15: Mary Trump

15: Mary Trump

Author: Jennifer Taub & Politicon LLC March 5, 2023 Duration: 1:11:26
You may think that Mary Trump needs no introduction, because you believe you know who she is in relation to a certain distasteful someone who shares her surname. Or you have read her first bestselling book:  Too much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man. Or her equally stellar second, The Reckoning: Our Nation’s Trauma and Finding a Way to Heal.

But what an author produces or shares with the public, as well as the degrees they collect (in Mary’s case a BA and MA in English literature as well as a doctorate PhD in clinical psychology) is only a part of who they are. And, it should go without saying that our family of origin is a piece, but not all of us.

In today’s episode, Mary and Jen get lost in a conversation about books. They start with Mary’s childhood favorite, Sylvester and the Magic Pebble, a children's picture book written and illustrated by William Steig that won a Caldecott Medal in 1970. And the conversation continued into weightier tomes like the more than 1,534 page epistolary novel Clarissa, by Samuel Richardson. The 1748 work’s rather lengthly alternative title reveals a bit about the story, but hardly as much as Mary does: The History of a Young Lady: Comprehending the Most Important Concerns of Private Life. And Particularly Shewing, the Distresses that May Attend the Misconduct Both of Parents and Children, In Relation to Marriage


Contact Booked Up:

You can email Jen & the Booked Up team at: BOOKEDUP@POLITICON.COM or by writing to: 

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Get More from Mary Trump
Twitter | The Good in Us Substack | Author of TOO MUCH AND NEVER ENOUGH and THE RECKONING

Get More from Jen Taub:
Twitter | Follow the Money Substack | Author of BIG DIRTY MONEY 



For anyone who’s ever finished a great book and immediately wanted to dissect it with a smart friend, Booked Up with Jen Taub is that conversation. Hosted by author and legal commentator Jennifer Taub, this podcast digs into the ideas, arguments, and narratives shaping our world, all through the lens of what we’re reading. It’s less a formal book review and more a lively, critical exploration. Episodes weave together themes from politics, culture, and current events, treating books as vital source material for understanding the bigger picture. You’ll hear Taub’s insightful commentary and analysis, often drawing connections between an author’s work and the real-world issues it illuminates. The discussion feels urgent and relevant, whether tackling a new release or a classic with renewed significance. Listening to this podcast is like joining a book club where the conversation is always sharp, informed, and unafraid to challenge conventional wisdom. It’s for readers, thinkers, and anyone curious about the power of stories to explain our complicated present.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 59

Booked Up with Jen Taub
Podcast Episodes
19: The Kneeling Man by Leta McCollough Seletzky [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:05:15
This week, Jen’s guest is Leta McCollough Seletzky. Leta is a former litigator who left the law to become a literary sensation. She is a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow. If you don’t already know…
18: Book Club: SPARE [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:09:19
This family has more money than God. Why in the world can’t they get some therapy? A Grandmother who never hugs her grandchildren? A father who does not hug his son after telling him his mother was killed? No, our book i…
17: The Sum Of Us Heather McGhee [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:02:04
Heather McGhee joins Jen this week to talk about the newly released, young reader edition of her best-selling book The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together. Heather’s book helps show how…
16: Ruth Ben-Ghiat [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:03:49
This week, my guest Professor Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert in authoritarianism, democracy protection, and propaganda and author of the bestelling book, Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present. Ruth is both a professor of Histor…
14: Martin Luther King Jr.’s  “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:19:48
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” To help honor Blac…
13: How We Win The Civil War with Steve Phillips [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:02:01
This week best-selling author Steve Phillips opens up about the very recent loss of his remarkable wife Susan Sandler and their shared goals on how to move America toward a multi-racial democracy. In the dedication to he…
12: Servants of the Damned by David Enrich [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 58:29
This week Jen speaks with David Enrich about his nationwide bestseller, Servants of the Damned, praised by David Cay Johnston in the Washington Post as “A powerful and important picture of how mega law firms distort just…
11: Lisa Guerrero [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:08:33
This week, Jen’s guest is the award-winning journalist Lisa Gurrero, on to talk about her new book Warrior: My Path to Being Brave. Lisa is a pioneer in the field of sportsbroadcasting enduring verbal abuse and sexual ha…
10: Book Club: January 6th Committee Report [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:11:43
Who knows? One day perhaps we will look back on this episode of Booked Up to find out that Donald Trump has faced a different kind of booking. Or at least an indictment. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Today for ou…
9: Hamlet’s Heirs with Linda Charnes [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:13:16
Dr. Linda Charnes –– Professor of English, European Studies and Gender Studies at Indiana University, Bloomington where she has taught since 1989–– joined Jen to talk about Hamlet, Talionic Law (aka retributive eye-for-a…