Novel Nights Live_ Books About College, Greek Life, Secret Societies, Teachers, Taboo Relationships

[00:00:00] Welcome to the what to read next podcast. I am so excited to be back and I am so happy to share this special episode with you. I see, you may not know. I actually do have live show every Thursday night from 7:00 PM Eastern standard times for eight-ish. At clock or sometimes a little bit, or at least sometimes a little bit longer, depending on the conversation.

We, my besties Victoria Francesca. We is, our show is called a novel. And it's a episodes that we would do recommendations. We chit chat about like bookish news, but there's T. And everything in between. So recently we did an episode about secret societies and Greek life, and I decided, you know, let's just share some of those recommendations with you because they're so good.

And this episode, we're chatting about Greek life. We have recommendations for, , for romance fiction, nonfiction and everything in between. So if you're curious about sororities and fraternities, if you have been \ clocked in with Bama rockstar, Todd. Or anything in between this emphasis for you.

And Laura here. Just letting you know that the audio for the episode, it's a little bit funky. [00:01:00] So. I am so sorry. I love the content. So I'm going to put it on, but the audio itself is a little funky. I used the wrong microphone, so I am so sorry.

, if you want to watch a video, go to my YouTube channel.

What should we next block? , did video is available there. You can watch your proposal and you can listen to you. Victoria's and Francesca recommendations about secret societies, college books, and everything in between. So now let's get to the episode.

Laura: Hello everyone. Welcome to Novel Nights. I'm Victoria. And I'm Laura. And we're missing our third. Francesca is not here with us. She is traveling. But today we're super excited to be talking about all things college books, secret societies. And just all the vibes. So if that sounds like something you're interested in, , let us know in the comments, what are some of your favorite college books set at colleges, secret societies, and just all the good things.

Laura: So again, let us know in the comments, your favorite [00:02:00] books and stay tuned.

Laura: Laura, let's do your recommendations Awesome So I ended up focusing on, we're going to talk a little bit about the super society, but the reality is I focus on Greek life, which is the other super society that most universities have. Not all of them, but most of them do.

Laura: So a little bit of background, I think I shared about this last week. I used to work at a college. I've done pretty much everything student affairs in a college, except for residence life. However, for a stick of six weeks, I was a house mom at a sorority house. I'm also a member of Roads from the Sorority, so it's a different ballgame than the regular kind of Latin sororities.

Laura: So there's So I'm pretty knowledgeable of the Greek life, and back in my 20s, I was, like, consuming anything Greek life. Because I wanted to know, did they get it right, did they get it wrong, what does it mean, what are the stereotypes, and all the fun stuff. So, I got a little bit of everything for the Greek life purpose, but the first two are thrillers.

Laura: [00:03:00] So, Zetas Tell Me Die, I just got this arc, so I have not read it. I'm not sure if this is a historical black sorority, I think it is, I think it is, but it's similar to the name of the sorority murder which we'll talk about afterwards, but essentially one sister dies, ten years later, the sorority sisters meet up to have a connection to remember her sister, and the guy who killed, who's supposed to kill the sister, actually was from prison, and then at the reunion, one of the sisters disappears.

Laura: This new rest. So it's supposed to be like an interesting, like murder mystery, like thriller moving around with the sorties and like a one night story, which is a different because they yell the big sororities is that you're a sister for life. You're not just like one time and that's it.

Laura: You just like, you can be adaptive and stuff like that. You're always going to be a sister. As far as what it happens is like, you. become interested and you become initiated, you learn about the [00:04:00] rituals and secrets and like, what does everything mean? It's very like, some stuff is like very dumb, but some stuff is like very meaningful.

Laura: Like the history of other sorority and all these different things. So you're always going to be a sister. And so you have this idea of like you connection beyond of your undergrad years. So I'm interested to read this book. It's bumping it out. I'm actually excited for it for what to come. So that saved us till we died.

Laura: I think it comes out this fall. So the next book is The Sorority Murder, which is what this book is the previous book has been compared to. It's another about a death to a sorority sister, so I'm like, they're killing sorority sisters, maybe it's a deadly thing. And a guy who's obsessed with this murder finds extra evidence, and then he went to the detective, so it's like, yeah, I found evidence from the Meadowbrook Cemetery, like we should open this murder, and they're like, no, we're not going to do this.

Laura: So he decided to start a podcast about it and more will [00:05:00] be revealed. Like it's getting to know the sorority murder, getting the podcast true crime vibe and trying to solve what happened to the sorority sister. So that's the sorority murder. So if you would like some thrillers, these are two Greek life thrillers.

Laura: Now, if you've been watching tech talk for the past four years, you're probably aware of Alabama rush talk of like, you know, OTT VAs and like. what they had to work for bid day, what they had to work for like, I don't know, like half night and all those different things. So this book is, and the next book is Rush by Lisa Patton.

Laura: It's a woman's fiction, Just commercial fiction about a sorority in Ole Miss. So it's a Southern sorority, which is like a whole ball gang. You cannot compare each sorority for mute stuff. But this is a whole about a rush, the rush crew. Which is, rush is basically the week before school starts, or week before you actually become initiated, you rush.

Laura: You go to different houses or to different sororities. It's just beautiful. [00:06:00] Some stories may have houses, some stories may have like just a meeting room but the group of people you'll get to meet with them and get to connect with them, get to figure out like, are we a good match? Is it not just you deciding that they're a good match, it's also you deciding if you're a good match for them.

Laura: Are you the fitting of women? So that's why it's interesting watching Mama talk, Rush talk, because you're like, does she get the bed that she wanted? Does she fit that house? Because there's a lot of stereotypes, we'll talk about that later on. So, Rush is about openness. Similar to Rush Talk, basically, there's a whole volcano about me, and there's, it features a freshman who is going through the Rush period, an alumni who is actually working the Rush Board, because alumni are heavily involved, again, so it's sister for life, and a housekeeper who was passed on for a promotion.

Laura: And there's like intrigue, there's like a girl's identity, elegance, and we're alumni, and what to come. So if you like, you [00:07:00] know, if you like some Southern fiction, Rosh might be for you. All right, the next, it's another book called Rush, but it's a very different Rush. So this one is more like the show Greek that happened in the aughts, where it's basically a gossip girl, like college gossip girl.

Laura: Essentially, it's a group of fraternities, sorority members, freshmen, juniors, seniors. Who are just trying to live in Greek life. And so this is more of like the steamy, spicy, kind of like easy to consume, very addictive romance novel. It's available in Canada Unlimited. It's basically, it's done in it's more of a soap opera style.

Laura: So there's no like, there's a bunch of vignettes of different points of view of different members, and you just follow their story as it goes. It's kind of like a TV show. So this is Roche, there's five books in the series, so it falls every year, for I think four or five years of the school. So it's a fun series to complete, so if you'd like the short brief, then this book is for you.

Laura: Okay, we're [00:08:00] gonna now go into the non fiction. Because it's also like, it's a real truth. When you're talking about Greek Latin, it's the same thing that you're talking about. So the next one is Fletch by Alexander Robbins. This is from the, I think this came in the aughts. Because I remember reading this and I was like, Is this really true?

Laura: This is what happens? Even though I was working on it. So it's actually Alexander Robbins spent about a year living in a solar deck house with solaris. And I don't know if you remember, but back in the 2003 2004 MTV Highest Scale Coworker's Call to Order Girl basically it was like a whole, you spent a whole semester with these girls and like whether they're rushing initiation and getting, becoming a sister, and it was fascinating.

Laura: So this was like the consuming, this is the type of need that the odds were providing us. And so, Alexandra basically showed off, like, you know, there's racism, there's, like, you know, eating disorders, there's front views, all the negative things about Rush, and why do you want to [00:09:00] be in a sorority? Like, what's the whole point?

Laura: And I would say, like, it's, yes, that exists. Yes, those stereotypes are there. They do exist. But there's also the sense of belonging, the sense of community, the sense of, like, wanting to be part of something bigger. Thank you. the networking opportunities. So that's one thing to look for. So this is mainly for panhellenic stories.

Laura: So there are the mainstream stories. So like when you typically see the Beverly Rock track, this book is a nonfiction from them from the early odds. So take it for the result. I don't know. Things may have changed. Things may have progressed. It's been almost 20 years. But sometimes it could be the same.

Laura: If we still consume media, we understand. So, but that's Pledge. It's by Alexander Robbins. Now, we're going to talk about the Divine Nine, because that's actually like, there's other sororities, and that's historically Black [00:10:00] fraternity sororities. There's nine there's nine organizations called the Divine Nine.

Laura: And then there's organizations that came afterwards, you know, the Divine Nine are the core organizations that build the community among \ , historical Black colleges and universities. But then. It expanded to other universities and other places for this, just to have a sense of belonging among black students in college, because a lot of them were first generation students were first time going in.

Laura: Did you have, they didn't, family did not understand what they were doing and they needed some deep connections and needed to build a network. So it's interesting to learn about the history. It's fascinating. Like how each organization was founded, what was the reason, what kind of numbers they attacked?

Laura: And so this is very fitting. This is 20 anniversary. I read it and the odds, actually, and it's they reprinted in 2019. So they updated. So there's new information, but it's interesting because we're actually, like, 1 of our presidential candidates is a [00:11:00] member of alpha, kappa, alpha, and so understanding the power of not only just having her attend at Howard University, but the power of her being part of APA.

Laura: And support that her sisterhood, years, 40 years later, is still providing her. It's explained in this book. I think it's like one of those books that gives you an idea. There's definitely media that can tell you about the different stereotypes, different things, expectations. The organization that I'm part of, it's the first Latino sorority.

Laura: And so a lot of our core values were replicated from the divine eye. 1 thing is different from the mainstream organizations and the line 9 or the multiple organizations is that there's a strong need for service and while the mainstream organizations are philanthropy, which means fundraising, getting money, doing this stuff.

Laura: The Divine Mind and a lot of their, like, the multicultural organizations that I advise were actually looking at community service, giving back to the community connecting among each other with the community, [00:12:00] providing a place for it, a place of growth, a place of just putting yourself forward.

Laura: And so it's different. There's also Sisterhood for Life, there's also Divine Mind and all organizations, there are many chapters, like I joined. As an adult, I did not join them at collegiate experience. I joined when I was 25, which was pretty normal. But if you think about it, like, I, the reason why I joined an organization at 25 was that I just moved to a new city.

Laura: I was in my young 20s and I was like, I want to get back to the community, but I also want to make friends for like me, or who has similar interests and similar values. And so it pushed me to join and yes, I went through like a new initiation process. It was like you know, like eight weeks of like learning about history.

Laura: You learn about like a lot of information. But it connected me with sisters that I still talk to 20 years later. I've been a sister for 18 years, it's just part of it. It was still like, you know, it still provides you a sense of [00:13:00] networking. So that's a little spiel about free flight. And so if you have any questions, put it in the comments.

Laura: If you have any specific things or specific media that you're like, this is story time or not just put it in the comments I'll reply back.

Laura: If you're looking for campus novels, we did a campus novel themed novel nights, . So yeah, we're really in that back to school vibe and spirit, and we will be continuing that the next novel nights.