Ten minutes with… is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they’re reading right now and what’s getting them through these difficult times.

Playwright, professor, director, and Carl Brandon and Otherwise-award winning writer Andrea Hairston talks with Gary about the necessity of reading during hard times, the appeal of hefty nonfiction titles as well as epic fantasy, the odd satisfaction of a virtual book tour, Afrofuturism and Indigenous Futurisms, and her new novel Master of Poisons.

Books mentioned include:

• Master of Poisons by Andrea Hairston
• The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power by Shoshana Zuboff
• The Daevabad Trilogy by S.A. Chakraborty
• The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang
• The Book of Lost Saints by Daniel José Older
• Nine Bar Blues by Sheree Renee Thomas
• Mama’s Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves, Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans de Waal