Our Critics' Year in Reading

<p>Literature isn’t a horse race. Taste is subjective, and artistic value can’t be measured in terms of “winners" and “losers.”</p><p>That doesn’t mean it’s not fun to try.</p><p>The book world’s awards season officially kicked off on Oct. 9, when the Hungarian novelist Laszlo Kr ... Show More

<p>Nicholas Boggs’s “Baldwin: A Love Story,” is many things at once. It’s a comprehensive biography of James Baldwin. It’s a nimble excavation of Baldwin’s work, filled with astute literary analysis of his books and prose. And, most pressingly, it’s an argument for a new critical ... Show More

<p>On Nov. 10, 1975, during a calamitous storm, the Edmund Fitzgerald sunk below the waves of Lake Superior. All 29 men aboard went down with the vessel. With no survivors and no eyewitnesses, there’s always been a sense of mystery to what is arguably the most famous shipwreck in ... Show More

Our favourite books from 2023 &#8211; or reads, because of course we mostly read &#8216;backlisted&#8217; titles. Always a fun one to record &#8211; this time with the added bonus that we were each going to choose one from the other&#8217;s 

This week, Kennedy and Mikayla put their knowledge of each other to the test! They are guessing books the other would never read as well as telling each other books to put on their TBR. Don't forget to follow along on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠IG⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠! Check out a ... Show More

Barbara Pym, May Sarton, and bookshops &#8211; welcome to episode 115! In the first half of the episode, we take up Sally&#8217;s suggestion of topic &#8211; and discuss whether or not we like books set in bookshops and libraries. More 

Christine is a farmer: in this chat, she gets into what she’s learning about the value of slowing down, of learning to embrace our full plates (while eschewing “busyness”), and the beauty of “delightfully misplacing our phones.” And because Tsh recently wrote about what books she ... Show More

Beryl Bainbridge, Celia Dale, critical and charitable reading &#8211; welcome to episode 123! In the first half of the episode we use a suggestion from Susannah &#8211; do we read charitably or critically? In the second half we compare too 

<p dir="ltr">Show notes:</p> <p dir="ltr">Reading is Funny Day is coming up on April 1st, so we wanted to talk about funny books in this episode. Plus, we just really love to giggle and laugh. We’re 12-year-old boys at heart and love jokes about butts and other body parts, so the ... Show More

On this week's episode Reggie, Kennedy, and Mikayla recommend books for their listeners. They put up a question box on instagram and the listeners put what kind of books they wanted the Ill read what she's reading girls to recommend for them! Books talked about in this episode: T ... Show More

<p dir="ltr">Show notes:</p> <p dir="ltr">We’re both very different readers, but it seems like lately, there’s more of a middle ground between Team Sarah and Team Mia. Here are some books that we both love and it was easier than we thought to come up with this list.</p> <p><stron ... Show More

<p dir="ltr">Show notes:</p> <p dir="ltr">Let’s just be real with it: we’re very nosy people. It’s why we’ve always been interested in other people’s stories and why we love books so much. And it’s why we’re both drawn to the historical fiction genre. We get to dive into the past ... Show More

<p><strong>Susie Boutry (<a href= "https://www.instagram.com/novelvisits/">@NovelVisits</a>) and I share our favorite books that missed last year's Summer Reading Guide, some shorter books we think are great for summer reading, and our #1 picks for each category featured in my <a ... Show More