LARB Radio Hour: Hanif Abdurraqib's Love Letters to A Tribe Called Quest and Claire Vaye Watkins's Desert Futurism

In the first of a series of shows from the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, Eric, Medaya, and Kate, catch up with two friends of the show: Hanif Abdurraqib and Claire Vaye Watkins. First up, Hanif talks about his new book, Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called Quest, an epistolary appreciation of one of the most influential groups in hip-hop history. As always, Abdurraqib astounds with instant recall of, and insights about, all things pop cultural and their social resonance. Then, Watkins joins the team to discuss her heralded first novel, Gold Fame Citrus: a terrifying, and all-too-possible, representation of Southern California's near future, in which love blooms in a landscape ravaged by drought.