Uploaded March 2024 | Updated September 2026, 15 hours ago
Susan Orlean, author of 10 bestselling books including 'The Orchid Thief' and 'The Library Book, joins us in a longform chat on 3 Books!
SHOW BACKGROUND:
3 Books is an award-winning podcast discussing life's biggest themes through the 3 most formative books of an inspiring guest. Past guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, Roxane Gay, Judy Blume, Quentin Tarantino, etc.
CHAPTER BACKGROUND:
I got an email from longtime 3 Booker Bo Boswell who told me he found an enticingly-titled thread on reddit called “What’s your field or study (hobbyist or professional) and what’s a cornerstone beginners book for that topic/field?”
The most upvoted reply on the thread read: "Librarian here, Susan Orlean’s ‘The Library Book’ is at first glance a true-crime book about tracking the arsonist who set fire and burned down the main library in Los Angeles, but it also gives a comprehensive glimpse into contemporary libraries and their issues, especially updating a view of them if you haven’t been inside one since you were a kid."
Bo picked up the book, loved it, and then wrote to me that "the amount of research and bizarre detail Orlean puts into her work is so engrossing.” Bizarre detail! I was convinced. I picked up ‘The Library Book’ and it blew me away. Reading it was like … wandering a library. Surprising curiosity trails at every turn. I ended up putting the book in my Best Of 2023 and then went deeper into Susan Orlean’s back catalog where I found myself reading profiles like ‘The American Man, Age 10’ and a series of fascinating obituaries about people like the inventor of Hawaiian Tropic or the first magician on the Las Vegas strip.
I’ve come to think of Susan Orlean as one of the best non-fiction writers on the planet. She’s been a Staff Writer for ‘The New Yorker’ since 1992 and has written more than 10 bestselling books including ‘The Library Book’, ‘On Animals’, ‘Saturday Night’, and ‘The Orchid Thief’, which was turned into the movie ‘Adaptation’, starring Meryl Streep in her Oscar-nominated role as … yes, Susan Orlean.
Susan has an endless, unbridled curiosity — that ‘bizarre detail’ — which you’ll see on full display in this conversation which begins by talking about how she organizes her shoes! She’s a writer’s writer who offers us a true masterclass and always reminds us that “storytelling and knowledge-sharing is the essential human experience.”
We talk about organizing shoes and spices, what books do that nothing else does, finding the balance between professional and amateur, the genius of container ships, what great book design does, how to cultivate your writing voice, how you might organize your book, facing the fear of failure, LSD, the power of libraries, Susan’s 3 most formative books, and much, much more…
I am so excited to share this conversation and hope you’ll find it as endlessly inspiring as I did.
Let’s jump into Chapter 134 of 3 Books now…
-
00:00:00 Intro
00:03:30 Meet Susan Orlean
00:07:15 Our Relationship With Surprise
00:11:10 About 3 Books
00:13:25 The Writer’s Organizational Process
00:17:19 The Human Impulse to Categorize
00:22:56 The Global Shipping Aha
00:27:12 Incentivization of Capitalism
00:30:17 Curing Disease is Commercial
00:34:03 Imposing Order on Books
00:37:25 Importance of a Book’s Design
00:41:15 The Library Book Easter Egg
00:44:11 People Are Like Libraries
00:47:33 Our Connection to Books
00:52:30 Owning vs. Reading Books
01:05:42 Writing Great Ledes
01:22:00 The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
01:37:37 Professionalism and Amateurism
01:45:08 Ensuring Humility in Your Kin
01:48:49 The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
02:16:13 Organizing Units of Information
02:26:57 Great Plains by Ian Frazier
02:35:06 Discovering Your Voice
02:41:21 Messiness of Truth in Non-Fiction
02:52:52 Lightning Round Questions
02:58:32 On Pursuing Inspiration
03:01:58 Outro
03:08:06 End of the Podcast Club
03:15:33 Word of the Chapter
-
SUBSCRIBE: bit.ly/2HHWPYg
Hey there,
I'm Neil and I spend a ton of time thinking, writing, podcasting, and speaking about living intentionally. I'm the New York Times bestselling author of six books including The Book of Awesome and The Happiness Equation. I've been lucky to speak at places like TED, SXSW, and Google. And I host a huge passion project called the 3 Books podcast.
Want to read more of my stuff?
https://www.neil.blog/archive/
Want to check out my podcast?
3books.co
Want to learn about my live events?
globalhappiness.org/speaking
Want my monthly book recos?
1000awesomethings.com/reading-club
Want my articles on intentional living?
https://www.neil.blog/newsletter/
I am also on the following drugs:
Facebook: facebook.com/NeilPasricha
Twitter: twitter.com/neilpasricha
Instagram: instagram.com/neilpasricha
Lastly, thanks so much for watching this vid.
👊,
Neil
neil@globalhappiness.org
Susan Orlean, author of 10 bestselling books including 'The Orchid Thief' and 'The Library Book, joins us in a longform chat on 3 Books!
SHOW BACKGROUND:
3 Books is an award-winning podcast discussing life's biggest themes through the 3 most formative books of an inspiring guest. Past guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, Roxane Gay, Judy Blume, Quentin Tarantino, etc.
CHAPTER BACKGROUND:
I got an email from longtime 3 Booker Bo Boswell who told me he found an enticingly-titled thread on reddit called “What’s your field or study (hobbyist or professional) and what’s a cornerstone beginners book for that topic/field?”
The most upvoted reply on the thread read: "Librarian here, Susan Orlean’s ‘The Library Book’ is at first glance a true-crime book about tracking the arsonist who set fire and burned down the main library in Los Angeles, but it also gives a comprehensive glimpse into contemporary libraries and their issues, especially updating a view of them if you haven’t been inside one since you were a kid."
Bo picked up the book, loved it, and then wrote to me that "the amount of research and bizarre detail Orlean puts into her work is so engrossing.” Bizarre detail! I was convinced. I picked up ‘The Library Book’ and it blew me away. Reading it was like … wandering a library. Surprising curiosity trails at every turn. I ended up putting the book in my Best Of 2023 and then went deeper into Susan Orlean’s back catalog where I found myself reading profiles like ‘The American Man, Age 10’ and a series of fascinating obituaries about people like the inventor of Hawaiian Tropic or the first magician on the Las Vegas strip.
I’ve come to think of Susan Orlean as one of the best non-fiction writers on the planet. She’s been a Staff Writer for ‘The New Yorker’ since 1992 and has written more than 10 bestselling books including ‘The Library Book’, ‘On Animals’, ‘Saturday Night’, and ‘The Orchid Thief’, which was turned into the movie ‘Adaptation’, starring Meryl Streep in her Oscar-nominated role as … yes, Susan Orlean.
Susan has an endless, unbridled curiosity — that ‘bizarre detail’ — which you’ll see on full display in this conversation which begins by talking about how she organizes her shoes! She’s a writer’s writer who offers us a true masterclass and always reminds us that “storytelling and knowledge-sharing is the essential human experience.”
We talk about organizing shoes and spices, what books do that nothing else does, finding the balance between professional and amateur, the genius of container ships, what great book design does, how to cultivate your writing voice, how you might organize your book, facing the fear of failure, LSD, the power of libraries, Susan’s 3 most formative books, and much, much more…
I am so excited to share this conversation and hope you’ll find it as endlessly inspiring as I did.
Let’s jump into Chapter 134 of 3 Books now…
-
00:00:00 Intro
00:03:30 Meet Susan Orlean
00:07:15 Our Relationship With Surprise
00:11:10 About 3 Books
00:13:25 The Writer’s Organizational Process
00:17:19 The Human Impulse to Categorize
00:22:56 The Global Shipping Aha
00:27:12 Incentivization of Capitalism
00:30:17 Curing Disease is Commercial
00:34:03 Imposing Order on Books
00:37:25 Importance of a Book’s Design
00:41:15 The Library Book Easter Egg
00:44:11 People Are Like Libraries
00:47:33 Our Connection to Books
00:52:30 Owning vs. Reading Books
01:05:42 Writing Great Ledes
01:22:00 The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
01:37:37 Professionalism and Amateurism
01:45:08 Ensuring Humility in Your Kin
01:48:49 The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
02:16:13 Organizing Units of Information
02:26:57 Great Plains by Ian Frazier
02:35:06 Discovering Your Voice
02:41:21 Messiness of Truth in Non-Fiction
02:52:52 Lightning Round Questions
02:58:32 On Pursuing Inspiration
03:01:58 Outro
03:08:06 End of the Podcast Club
03:15:33 Word of the Chapter
-
SUBSCRIBE: bit.ly/2HHWPYg
Hey there,
I'm Neil and I spend a ton of time thinking, writing, podcasting, and speaking about living intentionally. I'm the New York Times bestselling author of six books including The Book of Awesome and The Happiness Equation. I've been lucky to speak at places like TED, SXSW, and Google. And I host a huge passion project called the 3 Books podcast.
Want to read more of my stuff?
https://www.neil.blog/archive/
Want to check out my podcast?
3books.co
Want to learn about my live events?
globalhappiness.org/speaking
Want my monthly book recos?
1000awesomethings.com/reading-club
Want my articles on intentional living?
https://www.neil.blog/newsletter/
I am also on the following drugs:
Facebook: facebook.com/NeilPasricha
Twitter: twitter.com/neilpasricha
Instagram: instagram.com/neilpasricha
Lastly, thanks so much for watching this vid.
👊,
Neil
neil@globalhappiness.org
