← Book Riot - The Podcast
Book Riot - The Podcast
2026 Moms, Dads, and Grads Recommendation Show, Part 2
01:19:08
Jeff and Rebecca wrap up recommendation season.
Loading summary
Transcript188 lines
- [00:00]
Rebecca Schinsky
This episode is brought to you by Merit Beauty. My beauty routine has always been extremely minimal. We're talking like tinted moisturizer if I'm feeling really ambitious, but most days I don't wear makeup at all. That has worked fine for me until we started doing video podcasts and suddenly my face is everywhere. And I know you'll be shocked to hear that I care about that a little bit more than I used to. I wanted to step it up without adding a lot of time, because if a routine takes more than five minutes, it is genuinely not going to happen for me. And Merit Beauty was the answ. All of their products are designed to be fast, easy, and they're really good. I use three the minimalist stick, which pulls double duty as foundation and concealer so I'm not layering a bunch of products on my face the flush balm for a little color that looks like it came from being healthy rather than wearing blush and the signature lip blush, which is just enough. The whole thing takes me minutes and I actually look camera ready, which was the whole point. Everything Merit makes is clean, vegan and cruelty free with skincare ingredients that are actually good for your skin. Right now, Merit Beauty is offering listeners a free signature makeup bag with your first order at meritbeauty.com that's M E R-I-T beauty.com for a free signature bag with your first order merit beauty.com this episode is brought to you by Redfin. You're listening to a podcast, which means you're probably multitasking, maybe even scrolling home listings on Redfin, saving homes without expecting to get them. But Redfin isn't just built for endless browsing. It's built to help you find and own a home with agents who close twice as many deals. When you find the one, you've got a real shot at getting it. Get started@redfin.com, own the dream.
- [01:48]
Jeff O'Neill
This is the Book Riot Podcast. I am Jeff o'. Neill.
- [01:51]
Rebecca Schinsky
And I'm Rebecca Schinsky.
- [01:52]
Jeff O'Neill
And we're back with part two of our spring 2022 moms, dads and Grads recommendation show. We've got a little interregnum between where we did some other stuff, but we're back to up all your Father's Day and graduation type seasons. I guess. I guess it's Mom's grads than dads is typically how it happens on the calendar, right Rebecca?
- [02:12]
Rebecca Schinsky
This mostly happens for some reason. We've always done Mom's, Dad's Grads, so that's I don't know what I'm going to stick with for our description.
- [02:20]
Jeff O'Neill
I don't think we're getting a lot of value over mixing it up now.
- [02:22]
Rebecca Schinsky
I don't think so.
- [02:23]
Jeff O'Neill
But thanks for everyone for tuning in. Over on 00 to well read this week. Gatsby's back in the main feed. We were doing a recording rerun there. Spartan me as we're, you know, taking a breath, but we then decided not to take a breath and do a bonus episode for something that's coming on Friday. So it's all kinds of things are happening over there next week.
- [02:43]
Rebecca Schinsky
Next week coming out next week.
- [02:44]
Jeff O'Neill
Next week.
- [02:45]
Rebecca Schinsky
But next week there will be two zero to well read episodes. One a traditional book discussion on Tuesday and then Thursday will be our special feature.
- [02:54]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah. So without further ado, anything else we need to tell people about Rebecca before we get into this, if you've been
- [03:00]
Rebecca Schinsky
wanting some kind of book riot shaped book club read along situation, we've also launched guided read alongs over on the Zero to well Read Patreon. We're going to do four a year. We have not announced the first book yet, but it's going to be a book we read over the summer. We're going to announce it in a couple of weeks that's available to folks at our office hours level for the zero to well Read Patreon. So if you want to do some book clubby English class, blended sorts of stuff with us, you can do that over there. And then of course this week in the Book Riot Patreon, there will be a deals deals deals episode which is always a great time, especially for me because you do all the homework and I just show up, hear about book deals, have thoughts about them.
- [03:39]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah, I read one this morning that I was I immediately put in. So that'll be fun over there. I'm not saying that we're going to do Lonesome Dub for a guided read along. I'm saying if we did Lonesome Dove, it'd be a wonderful cat candidate for a read along. So.
- [03:51]
Rebecca Schinsky
So yes, I think it would too. I it's not the first one but I think we'll do it at some point.
- [03:56]
Jeff O'Neill
I was walk I was out for a run the other morning and what by a little free library and all that was in it were two copies of Lonesome Dub and the Dove and Joy of Cooking. So I don't know what's going on at that house.
- [04:08]
Rebecca Schinsky
Sounds like a short story prompt. I want to know what was going on and and is it like they still have four copies of Lonesome Dove, but those are the two they got rid of.
- [04:16]
Jeff O'Neill
There were two. There were two that were the same copy looked relatively newer, so I don't know if they both they asked for Lonesome Dove for their birthday and everyone got for them. I'm not sure what's going on here, but so that's it. All right, we'll take our first sponsor break and dive right into a recommendation. Responses
- [04:33]
Sponsor/Advertisement Voice
Today's episode is brought to you by Bloom Books, publisher of Terror at the gates by Scarlet St. Clair. Estranged from her family, Lilith Leviathan finds refuge in Nineveh, a district in the city of Eden devoted to sin. There she uses her magic to steal for a living, attracting the attention of the governing families and the church, which expects women to be pious and silent. When Lilith finds a powerful blade, she thinks all her worries are over until the buyer dies while inspecting it. So now she's in it. Frantic, Lilith turned to the only man who can help her, Zahariev, ruler of Nineveh. As their lives intertwine, their devotion to each other becomes a threat to the truth, to the church, and to those who want to tear it all down. The beloved first book in the seductive Romantasy series from number one New York Times bestselling author Scarlett St. Clair, is now available in a deluxe paperback edition with exclusive cover art and gorgeous designed edges. I love a Romantasy with a gorgeous designed edge, let me tell you. So get into Terror at the gates by Scarlet St. Clair and its beautiful edges. And thanks again to Bloom Books for sponsoring this episode.
- [05:50]
Rebecca Schinsky
This episode is brought to you by Quince. Working from home means that my getting dressed calculus is a little different than most people's. I need something that feels comfortable enough to wear all day at my desk, looks pulled together on video calls, but can also go straight to lunch with a friend or go to dinner out without having to change. The quince 100% European linen popover mini dress is doing all of that for me right now. I like it so much I have it in two colors. It's a breathable, it moves well. It looks like I tried, but it doesn't actually require much of me. And that is exactly what I need when I'm going from work from home to important calls to dinner out. And that's the whole thing with Quince. The fabrics feel genuinely premium linen pieces starting around $30 and everything is priced 50 to 80% less than comparable brands because Quint works directly with ethical factories and they cut out the middlemen you'll end up double checking the price every time because you won't be able to believe it. Refresh your everyday with luxury you'll actually use. Head to quince.com bookriot for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com bookriot for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com bookriot.
- [07:12]
Sponsor/Advertisement Voice
Today's episode is brought to you by best selling author Michael Chatfield, author of the Ten Realms, Book one the Two Week Curse and Aon Vault Publishing the best in science fiction, fantasy and horror. Fortune favors the strong. Two veterans are about to show a magical world what modern military discipline can do in this action fantasy adventure from international best selling author Michael Chatfield. Follow the journey of Eric and Rugrat, two combat hardened soldiers who are transported from Earth to the mystical Ten Realms after contracting the Two Week Curse. The story details their rapid adaptation to this new reality where they utilize their military discipline and modern medical knowledge to master magic, alchemy and smithing. This is on sale May 12th. Order yours today. And Matt Deniman, New York Times bestselling author of the super popular Dungeon Crawler Carl said, quote, once this crazy ride starts, you'll never want to get off. Make sure to pick up the Ten Realms book 1 the 2e curse and thanks again to a Thon Vault for sponsoring this episode.
- [08:22]
Jeff O'Neill
All right, I guess I'll just read the first one here and pick up here. Hi Jeff and Rebecca. I work hard, I pay my taxes. I would like a pick just for me. You know we do check. We do check everyone's tax reports before we answer. So I'm glad we didn't have to do this for Melanie. So very good Melanie. Thank you for getting letting us out of that. I would like to pick just for me. How about a recommendation for something that the less I know about it, the more fun the reading experience is? Examples of what I mean are Never let me go Hell yeah Jeff Commentary Audition Double Hell yeah Jeff Commentary and the English understand wool Garnering the rel Jeff Triple Hell yeah Rebecca Airhorn I would like to be surprised and delighted. Melanie, I think we need to welcome you to Weird Little Book Club. Rebecca, where did you go for Weird Little Book Club?
- [09:12]
Rebecca Schinsky
I think the great news for Melanie is you can sort of look for anything that's really high concept because those are the books where even if you know the general idea about them, what you're going to find inside is Just wilder than you could have imagined. Colson Whitehead is a great candidate for this. I think the intuitionist is essential. Especially good for it. Like she's an elevator inspector. How weird could it be? Quite weird. It turns out. George Saunders also great for this. Lincoln in the Bardo is one of my all time like you think you know that it's a story about Abraham Lincoln's young son having died and Lincoln sitting, you know, near the mausoleum where he's buried. But there's so much more going on. Juliet Suka, Susan Choi and one of our go tos here on 0 not 0 to well read here on Book Rant podcast. One of our Swiss army how to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe by Charles Yu. All great options.
- [10:08]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah. So by its nature, this request suggests that Melanie doesn't want to know anything about the book. So I'm going to skirt around talking about what the hike by Drew McGarry is about because you wouldn't believe me if I said what it is. But it is a very cool, unusual reading experience. McGarry has gone on to be like one of the muckety mucks over at Defector. He writes, you know, popular columns. Started out, I don't know if as a novelist, journalist, creative writer, whatever. But this is a one of one. And Melanie, feel free to email your feelings to us once you get done with the hike by Drew McGarry. I would put next to it the library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins. Scott Hawkins has another book coming out this fall. Good is also very, very odd and it's quite violent in ways that are hard to understand. The Library at Mount Char. But those are my two. I don't know anything like them. There are no Rita likes. They are ones of ones within ones. It's ones all the way down. It's infinite Mike monkeys typing ones on Shakespeare typewriters. That's how that. That goes, right? That's how that goes.
- [11:12]
Rebecca Schinsky
Totally.
- [11:13]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah. So the hike by drew. By Drew McGarry is mine there. It involves a hike kind of like Lincoln Abarto includes Abraham Lincoln in the same kind of way.
- [11:23]
Rebecca Schinsky
And welcome to being a nerd, Melanie. We're glad to have you. Next question is from Halle. They're looking for. They say they're generally a reader who goes for plot driven stories, but they're looking for good character driven ones. These kinds of stories tend to be hit or miss for them, so they're unsure of which direction to go. In the past, Halle has enjoyed Anna Karenina and Intimacies and is currently in the middle of in ascension by Martin McInnis. Any recommendations will be much appreciated.
- [11:51]
Jeff O'Neill
I've got two. They're quite different. The a more recent one in Pachinko by Min Jin Lee, which has not yet ascended to a Sound the horn when we recommend it, but it probably should because it's a family saga. In family sagas we tend to think of being fairly plot heavy and there's definitely plot here. But I think Rebecca we stay with this because of the characterizations and the relationship between characters the world wielding too. But we talked about the you will cry over someone eating a bowl of white rice. You were just quite of things unsaid and internal strife and where they are and who they get to know and their relationships between each other. That's on the the longer epic side. I don't know. I was thinking about this question. I don't know what the first book you could reasonably call a character study or a character portrait really was interesting. Have to go back a long way, I guess. But in the modernist tradition, Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf is kind of the pinnacle of this. It's called Mrs. Dalloway. It is largely Virginia Woolf trying to express the intuity of one woman kind of going about her day in Bloomsbury who's a upper middle class person. The famous first line is about buying the flowers herself, but that is just an entree into her psycho emotional dynamics with her husband and those around her her own existence. So Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf would be one that's quite short. Pachinko's quite long. So put them together and they're both. They're 330 pages on aver.
- [13:16]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah, I'm gonna give you, I think some of my recent favorites that blend this plot and character situation. From last year. The Wilderness by Angela Flournoy, about a group of black women who have been friends since their early adulthood. And we move through a couple of decades with them. Things happen, but mostly it is about these different women's experiences in the world and with each other. Kin by Tayari Jones, one of the big books of this year. Two women who are growing up without mothers. They grow up as kind of sisters to each other in the Jim Crow South. One goes off to an HBCU and is sort of set up to enter into a more privileged life. The other is going off to Memphis to look for her mom who has who left her when she was a child. And their lives diverge from there. So again, things happen. But we are with these two women over the course of many, many years of their lives. And if you have not read Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff, go back and read Fates and Furies, a wonderful character study, also a study of a marriage. Things happen, but the characters are the primary focus of that writing.
- [14:25]
Jeff O'Neill
Maybe you better read this one. I have an answer so let's do this way.
- [14:28]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah this next one is not my strong suit Request is for a birthday gift for Christina for herself looking for backlist pre2016 science fiction will read anything in the genre that isn't horror coded standouts have been the Martian and Project Hail Mary, the Murderbot Diaries, Beck Chambers and Nettie Okorafor.
- [14:47]
Jeff O'Neill
I didn't think of this when I wrote this down, so stay here if you haven't tried Dune. Christina Dune is good. The book Dune is very interesting. So if you want to be on the train, the first two movies have come out covered the first book. So if you've seen those and like those, they're pretty faithful but they make some changes and it's worth going back to it. We have an old adaptation nation where Jen Northington I talked about Dune. I think it's still where you can find podcasts out there on the open Internet. My real pick is Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson, which is actually the beginning of a I think there are three books in a collection of short stories. The first book came out in 93, I want to say, and it is a story of the colonization and terraforming of Mars and it happens over I believe, 150 or 200 years. Somewhere in that range, multiple decades. And it's interestingly not a huge bummer as some of these sci fi things are. It's not quite everything's going to be fine. But Kim Stanley Robinson is extremely cool and interesting and humane writer who I read his book about just hiking and I was into it and this one is very, very interesting and I think too if you want a series, I don't remember there being a cliffhanger. I don't know that you have to read all of them. Like it's just sort of the next the further adventures of people going to Mars and terraforming. Interestingly, I was looking at the Wikipedia entry and reminding myself of it last week or whenever we did these first pics, Rebecca and I've forgotten it now. It's been a while, but the action actually begins in 2026, which is very weird to do now. It's like it's beginning this year. Unfortunately, that's where the similarities end because in the books. Most of the world's power has been consolidated into the hands of a few technological corporations which luckily we've mostly avoided. Rebecca. So that's going to be weird to read and say. I can't believe anyone ever think that would happen.
- [16:35]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah.
- [16:35]
Jeff O'Neill
So you just have to put that to the side for a second. Second.
- [16:37]
Rebecca Schinsky
They were so silly being worried about.
- [16:38]
Jeff O'Neill
I know. So silly. So silly. But I especially think with like the Artemis 2 stuff like we're sort of thinking about space and other things going on, it felt like a good time to recommend Red Mars. One of my One of my best friends in grad school is her favorite book of all time. This series was a sci fi.
- [16:53]
Rebecca Schinsky
Oh wow.
- [16:53]
Jeff O'Neill
Not in Scholar.
- [16:54]
Rebecca Schinsky
So you know Red Mars as you're saying that. And I'm looking at Murderbot Diaries as one of Christina's previous picks. Somehow Christina, if you haven't read the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, that's a really.
- [17:05]
Jeff O'Neill
Why didn't we think of that before?
- [17:07]
Rebecca Schinsky
Right. Go back and do that. It is pre2016 as Christine is asking for. It's very pre2016. We just recorded a zero to well read episode about it and we were talking about how the Murderbot Diaries is one of the successors of that mode of comedic sci fi. So if you like that flavor and somehow you've not read Douglas Adams, get the onto the Heart of gold.
- [17:33]
Jeff O'Neill
So I guess I'll read the next one then. Hi. Absolutely love the show. I am looking for recommendations for myself books on or about Italy. I'm going on a trip in the fall and visiting Venice, Tuscany, Florence, Naples and Rome. I've gotten the mainstream novels. I've cut. I wondered about that Rebecca with the mainstream novels are. I was like I'm not sure what the rst unlimited for that is. But anyway under the Tuscan sun. I guess that must be the one or talented Mr. Ripley, isn't it? All said more Jeff. Rebecca style recommendations, fiction or non fiction. Audio options preferred if possible. We're also seeing a Formula One race in Monza. If you have any F1 adjacent book recommendations, go for it.
- [18:11]
Rebecca Schinsky
Rebecca, I'm so glad you mentioned Ripley. That's a great one. Yes, mostly in like Positano, but a lot of good stuff in Rome. I was thinking about Syracusa by Delia Ephron. This is several years back. It's about two couples that go on vacation in Syracuse, Italy together and secrets about their long lives and their relationships with each other come out. It's just juicy and fun. She's Nora Ephron's sister. Roman stories by Jhumpa Lahiri, which we talked about on the first installment of Moms, Dads and Grads. Jhumpa Lahiri doing Jhumpa Lahiri things in and around Rome and maybe Call Me by youy Name by Andre Aceman, also set in Italy.
- [18:51]
Jeff O'Neill
I've got a couple of ideas here on the F1 front. I have not read a book about F1. I've only read a handful of nonfiction books about cars, one of which is about parking, which is sort of about cars not moving ironically. But I did read before the movie came out that it's based on Go Like Hell, which is the book that the story of Ford vs Ferrari is based on. And it is extremely cool book and you can learn it a lot around racing. A lot of that has Italians in it because of the Ferraris and the it's in France I believe Le Mans is the actual track but like if you want some race car non fiction is pretty good. I did an audio which I enjoyed A sad Italian book memoir from Locke by Tim B. Locke. There aren't too many travel memoirs or like I went to Italy to find myself memoirs by non Elizabeth Gilbert looking folks I guess I'll just put it that way. And she is one of them. She's a black woman but and she meets someone and falls in love and then. And then it's a farm and that's it's. And I'll say no more. That's not where it ends but it's quite beautiful and moving and I really like that book At a clock sister. Those sisters can write. I shall say they can. A Room with A view by E.M. forster is Europeans on vacation in Italy. It's considered kind of like the most fun EM Forster that all of them are complicated. I think this is I wondered if this is one of the canonical sort of mainstream novels you're thinking about because it's often like the great European sort of mid century and earlier novel about going off and vacationing in Italy. Not sure about that. But also Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter is someone if I remember the plot correctly I remember liking this book. There's someone who starts to work for like this crumbling chateau and people who live there and it's not a romance or it's commercial figure like upmarket commercial. So I think it's a pretty good thing of what you're looking for. It's like it's kind of lightish but it's not complete fluff and there's a time and a place for that, but that's not what Beautiful Ruins is by Jess Walter. Sold quite well at the same time. So those are my picks there.
- [20:53]
Rebecca Schinsky
All right, next question is from Dana, who's getting married at the end of May. Congratulations, Dana.
- [20:58]
Jeff O'Neill
Congratulations.
- [20:59]
Rebecca Schinsky
She and her fiance will be heading to Tanzania for their honeymoon. They're spending half of the time at the beach in Zanzibar and half on a safari in the Serengeti. Looking for recommendations set in Tanzania, the Serengeti, or generally on a safari. Dana also mentions that her fiance's favorite book is Lonesome Dove, Ring the Bell, and he's been begging her to read it for three years. But she really doesn't think it's in the cards, so she enjoys the joking about it here. Dana, maybe you guys can read it together with us when we do it someday.
- [21:28]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah. So this is not exactly in the right place. And I don't. This is not in safari, but it is in Africa. This is Barbara Kingsolver's the Poison Wood Bible.
- [21:38]
Rebecca Schinsky
Great.
- [21:39]
Jeff O'Neill
Which I think before Demon Copperhead was the Barbara Kingsolver book people pointed to, but I think it's now Demon Copperhead.
- [21:45]
Sponsor/Advertisement Voice
It's.
- [21:45]
Jeff O'Neill
It's sold better. And. But this is a story of a missionary family that moves from the United States of Georgia to the Belgian Congo as missionaries. And what happens, I think it's. It's. I think it might be what you're looking for. You're looking for people, especially on safari. There's a kind of tourist element. You're. You're not a. You're not a native to this place. And what's it like to experience something like this? I do not have a great novel pick for you about being on safari, but this is Westerners coming to Africa. And maybe it can give you some distance to sort of frame your own experience as being a visitor and see how this particular family over time, what they were trying to do, what was great about it, and also what wasn't. At the same time, on the nonfiction front, I love Paul Thoreau. People have heard me talk about Paul Theroux, which is. I am. I like to read travel writing for sure, but I can't claim to be a completist. I think he is my favorite travel writer. He. A combination of literary literariness, gumption, will just go out there and do this. This, if I remember correctly, is not narrative. I believe it's like essays. But he is doing stuff in Africa. So, like, as part of an armed convoy in a Canoe on a bus. I believe there is a safari bit to this. It's been 20 years since I've read it, so I apologize for not knowing all of the details of it. But Paul Throw, you cannot really go wrong. I think in a lot of ways when you conjure in your mind a image of sort of a 20th century travel writer, it's a sort of weathered, bespectacled guy in like khakis, in a, like a tactical, A tactical vest and a camera and like he just knows how to get through the world. And sort of jaded but also interested. Like I think that's Paul. I think that's where that comes from. Rebecca. So Dark Star Safari by Paul Theroux would be my other selection there.
- [23:43]
Rebecca Schinsky
Thoreau's such a great pick. I didn't have anything that was a straight match for this request either. And it made me realize I want both like an Emma Straub White Lotus Y flavored book about people on safari and a Percival Everett book about people on safari. So if they're taking requests, there they are. The Tusk that Did the Damage by Tanya James is told from the perspective of an elephant in a big like conservation area in Africa. And it's not a warm fuzzy told from the perspective of the animal like the remarkably bright creatures phenomenon is. It's kind of naughty and challenging, but not over the top. I thought it was a really interesting writing exercise that she conducted in that book. I have not read by the Sea by Abdul Razat Gurna. I read a set in Zanzibar. It was the only really literary looking thing I found when I went googling for books in Zanzibar. And then a deep cut that I haven't touched in probably since high school or college is the Snows of Kilimanjaro, short stories by Hemingway. Some of them are set in and around Africa and about his various experiences there. So some of that like swashbuckling safari sorts of vibe.
- [24:53]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah, that's really. I mean, I've only read Afterlives by Abdul Razak Gurna and I can feel comfortable giving a blanket recommendation just like based on that. Try anything by Abdul Razat Gurna. And maybe if you just want to. Not just, but if you're interested in expanding your horizons, like maybe read one of the great African novels. I mean the one that's been out there since I was trying to read world literature. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. It's amazing. It's not about safari, but it is about Africa and it's short and feeble like and that might be another way to go at the same time while you're traveling. Okay, almost missed my favorite time of the year. Thank you for doing this. I'm looking for book suggestions that are narrative nonfiction adventure books. I can't believe people chose to do this. This is incredible. Kind river of Doubt About Roosevelt is great for this and includes some nice bonus history Into Thin Air. Oh, I just realized I also did Into Thin Air because I just skipped right over that. I'll skip that out. Endurance is good, but survival books aren't always a good fit when looking for adventure books. That's very interesting. Rebecca, you go first.
- [25:58]
Rebecca Schinsky
I have one suggestion I was thinking about. In the Shadow of the Mountain by Silvia Vasquez Lovato came out a couple of years ago and I really loved it. She is one of the only women to have climbe the seven summits. So we're talking about not just Everest but the other six that are in that same big gnarly zone. And one of the only Latina women to have done it. She had this incredible career in Silicon Valley, but privately was dealing with alcoholism and the alcoholism was a coping mechanism for abuse that she had experienced as a child. So she's like unpacking a lot. And the book is both about just the sheer adventure and terror of hanging from one rope while you cross these giant icy chasms on these huge mountains and the only thing between you and a fall that will kill you is a ladder from Home Depot that you're crawling across. Just really memorable, harrowing stuff and also an exploration of the ways that adventure activity and sort of serious like adrenaline pumping stuff like that can be healing and helpful for trauma that like this is what put her back into her body and set her life on a different kind of course. It's a really incredible story. I read it in print, but I suspect it would be really great on audio.
- [27:21]
Jeff O'Neill
I am going to go with a skiing memoir, Unbound by Steph Jagger and I don't remember the number, but she's trying to ski X number of vertical feet in a given year.
- [27:35]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah, I remember.
- [27:36]
Jeff O'Neill
And I don't know if it's for all people or women or what, but I like to ski. This is one that's different for me because I am terrified of this mountain climbing kind of stuff and the bouldering and the free soloing. Michelle and Ames, they can't get enough of it. So like they'll be watching one of these on a documentary on TV and I have to like Immediately turn around. But skiing I could kind of understand because that seems fun to me. Where the rest just seems not, I guess is the. The kindest way I'll put there. But I found it'd be a very cool memoir at the same time. Another one that I'm wondering if you might like that it's not quite an adventure book, but it has an element to it that you. You may find interesting. So it's Riverman by Ben McGrath. Ben McGrath is a journalist and he is telling in arrears the story of this guy who. I can't remember his name. It doesn't matter. It does matter, but for the purpose of this, who has lived on the rivers, like in a boat going up and down the rivers, mostly along the Atlantic seaboard, and a life lived outside of the things of man or living on the margins, the nature into the city, into civilization, into not. There's a mystery element to it as well. So I kind of like that story a little bit more than. Look at this nutty thing that is sort of a deathlike experience. This was more existentially adventurous, which I find quite interesting. So that's Riverbend, riverman by Ben McGrath, to go along by Unbound by Steph Jagger.
- [28:58]
Rebecca Schinsky
You know what this person really needs is to go watch 100 Foot Wave on HBO.
- [29:03]
Jeff O'Neill
That's a great. Yeah, that's a. That's a wonderful pick. Or like there's that 14 picks documentary. A 14 peaks documentary about the. The guy who did all 14. That's a really interesting thought.
- [29:14]
Rebecca Schinsky
At the same time for. For our unsigned letter here. Like, if you have not seen Hundred Foot Wave, it's a documentary series about people, but especially one man who have dedicated decades of their lives to trying to surf the biggest waves they can find. And they all get hurt and some of them die. And it's a real study in. I can't believe people choose to do this right.
- [29:33]
Jeff O'Neill
So that brings us all the way back around. Maybe what they really need is Barbarian Days by William Finnegan, which is one of my favorite memoirs of all time, which is a memoir of traveling the globe and surfing in the early days of surfing as a global popular sport. So maybe we got there finally. It was an adventure to get you to your recommendation. They're not signed.
- [29:54]
Rebecca Schinsky
That seems right.
- [29:55]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah.
- [29:55]
Rebecca Schinsky
This next one is from Josh. He said his formative years happened throughout the aughts. He was 13 at the time of 9, 11. Graduated college by the end of the decade looking for recommendations that portray life during that decade. So we're talking the age of slightly better Internet, the indie rock scene, our first black president, and hurrying home being the only way to check your social media, he says. I've heard that new books like so Old, so Young by Grant Ginder and Last Night in Brooklyn by Zoshito Gonzalez might fit the vibe, but hasn't read them. Perhaps you can weigh in and throw in some other suggestions. Fiction and nonfiction are all good.
- [30:29]
Jeff O'Neill
Luckily for you, Josh, I have read Last Night in Brooklyn. It did. I think it appeared on a recent front list for you. I can't remember. I think I talked about it. Yes, I really liked it. I did not know until about a halfway through and I'm like, wait a second. It is a reimagining, retelling a using the structure and some of the dynamics of the Great Gatsby into Brooklyn of the exactly the area you're talking about, mostly among people of color that are living in Fort Greene and Crown Heights and some of those places before they got super gentrified. Gentrification is happening at the same time, but it's about identity, it's about the come up, it's about getting richer. It's all also about downward mobility and a lot of the things that Great Gatsby is about, but set in a different time. I really like Zuchil Gonzalez. I like what she does. It's quite short, like Gatsby, so it feels like a snapshot in time, very much like Gatsby does. At the same time, that may have some other valences as well. I also think Great Expectations by Vincent Cunningham could do the job for you. Vincent Cunningham was an Obama staffer, someone junior campaign in the. In the first campaign fundraising, I think that's right. And this is his novelization of his own, his own experience. So Obama is in the book. So is New York and Brooklyn in the very age you're talking about. Interesting. Both of them are referencing obliquely or not obliquely, earlier classics. You know, Great Expectations, of course, by David Copperfield, which has some things going on here. So if you are a literary. If you have any sort of literary history, bona fides or interest, I think there's a valence of that. Both are very good. Both are quite short. You could knock them both out in a week or a long, warm sunny weekend.
- [32:06]
Rebecca Schinsky
So those are mine I can endorse. So Old, so Young by Grant Ginder. The pitch for it is the Big Chill for the Millennial generation, and we're both fans of the Big Chill follows a group of friends who meet in college in like the mid aughts. Like I was in College when 911 happened in 2001. And I think they start college a little bit later. So, like they might be a little closer to you, Josh, or like maybe they're right in between us generationally, but it moves through like up into their middle age. We kind of go back and forth in time and you rotate around to different characters. But it really did have like the chapters that were set 20 years ago really did tap into what it felt like to be a young person at that time and sort of have the optimism that we had then and not be as plugged into the Internet as we all are. It was really great. A good read. Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue that's set around the 2008 financial crash about a young couple. They are immigrants who are dealing with the impact of that. They've come seeking the American dream and they're living in a very different New York than what they expected. So kind of a different flavor than what you're looking for. And extremely loud and incredibly close by Jonathan Safran Foer Set also mostly in New York in and around 2001 and in and around 9 11. So it's hard to find these that like, really get it. I actually, I was kind of thinking about the 90s by Klosterman, which is not the early 2000s, but did really capture well.
- [33:34]
Jeff O'Neill
I think the 90s ended on September 11, 2001. That's. I don't know. That's a hot take. But that's how I think of it anyway. Really through the millennium. I. I lived through this. I was also reading through this. Interesting. My Sopranos re Watch includes this, like the transition before and after. Even the Sopranos didn't know what to do with it. David Chase didn't know what to do about 9 11. I don't have one that I point to. It's like this was. I was in New York. I don't know if I've told my 911 story on the show. I'm not going to do it now, but. But it was very close to me. And maybe it's just one of those things like World War II or the Great Depression or one of these big historical events. Like if you were there, you look at everything like. Yeah, sort of. But also. No, that's where I've kind of come down on Most of the 911 stuff that I've seen. I'll do the next read. Hi, Jeff. Rebecca. I'm a longtime listener of your show and new listener deserve to well read. I'm currently an adjunct English professor at a small college in West Virginia, will be applying for my PhD this fall. Congratulations and good luck. Good luck and very intimidating because you probably know more about this than we do. I'm writing because one of my former students whom I taught during my first semester as part of a dual celebrating his 18th birthday, is bright, ambitious, and has become a mentee. I am looking for book recommendations that could maybe serve not only as birthday present but also as a graduation gift. Anything along the lines of knowing the world is open to you and to always believe in yourself even when others don't. Thank you again. I think I'll leave the name off because it's gift and there's a lot. Let's be careful out there with too much specific information.
- [35:02]
Rebecca Schinsky
I love this though. What a sweet recommendation request. Maybe start with George Saunders congratulations, by the way, which is a bookified version of a graduation speech that he gave. It's not so much the world is open to you, always believe in yourself even when others don't. But this is the one where, much to Saunders chagrin, he talked about kindness and the times in his life that he regrets are the ones that where he wasn't kind or as kind as he could have been to people. And this sort of results in him being thought of as like the kindness czar in American culture, which he's kind of pushed back on. But it's a really lovely, lovely speech. It's a lovely little book to give. We've talked probably on every episode that we've done of moms, dads and grads about so good they can't ignore you by Cal Newport, which is the much needed antidote to just do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life, but more about finding something that you can be good at, honing your skills and carving out a space for yourself, even if that's not the space that you expected your life or your career to go in. Based on a ton of research that if you are good at the thing you are doing, you start to enjoy it more and then you want to become better at it and then you enjoy it even more. And it creates this virtuous cycle where many people are very happy in careers and lives that they never imagined because they invested in upskilling basically, but intentionally. A really powerful message that I wish someone had been talking about when I was 18. And this might also be the moment for Life in Three Dimensions by Dr. Shigehiro Oishi 1 of our shared favorites from last year about the three legs on the stool of what makes a good life and how everyone's balance of those three is different. But it's happiness, meaning and psychological richness. And some of that is the like. Like, always believe in yourself when others don't comes into the like when you are in a moment of difficulty. It can become something that is meaningful. It can become something that is interesting. And that interestingness can lead to a life that still feels valuable and productive, even if it's not like every day is your happiest day. Just such a. I think a really helpful addition to self development literature to think about. What are the. We all need all three of those things, but what's the right balance for you? And what are the pieces in the recipe of your life that support happiness, meaning and psychological richness?
- [37:28]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah, and a great chapter on reading as one of the avenues. You can bring it all the way around. I will ring the bell again for Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke, one we often recommend. And you yourself, I would guess probably at least know of this. So it's maybe not news to you, but to explain or give a pitch to the rest of the listeners, this is a cycle of 10 letters that a young man that was she from Rainer, Morocco. Roka the. The poet in response to him writing him. This guy's last name was Capus, and he was a pupil at the same military academy that Rilke was. And didn't realize it till someone there saw that he was reading Rilke's like, I can't believe that guy became a poet. He really was this like, loser, you know, skinny rake of a guy here. And so that instigated in his. In Cappas's mind, like, whoa, there's other ways of being in the world. I want to find out more about this. I want to send him some of my poetry. And initially Rilke doesn't want to talk. He's like kind of politely declines. He's very cordial. But I believe my understanding is that Kappas kept writing and eventually Rilke opened up. And so there's these 10 letters that Kappas has and he published them. And it's like, it's very much about what is. What's the best one. Probably like live the questions. Like, that's the tattoo, the throw pillar that people get. But it's so lovely and small. For a while I carried a copy in my backpack when I was in New York by myself.
- [38:46]
Rebecca Schinsky
I didn't die. I didn't know that.
- [38:49]
Jeff O'Neill
Because you can just pull it out and find some wisdom, comfort in something other than motivation, but a directional forwardness to living a different kind of life, a full life in tune with what you think and feel and want to be, even if you don't quite know what those things are yet. So I always have a warm spot in my heart to Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke yeah,
- [39:11]
Rebecca Schinsky
I'm just over here quietly bumping that up the zero to well read.
- [39:14]
Jeff O'Neill
I was wondering. It's not very long, but that doesn't mean we couldn't do it. I mean, we did Bartleby, but so we could do something else.
- [39:20]
Rebecca Schinsky
We could make some fun hay out of Letters to a Young Poet Is
- [39:25]
Katie Ferraro
there a baby in your life who's about to start solid foods? This can be such a confusing and stressful time. As a mom of seven, I really struggled with spoon feeding my oldest baby. But once I realized that babies can safely feed themselves real wholesome foods using the principles of baby led weaning, feeding the rest of my babies became an actually enjoyable experience instead of something that I used to dread. Hi, I'm Katie Ferraro, college nutrition professor and dietitian specializing in baby led weaning and I host the Baby Lead Weaning Made Easy podcast. Each week we cover evidence based safe infant feeding practices for parents and caregivers of babies who are 6 to 12 months of age. So if you're confused by all the conflicting info you hear about about starting solid foods or you want easy, actionable tips on how to safely prep food for your baby or introduce allergenic foods or figure out when to drop a milk feed. We cover all that and more, plus interviews with the world's leading feeding experts in two new episodes each week. Search Baby Led Weaning Wherever you listen to podcasts and happy feeding, this next
- [40:25]
Rebecca Schinsky
one is going to be all you. This is from Nikki who is looking for books for 12 year old twin nieces for Christmas. Nikki is planning very far ahead putting together book advent calendars for them so she needs 48 books. She did specify she's not looking for 48 recs from us, but is trying to get to a total of 48 looking for middle grade ya. One twin is into fantasy and loves dragons. She's read the Inheritance series and the Wings of Fire series. The other reads manga as well as realist fiction and her favorites include My Hero Academia Alone by Megan E. Freeman and Eagle Drums by Nazigrak Rainey Hopson. She'll be buying these mostly from library book sales and used bookstores. So backlist recs are really welcome.
- [41:08]
Jeff O'Neill
So I have a daughter who's 13 and she and her friends are readers and so I crowdsource some recommendations and then I gave a couple of my family favorites. I'll give a blanket recommendation. So there's a program here for it starts in third grade but goes only through high school, Oregon Battle of the Books, which is competitive book reading and trivia that my kids have participated in. But if you Google Oregon Battle of the Books you can search by there's a 3 to 5 level, a 6 and a 6 to 8 level and then a 9 to 12 level those being grades so that 6 to 8. Those 6 to 8 lists. There's a list of all the things they picked before. I would suggest just trolling that and seeing what jumps out to you. Some of these books I'm going to mention are beyond that, but that's a really good list. They've been picked for a variety of reasons. Diversity of all kinds in those. I've been extremely impressed with the books that my kids have read because of these. Some I would have heard of and some I absolutely would not have heard of. My family's favorite book in the middle grade chapter book genre is The Vanderbeekers of 141st street by Karina Jan Glazer, who has written for Book Riot in the past. I believe there's five books in the series. It is set. There's a an interesting group of a family who is blended in multiple ways, some of which are more or less explicit. Living in Harlem and the kids get into jams and they get out of them and it's warm. The kids are the central characters right. The the parents are there but it's mostly about the kids doing stuff like for example wanting to turn an empty lot on their block into a park like a little and like things like that that happen. But it also is quite sad like things happen. I don't. I have. I have broken down in tears twice reading to my children. Once in a character seen in one of these books and once the end of the Winnie the Pooh series when Christopher Robin has to leave which even now the emotions are right there. Rebecca I'm like a gusher.
- [43:00]
Rebecca Schinsky
Take a breath. You got this.
- [43:02]
Jeff O'Neill
So we love that series. We did audio read alouds the whole thing for those a couple other things. My daughter for a while her favorite audiobook into book was called the List of Things that Will Not Change the Story. There is about a girl in this age range whose parents get divorced and she makes alongside of them a list of things that will not change about her life to be to ground her and help her. And then she's navigating that at the same time. They all love the Rick Reardon book. Reardon, however you're supposed to say that. The Percy Jackson and then especially the Daughter of the Deep, which is sort of a follow along. That's the first in a follow along series. The story that cannot be told. Dragon Pearl is like a science space sci fi adventure. The Eyes of the Impossible by Dave Eggers where the animals are main characters. So those are some picks right there. But do troll those Oregon Battle of the Books lists for the sixth to eighth grade and I think you'll find some real gems in there.
- [43:56]
Rebecca Schinsky
Great work there.
- [43:57]
Jeff O'Neill
Thank you very much. All right, I'm going to read. Oh yes. Thank you Rowan and Dot and B and Madeline and Zoe for helping me with that. Okay. Okay, quick backstory. Every year at Christmas my family is together. We create a family reading bingo card for the upcoming year. My siblings, mom and I all contribute a few squares. So back to back elite ideas, I should say from our listeners. The Advent calendar and then whatever we're going to call this.
- [44:20]
Rebecca Schinsky
Reading Bingo.
- [44:21]
Jeff O'Neill
Reading Bingo passes the contribute a few squares without knowing what the other people will contribute. And then my brother puts it all together and passes the bingo card out to everyone. It's a really special tradition that gives us fodder for conversation all year long and challenges us to read books that we might otherwise overlook. I cannot overemphasize how much the silly bingo card has come to mean to me on a personal level. Isn't it funny how those weird things become the glue with which you can adhere a family over time?
- [44:48]
Rebecca Schinsky
Beautiful.
- [44:49]
Jeff O'Neill
It's really wonderful. I would like to hear Amanda Green you to write back into us and let us know if it's helpful to say what some of the real hits have been. And also the duds. Also everything that's ever happened in this group. So just those three things. Yeah.
- [45:04]
Rebecca Schinsky
How much of a genius an oral
- [45:05]
Jeff O'Neill
history of Amanda's families reading Bingo card. I feel like there's a cozy like Christmas time holiday story here. Like you could get a book deal off this, Amanda. I really think that you could. My family lives is very close, but we live far apart and this helps us stay connected. This year a square I'm having trouble with is would make conservatives cry. So my understanding, Rebecca is like this is on this year's bingo card. Yes, and she's trying to fill it. I've read two books that could fit in the square, but I put them elsewhere on the card. I'm not going to say what they are, just to keep the shorter. I think this is a fun square and I want to do it justice. I would prefer fiction and non fiction, but I'm open to a memoir, some sort of narrative nonfiction. Whenever I try googling or looking on Reddit to see if people have good recommendations, I see a lot of stuff like why it's bad to be Republican by well known liberal dude, which is amazing.
- [45:52]
Rebecca Schinsky
So you're not looking for like the latest as Recline?
- [45:55]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah, something like that. Or the Pod Save America book or something like that. While that would work for the bingo card, it just seems too obvious to read such an overtly political book. I'm really interested to see what two people whose opinions I trust as much as yours would come up with. Pressure, Rebecca.
- [46:09]
Rebecca Schinsky
Pressure.
- [46:09]
Jeff O'Neill
I know, I know you don't really shy away from mentioning politics on the podcast, but I totally get if you don't want to outright discuss it. I think we're cool discussing it still. If it's a question you're interested in, blah blah blah. Let me know if you need any more information. We're ready to go. Rebecca, what did you pick?
- [46:24]
Rebecca Schinsky
Okay, I totally missed the part where she said she would prefer fiction, so
- [46:28]
Jeff O'Neill
I'll start with no, that's fine, that's fine, that's fine. Yeah.
- [46:30]
Rebecca Schinsky
The nonfiction recs. My first one is who Is Government? By Michael Lewis, which is the counter argument to everything that Doge was about. It is profiles of several people in very unglamorous but very important roles in the American government. And like stories about the things that they have accomplished basically through sheer will and being people who care a lot about the work that they're doing because they see the impact that it has on people's daily lives. The one that I remember the most is about the man who runs like family services for the department that deals with veterans and burials. And they have like revitalized the whole thing in cemeteries across the country so that families who are burying soldiers who served the government and served the country have a better experience. And it's like completely thankless, but of course very important in these people's lives in the moment that they're experiencing it. I loved it. I tried to take like also a cheeky approach to would make conservatives cry.
- [47:32]
Jeff O'Neill
I did too.
- [47:34]
Rebecca Schinsky
Women Living Together by Kim Hanna and Wong Sun Woo. They're not American women, But this is two women who in their 30s have decided that careers and their lives with their friends and sort of rich social lives, like that's the direction that they want to go. They don't anticipate getting married, they don't want to have kids. And so they buy a home together. And this is the story about like their true story about how they got to know each other, how they made these decisions. And also like the difficulties of being a person who's pretty far into adulthood and kind of set in your ways. And then you're similar to like marriage or moving in with a long term partner, like moving in with someone and adjusting your lives and making all the compromises that you have to make. But just the sheer fact of them being like, who needs a man, who needs a baby? Let's live together and have a great time. Like they go to parties, they, they drink, they go on trips. One of them is an editor for like a, you know, popular magazine. Maybe on the fiction tip just pick up some George Saunders, but really go to vigil.
- [48:32]
Jeff O'Neill
Yep, I was kind of cheeky as well. Thinking along the same lines of you. What could be more infuriating than people living non cishet white lives and having a great time and being warm and having happy endings and having strong connections to their community, each other. This one is set in New Zealand. It's called Greta and Valden by Rebecca Riley. One of my favorite books of last year. The main character, Greta and Valdin are siblings who are Maori and they are just sort of early professionals. Like they're not in college or sort of just out of college and finding their way in the world and love and their relationship to each other and their families and it's really funny. The comp. One of the comps was Schitt's Creek. I don't. It's not quite that slapstick, but the dialogue is a lot. It's just a lot of fun. It's a lot of fun to be with these characters.
- [49:18]
Rebecca Schinsky
It's really charming.
- [49:19]
Jeff O'Neill
It's really, really charming. I think I liked it a little better than you did though. I don't think you liked it in retrospect. But I think like this is. Is this what we're afraid of really, Rebecca? That's where I'm going with Greta and Valdon by Rebecca Riley. And then something much more serious about the violence that certain worldviews can rot. Can rot. That's not the right conjugation of that.
- [49:39]
Rebecca Schinsky
Can read.
- [49:39]
Jeff O'Neill
Can. Can bring about. Can. Can wreck we nailed this. Thank you very much. I'm. I think Benjamin Dreyer would be very
- [49:46]
Rebecca Schinsky
happy with our Our grammar podcast will
- [49:48]
Jeff O'Neill
not be forthcoming on the fly there. I've never tried to come conjugate rot. I don't know where that goes into just wrought iron and anyway, anyway, I'm sure that's what people are tuning in for, but there's a long way of saying that Nickel the Nickel Boys Buys Colson Whitehead is a very steady, clear eyed, unflinching and harrowing account of real life events about a reform school in Florida and what happens to young black men that were brought there for reasons that are are laughable at best and I don't know, evil at worst. And I think this is like, this is what we're. This is if, if those in the left are afraid of something, this is the Satan's butthole of what we're afraid of. What happens in the Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead. It was. It is not fun. It is short and it's both of our favorite Whitehead, surprisingly, because it's in a way the least Whitehead of Whitehead things, but it's also the most because he can do kind of whatever. So I'm not sure where we are on that, but the Nickel Boys by Colton Whitehead would be rather big.
- [50:50]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah. And really, Amanda, please do tell us everything you're willing to absolutely. About this family book. Bingo.
- [50:58]
Jeff O'Neill
How many people there are all the things that go into it.
- [51:00]
Rebecca Schinsky
So lovely. Next one is from an anonymous listener. Doesn't want their name used here. Looking for favorite older or under the radar genre upmarket fiction not to be missed. Says they tried to read diversely in this genre and has really enjoyed a wide variety of books, but finds themselves coming back to upmarket fiction, usually genre up. They liked God of the Woods, Blacktop, Wasteland, Celeste Ng, all the Colors of the Dark, Andy Weir, Miracle Creek, into the Woods, Peter Heller. Just a few of their favorites to give us a sense. So we're looking for genre upmarket, which is indeed a thing on named listener.
- [51:35]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah, I think the Night Watchman by Luis Erdrich is my number one pick here because it has a mystery at the center of it. It might be a little more literary than genre literary, but it's quite good. And if you like that, go on to the sentence, which is also like a ghost story set in a bookstore. I don't think these were your picks, so I don't mean to steal them. So I think Erdrick would be my pick there. Let's go back to Colson Whitehead, what about Zone one? Rebecca, what do you think about something like that?
- [52:01]
Rebecca Schinsky
I think Zone one is a great choice here.
- [52:03]
Jeff O'Neill
That is Colson Whitehead zombie novel and
- [52:07]
Rebecca Schinsky
they did specify they don't like horror and gore. But Zone one is not my memories.
- [52:12]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah yeah.
- [52:13]
Rebecca Schinsky
The zombies are kind of of secondary to what he's doing because it's cool.
- [52:17]
Jeff O'Neill
Right. I'm gonna give a couple of more straight ahead up market commercial because you were looking for under the radar older the Women of Brewster Place by Gloria Naylor. She also write wrote Mama Day wrote around in the 70s and 80s but this is a portrait of the women in this particular place. Each, each chapter it's not quite linked short stories because they're. I don't know, I guess you count the characters living the same place as being linked. They are but there's not like narrative, too much narrative hooks between them. It's quite beautiful. She's under known. And then I was thinking again as you're the well read favorite of ours that people have rediscovered for the first time the Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan which is a family I think family commercial, upmarket like is its own genre. Like these family interweaved immigrant stories. Multiple generations. How are we going to understand each other over time? Really beautiful at the same time. So Erdrick Women of Brewster Place. Some Zone one Joy Luck Club. Take your pick from from my selections there.
- [53:17]
Rebecca Schinsky
All right. Ring the bell because I'm going to talk about the Sparrow by It's been
- [53:20]
Jeff O'Neill
a while Rebecca from the Sparrow.
- [53:23]
Rebecca Schinsky
It has and this was just occurring to me as. As you were talking for upmarket genre. It's literary sci fi. This is actually the book that taught me that you can do literary sci fi. It blew my mind when I read it like 20 years ago. Y and I think by now the years that the book is set in have passed. But it's from the early 2000s and it imagines like 20 years into the future where the Jesuits have detected music coming from outer space and they're putting together a mission of people to go meet the other beings. So they have. The main character is a priest who's also a linguist. But then they have scientists who go and they make their way to this other planet and they meet these other beings and. And get to know them, learn their language, learn about their cultures and all kinds of things happen. And it's both about the thing that makes this upmarket and literary is that it's also about like the nature of faith and belief and doubt and the role of religion in Our lives. Like, it is not an accident that this main character is a Jesuit priest. That's really important to the story. Just a beautiful book with a devastating ending. So get your tissues ready. I was really interested also looking at this listener's list that they didn't have. Wild Dark shore by Charlotte McConaughey.
- [54:44]
Jeff O'Neill
Well, the older. I think they were looking for older. But God of the woods is.
- [54:47]
Rebecca Schinsky
They gave the examples of things that they liked. And God of the woods is on there. So just in case you didn't read Wild Dark Shore, pick that up. And also from this year, Whidbey by T. Kira Madden. Check the trigger warnings on that. But really good upmarket suspense. And then also the Dream Hotel by Leila Lalami. It's just from last year, but it didn't get near the shine. I didn't expected it to.
- [55:11]
Jeff O'Neill
Or that we took losses on our stock. We bought too high. We should have waited to buy our stock.
- [55:16]
Rebecca Schinsky
I kind of suspect that that's because the things that happen in the book that are supposed to be dystopian were feeling all too real at the moment that the book came out. But it's about this future in which surveillance is everywhere and including in your dreams. And if you are found to have had a dream or even just. Just to have engaged in, like, text messages, because there's an algorithm that looks at your entire life. If they think that there's a chance that you are likely to commit a crime, they pluck you and you are incarcerated for supposedly, like a retreat period just to keep you from doing the thing that you're not even sure you were going to do. But of course, like a prison system has to continue justifying its own existence. So getting out of there is not as easy as it sounds. So the techno. So like techno thriller. Upmarket.
- [56:06]
Jeff O'Neill
Right.
- [56:07]
Rebecca Schinsky
It's really good.
- [56:08]
Jeff O'Neill
While we're saying things we can't believe are there once we see it. And maybe you've done all these. So I apologize. What about station 11?
- [56:15]
Rebecca Schinsky
Oh, yeah.
- [56:15]
Jeff O'Neill
Into some post apocalypse. Or the Dog Stars by Peter Heller to get some of that post apocalyptic literary fiction going. I don't see any on this. Examples I liked. It tends to tend more towards straights. Nuts. Oh, there's Peter Heller at the end. I'm so. I'm so sorry. I did see that. So Station 11 by Emily St. John. John Mendel. I'd put on the list as well. We've said plenty about that at this point. Okay. Longtime listener, first time recommendation requester. I'm a mom of three. And I've noticed that in the summer I get an itch to read a page turning pirate adventure novel.
- [56:43]
Rebecca Schinsky
Love this.
- [56:44]
Jeff O'Neill
I don't know how you noticed that. Was it a hive? Was it an allergic reaction? I like this idea though. In the past I've enjoyed Cinnamon and Gunpowder by Eli Brown which I think I heard about on a past recommendation episode. I do like that book. So it's possible. Possible. And the Adventures of Mina al Safar Sarafi by Shannon Chakraborty. Do you have another suggestion? Thanks so much. What'd you find, Rebecca? Maybe not the white hot center of our shared interest, but we did not
- [57:08]
Rebecca Schinsky
the white hot center. I did some googling for you and I looked at some back book riot pieces. The Internet really likes The Pirate Queen by Ariel Lahan. That was the one that came up most often. Also take a look at On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers and Gentlemen of the Road by Michael she shaven.
- [57:24]
Jeff O'Neill
I had Gentlemen of the Road here too. Was that mine or yours? I think those maybe my two that I did. Yes. Gentlemen of the Road is not about pirates, it's about highwaymen. So they are pirates without boats and they're just on roads but they're doing the stick them up kind of thing. It's the same thing and they're just a ton of fun. Shabin is really just having a good old time of writing a period piece and it's silly and fun and I think would be a great two hander as like a play or a short movie or something like this. It's a period piece so I know it's more expensive. This. I miss this shape. I miss Shabin at all. But when I think about Gentlemen of the Road, I'm like boy, I would like. I'd read six more of these books where he sort of does a tour of genre or place and time and just has some fun with it. And then On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers has a extra or a supernatural element to it. So I think it's maybe more in the Pirates of the Caribbean vein if that's your particular brand. I don't know if you're just tall ships are okay, but get yourself master and commander or you can get yourself. You know there's a lot of nonfiction, but I'm guessing that's not what you mean. Mean. You mean pirates in people, in boats, taking things from people. So those are my two On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers and Gentlemen of the Road by Michael Chabon, which is not about pirates except in their heart. They are pirates.
- [58:34]
Rebecca Schinsky
Pirates in their hearts. All right, next one is from Becky who says, I know short story collections are a hard sell, though they seem to be having a moment this spring. Besides the ones that we recently discussed by Louise Erdrich, Lauren Groff and Rachel Kong, do we have any that we would recommend and bonus points if they are somehow loosely connected? Bless your heart, Becky.
- [58:55]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah. So my first pick is Lost in the City by Edward Jones, which we were talking about when we're ranking Pulitzer winners. I think we were talking about the known world and that must have been front of mine because this is a bit of a deep pull from me because I haven't thought about this book in a long time. But his 1992 collection of short stories is called Lost in the City. We mentioned there that He's a Washington D.C. resident, a son of. This is a collection of 14 short stories about people living in Washington D.C. he was inspired by James Joyce's Dubliners, which is quite similar. And he's trying to give a portrait of the city through the. Through the people. So he has another collection of short story called All Ain't Hagar's Children, but this one is more linked in my memory. So that's one for you. Mither is the incomparable Sandra Cisneros's house on Mango street street, which is extremely short, but it's a series of short vignettes in this life of this young girl. The house is on Mango street, but that's just one of the houses she lives in. But you get multiple perspectives from the people in this place ahead of its time. It's a coming of age story in a Latino neighborhood of Chicago's Humboldt Park. So it feels like this book is just as current as it was when it came out. Gosh. Next, the early 1991. I have in my notes here, but the House on Mango street is tremendous.
- [60:16]
Rebecca Schinsky
I am learning right now that that's a short story collection.
- [60:20]
Jeff O'Neill
They. Joy Luck Club did a little bit, I think. I think they. I think it's called a story novel, but it's really a series of vignettes. And what is a vignette if not a super short story? So I'm. I'm counting it.
- [60:33]
Rebecca Schinsky
Okay, Becky, go back to Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri. The characters are not linked, but the themes certainly are of that book. And there's a zero to well read episode to keep you company when you're done. 10th of December by George Saunders or Liberation Day. It's been a while since I read 10th of December, so I don't remember the links between the stories as much, but Liberation Day has several that are connected and leans a little bit more into like speculative and sci fi zones, but in that George Saunders way where it's like, it's about robots, but it's really about people's souls. So take your pick between 10th of December or Liberation Day and then Almost Famous Women by Megan Mayhew Bergman, who just, full disclosure, happens to be a good.
- [61:16]
Jeff O'Neill
Such a Homer.
- [61:18]
Rebecca Schinsky
Sorry. It's a great book.
- [61:19]
Jeff O'Neill
It's a great pick. It's a good pick.
- [61:20]
Rebecca Schinsky
It's a great book. Each one of the stories in the collection is about a woman who was proximal to fame in some way but never quite got the shine herself. Some of them are women who, like, made famous discoveries or were firsts or should have been famous except for patriarchy. Some of them had famous partners and so their lives were adjacent to fame and shaped by fame. It's really creative. It's based on a ton of research. So if you like that historical grounding, just a really wonderful sensibility. And Megan's a terrific writer.
- [61:52]
Jeff O'Neill
Okay, Molly. I love the pluck. Molly, who wrote us two sequential recommendation requests. And you know what? But they're both here. You did it, Molly. Congratulations. I'll do the. I'll read the first. Hello, Jeff. Rebecca. My best friend is graduating, heading off to culinary school. I'm hoping for your favorite food chef cooking book recommendation. Not a cookbook, but rather a novel about food. I recently read Feast on your Life after hearing Rebecca recommended and I'm curious about other food favorites in the same vein. Thank you. What do you got?
- [62:25]
Rebecca Schinsky
I just remembered Sweet Bitter by Stephanie Danlo, which kind of about food, but more like about working in a restaurant, but a really fun novel. Young woman moves to New York City, gets a job working in a restaurant, and it has all the flavors of like a Bourdain Kitchen confidential situation. Everybody's banging everybody else in the walk in. There are scandals with the staff and all sorts of stuff. A really. Just a really good time. Not fiction, but worth reading for somebody, you know going into this field with culinary school. Eat a Peach by David Chang is the rare modern food memoir that worked for both of us. Like in the post Bourdain food memoir landscape, you've got to be doing something really interesting. And Chang is the spiritual successor to a lot of what Bourdain did, but is also now having to repair in his own kitchens and his own working life, his relationship to the work and sort of the culture of the kitchen. And it really feels like you know, Bourdain was, was the master first and Chang was the student and now Chang has risen to being the level of the teacher writing about that. But my personal all time favorite for a great book about food is Life is Meals by James and Kay Salter. James Salter of course, an amazing American novelist. But this is a book that he and his wife wrote together about all of the meals that they cooked together over the course of their long marriage. They kept this notebook in their kitchen where they would make, they would make notes about the meals that they cooked for dinner, the dinner parties that they threw, who came, what they cooked. It's got recipes with their handwritten notes in them. And the book itself is structured as a year in an eating life with like stories about their other, their writer friends who came to dinner and you know, the sort of wine soaked dinners that they had. It's just really beautiful. My favorite move is to buy a copy of that and a really nice empty leather bound journal for couples that are getting married. But you could do the same thing for this person to like keep track of, you know, notable moments in their own eating and cooking life.
- [64:30]
Jeff O'Neill
I am going to recommend one book but that shows an entree. To recommend the whole author I'm going to recommend Kitchens of the Great Midwest by J. Ryan Stradow. I've never heard his name said out loud. S T R A D A L Kitchen of the Great Midwest I believe is his debut novel. The subsequent books are the Lager Queen of Minnesota and the I think it's the Last Chance Supper Club. I'll find it here as a second Saturday night at the Lakeside Supper Club. So each one of them, these are kind of like, I don't know how to describe these. They're feel good kind of zany portraits of these places and people as you. One is a supper club, one's about brewing beer and the first one, the main character is a gastronomic prodigy. At the age of 3 and a half months she can like taste different things and she starts growing chocolate habanero. Like I don't really know what genre this is. I'm thinking it's like what if fried green tomatoes was in Minnesota? Is the closest I can come up with with this. But they're a lot of fun and they're about food and if you happened. You didn't say here. If you happen to be Midwesterners all the better. But these are feel good, fun, creative, off the beaten path, but not Strange for strange sake kind of books. You could read them all very easily. Jay Ryan Straddle's the Kitchens of the Great Midwest. This ripped like a wildflower through my parents reading circles 10 years ago and that's how it came to me. But I remember reading it very fondly. I've not read the subsequent two. I've always meant to and just haven't. So those are my picks there.
- [66:05]
Rebecca Schinsky
Okay.
- [66:06]
Jeff O'Neill
I also have Shock a Lot by Joanne Harris, which the movie is quite good. I like the book better. Take that with you Will. But I like Shock A Lot by Joann Harris.
- [66:13]
Rebecca Schinsky
All right, Molly's next question. Looking for a book for of this is the one just for Molly actually is looking for books that have made us laugh out loud. Something to combat the end of winter dreariness and the less than cheerful nature of the news cycle.
- [66:27]
Jeff O'Neill
I was talking about this on that same Pulitzer show about like what do People make of Less By Andrew Shangrier but I was thinking about it again and it really, it's a really funny book. So the main character is a middle aged novelist who's had some success but has fallen on harder times and and goes on a book tour to avoid his ex boyfriend's wedding. So that's kind of the genre getting. But I am surprised these are ripe to be made into movies. I think they may be too smart, too clever by half. Rebecca. I don't think people actually want these. I think they want the not version of these like the Netflix romantic comedy mill stuff that comes out of it. I don't because these it's just a little sharper. It's just a little sharper than I think what people want from those. And I think it's really funny on a line level, on a situation level and observational level. It's a lot of fun. So I guess I'm bringing a Pulitzer Prize winning novel back me, myself.
- [67:25]
Rebecca Schinsky
All right, last one we're gonna end on.
- [67:28]
Jeff O'Neill
Oh no, wait, did you have one? You had to. Did you do your rec for that one?
- [67:30]
Rebecca Schinsky
Oh no, I'm sorry, I totally skipped Go Gentle by Maria Semple, which we just talked about a few weeks ago together in front of List Foyer is the most recent book that made me laugh out loud. And it's exactly what I want from a funny novel because it's funny and it's really smart. The main character is a moral philosopher. She's a stoic. Her job is to provide moral training to the two sons of these rich people who have like a private museum basically. And she finds herself accidentally embroiled in what she believes is an international arms deal. And it is, but not in the way that you think. There's a mysterious gentleman who appears in her life and she might have a thing with him or might not. But just the voice is so much fun. The references like simple is so well read and just so, so funny. It's not highfalutin, snobby, it's just really small.
- [68:25]
Jeff O'Neill
It's just falutin. It's just regular fallout.
- [68:27]
Rebecca Schinsky
It is. It's just a great time. Like the book is hot pink and when I put it in our newsletter, I put it on a background with a bunch of disco balls. And that felt right to me. Me. It's a party.
- [68:37]
Jeff O'Neill
I think that we can agree for 2026. So far this is our most generally recommendable book. So if you're listening to this show and you're like, I don't know, I'm just looking for something. We know nothing about you, dear reader, other than you're listening to us. Go Gentle by Maria Semple is a great time. Okay. Hi Jeff and Rebecca. My name is Rachel and I love a book recommendation for myself. I am somewhat recent graduate from my MPH program, so I think it counts. You don't even have to do that, Rachel. Just say you want a book rec. I'm looking for what you both have called on the podcast. Oh yes, a weird little book. A wlb. This could be any fictional genre, but I think little. I mean somewhere between 2 and 300 pages for the weird part. That's harder to find. But I'm looking forward to feel after finishing the book in a sense of what on earth did I just read in the best way. Not something easily found, but I know Jeff loves a short or rather economical book. Thank you very much for that difference. That is a distinction. Short and economical. And you all have led me to some great weird little books in the past. See below for a list of ones. Audition angel down. Holla. Pulitzer Prize winners and finalists. This is how you lose the time war. Piranesi Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy shouts this. You know, it sounds like Rachel is a fruit who knows where her towel is. Rebecca to me the Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera and Eileen by Tessa Mushfag. Where do you want to go?
- [69:58]
Rebecca Schinsky
I just think it's time for Rachel to meet Ben Lerner.
- [70:01]
Jeff O'Neill
Great call Transcription off of yeah. 10:04 to Achoa Station. The the Topeka school. Where do you want to go?
- [70:07]
Rebecca Schinsky
I mean we're fresh off transcription, so that's the one that I'm really thinking of. You can hear us talk about it. We did a book club episode in the Patreon. But this. This is one of those where, like, the synopsis and the book are really different.
- [70:21]
Jeff O'Neill
Just as a. Don't read the synopsis.
- [70:23]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah, technically true, but not. But there's a. A journalist who's going to interview this older academic. His phone dies. He doesn't have a way to record the conversation. And that is our entrance into their conversations with each other in a couple of different timelines. A real meditation on how we speak about art. Like, the book is very much about art and writing. Yeah, it's, what, like, 128 pages?
- [70:49]
Jeff O'Neill
It's really short, very short.
- [70:52]
Rebecca Schinsky
And you just don't totally know what Lerner is doing, what this character is doing. But the. The journalist writes an article based on the conversations that he had with this man, but without a transcript. So there's also a. Like, how do I know what is true? What is the point of recording things? How do we use art and writing? I feel myself being inarticulate talking about it. And it's because Ben Lerner is. Ben Lerner is meant to be read and pondered and is actually quite difficult to talk about, but it's not hard to read. You just have to give yourself over to it. And if you have given yourself over to audition by Katie Kitamura, which I know you have, you're gonna be just fine. Just get weird with Ben Lord.
- [71:31]
Jeff O'Neill
Yes, I've got a bunch here. Rachel, you've really asked for it. So one that was mentioned up top. If you haven't read the English, Understand will by Helen DeWitt. This is like 70 pages, like, barely a novella. The less you know about it, the better. In fact, most of these I'm not going to say much about, because you want to know something about them, but I will do a little bit on a few. So one is Pincher Martin by William Golding, best known for writing Lord of the Flies. This is a survival book. It's quite short. I will say no more. Read to the end. Invisible Calvino, the patron saint of the wlb. I think maybe Italo Calvino, if on a winner's night, a traveler. I like Invisible Cities the best. This is an imagined interaction between Marco Polo and Genghis Khan, in which Marco Polo is fallen into the court of Genghis Khan. And there's a little bit of, like, A Thousand and One Arabian Nights. Like, maybe he has to keep telling these stories to stay alive. We're not really sure but he's telling stories of the places that he's visited but making them up. But it's a chance for Calvino just to like show off his imagination. So it's like if Gulliver's Travels wasn't written by an Italian fabulist, you would get invisible. I know a lot of people. Do you think that's a good SEO topic? Should I write that up? I think we get a lot of traffic from that one. I've talked. We talked about Sea of Trip. We've talked about Emily St. John Mandel. If you not did Sea of Tranquility I think that one has Station 11 is a strange premise but it's actually quite cons it's not predictable story. There's a lot of story in the Sea of Tranquility has a. A construction and a looping in on itself. That's quite amazing. Black no More is a Harlem Renaissance satire. It's not a satire of the Harlem Renaissance. It's a satire written during the Harlem Renaissance. George Tyler is a novelist. The conceit of this one is the main character is out on a on the town. He's drinking a beer. He gets into a nice conversation with a lady, a white woman and she rejects him really only because he's black and the racial politics of being black. And he wakes up the next day and sees on the news or a newspaper I guess there's no TV at this point reads about or on the radio that someone has invented a black no more process by which a black person can become white. And he is the first buyer user of this and then but it's not the first one. So a bunch of people start using the black no More process and it wreaks havoc on the New York social fabric. There's like star bellied sneetches thing but for race in the Harlem Renaissance. It's a weird little book Rebecca. It's a. It's a deep cut for you there and then because you said Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy look for a HTGGT G that's a really awesome shorthand that doesn't help anyone Episode coming to zero well read you near your I did a read alike for that of Steel Life with Woodpecker by Tim Robbins who issues any of the sci fi for just let's be weird and talk about religion and sex and drugs and Buddhism and motorcycles and cigarettes and rock and roll. I love these books. These were extremely important to me as a 14, 15, 16, 17 year old. And because hitchhikers held up so well, I'm going to say Tim Robbins holds up particular well, it's the plot. Doesn't matter. The plots, when you read them, like the synopsis makes you feel like you've eaten a mushroom unbeknownst to you. But it's the vibe, it's the language. It's Tim Robbins literary flights of fancy that you stay for. So that's a six pack of recommendations of WLBS for me.
- [74:53]
Rebecca Schinsky
Really? In your bag here?
- [74:54]
Jeff O'Neill
Yes. Thank you very much. It's not a huge bag. You can fit a lot of books in the bag. Just like. It's like a lot in there.
- [75:00]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah. Is Still Life with Woodpecker your number one Tim Robbins draft?
- [75:03]
Jeff O'Neill
I have no idea. I think they all are kind of doing the same thing. I like Skinny legs with all. I like Even Cowgirls get the Blues. I like another Roadside Attraction, I think. Still, would you like. Okay, Rebecca, do you want to do this? Let's do the synopsis for Still Life with Woodpecker right now.
- [75:18]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah, let's hear it. Let's.
- [75:19]
Jeff O'Neill
I know what it is off the top of my head, but I'm going to read verbatim. Let's see. I need to get to the Publisher's page. There's PRH's page. Page. Here we go. It's a sort of love story that takes place in. I'll let you guess. Anything you want, you get. Let me check. 10 million guesses. What would you. Where would you like to guess? The love story takes place in Still Life with Woodpecker.
- [75:40]
Rebecca Schinsky
Hell. But hell is a planet in outer space.
- [75:42]
Jeff O'Neill
No, it's a pack of Camel cigarettes. It reveals the purpose of the moon, explains the difference between criminals and outlaws, examines the conflict between social activism, romantic individualism, and paints a portion of contemporary society that includes powerful Arabs, exiled royalty, and pregnant SHIELD Leaders. It also deals with the problems of redheads. So that speaks directly to you at the same time.
- [76:07]
Rebecca Schinsky
Well, then I think I've. So I have like circled around Robins for zero to well read and it's impossible to know which one to pick.
- [76:13]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah.
- [76:14]
Rebecca Schinsky
But maybe we'll just go with Still Life with Woodpecker.
- [76:16]
Jeff O'Neill
I don't know what I would love to know. Maybe this needs to be a bonus episode or Patreon, because I think we need to be careful out there because I'm not sure how. Well, a lot of this is page, but if you're open to MLBs, this to me is the. The WLB of my heart. They're 300ish pages, but they read so fast, they might as well be 150 pages.
- [76:35]
Rebecca Schinsky
All right. And we're also. We're gonna end in your bag, Jeff.
- [76:38]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah. So I guess last.
- [76:40]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah, our last letter is from Blake, who he and his wife are expecting, or their baby will be a year old next month. So he's a newer dad and starting to get a little reading time for himself. So this is a shameless recommendation request, and we will say no shame, Blake. Just get that recommendation. You got a year old kid, you do whatever you need to do. He's looking for elevated, gritty Westerns. Some favorites and recent reads include True Grit by Charles Portis, the Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt, Doc by Mary Doria Russell, who has some range because she is the author of the Sparrow, which I was talking about earlier, the Western Short Stories of Elmore Leonard, and of course, the biggie Lonesome Dove. And Blake is also waiting on the 0 to well read episode of that. So, Jeff, what do you have here? Elevated gritty Western.
- [77:26]
Jeff O'Neill
I've got a few ideas here. I'm gonna be surprised if some of these haven't come up, but have you heard of Cormac McCarthy? Have you heard of Blood Meridian? No country for Old Men. You know, sort of take your pick. I. So the judge in Blood Meridian is like the Darth Vader of genre literary, genre fiction. Like if, you know, you know, kind of a figure. The judge in Blood Meridian. I think I prefer the lyricism and plot of no country for Old Men. I also love the movie at the same time, but it's well worth going back to the book if you like that. You mentioned the Sister Brothers. I'm gonna do one more. We were talking with Josh on his show, and I can't remember Josh's last name. That was Johnson. Johnson. And he mentioned Butcher's Crossing by John Williams, which is the second most famous book behind Stoner, which is a cult, which is now properly rated. I think. I think we can all agree we don't need to argue about Stoner being underrated. Overrated. It's just properly rated. But I really like it. This one is a Western. A Harvard graduate, a Harvard student, drops out and heads west in 1870, goes to a small Kansas town and things happen and buckle your seat belts. The level of sentence, like McCarthy, it's using the Western tableau to think about, like, Americans. Like, look West. Melville did the sea with Moby Dick. There's nothing out there. We Plumb the depths of the sea for biblical references and the good and evil. We had to come west to do this. And Butcher's Crossing is doing many of the same things, not stylistically but in the same setting as Cormac McCarthy is doing. So Butcher's Crossing by John Williams and Blood Meridian Slash no Country for Old men by Cormac McCarthy are my selections.
- [79:18]
Rebecca Schinsky
I think we're about due for the latest round of social media people to discover John Williams. Like there's a new stoner renaissance.
- [79:26]
Jeff O'Neill
Like the cicadas, like every seven years they come out of the ground and chirp for a while and you get everyone gets annoyed and you wait for them to go away. Okay, I hear what you're saying.
- [79:34]
Rebecca Schinsky
We're due for it. I don't know that book talk is going to take to John Williams.
- [79:37]
Jeff O'Neill
Are we enough on social to even know? Do we even know? Would you and I even know right now if this is happening?
- [79:43]
Rebecca Schinsky
Tell us. Tell us, people of the Internet. Have the kids discovered Stoner by John Williams?
- [79:48]
Jeff O'Neill
You're right. It's a really good point. It's a really good point. All right, Rebecca. Fun.
- [79:53]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah, this was a good time. Thanks everybody for your questions.
- [79:56]
Jeff O'Neill
You can shoot us email podcast@book riot.com we love to hear follow ups, especially success stories. But we will also hear our failures. That is we, we are big enough to know that it just trains us the the walking book recommendation models that we are. We need to get trained with negative feedback as well. Check out the Patreon deals deals deals is coming up over there. We're gonna have the hot list coming up next week. I believe in this feed as we head towards the summer season. Check out zero to well read a lot of fun stuff. Stuff coming up. Hitchhiker's Guide I guess is in a few weeks. It's not going to be the next one so you have to wait a little while from there. Rebecca, well done. Excellently spotted as always.
- [80:36]
Rebecca Schinsky
Yeah, this was really fun. Also listeners, if you have great family holiday book traditions, send us a voice note to our email@podcastookriot.com and if we get enough of them, I think we could stitch them together and have an
- [80:52]
Jeff O'Neill
interesting maybe we like y'. All. What if we did like a listener stories holiday episode like Christmas, like Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's, stories of books you got or gave or reading around the fire or something. Think about that. If you've got stories, I've got one or two I could add to the the U log if we needed to to flesh.
- [81:10]
Rebecca Schinsky
Nothing's going to top. Family book bingo. That's a high bar. But I'd like to hear people try.
- [81:14]
Jeff O'Neill
Yeah, I'd like to hear people try. That's a cool idea. All right, Rebecca. Thank you so much.