New Books Network

About Mark Molloy

Book Reviews editor - MAKE: A Literary Magazine. Plant Based 🌱💪
Mark Molloy
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NBN Episodes hosted by Mark:

Animal Studies May 3, 2021

Metazoa

Animal Life and the Birth of the Mind

Peter Godfrey-Smith

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Dip below the ocean’s surface and you are soon confronted by forms of life that could not seem more foreign to our own: sea sponges, soft corals, and serpulid worms …
Animal Studies April 7, 2021

The Doggie in the Window

How One Dog Led Me from the Pet Store to the Factory Farm to Uncover the Truth of Where Puppies Really Come From

Rory Kress

Hosted by Mark Molloy
When journalist Rory Kress met Izzie, she didn’t think twice before bringing her home. She found the twelve-week-old wheaten terrier in a pet shop and was handed paperwork showing Izzie …
Animal Studies March 22, 2021

The Reign of Wolf 21

In the Valley of the Druid King

Rick McIntyre

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Today I talked to Rick McIntyre about the first two books of his ongoing The Alpha Wolves of Yellowstone series. The first book we discuss, The Rise of Wolf 8 …
Animal Studies March 19, 2021

The Sexual Politics of Meat

A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory

Carol J. Adams

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Today I talked to Carol J. Adams about two of her classic texts that have recently been republished. The first book we discuss, first published in 1990, is The Sexual …
Animal Studies February 5, 2021

A Plea for the Animals

The Moral, Philosophical, and Evolutionary Imperative to Treat All Beings with Compassion

Matthieu Ricard

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Today I talked to Matthieu Ricard about two books. The first is A Plea for the Animals: The Moral, Philosophical, and Evolutionary Imperative to Treat All Beings with Compassion (Shambhala, 2016) It is a …
Animal Studies December 8, 2020

Thirty Times a Minute

Colleen Plumb

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Captive elephants exhibit what biologists refer to as stereotypy, which includes rhythmic rocking, head bobbing, stepping back and forth, and pacing. Colleen Plumb traveled to over seventy zoos in the …
Animal Studies December 3, 2020

Why Vegan?

Eating Ethically

Peter Singer

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Even before the publication of his seminal Animal Liberation in 1975, Peter Singer, one of the greatest moral philosophers of our time, unflinchingly challenged the ethics of eating animals. Now …
Animal Studies November 27, 2020

Animal Traffic

Lively Capital in the Global Exotic Pet Trade

Rosemary-Claire Collard

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Parrots and snakes, wild cats and monkeys---exotic pets can now be found everywhere from skyscraper apartments and fenced suburban backyards to roadside petting zoos. In Animal Traffic: Lively Capital in …
Animal Studies November 24, 2020

An Unnatural Order

The Roots of Our Destruction of Nature

Jim Mason

Hosted by Mark Molloy
First published by Simon & Schuster in 1993 and then by Continuum in 1998, Jim Mason’s An Unnatural Order: The Roots of Our Destruction of Nature has become a classic …
Animal Studies November 13, 2020

The Lives and Deaths of Shelter Animals

Katja M. Guenther

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Monster is an adult pit bull, muscular and grey, who is impounded in a large animal shelter in Los Angeles. Like many other dogs at the shelter, Monster is associated …
Animal Studies November 3, 2020

The Animals' Agenda

Freedom, Compassion, and Coexistence in the Human Age

Marc Bekoff and Jessica Pierce

Hosted by Mark Molloy
A compelling argument that the time has come to use what we know about the fascinating and diverse inner lives of other animals on their behalf. Every day we are …
Animal Studies October 30, 2020

Animalkind

Remarkable Discoveries about Animals and Revolutionary New Ways to Show Them Compassion

Ingrid Newkirk and Gene Stone

Hosted by Mark Molloy
The founder and president of PETA, Ingrid Newkirk, and bestselling author Gene Stone explore the wonders of animal life and offer tools for living more kindly toward them. In the …
Animal Studies October 13, 2020

A Traitor to His Species

Henry Bergh and the Birth of the Animal Rights Movement

Ernest Freeberg

Hosted by Mark Molloy
In Gilded Age America, people and animals lived cheek-by-jowl in environments that were dirty and dangerous to man and animal alike. The industrial city brought suffering, but it also inspired …
Animal Studies October 1, 2020

Mama's Last Hug

Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves

Frans de Waal

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Mama's Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves (W. W. Norton & Company) is a fascinating exploration of the rich emotional lives of animals, beginning with …
Animal Studies September 30, 2020

The Wake of Crows

Living and Dying in Shared Worlds

Thom van Dooren

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Crows can be found almost everywhere that people are, from tropical islands to deserts and arctic forests, from densely populated cities to suburbs and farms. Across these diverse landscapes, many …
Animal Studies September 17, 2020

Becoming Wild

How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty, and Achieve Peace

Carl Safina

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Some people insist that culture is strictly a human accomplishment. What are those people afraid of? Becoming Wild: How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty, and Achieve Peace (Henry Holt …
Animal Studies September 14, 2020

Run, Spot, Run

The Ethics of Keeping Pets

Jessica Pierce

Hosted by Mark Molloy
A life shared with pets brings many emotions. We feel love for our companions, certainly, and happiness at the thought that we’re providing them with a safe, healthy life. But …
Intellectual History September 8, 2020

Behemoth

A History of the Factory and the Making of the Modern World

Joshua B Freeman

Hosted by Mark Molloy
In an accessible and timely work of scholarship, celebrated historian Joshua B. Freeman's Behemoth: A History of the Factory and the Making of the Modern World (W. W. Norton) tells …
World Affairs August 28, 2020

The World Philosophy Made

From Plato to the Digital Age

Scott Soames

Hosted by Mark Molloy
How has philosophy transformed human knowledge and the world we live in? Philosophical investigation is the root of all human knowledge. Developing new concepts, reinterpreting old truths, and reconceptualizing fundamental …
European Studies August 26, 2020

The Scientific Revolution

Steven Shapin

Hosted by Mark Molloy
“There was no such thing as the Scientific Revolution, and this is a book about it.” With this provocative and apparently paradoxical claim, Steven Shapin begins The Scientific Revolution (University …
European Studies August 24, 2020

Calculus Reordered

A History of the Big Ideas

David Bressoud

Hosted by Mark Molloy
Calculus Reordered: A History of the Big Ideas (Princeton UP, 2019) takes readers on a remarkable journey through hundreds of years to tell the story of how calculus evolved into …
European Studies August 20, 2020

The Secular Enlightenment

Margaret Jacob

Hosted by Mark Molloy
The Secular Enlightenment (Princeton University Press, 2019) is a panoramic account of the radical ways that life began to change for ordinary people in the age of Locke, Voltaire, and …
European Studies July 22, 2020

A Short History of European Law

The Last Two and a Half Millennia

Tamar Herzog

Hosted by Mark Molloy
To many observers, European law seems like the endpoint of a mostly random walk through history. Certainly the trajectory of legal systems in the West over the past 2,500 years …