and becoming one of the first major artists to use a crowd-funding model to fund her work. She has attracted many critiques over the years: both for the lyrical content of her music as well as her behaviour on social media. She is currently married to the author Neil Gaiman.

PLAYLIST OF THE SONGS WE TALK ABOUT HERE: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0SgYWvoAKB8srS7sNWOCRM?si=1cbc904906774151

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If I should stay, I would only get in your way. Caroline and Irenosen Okojie get extremely giddy about The Bodyguard, arguably the best date movie of all time. We talk about the tragic history of Whitney, the power of sister relationships in art, and the psychological weight of assassinations within contemporary culture.

Irenosen is the author of several books, including the most recent Nudibranch. She is the winner of the Betty Trask award, the Caine Prize for African Writing, and was recently awarded an MBE for her services to literature.

Caroline is an author and eats trash for dinner

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It's 1997 and Bridget Jones is navigating New Labour, the sudden death of Princess Diana, and her on-again off-again relationship with the elusive Mark Darcy. Caroline and novelist Ayisha Malik discuss why Helen Fielding remains one of the greatest comic novelists of the 20th century (and yours, Mrs Townsend, are quite good too),as well as the everlasting and occasionally frustrating thick behaviour of our best mate Bridget.

Ayisha Malik is the author of several books, most recently This Green and Pleasant Land. Her next novel, The Movement, is out in 2022.

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Super Trouper Zoe Terakes has brought Mamma Mia to the garbage dump and is ready to celebrate it for the mad camp wonderland it truly is. We talk about how Mamma Mia rejects patriarchal frameworks, whether or not Sophie is in the middle of twelve steps, our love of Pierce Brosnan, and the high lesbian energy coming off Does Your Mother Know. This episode is sponsored by Nine Perfect Strangers, available on Amazon Prime Video now.

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Rebecca Taylor of Self Esteem (formerly Slow Club) talks about how Drag Race literally dragged her out of a dark post-break up depression and helped redefine her musical persona. We gush unabashedly about how this show changed our lives, admit to reading the Reddit and confess to drag queen sex dreams. There's also a preview of her new single, HOW CAN I HELP YOU, at the very end, so stay tuned!

Rebecca is @selfesteemselfesteem on everything and her new album, Prioritise Pleasure, is coming October 2021.

Caroline is @czaronline on Instagram and her books are on sale where you get books

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In today's postcard, we discuss the ethics of bailing. In the main episode, we catch up with our best pals Jesse and Celine to see if these two kids can finally get it together.

Film discussion from 19.54

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This is the FIRST class sleeper? Put on your visor and trapeze dress, it's time for the big bag of fun that is season five. We talk about Atlantic City, big wing woman energy, how everyone must open for a dog eventually, the continued comedic genius of Chris Noth, the FINAL act of the MacDougalls Are Coming For Supper, the dangers of falling for Jack Berger and the inspiring self-love of Harry Goldenblatt. Carrie clangs out while 'dating the city' and the fashion is disappointing but not without its charms.

Caroline O'Donoghue is the author of Promising Young Women, Scenes of a Graphic Nature and the forthcoming All Our Hidden Gifts

Dolly Alderton is the author of Everything I Know About Love and Ghosts

This podcast was produced by Caroline O'Donoghue, mixed by Hannah Varral, with music by Harry Harris and art by Gavin Day

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Don't you bring that cardboard baby in here! This week we're coming into Season 4 with tears, and the firm knowledge that CABS ARE BULLLSSSSH*T. We discuss the comic chops of Chris Noth, the confusing friendship of Aidan and Steve, the great When Harry Met Sally drama that never was, and we go very deep on the financial awkwardness of friendship. We praise the hugely under-sung Walker Lewis and wonder what the hell is going with Richard Wright (creature of the night)

Dolly Alderton is the author of Everything I Know About Love and Ghosts

Caroline O'Donoghue is the author of Promising Young Women, Scenes of a Graphic Nature and All Our Hidden Gifts

This episode was produced by Caroline O'Donoghue and mixed by Hannah Varral. Music by Harry Harris, artwork by Gavin Day

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Take your seats, turn off your phones, it's time to settle in for the National Theatre's presentation of THE MCDOUGALLS ARE COMING FOR SUPPER and there will be no intermission. This week we discuss everyone's favourite members of the Scottish-American aristocracy, Aidan and the affair, and the general neglect of dogs in this season. We also discuss how and why this is Sex and the City's most problematic season – did the writers take their own status as being the Big Sex Show for granted? We rhapsodise about Bill Kelly the piss politician and the great Power Lad divide between Caroline and Dolly.

Dolly Alderton is the author of Ghosts and Everything I Know About Love

Caroline O'Donoghue is the author of Promising Young Women, Scenes of a Graphic Nature and the forthcoming All Our Hidden Gifts

This podcast was edited by Caroline O'Donoghue and mixed by Hannah Varrall. Artwork by Gavin Day and music by Harry Harris

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It's season two and the hair is great, the clothes are even better, and Mr Big is fundamentally depressing. We argue that season two of Sex and the City is Miranda's Season as twenty episodes of sexual humiliation threatens to break her, until she's given the greatest meet-cute in the show's history. We profess our love for Steve Brady, investigate class in Britain as well as in the show, and dissect the meaning of the gold corduroy suit. We discuss why, exactly, the girls are still single and discuss the vagaries of Charlotte York's personality. Also, don't invite someone to your house unless you have food in it.

Dolly Alderton is the author of Ghosts and Everything I Know About Love

Caroline O'Donoghue is the author of Promising Young Women, Scenes of a Graphic Nature, and the forthcoming All Our Hidden Gifts

Harry Harris did the music and Gavin Day (Steve Brady) did the artwork. This podcast was produced and edited by Caroline O'Donoghue and mixed by Hannah Varral

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This week, we're kicking off our Sex and the City mini-series with our discussion of the character arcs and themes (take a drink) of season one. After a round dismissal of the pilot episode (abso-f*cking-who-cares?) we get right into the meat of The Valley of 20-Something Guys, where we re-enact the infamous taxi scene that landed the tone of the whole series, dissect the cultural practice of Carrie-bashing, and generally watch as a previously sane New York party girl loses her goddamn mind for the most boring man in the tri-state area. We round off the chat with Man of the Season (he misses the touch of a woman), Outfit of the Season (or lack thereof) and the Carrie Clanger of the Season (the prayer book drop heard around the world).

Dolly Alderton is the author of Ghosts and Everything I Know About Love

Caroline O'Donoghue is the author of Promising Young Women, Scenes of a Graphic Nature, and the forthcoming All Our Hidden Gifts

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It's the first ever Sentimental Garbage mini-series: a big basket of episodes about Sex and the City! In this mini-series, author Dolly Alderton joins me as we spend each episode discussing every season of the TV show Sex and the City for the great American novel it truly is. This is not an episode by episode analysis but a look at each season as an individual piece of work, where we discuss the themes, character journeys and lasting messages of it. We examine the big thesis topics such as: The Corsage and Saddlebag Tragedy of Series Three, The Absence of Strap-ons in Sex and The City, and Big’s Weekend Shirts: Wide-fitting sleeves to house an absent soul. Crucially: we don't know the most about Sex and the City, we just feel the most about Sex and the City.

Pour yourself a cocktail and ask yourself some huge questions about the McDougall family trust, and we’ll see you every Thursday for the next six weeks! (Plus maybe again for the movies, who knows)

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Sophfronia Scott re-imagination of Dangerous Liaisons set in the Harlem Renaissance is sexy, surprising and so entertaining that we're willing to forgive the baseball references. Author of IF I DON'T HAVE YOU Sareeta Domingo talks us through her love for a book that, despite only coming out in 2017, has already earned a cult classic status. Be prepared for moustache-twirling, hand-rubbing, god-fearing, and hot hot jazz.

Unforgivable Love is a retelling of Dangerous Liaisons set in post-war Harlem among an elite set of the wealthy African American upper classes. Among them we have Mae Marveaux, a beautiful conniving young widow whose desperate need to be loved is offset by her need to destroy other people’s lives. She is obsessed with her similarly conniving friend, Val Jackson, and the two of them decide to prey on Elizabeth Townsend, a devout married Christian, and Cecily, an innocent young virgin who has been brought from North Carolina for an arranged marriage to one of Mae’s former lovers. Over a single summer, Cecily is deflowered, Elizabeth falls for Val, and almost everyone is either pregnant or dead.

Find Sareeta Domingo here: https://twitter.com/SareetaDomingo and anywhere you buy books!

Find Caroline O'Donoghue here: https://twitter.com/Czaroline and in those same places that you buy books!

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You asked for it and we damn well delivered - here's our analysis of Taylor Swift's 'The Tortured Poets Department'.

ALBUM DISCUSSION FROM 24.04.

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Ciao bella! It's our second Maeve Binchy-cast of the season, with returning guest Sarah Maria Griffin. It’s the dawn of the Celtic Tiger in early nineties Ireland, and Nora O’Donoghue, or Signora, is returning home after over 20 years away. Having spent her youth in Sicily, in love with a married man, she has returned with no money, no friends and no prospects. She begins teaching italian at Mountainview school, where the beleaguered Aidan Dunne has just been passed over for the job of principal in favour of the womanising Tony O’Brien. Tony, meanwhile, is in love with Aidan’s adult daughter. The book follows every student in the evening class, subtly changing each of their destinies, and culminating with a trip to Italy at the end of the book. 

Sarah Maria Griffin is an award winning novelist and zine maker, follower her at @griffski

Caroline O'Donoghue is a novelist, her latest novel, Scenes of a Graphic Nature, is out now. All Our Hidden Gifts is available for pre-order

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Get your Kelly bag and your load-bearing beams ready, this week we're talking about Diane Johnson's Le Divorce with real-life American Girl in Paris, Fiona Zublin! Isabel Walker is a young, bored film school graduate who has decamped to Paris to help her older sister Roxy, with her second pregnancy. Upon her arrival she discovers that Roxy has just been left by her French husband, Charles-Henri for another woman. As Roxy tries to negotiate French divorce courts and her estranged husbands family, Isabel slowly ingratiates herself into Paris life, becoming the mistress to Isabel’s 70 year old uncle-in-law, Edgar. When a valuable painting belonging to the Walker family gets implicated in the divorce, both families are forced to come together to find a way out. 

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Merry Christmas everyone! Usually this time of year, you’d be in your childhood bedroom, re-reading the books that got you through primary school. This year, a lot of us can’t go home this Christmas, but there’s still every reason to revisit the books that made life better when you were nine. It might even make life better now? Caroline and occasional co-host Ella Risbridger talk about childhood reading habits, magazines, tough but beautiful Christmases, and why the Secret Garden is the greatest love triangle of all time.

We mention:

Tom's Midnight Garden

Charmed Life

Miss Happiness & Miss Flower

The Secret Garden

Back Home

the "My Story" books

The Illustrated Mum

The Suitcase Kid

The Lottie Project

Going Solo

Danny The Champion of The World

& more!

Caroline and Ella both have books for younger people coming out next year! Pick up The Secret Detectives by Ella Risbridger and All Our Hidden Gifts by Caroline O'Donoghue. See you in 2021!

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Scenes of a Graphic Nature has been out for over a month, so Caroline and Ella are talking about it! We say this is an 'all spoiler' edition, but in practice there are actually very few spoilers and a lot of discussion of grief, working together, how it feels when a book comes out, how perceptions of Ireland have changed in less than a decade, the use of music in the novel, friendship and porn. Buy the book!

https://www.waterstones.com/book/9780349009940

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07WN4QNYN/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_tkin_p1_i0

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This week we're talking about food, friendship and the cult favourite of Home Cooking by Laurie Colwin. Brian Eno once said that everyone who bought The Velvet Underground's first record went on to form a band, and the same can be said of Home Cooking and people who went on to write cookbooks. We talk about recipe writing, the godlike power of food writers, our dowdy twenties, tiny flats, and the uselessness of describing someone as "the new Nora Ephron".

Caroline O'Donoghue has two books out, the most recent of which is Scenes of a Graphic Nature and is available in all book shops. Ella Risbridger is the author of Midnight Chicken and Set Me On Fire, as well as a forthcoming children's fiction series The Secret Detectives.

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CONTENT WARNING: frequent, graphic mentions of suicide

We're back after a short break with more Covid-appropriate reading material, and what's more pandemic-y than The Virgin Suicides, a book where everyone dies and no one leaves their house. We talk about bad faith readings, Lolita, Sylvia Plath, the 'we' voice, suburbia, and Jeffrey's talent for smells.

Caroline O'Donoghue has two books out, the most recent of which is Scenes of a Graphic Nature and is available in all book shops from August 6th

Ella Risbridger is the author of Midnight Chicken and Set Me On Fire, as well as a forthcoming children's fiction series The Secret Detectives

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This week we're in Croatia, being tomato girls and living our best Porco Rosso life.

FILM DISCUSSION STARS AT 26.07

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My second book is out on audio and ebook today, here's me talking about it and doing a reading!

Scenes of a Graphic Nature by Caroline O'Donoghue https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07WN4QNYN/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1

Audio narration by Esther O'Moore Donohoe

https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/Scenes-of-a-Graphic-Nature-Audiobook/1004001509?qid=1592504228&sr=1-1&ref=a_search_c3_lProduct_1_1&pf_rd_p=c6e316b8-14da-418d-8f91-b3cad83c5183&pf_rd_r=2B3Z57HX8WY3E9XPZPXW

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No new episode this week, but here are some fiction recommendations that you might be interested in given the current political climate:

Heads Of The Coloured People - Nafissa Thompson-Spires

Kindred - Octavia E Butler

Song of Solomon - Toni Morrison

Nudibranch - Irenosen Okojie

Such a Fun Age - Kiley Reid

Property - Valerie Martin

The Wedding Date - Jasmine Guillory

Girl, Woman, Other - Bernardine Evaristo

Donate to UK Black Lives Matter: https://www.gofundme.com/f/ukblm-fund

Exist Loudly Fund to Support Queer Black YP: https://www.gofundme.com/f/exist-loudly-fund-to-support-queer-black-yp

SARI Stand Against Racism and Inequality https://www.sariweb.org.uk/who-we-are/donate/

Girl Guiding: https://www.girlguiding.org.uk/

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This week we're talking about 1989's smash-hit debut The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan. We talk debut novels, immigration literature, why so many women find Amy Tan in their teens, mothers and their daughters, food and how it travels, and why we're still obsessed with Waverly Jong.

Lillian Li's "The Love Hate Joy Luck Club” - https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/mqr/2015/05/the-love-hate-joy-luck-club/

Sentimental Garbage is produced and edited by Caroline O'Donoghue, mixed by Hannah Varrall and hosted by Acast.

You can find Caroline's books here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Caroline-ODonoghue/e/B07CR7SFJM?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1588717449&sr=1-1

You can find Ella Risbridger's books here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ella-Risbridger/e/B07KR8NDY8?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1588717479&sr=1-1

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This week on the Corona Cast, Caroline and Ella discuss the ultimate smart lady holiday book (she's going to Split) American Wife! American Wife is a 2009 novel inspired by the life of Laura Bush, former First Lady and wife of George Bush junior. Here, we know her as Alice Blackwell. Beginning in the mid-west in the 1950s, we follow Alice from her quiet childhood to the car accident in her teens that killed her first crush and changed her life forever. After becoming a school librarian, she meets Charlie Blackwell at the barbecue of some mutual friends and begins a whirlwind romance that leads to a long marriage, and eventually, the White House. 

Sentimental Garbage is produced and edited by Caroline O'Donoghue, mixed by Hannah Varrall and hosted by Acast.

You can find Caroline's books here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Caroline-ODonoghue/e/B07CR7SFJM?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1588717449&sr=1-1

You can find Ella Risbridger's books here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ella-Risbridger/e/B07KR8NDY8?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1588717479&sr=1-1

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CONTENT WARNING: rape, fat shaming, homophobia, literally all possible triggers a person could have.

This week it's another special edition of Sentimental Garbage, where we talk about the novels that are getting us through the corona virus! Today we’re talking about VALLEY OF THE DOLLS by Jacqueline Susann

When twenty year-old Anne Welles moves from New England to New York in the summer of 1945, she’s pretty enough to be a model but settles for being a secretary at a theatrical agency. Here she meets a host of showbiz characters, including Neely, a vaudevillian teenager; Jennifer North, a starlet fresh from a marriage to an Italian prince; Helen Lawson, an ageing broadway star and Lyon Burke, a wannabe writer who she falls in love with. Over twenty years, the novel covers their rise and fall through show business, as each woman battles with age, men, and their mutual pill addictions. 

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It's week two of the Corona Cast, and we're still stuck in our bedrooms. What better time to get into supernatural YA classic, Margaret Mahy's The Changeover? Ella and Caroline talk about going back to adolescence, magical admin, morally ambiguous witches, suburban New Zealand, forgiveness, the extremely good film adaptation, and "changing over" from girl to woman.

Caroline O'Donoghue is an author and would like you to pre-order her new book: https://www.waterstones.com/book/9780349009940

Ella Risbridger is a cookbook writer and children's author, and would also like if you bought her books: https://www.waterstones.com/books/search/term/ella+risbridger

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Welcome to our Corona Cast, a series where I invite my favourite people (mostly Ella) to record remotely on their favourite books, regardless of genre, sentimentality, or garbage-y content. Today, we're doing Brother of the More Famous Jack by Barbara Trapido. Katherine is an eighteen year old first year university student who, after meeting the flamboyant and much older John Millet at a book shop, is asked to join him for a weekend in the country to visit some old friends. When she gets there, she realises that it’s the home of her University professor, Jacob Goldman. What follows is a love story spanning two decades as Katherine attaches herself to various members of the Goldman family, including Jacob’s two sons Roger and Jonathan, as well as his wife, Jane. 

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Hold steady everyone, there’s a WAR ON! Joining Caroline O'Donoghue is author, cook and currently in love with a set of twins, KATE YOUNG and today we’re talking about The Camomile Lawn by Mary Wesley published in 1984. 

Every summer, a group of young cousins – Oliver, Walter, Calypso, Polly and the much younger Sophy – gather at their Aunt Helena and Uncle Richard’s house in Cornwall for an idyllic beachside holiday. We meet them in August of 1939, where people are still saying that the Nazis are splendid and the war will never happen. That night after their inaugral dinner party, it does. What follows is the explosion of their teenage innocence, and we watch them grow up through the war and find the Blitz isn’t actually all that bad, when you get used to it.

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Nothing says Christmas like freezing to death in your country estate while your sisters commit themselves to fascism and/or Marxist theory! Caroline O'Donoghue and returning guest Ella Risbridger discuss the Mitford sisters, the political climate (yikes) and why we will never stop loving Nancy, Pam, Diana, Unity, Decca and Debo.

The Pursuit of Love - Nancy Mitford

Hons & Rebels - Jessica Mitford

Wait for Me - Deborah Devonshire

The Mitfords: Letters from Six Sisters

The Mitford Girls - Mary S Lovell

Caroline fan-casting the Mitford movie: http://www.workinprowess.com/2015/02/09/dream-casting-the-mitford-sisters-film/?LMCL=uu47bB

Ella's selection of lines from Wait For Me: https://the-toast.net/2014/10/03/best-sentences-debo-mitfords-wait/

This is the last episode of season four, see you in 2020 for more sentimentality and more garbage!

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This week we're checking out of our hostel bunk beds and into the fanciful world of Wes's Grand Budapest Hotel, bathing in all its delicious violets and pinkish hues.

Film discussion from 24 minutes.

SENTIMENTAL GARBAGE UK LIVE TOUR

Tickets out now - www.fane.co.uk/sentimental-garbage

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