Can't Make This Up

Check out my new Etsy shop ⁠⁠Gifts for History Nerds⁠⁠! Enter the promo code "CMTUHISTORY" for 10% off. Today I speak with Patti McCracken about her new book Femina: A New History of the Middle Ages, Through the Women Written Out of It (Also available as an ⁠audiobook⁠ narrated by the author) A groundbreaking reappraisal of medieval femininity, revealing why women have been written out of history and why it mattersThe Middle Ages are seen as a bloodthirsty time of Vikings, saints and kings; a patriarchal society that oppressed and excluded women. But when we dig a little deeper into the truth, we can see that the “Dark” Ages were anything but. Oxford and BBC historian Janina Ramirez has uncovered countless influential women’s names struck out of historical records, with the word FEMINA annotated beside them. As gatekeepers of the past ordered books to be burned, artworks to be destroyed, and new versions of myths, legends and historical documents to be produced, our view of history has been manipulated. Only now, through a careful examination of the artifacts, writings and possessions they left behind, are the influential and multifaceted lives of women emerging. Femina goes beyond the official records to uncover the true impact of women, such as: Jadwiga, the only female king in Europe Margery Kempe, who exploited her image and story to ensure her notoriety Loftus Princess, whose existence gives us clues about the beginnings of Christianity in England In Femina, Ramirez invites us to see the medieval world with fresh eyes and discover why these remarkable women were removed from our collective memories. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on ⁠Patreon⁠! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on ⁠YouTube⁠, ⁠Facebook⁠, ⁠Twitter⁠, ⁠Instagram⁠ & ⁠TikTok

Check out my new Etsy shop Gifts for History Nerds! Enter the promo code "CMTUHISTORY" for 10% off. Today I speak with Brianna Labuskes about her new book The Librarian of Burned Books. (Also available as an ⁠audiobook⁠ narrated by Caroline Hewitt, Eleanor Caudill & Karissa Vacker) Berlin 1933. Following the success of her debut novel, American writer Althea James receives an invitation from Joseph Goebbels himself to participate in a culture exchange program in Germany. For a girl from a small town in Maine, 1933 Berlin seems to be sparklingly cosmopolitan, blossoming in the midst of a great change with the charismatic new chancellor at the helm. Then Althea meets a beautiful woman who promises to show her the real Berlin, and soon she's drawn into a group of resisters who make her question everything she knows about her hosts--and herself. Paris 1936. She may have escaped Berlin for Paris, but Hannah Brecht discovers the City of Light is no refuge from the anti-Semitism and Nazi sympathizers she thought she left behind. Heartbroken and tormented by the role she played in the betrayal that destroyed her family, Hannah throws herself into her work at the German Library of Burned Books. Through the quiet power of books, she believes she can help counter the tide of fascism she sees rising across Europe and atone for her mistakes. But when a dear friend decides actions will speak louder than words, Hannah must decide what stories she is willing to live--or die--for. New York 1944. Since her husband Edward was killed fighting the Nazis, Vivian Childs has been waging her own war: preventing a powerful senator's attempts to censor the Armed Service Editions, portable paperbacks that are shipped by the millions to soldiers overseas. Viv knows just how much they mean to the men through the letters she receives--including the last one she got from Edward. She also knows the only way to win this battle is to counter the senator's propaganda with a story of her own--at the heart of which lies the reclusive and mysterious woman tending the American Library of Nazi-Banned Books in Brooklyn. As Viv unknowingly brings her censorship fight crashing into the secrets of the recent past, the fates of these three women will converge, changing all of them forever. Inspired by the true story of the Council of Books in Wartime--the WWII organization founded by booksellers, publishers, librarians, and authors to use books as "weapons in the war of ideas"--The Librarian of Burned Books is an unforgettable historical novel, a haunting love story, and a testament to the beauty, power, and goodness of the written word. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on ⁠Patreon⁠! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on ⁠YouTube⁠, ⁠Facebook⁠, ⁠Twitter⁠, ⁠Instagram⁠ & ⁠TikTok

Check out my new Etsy shop ⁠Gifts for History Nerds⁠! Enter the promo code "CMTUHISTORY" for 10% off. Today I speak with Patti McCracken about her new book The Angel Makers: Arsenic, A Midwife, and Modern History's Most Astonishing Murder Ring (Also available as an audiobook narrated by Gabra Zackman) The Angel Makers is a true-crime story like no other—a 1920s midwife who may have been the century’s most prolific killer leading a murder ring of women responsible for the deaths of at least 160 men. The horror occurred in a rustic farming enclave in modern-day Hungary. To look at the unlikely lineup of murderesses—village wives, mothers, and daughters—was to come to the shocking realization that this could have happened anywhere, and to anyone. At the center of it all was a sharp-minded village midwife, a “smiling Buddha” known as Auntie Suzy, who distilled arsenic from flypaper and distributed it to the women of Nagyrév. “Why are you bothering with him?” Auntie Suzy would ask, as she produced an arsenic-filled vial from her apron pocket. In the beginning, a great many used the deadly solution to finally be free of cruel and abusive spouses. But as the number of dead bodies grew without consequence, the killers grew bolder. With each vial of poison emptied, a new reason surfaced to drain yet another. Some women disposed of sickly relatives. Some used arsenic as “inheritance powder” to secure land and houses. For more than fifteen years, the unlikely murderers aided death unfettered and tended to it as if it were simply another chore—spooning doses of arsenic into soup and wine, stirring it into coffee and brandy. By the time their crimes were discovered, hundreds were feared dead. Anonymous notes brought the crimes to light in 1929. As a skillful prosecutor hungry for justice ran the investigation, newsmen from around the world—including the New York Times—poured in to cover the dramatic events as they unfolded. The Angel Makers captures in expertly researched detail the entirety of this harrowing story, from the early murders to the final hanging—the story of one of the most sensational and astonishing murder rings in all of modern history. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok

CMTU supports local bookstores! Receive a free audiobook when you join Libro.fm then enjoy monthly audiobooks while helping independent booksellers. Today I speak with Buddy Levy about his new book Empire of Ice and Stone: The Disastrous and Heroic Voyage of the Karluk (Also available as an audiobook narrated by Will Damron) In the summer of 1913, the wooden-hulled brigantine Karluk departed Canada for the Arctic Ocean. At the helm was Captain Bob Bartlett, considered the world’s greatest living ice navigator. The expedition’s visionary leader was a flamboyant impresario named Vilhjalmur Stefansson hungry for fame. Just six weeks after the Karluk departed, giant ice floes closed in around her. As the ship became icebound, Stefansson disembarked with five companions and struck out on what he claimed was a 10-day caribou hunting trip. Most on board would never see him again. Twenty-two men and an Inuit woman with two small daughters now stood on a mile-square ice floe, their ship and their original leader gone. Under Bartlett’s leadership they built make-shift shelters, surviving the freezing darkness of Polar night. Captain Bartlett now made a difficult and courageous decision. He would take one of the young Inuit hunters and attempt a 1000-mile journey to save the shipwrecked survivors. It was their only hope. Set against the backdrop of the Titanic disaster and World War I, filled with heroism, tragedy, and scientific discovery, Buddy Levy's Empire of Ice and Stone tells the story of two men and two distinctively different brands of leadership: one selfless, one self-serving, and how they would forever be bound by one of the most audacious and disastrous expeditions in polar history, considered the last great voyage of The Heroic Age of Discovery. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok

CMTU supports local bookstores! Receive a free audiobook when you join Libro.fm then enjoy monthly audiobooks while helping independent booksellers.  Today I speak with Alexander Rose about his new book, The Lion and the Fox: Two Rival Spies and the Plot to Build a Confederate Navy.  (Also available as an audiobook narrated by Mark Bramhall)  In 1861, soon after the outbreak of the Civil War, two secret agents—one a Confederate, the other his Union rival—were dispatched to neutral Britain, each entrusted with a vital mission. The South’s James Bulloch, charming and devious, was to acquire a cutting-edge clandestine fleet intended to break President Lincoln’s blockade of Confederate ports, sink Northern merchant vessels, and drown the U.S. Navy’s mightiest ships at sea. The profits from gunrunning and smuggling cotton—Dixie’s notorious “white gold”—would finance the scheme.  Opposing him was Thomas Dudley, a resolute Quaker lawyer and abolitionist. He was determined to stop Bulloch by any means necessary in a spy-versus-spy game of move and countermove, gambit and sacrifice, intrigue and betrayal. If Dudley failed, Britain would ally with the South and imperil a Northern victory.  The battleground was the Dickensian port of Liverpool, whose dockyards built more ships each year than the rest of the world combined, whose warehouses stored more cotton than anywhere else on earth, and whose merchant princes, said one observer, were “addicted to Southern proclivities, foreign slave trade, and domestic bribery.”  From master of historical espionage Alexander Rose, The Lion and the Fox is the astonishing, untold tale of two implacable foes and their twilight struggle for the highest stakes.  Check out Alex's website: www.alexrose.com and his Substack Spionage.  If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok

CMTU supports local bookstores! Receive a free audiobook when you join Libro.fm then enjoy monthly audiobooks while helping independent booksellers. Today I speak with Dr. Colleen Darnell about her new book with her husband, Dr. John Darnell, Egypt's Golden Couple: When Akhenaten and Nefertiti were Gods on Earth. (Also available as an audiobook narrated by Roshelle Simpson) Akhenaten has been the subject of radically different, even contradictory, biographies. The king has achieved fame as the world's first individual and the first monotheist, but others have seen him as an incestuous tyrant who nearly ruined the kingdom he ruled. The gold funerary mask of his son Tutankhamun and the painted bust of his wife Nefertiti are the most recognizable artifacts from all of ancient Egypt. But who are Akhenaten and Nefertiti? And what can we actually say about rulers who lived more than three thousand years ago? November 2022 marks the centennial of the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun and although "King Tut" is a household name, his nine-year rule pales in comparison to the revolutionary reign of his parents. Akhenaten and Nefertiti became gods on earth by transforming Egyptian solar worship, innovating in art and urban design, and merging religion and politics in ways never attempted before. Combining fascinating scholarship, detective suspense, and adventurous thrills, Egypt's Golden Couple is a journey through excavations, museums, hieroglyphic texts, and stunning artifacts. From clue to clue, renowned Egyptologists John and Colleen Darnell reconstruct an otherwise untold story of the magnificent reign of Akhenaten and Nefertiti. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok

CMTU supports local bookstores! Receive a free audiobook when you join Libro.fm then enjoy monthly audiobooks while helping independent booksellers. Today I speak with Steve Kemper about his new book Our Man in Tokyo: An American Ambassador and the Countdown to Pearl Harbor.  (Also available as an audiobook narrated by Dan Woren) In 1932, Japan was in crisis. Naval officers had assassinated the prime minister and conspiracies flourished. The military had a stranglehold on the government. War with Russia loomed, and propaganda campaigns swept the country, urging schoolchildren to give money to procure planes and tanks. Into this maelstrom stepped Joseph C. Grew, America’s most experienced and talented diplomat. When Grew was appointed ambassador to Japan, not only was the country in turmoil, its relationship with America was rapidly deteriorating. For the next decade, Grew attempted to warn American leaders about the risks of Japan’s raging nationalism and rising militarism, while also trying to stabilize Tokyo’s increasingly erratic and volatile foreign policy. From domestic terrorism by Japanese extremists to the global rise of Hitler and the fateful attack on Pearl Harbor, the events that unfolded during Grew’s tenure proved to be pivotal for Japan, and for the world. His dispatches from the darkening heart of the Japanese empire would prove prescient—for his time, and for our own. Drawing on Grew’s diary of his time in Tokyo as well as U.S. embassy correspondence, diplomatic dispatches, and firsthand Japanese accounts, Our Man in Tokyo brings to life a man who risked everything to avert another world war, the country where he staked it all—and the abyss that swallowed it. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok

CMTU supports local bookstores! Receive a free audiobook when you join Libro.fm then enjoy monthly audiobooks while helping independent booksellers. Today I speak with journalist Greg Melville about his new book Over My Dead Body: Unearthing the Hidden History of America's Cemeteries. (Also available as an audiobook narrated by Will Tulin) A lively tour through the history of US cemeteries that explores how, where, and why we bury our dead The summer before his senior year in college, Greg Melville worked at the cemetery in his hometown, and thanks to hour upon hour of pushing a mower over the grassy acres, he came to realize what a rich story the place told of his town and its history. Thus was born Melville’s lifelong curiosity with how, where, and why we bury and commemorate our dead. Melville’s Over My Dead Body is a lively (pun intended) and wide-ranging history of cemeteries, places that have mirrored the passing eras in history but have also shaped it. Cemeteries have given birth to landscape architecture and famous parks, as well as influenced architectural styles. They’ve inspired and motivated some of our greatest poets and authors—Emerson, Whitman, Dickinson. They’ve been used as political tools to shift the country’s discourse and as important symbols of the United States' ambition and reach. But they are changing and fading. Embalming and burial is incredibly toxic, and while cremations have just recently surpassed burials in popularity, they’re not great for the environment either. Over My Dead Body explores everything—history, sustainability, land use, and more—and what it really means to memorialize. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok

CMTU supports local bookstores! Receive a free audiobook when you join Libro.fm then enjoy monthly audiobooks while helping independent booksellers. Today I speak with historian and former CIA officer Nicholas Reynolds about his recent book Need to Know: World War II and the Rise of American Intelligence. (Also available as an audiobook narrated by Fred Sanders) The entire vast, modern American intelligence system—the amalgam of three-letter spy services of many stripes—can be traced back to the dire straits the world faced at the dawn of World War II. Prior to 1940, the United States had no organization to recruit spies and steal secrets or launch covert campaigns against enemies overseas and just a few codebreakers, isolated in windowless vaults. It was only through Winston Churchill’s determination to mobilize the US in the fight against Hitler that the first American spy service was born, built from scratch against the background of the Second World War. In Need to Know, Nicholas Reynolds explores the birth, infancy, and adolescence of modern American intelligence. In this first-ever look across the entirety of the war effort, Reynolds combines little-known history and gripping spy stories to analyze the origins of American codebreakers and spies as well as their contributions to Allied victory, revealing how they laid the foundation for the Cold War—and beyond. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok

CMTU supports local bookstores! Receive a free audiobook when you join Libro.fm then enjoy monthly audiobooks while helping independent booksellers. Today I speak with novelist Kim Taylor Blakemore about her recent book The Deception. A sleight of hand. A trick up the sleeve. A call for the dead. It’s all part of the game in this twisty tale by the bestselling author of After Alice Fell. New Hampshire, 1877. Maud Price was once a celebrated child medium, a true believer in lifting the veil between the living and the dead. Now penniless, her guiding spirits gone, the so-called “Maid of Light” is desperate to regain her reputation—but doing so means putting her faith in deceiving others. Clementine Watkins, known in spiritualist circles for her bag of tricks and utmost discretion, creates the sort of theatrics that can fill Maud’s parlor again, and with each misdirection, Maud’s fame is restored. But her guilt is a heavy burden. And the ruse has become a risk. Others are plotting to expose the fraud, and Clem can’t allow anyone—even Maud—to jeopardize the fortune the hoax has made her. When the deception hints at a possible murder, Maud realizes how dangerous a game she’s playing. But to return to the light from which she’s strayed, she must first survive the darkness created by Clem’s smoke and mirrors. If you would like to help Can't Make This Up (and get early access and bonus episodes), consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon! Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok