Nat Sec Beach Reads

In the season three finale, hosts Steph, Leah, and Jess share their summer reading lists with a national security flavour, along with personal updates and summer plans. They might not be what you think of as traditional beach reads, but these books have it all for Secure Line listeners. Steph is calling in from the south of France, where she's spending 12 weeks on an intensive French language course (DELF B2 level). Her reads reflect her immersion: a French graphic novel history of Russia (Un Russe), a novel about a teacher helping refugees learn French (Francais Long Etranger), and Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express — in French. She also shares an advance copy of J.M. Berger's upcoming thriller The Pope's Hitman(described as "John Wick meets the Conclave"), and plugs her own newly released book on the Canadian far right, For Blood and Soil.Jess recommends Patrick Radden Keefe's London Falling (narrative nonfiction about a man impersonating a Russian kleptocrat's son), Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower/Talentsduology, Corey Doctorow's The Bevel, and David McWilliams' A History of Money.Leah is revisiting Brave New World through the lens of AI and modern politics, reading Sarah Isgur's Last Branch Standing on the US Supreme Court, and has just picked up The Double Black Box by national security lawyer Ashley Deeks on AI and democratic accountability.The episode wraps with summer plans: Leah is finishing a book and training for the Chicago Marathon. Jess is wrapping up travel, doing consulting work, playing pickleball, and editing her third book (pending peer reviews!). Steph is returning to Ottawa after four months of travel and launching several new research projects, some of which are super secret that she won’t even tell her cohosts about.