← All Of It with Alison Stewart
All Of It with Alison Stewart
Wrapping Up the 2025 Summer Reading Challenge!
00:29:50
Labor Day marked the deadline to complete the 2025 All Of It Summer Reading Challenge.
Loading summary
Transcript81 lines
- [00:08]
A
This is all of it. I'm Alison Stewart. Thanks for spending part of your day with us. We are grateful that you are here. Tomorrow on the show, we'll talk about a new exhibit at the Bronx Museum celebrating the ceramic work of Reverend Joyce McDonald. We'll also talk about the music of Mark Bolan and T. Rex. There's a new documentary about him. Plus, we'll dive back into the cultural turmoil of New York from 1986 to 1990. I got here in 1998. What is that time? That's with author Jonathan Mailer. And with that, let's get back into today's show with the end of our 2025 Summer Reading Challenge. We have officially come to the end of our Summer Reading Challenge this year. You blew our numbers from last year out of the water. We 1,338 of you signed up to participate and 353 of you were able to actually finish the five books in five different categories between June 1st and Labor Day. We got so many lovely responses and comments from you all about the challenge. Like this one from Christine in Yorktown Heights who said, the Summer Reading Challenge always leads me to read a wide array of books that I may not have selected otherwise. The five books I read for the challenge this summer were so diverse, yet all enjoyable. Thanks for providing the impetus. And Brian on the Upper west side wrote, I loved it. I only read books talked about on aoi. It was great to hear the author's perspective and process which enriched the overall reading experience. And Shane from Los Angeles wrote, this was my first time taking part in something like this and it was very enjoyable. I feel proud of myself for finishing and I got to read some great books. I've been meaning to get to. This gave me a solid reason to finally do it. We're proud of you too, Shane. To wrap things up and tell us about some of the patterns that emerged this year and to hear some recommendations is Jordan Loft, producer for all of it and get lit and the Summer Reading Challenge. Hi, Jordan.
- [02:20]
B
Hi, Alison.
- [02:21]
A
Listeners, we want to hear from you. What was the best book you read this summer? It could have been for the Summer Reading Challenge or it could have just been a great book you picked up in the last few months. We want to hear the best book that you read best in summer 2025. Our number is 2124-3396-9221-2433 wnyc. So, Jordan, you get to see what people have read for the challenge. So we're gonna go through Some of the patterns you noticed when it came to the challenge this year. Okay, ready, Go. What was the big thing?
- [02:56]
B
So there are a couple things I noticed this year. We had a new category. One of our new categories was pick a biography or memoir. I'm here to report that nearly everyone picked a memoir, which I think makes sense. Biographies are long. It's not necessarily something you want to lug with you to the beach. But there were at least three power broker readers and finishers over the course of the challenge this year. When you think about the fact that they also read four other books, that's a little frightening. I'm actually a little scared of that. But good on you for doing that last year. What was really interesting about the challenge is that there were clear correlations with the New York Times top 100 books of the 21st century. That was a list that had come out, I think, just before we started the challenge. And I could tell that people were really inspired by that list. This year, that was not the case at all. There seemed to be no, like, overarching list that people were drawing from. That was interesting for me to note. Also, local librarians were some of the heroes of this challenge, both as participants and as helping out our readers. So I just wanted to read two quick comments from people who participated. This one is from Susan from Hastings on Hudson. She wrote to say, as a children's librarian, I helped design a summer reading challenge each year that will encourage children to read and adults to read to their children. What fun to be a participant this year. Your well designed categories allow personal preferences while encouraging readers to explore beyond their comfort zones, just like the children. I look forward to receiving my prize, but I know I've already been rewarded with the reading. So, Susan, we love to hear that you will get your prize and thanks for all you do for kids. And then Carol in Neptune, New Jersey, wanted to give a shout out to her local librarian. She said, shout out the Neptune library librarian who pulled four or five debut novels for me when I explained my problem with figuring out what fit in that category. So more than one person wrote in to say that their local librarian had helped them pick a book. So I really love to hear that. And that brings me actually to my final point, which is so many of you were confused about what counted as a debut novel. So true love to all of our readers. But some people said, you know, in this category, I read Wally Lamb's fifth novel, which technically doesn't count. We'll send you your prize anyway. But that is a category that seemed to cause a lot of people confusion. So maybe that's one I'll take back to the drawing board next year.
- [05:21]
C
I did love it when you got something from a librarian, you'd be like, guys, a librarian wrote me it was like your big thing.
- [05:29]
A
All right, let's get into it. What did you read for your summer challenge? Jordan.
- [05:34]
B
Yes. So this was my final lineup. For a classic, I read east of Eden by John Steinbeck. More on that in a little bit. For a book about or set in New York City, I read Severance by Ling Ma. For a debut novel, I read Maggie or A Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar by Katie Yeezy. For a memoir or biography, I read the Color of water by James McBride, which is a memoir. And for published in 2025, I read Daughters of the Bamboo Grove by Barbara Demick. I've talked a little bit about all of these books on the show already, I think, except Severance by Ling Ma, which not to be confused with the television show, it's a totally separate book. It's about a woman who is so caught up in her corporate job that she almost doesn't realize there's a zombie apocalypse happening outside in New York City. And she becomes one of the last people out of the city during this zombie apocalypse. So I really enjoyed that one. And Allison, I know you finished as well. I want to hear what you read.
- [06:34]
A
Yes. So for my classic, which was hard for us because we read so much for this show, but I wanted to read Lolita. I really hadn't ever. And I thought it was well crafted. It was language rich, it was completely strange. I love being able to talk about it on air. So that was a kind of a cool thing for us to do. Our New York City based book, I read Elise Aaron's We Might Just Make It After All, My Best Friendship with Kate Spade. It was really a lovely view of their friendship and it's a good tale of New York city in the 80s and 90s and we're young women and we're gonna make it, and we're gonna make the Kate Spade brand and all the mistakes that went with it. I really enjoyed that book a lot. Our debut, I read the Ghosts of Gwendolyn Montgomery by Clarence Hine. So you read this? Oh, it's something about glamorous New York publicists, whatever. But then it quickly turns into a spooky story. Things start going wild. There are ghosts, there's a queer Latinx psychic, there's evil spirits. It's all set in New York. And the author actually gave me his book and just said, well, if you would read it, I would really love that. And so I did. And it was great.
- [07:49]
B
So, yeah, he approached you at a get lit event, is that right?
- [07:52]
A
He did, right. It was really wonderful. For memoirs, I picked two because they were so interesting. The Charles Sumner memoir by Zakir Tammies or Wild Thing by Sue Prudhoe, because one was written by a late 20something who had a different take on history at a strong vision of Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner. And it was interesting to hear a 20 somethings take on a potential founding father. It was just. And he. He basically called him gay in the book. And it was sort of interesting to hear him approach Sumner in. That was very interesting. And Sue Prudho, who wrote about Gauguin, it made me think about Gauguin in a different way, in a more objective way. And I got to go see his work at the Met, which was great. So that was a good combo. And the last one was Vera or Faith by Gary Steingart, because who wouldn't.
- [08:45]
C
Love Gary Steingart and his wonderful characters?
- [08:48]
B
And in fact, many of our readers agreed with you. A lot of people read Gary Steingart's Vera or Faith for a book published in 2025 that was definitely a popular selection.
- [08:57]
A
Let's take a couple calls. Let's talk to Rita in Manhattan. Hi, Rita, thanks for calling all of it. What did you read?
- [09:05]
D
I read Lincoln's Lady Spymaster by Jerry Willis.
- [09:10]
E
It is an awesome book. It's nonfiction.
- [09:14]
D
It is set in the south during the Civil War. It's just amazing.
- [09:19]
E
Can't recommend it enough.
- [09:21]
D
Thank you so much for taking my call.
- [09:23]
F
Have a good day.
- [09:23]
A
You too. Have a good day as well. Lucia is calling in from Michigan. Hi, Lucia, thanks for calling all of it. What did you read?
- [09:33]
G
Hi. Thank you so much for having me. I read. For my debut novel, for the Challenge, I read Agatha of Little Neon by Claire Lucette. And I wanted to recommend it because I haven't heard anybody talk about it. But the story follows Agatha, who is a sister of the Catholic Church, who has been living with her three fellow religious sisters for nine years. And the parish where they're living runs out of money. And so they find themselves making this big move and going to kind of an unexpected next step where suddenly they're living and they're working in a halfway house, kind of a transitional living situation for adults who are in recovery for substance use. And then she ends up. There's sort of a lot of funny things that happen. The local Catholic high school comes to them and says, we need a math teacher. Agatha has never taught. She doesn't know a lot about math, but knows more than the other ones. And suddenly she's teaching high school math. And there's just this great sense of humor throughout the whole book, all these really fun, eccentric characters. And throughout the whole thing, Agatha is trying to reconcile her own religious identity, her own religious identity with the fact that she's attracted to women. And so there's a lot of kind of internal. There's some conflict and some reconciliation going on. She's navigating, having a different point of view in her religious understanding than her sisters. And you really see that kind of come across in the way that they're forming relationships or failing to form relationships with the people living in the group home. But it's just this beautiful little book. I think the language is pretty simple, but it feels like every word is very intentional and conveys a lot of humor. And it kind of feels like little mini stories or vignettes put together, building this whole big narrative. But, yeah, I absolutely loved it, and I had never heard of it, so I want to. I want to give it some recognition.
- [11:24]
A
Thank you so much, Lucia. That was a good synopsis. I like this text.
- [11:29]
C
This is interesting.
- [11:30]
A
This woman wrote woman or man or she or he.
- [11:33]
G
They.
- [11:34]
A
I ended up reading a full roster of black writers. They spoke to each other in such wonderful ways. The warmth of other suns. Their eyes were watching God erasure didn't fit the challenge. But I read anyway.
- [11:47]
C
Who wouldn't meet Percival Everett?
- [11:49]
A
And another Brooklyn. So great.
- [11:52]
C
That was very interesting.
- [11:55]
B
That's a great comment. And that was another comment that I had seen a couple of times about realizing that their books were more connected than they thought. This comment actually is from Sophie in Brooklyn, who said, I also found it to be an interesting experience to read a collection of books. Unintentionally, I found overlaps between the stories. I read two books about Nigerian immigrants, three books with deep connections to New York City, four books about the experience of being an outsider and confronting prejudices. And all the books I read track stories over many years and through journeys. A truly epic summer reading experience. So sort of like that text you got. It's very interesting to see people who found connections between the five books they read, even if they started out feeling like, oh, they were totally disparate books. In the end, there are themes that resonate between all five of them. I think that's great.
- [12:46]
C
I wanted to talk a little bit More about classics, because that was the.
- [12:49]
A
Hardest thing for me to read because.
- [12:52]
C
We read so many books to find time to read a classic. What did our listeners find time to read?
- [12:58]
B
Yeah. So I would say, maybe unsurprisingly, I would guess about 50% of our readers chose the Great Gatsby as their classic this year. It makes a lot of sense. It was the 100th anniversary, it's the centennial, so I think we were really hyping it up. It's also a nice short book. I think it's about 200 pages or under. So quick for summer reading. But I loved readers who were coming to it for the very first time. I was surprised how many people had never read the Great Gatsby. Bill from Norwalk, Connecticut, wrote us to say the challenge finally got me to read the Great Gatsby After 40 plus years of starts and stops. And then I ask every participant who finished to say at the end, what was their favorite book they read this summer. And the Great Gatsby, it was Bill's favorite book that he read this summer. So after 40 plus years of stops and starts, it turned out he really liked it. Another big one was James Baldwin. There were still pretty much all of his catalog was represented among our readers. Not surprising. That was also a big centennial last year. And also so many of his books are set in New York. So there's good overlap there. I was surprised at how much Edith Wharton there was. We had a lot of Edith Wharton readers, and I don't know why. If anyone is sensing an Edith Wharton trend, a resurgence, I would love to hear, but maybe it was just that people were excited to explore. Maybe. Actually, you know what, Allison? Maybe it's the Gilded Age.
- [14:20]
C
Gilded Age. That's exactly what I was gonna say.
- [14:23]
B
To watch the Gilded Age and are picking up Edith Wharton. That's maybe what it was. And finally, dare I say, did I start a mini east of Eden book club? Because I was really pumping up east of Eden by John Steinbeck on this show. A couple people, actually more than a couple people, a fair amount of people ended up reading east of Eden. And Shannon in the financial district wrote us to say that her favorite book of the summer was definitely east of Eden. She said, it's truly an unforgettable read. And what got me interested in the challenge in the first place, crazy enough, while I was reading it, I found out that two other friends were also reading it. So we had an informal book club. So I love that. So Shannon got to have a little east of Eden book. Club while she was participating in the challenge. So those were some of our most popular classic selections.
- [15:09]
C
Let's talk to Sheri from Westchester. Sheri, thanks for taking the time to.
- [15:14]
B
Call, all of it.
- [15:15]
C
We lost Sheri. She's not there. Let's go to Louisa in South Brunswick, New Jersey. Hi, Louisa.
- [15:22]
F
Hi. Thank you for taking my call.
- [15:24]
C
What did you read?
- [15:28]
F
The Shatter Me series by Toria Mafi.
- [15:32]
C
Tell us about it.
- [15:35]
F
So it's about a girl who has a special ability, but she has gone through a lot of trauma about it. And then basically the current government is almost trying to overthrow every single culture and the past history of the world. And now she has to team up with a couple of people like that have like supernatural powers to like overthrow the government. But in the process, there are like a whole bunch of really big plot twists and revelations and it's a really big thriller for me. But I can't say the same for other people, though.
- [16:10]
C
It's okay as long as you liked it. That's important. Louisa, thanks for calling in. My guest is get lit and Summer Reading Challenge producer Jordan Loft. We want to hear from you. What's the best book you read this summer? Give us a call at 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. After the break, we'll talk about memoirs and biographies.
- [16:45]
A
You're listening to all of it on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. We're wrapping up the 2025 Summer Reading Challenge. My Jordan Loff, who runs the challenge. And we want to hear from you. What was the best book you read this summer? Give us a call. 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. All right, we got to the part of the challenge about memoir or biography. You know how I feel about memoirs, but I think it's taking a turn personally.
- [17:16]
B
You've, you've come around.
- [17:17]
A
Well, I think right out of COVID there were a lot of memoirs, but we're five years out now. So I think, I think it's taking.
- [17:23]
B
A turn a little bit. Yeah, that's good. I tend to agree with you. I read some really good memoirs recently and it was interesting. So last year there was one book, a couple books that really rose to the front as some of the most popular selections. One of them, like, for example, was All Fours by Miranda July. A ton of people read that book. This year there was one memoir that was incredibly popular with a lot of our readers, and that was how to Lose youe Mother by Molly Young Fast. She is the daughter of Erica Young, and this is a memoir about their relationship and growing up with her. Jean from Chatham, New Jersey. That was her favorite book she read this summer. And she wrote in to say, I loved reading how to Lose youe Mother by Molly Young Fast. I'm a huge Erika Young fan and a Molly fan, too. I loved Molly's perspectives and her conflicted feelings about the relationship she had with her mother. A brilliant and difficult woman. I could totally relate because I lost my mom years ago after a prolonged illness. Our last few years together were very challenging. So clearly that was a memoir that meant a lot to our readers and to Jean from Chatham in particular. I wanted to just spotlight one other selection from one of our listeners because this was a guest we've had on the show. Deborah in Manhattan wrote in to say, my favorite book I read for the challenge was all the Beauty in the World by Patrick Bringley. To see the Metropolitan Museum from the perspective of to see the Metropolitan Museum from the perspective of a museum guard, especially this very sensitive one, was a great pleasure. And then she writes about how reading the book is changing her experience of going to the museum and thinking about the guards who worked there. So that's a memoir from a Met Museum security guard. And that was another one that seemed to really resonate with a couple of our readers.
- [19:15]
C
That was so great. This summer I went to the Met all summer long. Every weekend I spent a part of it at the Met in a different section because you can never, you always go. And it's just like overwhelming. It was so cool to take it one area at a time. Also with that new wing, that new Rockefeller Wing is spectacular. So I'm really with Deborah on that, that track. Let's talk to Eugenia in Washington Heights. Hi, Eugenia.
- [19:43]
B
Hello.
- [19:43]
E
How are you doing?
- [19:44]
C
Well.
- [19:46]
E
I read or reread the House of Mirth by Edith Orton. It's one of the most heartbreaking books I have ever read in my life. I read in high school way back then. And it's it breaks my heart to see that a beautiful, talented and smart woman ends up dead because she can fit it in with in her own society. She was born like as an aristocrat. And then because she can't marry this guy, she can't marry this guy. That was the time when people, women had to marry in order to survive, more or less like the Bennett sisters and Pride and Prejudice. And it it's one of the best books ever. And also Act One by most heart he he was screenwriter and playwright born in the Bronx, very poor and he wore about his life getting to be a famous playwright and about being working in the 1920s in the Catskills as a director of people who want who want to go to colonies to and it's just the best one of the best best books ever.
- [21:06]
C
Eugenia, thank you so much for calling in. Eileen is calling in from Weehawken. Hi Eileen, what did you read?
- [21:14]
D
I did send in my survey. Hopefully it got received the New York well my anyway Red Faulkner for my classic Sound and the Fury. I need to look at it, not just listen to it because apparently there's typographical information if you're actually reading the paper. But I called the book set in New York City. I had you know, like many people sounds like I looked like what's a book set in New York blah blah blah. And it's called the Doorman by Chris Pavone. And what I something I liked about it and now I'm reading another book I didn't have time for that came up in that search and I can compare the specificity and the breadth of location and cultures and types of people. It's the Doorman refers to a longtime doorman in a Central park west upscale building. But we see his life we see all kinds of goings on from other characters. And it felt very resonant like with.
- [22:18]
G
I'm fortunate that I feel like in.
- [22:20]
D
My life I've been to all kinds of situations in New York and this kind of covered it and it really resonated authentically with each area. So I really enjoyed that. And I tend towards nonfiction and so thank you for encouraging me to read books like that.
- [22:36]
C
Thanks for calling in. This was big on our list, right Jordan?
- [22:40]
B
This was one of our most popular selections for that category a book about or set in New York. And Alison, I think this was your influence. You recommended this one on the show a couple of times. We had Chris Pavoni on the show to talk about was just a really popular read. Josephine from Glen Head, New York wrote in to say that that was her favorite book she read this year. So that seemed to be really popular with our readers. Another couple others that were popular in the book about are set in New York Category 1 was Play Worlds by Adam Ross, which is another book you and I both loved. That's sort of a coming of age story about a young male actor in the 1980s who ends up in an inappropriate relationship with a much older woman. It's just a great book and our readers seemed to really love that one. One of my favorite comments from people who wrote in comes from Judy in Yorktown Heights. She wrote that her favorite book that she read in this category was Rules of Civility by Amor Towles. This novel is a great period piece of surviving the Depression era of Manhattan. The characters, especially Katie Content, are wonderfully woven into the fabric of New York city in the 1930s. I read this novel with Billie Holiday playing softly in the background while sipping a French 75. It probably should have been a gin martini, but I am more partial to a French 75 with gin. And to that I say, judy, I salute you. I want to read with you if you would make me a nice French 75 and put on some Billie Holiday. That sounds like a great day to me. So I loved that comment from Judy. And one more in that category I wanted to give a shout out to. This comment comes from Brian in the Upper west side who read Four Squares by Bobby Finger and said as a 49 year old gay man, it was lovely to read about aging and finding love and community in your later years in New York City. It was hopeful. So I love to hear that. So that is just some of the selection of different books people read for a book about or set in New York, and there are just so many different kinds to choose from.
- [24:46]
A
I also wanted to mention to our listeners there will be transcripts available of this conversation. So if you didn't get the exact name or the exact title of the book, wait for our transcripts to go up the next day or so and you'll be able to have them at your leisure. All right, let's talk about the debut novel. We don't know if it's gonna be there next year, but the debut novel, what was big.
- [25:09]
B
I know. Well, I just wanted to explain one more time for people who were so confused. I'm sorry, that everyone was confused about this. A recent debut means it's the first novel that this author has published hopefully in the last couple of years. So like not Toni Morrison's first novel, even though that was her debut. We were looking for something recent. With that said, there were three books that did fit in this category that came to the forefront. The first was Martyr by Kaveh Akbar, which was a debut that came out last year but totally counts. He is a poet. He actually joined us on the show to talk about Lolita. Very thoughtful guy and writer and I was happy to see that that one, even though it was published over a year ago, was still so Popular and resonating with our readers. The second most popular book I saw was the Names by Florence Knapp. That's a story about domestic violence and how picking the name for your kid can sort of help determine the course of their future. That was a popular selection. And the third most popular one was a book that you really loved, Alison Blob by Maggie Stuart.
- [26:15]
C
Love that book.
- [26:17]
B
I think that was also your influence. That's about a woman who finds this sort of amorphous blob and shapes him into her dream man. And one other comment I wanted to read in this category comes from Laura in Pleasantville, New York, who wrote in to say that Lonely Crowds by Stephanie Wambugu was my favorite because the author told an unexpected, deeply felt story. And I love a story with no easy answers or ending. Catholic school upbringing described perfectly. So that's a very recent debut from this year from Stephanie Wambugu, who came on the show actually to talk about it. That book is called Lonely Crowds, and Laura and Pleasantville really loved it.
- [26:55]
C
Let's talk to Amy in Westchester. Hey, Amy, what's the best book you read this summer? Amy, are you there?
- [27:03]
F
Hi there. Sorry. Yes. Do you hear me?
- [27:05]
C
Yeah, go ahead. Go for it.
- [27:06]
F
Hello? Okay, got it. Great. I'm the owner of Hudson Valley Books for Humanity in Ossining. And so I read a lot of.
- [27:12]
B
Books, and I was completely explored by A Different Kind of Power, which is.
- [27:18]
F
The memoir written by Jacinda Ardern, the former prime minister of New Zealand. I didn't know anything about her, and I left. I just wanted to meet her. It felt like she was my new best friend, and I felt like we need her and her style of leadership in this country.
- [27:35]
B
That's what it did for me.
- [27:37]
C
Thank you so much for your call. All right, which were the popular books published in 2025?
- [27:44]
B
There were two that were clear frontrunners that got the most reads in this category among our readers. One was Emperor, the Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong. That is a beautiful novel about a young man who's really struggling with addiction and depression and trying to figure out his life when he enters this friendship, unexpected friendship, with a woman who has dementia and becomes her caretaker. So that was one of the most popular books. The other was a thriller called King of Ashes by SA Cosby. This is a story about a oldest brother in a family who has become a very successful guy in Atlanta. And he ends up coming home to a small town in Virginia because it seems that some members of his family have gotten caught in the crosshairs with a very violent gang. So he needs to figure out how to extricate his family from clutches of this gang. It is violent, it is gory, it will keep you turning pages. And a lot of our listeners seem to really love that book. And if you're interested in reading it, you might want to stay tuned for a little special announcement we might have coming in the next couple of weeks. So that's Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong and King of Ashes by SA Cosby, our two most popular books published in 2025.
- [29:01]
A
And what can you tell us about the prize in our last minute?
- [29:05]
B
Okay, so for those who finished and signed up for your prize, it should be coming in the next couple of weeks. And this year for the first time, we had a prize especially created for this challenge. So it's a unique thing that's never existed before that you will be getting in the mail. And we created it just for you, just for the challenge, just for this year. So you can look forward to that coming soon.
- [29:26]
A
Your Summer Reading Challenge 2025 it is over. Congratulations, Jordan. Congratulations to all of our listeners who participated. And we're about to get read ready for get lit, so we'll start talking about that next week.
- [29:40]
B
That sounds great. And thanks so much to all the readers who made this summer so fun. I love seeing what you're reading and reading along with you. So thanks again so much for making this such a blast.
- [29:50]
H
Sometimes an identity threat is a ring of professional hackers, and sometimes it's an overworked accountant who forgot to encrypt their connection while sending bank details.
- [29:59]
B
I need a coffee.
- [30:00]
H
And you need Lifelock because your info is in endless places. It only takes one mistake to expose you to identity theft. LifeLock monitors hundreds of millions of data points a second. If your identity is stolen, we'll fix it, guaranteed. Or your money back. Save up to 40% your first year at lifelock.com Specialoffer terms apply.
- [30:20]
I
NYC now delivers the most up to date local news from WNYC and Gothamist every morning, midday and evening with three updates a day. Listeners get breaking news, top headlines and in depth coverage from across New York City. By sponsoring programming like NYC now, you'll reach our community of dedicated listeners with premium messaging in an uncluttered audio experience. Visit sponsorship wnyc.org to get in touch and find out more.