Season 8, Episode 7: Small-Town Escapes + Reading - Why So Serious?

Summary

Currently Reading Podcast

Season 8, Episode 7: Small-Town Escapes + Reading—Why So Serious?

Release Date: September 15, 2025
Hosts: Meredith Monday Schwartz and Kaytee Cobb

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Overview

In this episode, Meredith and Kaytee dive into how to keep reading joyful and avoid taking it “too seriously.” Alongside their signature deep book chat, they explore small-town settings in new releases, celebrate beautiful book editions, consider the impact of book bans, and challenge common “shoulds” in reading habits. The show balances thoughtful reflection and irreverent fun—plus plenty of specific recommendations for your TBR.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Bookish Moments of the Week

• [02:19] Kaytee delights in receiving Katabasis by RF Kuang, admiring its beauty and weight, and describes sharing her curated shelves with an awestruck 12-year-old friend.
  • “If you start this hobby at 12 years old, you’re never going to be able to save for retirement ever.” — Kaytee [03:54]
• [04:11] Meredith shares her passion for book aesthetics and laments the rising cost of physical books, wondering why publishers make more beautiful editions while digital reading surges.
  • “I would love to have Bhumi or somebody in the publishing industry speak into this issue of why physical books seem to be getting more special treatment...” — Meredith [05:22]
• [06:19] Book Awards Spotlight: Meredith celebrates The Tainted Cup winning the Hugo Award, noting its genre mashup strengths—a blend of murder mystery, fantasy, and police procedural.
  • “It’s one of the best genre mashups I’ve ever read.” — Meredith [07:06]

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2. Current Reads & Notable Recommendations

Kaytee’s Picks

• [07:56] Haunted Ever After by Jen DeLuca

  • Small-town, pun-filled Florida setting with a haunted house vibe and “closed door” romance. (Perfect for fall!)
  • "If misogyny bothers you, it will bother you in this book..." — Kaytee [12:00]

• [20:41] Let Them Stare by Jonathan Van Ness & Julie Murphy

  • New Adult, small-town queer mystery. Nonbinary main character, found-family vibes, a ghost drag queen in a vintage bag, and fun/quirky narration.
  • “This small town queer NA mystery is just what the doctor ordered. I laughed. I gasped. I loved it.” — Kaytee [22:37]

• [28:31] Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books by Kirsten Miller

  • Satirical look at book bans in a small Southern town and the unexpected impact of a “wholesome” free library getting restocked with banned books.
  • “This is a feel good small town contemporary fiction story... about the power of books to open hearts and change minds.” — Kaytee [31:22]

Meredith’s Picks

• [13:29] Rites of Extinction by Matt Serafini

  • Noir horror novella: a mother’s grief-driven quest in a creepy small town turns into a descent into “hallucinatory, suffocating” horror.
  • “This is honestly one of the most upsetting books I’ve ever read… I did not enjoy the experience at all.” — Meredith [16:16]
  • Insight: Meredith emphasizes the value of knowing one’s own reading limits and listening to “visceral” responses as guidance.

• [23:52] Jobs to Be Done: A Roadmap for Customer Centered Innovation by Steven Wunker, Jessica Wattman & David Farber

  • Accessible business book applying practical innovation frameworks; famous for the “milkshake theory” and how it reframes understanding customer needs.
  • “You didn’t need a drill, you needed a hole.” — Meredith [28:27]

• [31:40] 20 Years Later by Charlie Donlea

  • Twisty mystery tied to 9/11. Multiple POVs, clever structure, fast pace.
  • “I was literally high-kicking as I read the very last sentence… Charlie Donlea stuck the landing.” — Meredith [35:11]

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3. Bookish Deep Dive: Reading—Why So Serious?

[36:34]

Prompted by a listener question, Meredith and Kaytee dissect ways readers—intentionally or not—overcomplicate their reading lives:

How People (and We) Take Reading Too Seriously

• [37:54] Obsession with Numbers/Goals:
  • “You’re not beholden to a number… Lay that down.” — Kaytee [39:00]
• [40:06] Forcing Misfit Book Club Reads:
  • Choose clubs and projects that serve you, not vice versa. Consider “what result are you looking for?” — Meredith [40:08]
• [41:33] Rigid Recommendation Sources:
  • Over-reliance on bestseller lists or celebrity picks limits joy and serendipity.
• [42:46] The ‘Shoulds’ of Serious/Important Books:
  • “Feeling like all your books need to be serious…is one way I see people taking their reading too seriously.” — Meredith [42:58]
• [44:13] Judging Others’ Reading Choices:
  • “If you are taking your reading so seriously that you are bereft at somebody not having read Stone Yard Devotional, why so serious?” — Kaytee [44:13]
• [45:24] Ownership Over Public Services:
  • Library rules, fines—let people use services in the way that works for them (as long as it isn’t harming others).
• [46:08] The DNF (Did Not Finish) Hang-Up:
  • “Why are we so serious about every book that I start I have to finish?” — Meredith [46:08]
• [46:52] Audiobooks Don’t “Count”:
  • This tired gatekeeping persists beyond core bookish circles; currently reading listeners largely reject it.
• [47:20] Obsessive Tracking (or Not Tracking):
  • “Either one of those big extremes...” — Meredith [47:24]
• [48:23] Yucking Your Own (or Others’) Yum:
  • Where do we self-police joy out of our reading? Why are we “yucking” our own “yums”?
    • “Where are we yucking our own yums?” — Meredith [48:23]
• [50:12] Mantra:
  • That’s none of my business—even when applying that to your own reading rules.

Takeaway Challenge for Listeners

• [50:35] “Your job this week is to… listen for the places in your reading where you are saying ‘should’, and see if you can find one or two to remove and see what happens.” — Meredith [50:35]
• [50:59] “Figure out what’s none of your business.” — Kaytee [50:59]

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The Fountain (Wishes Segment)

• [51:05] Kaytee’s Wish: GBBO for Readers

  • Envisions a cozy, non-competitive TV show where readers hang out, discuss books, and create “vibes,” akin to The Great British Bake Off but for book lovers.
    • “I want GBBO for readers. That's what I want.” — Kaytee [54:06]

• [54:46] Meredith’s Wish Update: Screenshot-to-Email Tech Hack

  • Thanks listener/editor Chrissy for solving last week’s wish about easily emailing phone screenshots using Apple Shortcuts—helping her streamline a task she does “20 times a day.”
    • Meredith and Kaytee agree to link Chrissy’s instructions as a PDF via the website show notes.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On book aesthetics:

  • “It makes my aesthetically pleased reader heart very happy.” — Kaytee [01:05]

• On beautiful editions and FOMO:

  • “If you start this hobby at 12 years old, you’re never going to be able to save for retirement ever.” — Kaytee [03:54]

• On how reading “shoulds” can constrict joy:

  • “What are the shoulds you can take off?” — Meredith [41:35]
  • “Nobody is judging your reading in the same way… You don’t have to prove anything to us.” — Kaytee [44:06]

• On tracking and extremes:

  • “We can track too much or… decide not to track anything at all… both extremes…” — Meredith [47:20]

• On embracing joy and letting go:

  • “Let’s not take all these pieces so seriously.” — Meredith [49:14]
  • “That’s none of my business.” — Kaytee [50:01]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:10 – Intro & Episode Overview
• 02:19 – Bookish Moments of the Week
• 07:56 – Current Reads: “Haunted Ever After” by Jen DeLuca
• 13:29 – Current Reads: “Rites of Extinction” by Matt Serafini
• 20:41 – Current Reads: “Let Them Stare” by JVN & Julie Murphy
• 23:52 – Current Reads: “Jobs to Be Done” by Wunker et al.
• 28:31 – Current Reads: “Lula Dean’s Little Library…” by Kristen Miller
• 31:40 – Current Reads: “20 Years Later” by Charlie Donlea
• 36:34 – Deep Dive: Reading—Why So Serious?
• 51:05 – Fountain Wishes: GBBO for Readers & Tech Hack

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Tone & Language

The hosts keep a tone that is approachable, bookish, irreverent, and warmly encouraging. Strong opinions are met with humor rather than rigidity. They value reflection on personal habits, but never lose sight of joy, experimentation, and pleasure in reading.

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Conclusion

This episode is a thoughtful, wide-ranging blend of readerly wisdom, practical recommendations, and self-reflection. Meredith and Kaytee invite listeners to lay down “shoulds,” embrace fun and serendipity in reading, and prioritize joy—whether you’re chasing ghost stories in small towns, puzzling over business innovation, or just ogling the prettiest new edition on your shelf.

“May your coffee be hot and your book be unputdownable.”

Transcript

[A]

Foreign.

[B]

Hey, readers, welcome to the Currently Reading podcast. We are bookish best friends who spend time every week talking about the books that we've read recently. And as you know, we won't shy away from having strong opinions. So get ready.

[A]

We are light on the chit chat, heavy on the book talk, and our conversations will always be spoiler free. Today we'll discuss our current reads, a bookish deep dive, and then we'll visit the fountain.

[B]

I'm Meredith Monday Schwartz. I'm both a mom and a Mimi and a full time CEO living in Austin, Texas. And I love it when my favorite books get the honors they deserve.

[A]

And I'm Katie Cobb, a homeschooling mom of four living in Arizona. And I think beautiful books deserve to be admired. This is episode number seven of season eight, and we are so glad you're here.

[B]

Oh, yeah, they do, Katie. And there are more beautiful versions of books I feel like coming out and accessible than ever before.

[A]

Indeed. And it makes my reader heart so happy. My, like, aesthetically pleased reader heart very happy. Yeah.

[B]

You know that there's a brand new 20th edition version of Still Life, Louise Penny's first book in her series coming out, which I am really excited about.

[A]

Oh, my gosh. Speaking of, this is not my bookish moment of the week, but I did find out that a local bookstore to me, is doing a watercoloring page edges class in the upcoming weeks. So you, like, clamp your book together and you make a four edge design on it. Oh, so you can make your books. I was like a this should be a monthly class because I need to do it to so many books. Yes, baby. I need to learn this. How fun.

[B]

That is very interesting. That's very interesting.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

All right, well, we will let you know that we are going to do a deep dive today that I like to call reading. Why so serious? There's lots of ways we get in our own heads or we let other people get into our heads about our reading. So we're going to kind of talk about that, maybe unearth some blind spots and make sure that our reading is just a source of enjoyment for us.

[A]

As fun as it should be.

[B]

Exactly. All right, but before we do that, let's start out the way we always do with our bookish moments of the week. Katie, what have you got?

[A]

All right, Meredith, this week, just like everybody else in the world, I got my beautiful copy of Katabasis by RF Wong in the mail. I started it immediately, so it's constantly on my kitchen counter. I just. It's so pretty. I want to touch it. The four edges on that one. Holy moly.

[B]

It is absolutely beautiful. It's heavy.

[A]

It's so heavy. I looked at it last night. It's 540 pages. Ish. But the pages are weighty, right? They're not thick, but they're like dense. I don't know. It's interesting.

[B]

And they're also really white. The pages are really white comparatively. It almost feels like when you have like illustrated like four color illustrated book pages. Like that's a different weight of page paper. And definitely this book, you feel it.

[A]

But they're not glossy. Like it's not graphic novel pages. Right. It's very interesting.

[B]

It is.

[A]

Anyway, it's always on my counter. It's beautiful. I love it. I also had one of my kiddos best friends over at my house this past week and this 12 year old girl just could not get enough of walking around my house to different bookshelves and me pulling out books and being like, surprise, look at this one. So I was like, look at Adventures of Aminah El Sarafi. And then she's like, ooh, octopus. Yay. Love that map. So excited about that. She wants to know the setup for each of these books. And I'm in the YA shelf. I'm in the middle grade shelf. I'm in my adult keeper shelf. I'm all over the place. And she's like, why don't I have pretty copies of books like this? And I was like, oh, honey, if you start this hobby at 12 years old, you're never going to be able to save for retirement ever. Yeah, it will take all your money. Right? But we had so much fun get.

[B]

You a good job so that you can feed your beautiful addition habit.

[A]

Exactly. I'm like, if you can find them at garage sales, get them there.

[B]

Yes. You know this. Earlier this week on my Instagram, I posted a book that I had received out of the blue from the publisher called the Creeping Hand. And it had this great cover, but on the inside it had these end papers that I think are my favorite end papers of all time.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

It's like black and white and it shows like hand drawn illustrations of all the different ways in classic murders that people get killed like a knife and like a mushroom and an axe and all of. And I thought, oh God, there's never been a better set of end papers for me. And now that is what I really want. We talked on Indie Press List about wanting the Phoenix Keeper, I think was the book we were talking about.

[A]

The Phoenix Keeper as wallpaper. Yeah.

[B]

But this one, these end papers, this is the wallpaper that I want.

[A]

See? And I felt that way about the Backyard Book Guide by Amy Tan.

[B]

Oh, yes, yes, yes.

[A]

What is that one called? Backyard Birds for a Year or something. With her actual illustrations of birds.

[B]

Yes. Gorgeous.

[A]

And then the end papers are her illustrations, but made into this kind of argyle pattern. I die.

[B]

Yeah, I know. See, I really do feel like right now, and I would love to have Bhumi or somebody in the publishing industry speak into this issue of why physical books seem to be getting more special treatment. I think that's an interesting trend given that so many people are listening to audiobooks or going fully digital in their reading. Like, I just think that's an interesting part of the publishing world right now.

[A]

Yeah, we did talk about a little bit with regard to tariffs and how that is gonna change the cost of books. And books are already getting more expensive because we are doing these other like, special things to them and how that piece of it is going to go up exponentially because that stuff can't happen in the US like full color pages and stuff. So that was an interesting conversation. I believe that was our last quarter. So maybe March of 2025.

[B]

Great combo, right behind the paywall. So if you want to join us for those conversations.

[A]

Patreon.com currentlyreading podcasts well, speaking of a beautiful book. Yes.

[B]

The Tainted cup.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Won the 2025 Hugo Award for best novel.

[A]

Best sci fi. That's Hugo, right? Is sci fi.

[B]

Is sci fi. Exactly.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

This was my favorite book of 2024. My number one book of 2024. It is this fantastic mix. I know you guys have heard me talk about it, but I just was so happy when I saw that it won the Hugo because it is this fantastic mix of murder mystery and fantasy and it's a police procedural, it's an absolutely fascinating murder mystery, but also this bizarre, you know, these massive magical creatures, the Leviathans are a part of it and there's this magical construct that's a part of it and people have these different knacks, which is really interesting. So I love a really well done genre mashup. And the Tainted cup is one of the best I've ever read. I absolutely love it. I was so happy that it won the Hugo. So that just made my heart happy this week.

[A]

Oh, so good. I saw one of our bookish friends has a scratch off poster of Hugo Award winners that she is doing as like a small bookish project right. Where she Wants to try and complete all of them. And as she reads them, she gets to scratch them off, which is amazing.

[B]

Now that is interesting. That is interesting.

[A]

We know you love a project. I'm pretty sure that's why she shared it. It's like, share your bookish projects. Here's Min.

[B]

I miss that somehow. I absolutely love it.

[A]

Oh, we gotta make sure you see that.

[B]

Yes, I do love a bookish project. I really enjoy that. All right, let's talk about our current reads, Katie.

[A]

All right, perfect. I have some great recs for fall reading this week. First on the docket is Haunted Ever after by Jen DeLuca. This book is perfect for fall reading, as I said, because I'm trying to channel cooler temperatures here in Arizona. I've got my people across the country being like, it's chilly here. It's fall. And I'm like, look, my low is 81 today. It's my low.

[B]

I know it's a tough time of year for those of us in the South. It is.

[A]

It's really hard. Everybody's like, pumpkin spice. And I'm like, blistering heat. Yay.

[B]

It's bikini weather.

[A]

So I wore a bikini yesterday. I'm not kidding. Yeah. Okay. So I read this book this summer, which is not necessarily the right time to read it, but it is perfect to tell you about it. Now I got to attend an author panel with Jen DeLuca at the Tucson Festival of Books in March. This book is meant to be read in October as Jesus intended. So that's why I'm telling you about it now. You can put in your holds. And there's another reason I'm telling right now, too. Boneyard Key, Florida, is the town where this takes place, but it's also a character in itself. It's a small town that barely makes ends meet because all the big tourism dollars go to Orlando and theme parks and Mickey Mouse. Thankfully, they have something that Orlando lacks. A truly haunted town. And the residents play it up for all it's worth. Everything has, like, a punny name. It's very cute. The newest resident is named Cassie. She just bought a house in this adorable town, but definitely doesn't believe in ghosty nonsense. She's like, duh, that's for the tourists. It's fine. But that doesn't change the fact that her new home, well, newly flipped by the previous owners, has weird stuff going on with the power outlets where her laptop won't charge. And it doesn't explain the fact that sometimes when she wakes up in the morning, her magnetic Poetry has moved around to highlight words like wrong, get out my house. It's a little freaky.

[B]

No.

[A]

Yes. No. It's magnetic poetry. It's cute.

[B]

I am so freaked out anytime in books that you go to bed and something is one way and you wake up, it's another thing that is something that absolutely freaks me the f out so badly. And magnetic poetry. I will never have it in my house. Now that you've said that, I will never have it.

[A]

It's banned forever. Yep. Okay. Well, mostly because of the laptop issues, Cassie spends a lot of her time at Hallowed Grounds coffee shop because everything is a pun in this town using their free wi fi and fully functioning power outlets. And she spends plenty of that time making eyes at Nick, the shop owner after their disastrous meet cute where she pretended he was not the owner but just an employee and also spilled his beautifully created coffee all over the place and made suggestions about how to run his shop. It's fine. But Nick is not just playing to tourists. He has a ghost for a roommate who sends him text messages on his phone. He also takes Cassie on the town's best ghost tour, run by the very earnest Sophie, which is when the two of them decide to look into the former inhabitants of Cassie's home to see if they can figure out why it seems she's not wanted there. Meanwhile, sparks start to fly and Cassie isn't sure if she should sink into small town life or run for the hills back to normal non haunted places. This book is perfect transitional piece for spooky season. It's got that sweltering Fall in Florida vibe, right? It's probably 81 as the low but also 80% humidity, but it's mixed with ghouls and ghosties and it's orange. The names of all the businesses are delightfully punny and the spice scenes are closed doors. So this is perfect for a lot of readers. I really enjoyed this story. It was really fun, especially the setting. And I'm looking forward to book two in the series which is called Ghost Business and it came out the Tuesday before this episode released. So in between when we're recording and when this episode comes out, it's now available. I did have a not small quibble with the way this book resolved. It's a little bit spoilery, but I'm just going to say that if misogyny bothers you, it will bother you. In this book if you don't like thinking that like men are better than women just by being men, that's going to be a Problem for you here.

[B]

If you're one of those weirdos, if.

[A]

You'Re a feminist in any way, it's going to bother you. It feels a little spoilery to say exactly how that plays in, but it should suffice to say that I did want to punch some things. That objection was not enough to steer me away from the story. Overall. And the next book in the series appears to be Enemies to lovers and like rival businesses. Very excited about that. One of my favorite romance tropes for now. This one is perfect for this time of year. Grab it. Now it's Haunted Ever after by Jen DeLuca.

[B]

You know, I think I might like a contemporary romance that was Enemies to lovers, but make it about business.

[A]

Uh huh.

[B]

I mean, I know everyone's gonna be like, oh, you've got mail. Wait, no.

[A]

Yeah, a little bit. You've got mail.

[B]

What's the one everybody loves? Is that the Meg Ryan?

[A]

Yeah. Cause it's like Shop around the Corner and Fox Books. Yeah, okay. Yeah, Okay. I mean, this is some of that because it's Sophie who runs the ghost tour and then this new guy shows up in town that's like very business y and he becomes her rival and that's our Enemies to Lovers set up. So yeah, I can see you've got male vibes.

[B]

Okay, excellent.

[A]

And closed door, which is another fun thing because sometimes in contemporary, that's the way to go. Right?

[B]

Exactly. All right, perfect. That actually sounds like a good one. And like you said, perfect for this time of year. All right, I have one that is great for this time of year. If you are looking for not fun, but also scary.

[A]

Yes. All right.

[B]

This is called Rites of Extinction by Matt Serafini. So here's the setup. Our lead character is Rebecca Daniels.

[A]

I know somebody named Rebecca Daniels.

[B]

Oh, you do?

[A]

Crazy.

[B]

She should probably not read this book.

[A]

Okay, I'll let her know.

[B]

In our story, this very fictional Rebecca Daniels is a private investigator. She is drowning in grief and lots of really cheap whiskey. She's trying to find the monster who murdered her daughter. She has followed him to a really, really small New Hampshire town called Brightfork. So what starts out as a straightforward revenge mission, which I'm all for, quickly spirals into something far more disturbing when Rebecca discovers that the town has some secrets more and darker than she had ever imagined. And brutal killings pile up. And she's having these terrifying visions that are making her blur the line between reality and her absolutely losing her sanity. And Rebecca has to navigate secret rituals and confront not just her daughter's. Killer, but the darkness growing inside herself. All right, Rites of Extinction is a book that came to me by way of Betsy and I's read through of 101 horror books to read before you get murdered by Sadie Katie Hartman, which we are loving. But I have to tell you, this is honestly one of the most upsetting books I've ever read. And I mean that in a proceed with serious caution kind of way, not in a oh, it's upsetting rush out and get this immediately kind of way. I know I can be confusing on those topics. Let me dig into the why of this, because I think the exercise of figuring out that why behind such a strong reaction helps me and hopefully you guys, to make some better reading choices. So this is a really short work of very graphic horror and it is really well done in that it is a study as so many great works of horror are in the hardest kinds of grief. This one a mother's grief over her lost child. So that's already tough territory to navigate. But the visceral kind of mind bending way that Matt Serafini presents this grief takes things to a whole other level. Matt Serafini blends hard boiled detective noir with folk horror and he creates an atmospheric nightmare. This is as if True Detective and Wicker man got together. This combo will work really well for some readers. It didn't work for me and I've thought a lot about this. I'm giving this book four stars because it's did everything that it set out to do. Actually, it did it really well. The writing is very strong, the atmosphere is suffocating in exactly the way that the author intends it to be. And I was never bored, not for a single page. But here's where we get into this difference between a book being good and a book being enjoyable. Because I did not enjoy the experience of reading this one at all, which is a pattern that I have seen in my reading of these 101 books.

[A]

To read before you get murdered, which.

[B]

Is important to know. So I want to know myself as a reader. You guys do too. I am breaking down the why this visceral, nope. Reaction to me. For me, this book contained two things that just don't work. First, it seamlessly blends real life and hallucinatory visions and graphic what is real and what is not. Scenes are really hard for me. Like you're in one place with the character and all of a sudden something very otherworldly is happening that is the hallmark of this book. It's what he does really well and it is. I want to say what a lot of readers love about this book. I just don't enjoy that experience. It's unsettling to me in a way that puts a knot in my stomach that is good for me to know. Secondly, and also just a personal preference thing, this book blends sexual pleasure with horror in ways that I find really difficult. It's not my jam. Some readers, again, love that kind of boundary pushing horror that makes you feel that kind of uncomfortable. If that's you, I want you to hear that this book will deliver it in spades. So I thought a lot about whether to bring this book to the show at all because my reaction was so visceral and negative. But I decided to talk about it again because this exercise of figuring out our why behind our reactions makes us more able to make better choices in the future. This novella packs devastating emotional punch. It does explore the lengths that a mother will go for vengeance, and it also questions what sacrifices are worth making. This is Rites of Extinction by Matt Serafini.

[A]

Sounds rough. And I also have a book for you to take off your TBR if it was anywhere near it. Okay. The Unveiling by Quan Berry has that same. You can't tell when she started hallucinating and when reality sets back in. And there's a lot of gore in both sides of that. Yeah. So you're just like, I don't know what's actually happening right now. Yeah. It takes place in Antarctica, which is what drew me to it. I love an Antarctic storyline. Yeah. But it was very unsettling to read as well. Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

Very, very good to know about that book. And in general, that's, you know, one of those things that can help me make better choices. So now I just, I'm like, you know what if it talks about Fever Dream, if it talks about hallucinatory, well, sometimes that works.

[A]

What's that one? The need by Helen Phillips.

[B]

That is the exception that proves the rule.

[A]

Right, Right.

[B]

Because it is like maybe the one book that I can point to that worked for me, that had that element to it. These are things that we need to know about ourselves as readers.

[A]

We did also in the spreadsheet this year, add a spice level rating and including one that's sexy time that's not sexy. And this is exactly the type of book that you would use that for, where you're like, I need to know this for future readers if I'm telling them about it. But also, this is horror and there's a lot going on here. We're blending horror and sexual scenes. So it's just an important thing to know. Yep, indeed. I have something much lighter than that for my second one. Okay, I'm going to talk about Let Them Stare by Jonathan Van Ness and Julie Murphy, two people I adore. Just like my first book, we've got someone who cannot wait to leave town. In this case, it's Sully, a non binary teen who cannot wait to leave the small town of Hearst, Pennsylvania. After graduating from high school, they have an internship with a high powered influencer set up in New York City. But by the end of chapter one, all the plans have fallen apart and Sully is stuck in their hometown, floundering. They even sold their car in preparation to move to the big city. In desperation, Sully heads to the thrift store to see if they can get their job back and make some cash for future plans to try and at least leave Hearst as the owner's favorite employee for many years. They get to rifle through a new box of donations that was left on the porch. And in there, they find a vintage bag that could potentially be worth six figures. Oh. If Sully can verify the bag itself and its provenance, they can make New York City life happen for real. But when they get home and open the bag to investigate it, a ghost named Rufus reveals himself inside. Rufus is a drag Queen from the 1950s who cannot remember how he died and he got stuck in his own bag. Sully has to help lay Rufus to rest by figuring out what happened to him. Sully and Rufus team up with Brad, the most boring other gay dude in town, to drive them around in Sully's old car. Sully had sold their car to Brad and help solve the mystery. As they peel back the layers on Rufus and his history in Hearst, Sully and Brad discover a scintillating town history that makes them love their hometown more than they thought possible. This one was so fun. It was so fun.

[B]

I have a question just to kind of orient myself. Who's the audience for this?

[A]

What is the audience? I'm calling this New Adult Small Town Queer Mystery. Okay, so who's the audience for that? Well, apparently a 41 year old adult woman that moved back home. Right? That's who it is, right? Jonathan Van Ness is the author here. One of the two authors obviously known by most of us as the hair and makeup maven on Queer Eye. Julie Murphy is known for authoring so many books, but especially the Dumplin series. That's where she really like made her name, got her start right. The Fact that these two teamed up to create a joyfully queer new adult small town mystery feels like the best version of this current disaster timeline that we're living in. My full review on storygraph only says, oh, Sully. It was probably the narration by Jonathan Van Ness, but this small town queer na mystery is just what the doctor ordered. I laughed. I gasped. I loved it. Julie and Jonathan are a force to be reckoned with. It was fabulous on audio. Again, narrated by jvn and I'd happily read anything else this dynamic author duo puts together in the future. The characters were delightful. The mystery was a little bit nerve wracking and exciting. There are some mental health issues that are dealt with in here, especially in the past timeline. The past timeline is just as fun as the present one. And I was delighted by this entire thing. Also the COVID it looks bizarre, but it makes sense within the story. This book is phenomenal. It's Let Them Stare by Jonathan Van Ness and Julie Murphy.

[B]

I love that premise. That is a really fun premise.

[A]

Like inside a bag, there's a drag queen ghost. What? I love it so much.

[B]

And then the boring gay guy that's helping them solve the mystery.

[A]

My gosh. And Sully calls the boring gay guy Bread. They're like, well, Bread showed up with the car. I mean, Brad. And then Brad finds out that Sully calls him Brad.

[B]

And that is so funny.

[A]

Oh my God, it's so funny. I love it.

[B]

Okay, my next one is a business book and a business book that I that I've been meaning to read forever. It's a book called Jobs to Be Done, A Roadmap for Customer Centered Innovation by Steven Wunker, Jessica Watman, and David Farber. All right, this is where all y' all who are not interested in business related things, just fast forward, fast forward real quick. Go, go to Katie's next book. In Jobs To Be Done, the author takes the famous milkshake theory. Katie, I don't know if you've heard about this, but back in the day, this is where McDonald's had this business breakthrough. They figured out that commuters weren't buying milkshakes because they were hungry or thirsty for a milkshake, but because they needed something to make their boring drive more interesting. Okay. And it turns out that they were able to create an actual roadmap that you can follow from thinking about business in that kind of way. The core premise is simple. Customers don't buy products. They hire them to get specific jobs done in their lives. So you bought a quarter inch drill, Katie you didn't want the drill, you wanted a quarter inch hole. Does that make sense?

[A]

Okay. Yes. Yes.

[B]

And they explain the theory with several really useful examples. Like, they show how Snapchat beat Instagram by doing less, not more. Right. Like, Snapchat stripped away filters and likes, and they just satisfied the user's need to document real life without performance anxiety. So this isn't about demographic segmentation or focus groups telling you what they want. It's about understanding the actual progress that people are trying to make in specific circumstances and building your product to nail those jobs. All right, this is a very famous business book, and it was recommended to me multiple times by Roxanna. She's an expert on this kind of thing and has used this in her work. So of course I knew I needed to pick it up. Mostly because I tend to read a lot of business books that are about management and leadership, and this one instead is centered around product innovation, like coming up with ideas for new products or services for your company. And its approach is, in one way really obvious and also often in my mind, completely overlooked. For this reason, it was a fascinating read. The chapters are short and actionable. They go over everything from charting that roadmap to figuring out what it is that your customers actually need from you. It's probably not exactly what you think they need from you, so it's helping you discover their pain points and then how to come up with new products and services that align with what your customers actually need. There are a lot of graphics and handy appendices at the end to remind you of the different exercises that you can go through to do this work. I also appreciated that the book is general enough that no matter what industry you're in, you're likely to find something really useful here. And they did a good job of using really specific anecdotes to illustrate the points that they were making, making those larger concepts easier to understand. My only issue is that there is quite a bit of repetition in this book. Each chapter starts out telling you what it's going to do, and at the end it tells you what it's done.

[A]

And.

[B]

And in the middle I'm like, come on, I'm reading the book, you guys.

[A]

Like, I got it. You don't have to tell me again. Yeah, right.

[B]

But this is a small quibble in an overall hearty recommendation for this book. It's definitely going to be added to my list of favorite business books. And I do want to do a little tease and let you know that I and my best friend, Lisa who's my COO are going to be doing something related to business books in the coming months because loads and loads of y' all are interested in this genre way more than I thought. That's in the future. But just letting you know that is in the works. It'll be related to Here Comes the guide. This is one that I annotated the heck out of and I will be returning to over and over again. This is Jobs to Be a Roadmap for Customer Centered Innovation by Steven Wunker, Jessica Wattman and David Farber.

[A]

All right, that sounds good. I love that. Reframing, rethinking. Yeah. What's the actual thing that the customer is looking for here rather than what could we make that might serve somebody or not? Right.

[B]

You didn't need a drill, you needed a hole.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

All right, Katie, what is your next book?

[A]

Let me tell you, I'm excited. I am bringing Indie Press List book from this year, but I'm going to talk about Lula Dean's Little Library of Banned books by Kirsten Miller. Yes. So this is a departure from Kirsten Miller's previous runaway bestseller, The Change. This 2024 release was shoved back onto my radar in June when Schuler Books, one of our IPL anchor stores, put it on the indie press list for that month. And because I had some big feels about the change and not all of them were positive, I actually had taken this off my tbr. It was only the Indie Press list where I have agreed to read 10 to 20% of each of these books that put it back on. And it turns out I loved it. So thanks, Shuler. Here's the setup. The titular Lula Dean lives in the tiny town of Troy, Georgia, where she's leading the way in book banning at school board meetings. Beverly Underwood is on that town school board and pushes back against Lula, her nemesis, at every opportunity. When Lula Dean makes a little free library in front of her house filled with wholesome books about cake baking and real manhood, she definitely doesn't expect that a town vigilante will replace every title inside its dust jacket with the very books she has been trying to ban. Her library now houses literary classics, gay romance, black history, Judy Blume, the worst offender, of course, and more. When the neighbors start to borrow books, they realize that instead of Chicken Soup for the Soul, they're grabbing something that's going to change their lives. Because of course, this is fiction, even though it skates close to many of the issues in today's news and headlines so every library patron that stops by the little free library happens to walk away with a book that's exactly perfect for them and their place in life. Finally, one of Lula Deen's enemies discovers the library and decides to turn the tables on her, just as Lula and Beverly are running against each other to replace the town's mayor. It's drama, it's exciting. It's also a small town. This is a theme for me, this episode. I brought three small town books. This is a feel good small town contemporary fiction story. It's a bit kitchen sink because it feels like via book banning, Kirsten Miller is tackling every single issue under the sun. We've got social justice, we've got gay rights, we've got are girls allowed to talk about their periods, is sex okay to bring to the table, et cetera. But it's also about the power of books to open hearts and change minds. And that's why it resonates so much with so many readers on storygraph. It's rocking nearly four and a quarter stars and is marked as both funny and hopeful. It's oftentimes marketed as satire, which I'm on the record as not really loving because the books themselves and the suspension of disbelief required is so over the top. But it's sweet enough to counterbalance that satirical harshness. And for that reason, I was reluctant to say it, but it's true. I did love it. This is Lula Dean's little library of banned books by Kirsten Miller.

[B]

Yeah, that was a good one.

[A]

I like that one. It was so cute. And I loved, like, even the COVID on this one. It was just delightful.

[B]

All right, my third book. I am squarely back in my happy wheelhouse with 20 years later by Charlie Donnelly. Here is the setup. You've probably heard this a couple of different places. Twenty years after 9 11, our lead character, TV host Avery Mason, stumbles onto what she thinks will be a feel good story about the fact that even 20 years later, we are still identifying victims. Remains feel good only in that, like a resolution, like, hey, we're getting some closure kind of thing.

[A]

Let's talk about remains, folks. This is a feel good story.

[B]

Like, people are getting closure. We're closing the book on that kind of thing.

[A]

Fair.

[B]

Yes, a happy resolution story. Until she learns that the woman they found the remains of was about to be charged with murder. Victoria Ford's sister has been waiting for two decades to clear Victoria's name. And she's got a recording of Victoria's final call from the North Tower. Swearing she was innocent, Avery teams up with Walt Jenkins, the original detective on the case who's now a washed up FBI agent hiding out in Jamaica with a serious alcohol like a rum habit. But here's the thing. Both Avery and Walt are running from their own messy pasts, and this cold case is about to dredge up way more than anyone bargained for. This was my first Charlie Donnelly book, and honestly, I almost didn't make it past chapter one. The opening had this super metaphor, heavy, trying too hard vibe that made me wonder if I'd picked up the wrong book. But here's the thing. I'm so glad I stuck with it, because whatever writerly posturing was happening in those first few pages disappeared. The prose quickly relaxed into a much more readable style, and I never thought twice about it again. Sometimes authors just need a minute. They just need a minute to find their groove, you know? And also, this book had been recommended by Elizabeth Barnhill on all things Murderful, and so I knew there was more than met the eye initially. Once Dom Lee hit his stride for me, I was all in. This is the kind of author I will reach for when I want a fast read that keeps me turning pages like Andrea Mara or Kara Hunter kind of territory. The mystery structure here is really clever. You're actually getting breadcrumbs for three different mysteries as the POVs shift, and that constant rotation keeps that momentum humming. I was genuinely interested in all three storylines, which is no mean feat. There are also some light mixed media elements sprinkled throughout that I really enjoyed. They added texture without feeling gimmicky. Now, fair warning, There are several POVs and there are several characters to keep track of. If you're someone who gets overwhelmed juggling multiple perspectives or remembering who's who, this might be a little bit of a struggle for you, but if you can roll with it, the payoff is worth it. I'm not usually Also, an ending makes the book kind of reader, but in this case it absolutely did. I was literally high kicking as I read the very last sentence. Charlie Donnelly stuck the landing in a way that made everything that came before it feel even better. I'm definitely going to be reading him again. There's a book that I don't know if it recently came out, but it's recently being talked about a lot called Guess Again that I immediately downloaded onto my Kindle. This one is 20 years later by Charlie Donnelly. I really, really like him, and in my notes, I don't know why I kept calling him Charles Donnelly. That's not what he goes by.

[A]

You were elevating him like his metaphors.

[B]

Yeah, but I like this one a lot.

[A]

He only goes by Charles with his friends. Or his teacher, I guess, probably.

[B]

Or his mom.

[A]

Maybe his mom calls him Charles when he's in trouble.

[B]

Charles Donnelly.

[A]

Charles Donnelly, get over here. That sounds good. I vacillate wildly between really enjoying stories that have a connection to 911 and being like, no, it's still too soon. Yeah. I go back and forth regularly.

[B]

I will say that this book does ground itself, especially at the beginning, in that 911 element. But you're not there for a long time.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

If that helps to know.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It's not something that's sitting in the 911 ness of it all, because I understand what you're saying there.

[A]

I also really like drinking rum in Jamaica, so I can identify with that part.

[B]

I will say there is a lot of rum related. Like, Walt has become an expert in rum. It's like, the only thing he drinks.

[A]

Oh.

[B]

So as he travels around, like, he goes to New York City at one point and he's like. It's kind of an interesting element of things, actually, now that you mentioned it.

[A]

Okay, okay. I mean, I just meant, like, your standard Appleton Jamaican rum. Like, just.

[B]

Yeah, this guy knows his rum.

[A]

Okay. Yeah.

[B]

All right. Well, my books today had me thinking as we went into our deep dive. My books were three very different kinds of books, Right. One that kind of pushed me way past my comfort zone. A business book that pushed me to think differently. And then a really easy milkshake book that just had me turning the pages, and it had me thinking about reading and how, for me, right now, all of those different kinds of reading are helping to make my reading fun, but they also can be really different reading experiences. So I wanted to talk a little bit, Katie, about this element of reading being overly serious sometimes. Because we got a message from our own dearly beloved Rebecca Hoffer, who hosts Love and Chili Peppers with you behind the Paywall. And she says, how do people take their reading too seriously? You guys have been preaching for years that there's no reading police. But despite that, people in your DMs and comments constantly seem to be taking reading too seriously. What reading or bookish habits make you guys want to take someone by the shoulders and shake them a little bit and just say, why are we being so serious about this?

[A]

Why so serious?

[B]

Why so serious? This, I know, gave both of us a lot to think about.

[A]

Yes, definitely. And I think the overarching Theme here is that we are seeking joy and fun in our reading. And you can say that your reading serves you in a lot of different ways. Maybe your primary goal for reading is to learn new things, but still, you can allow for certain frivolity in your reading life. Right. Even if you're like, listen, my entire goal is to be an expert on the law. And all I can read right now is things about the law. Oh, my gosh, I hope you're doing something fun in your life. Right, Right. But there's room for fun there as well. And I think the first thing that came to mind for me is that a lot of us are guilty of this. We over obsess about the number of books read or the number of pages read or how much we've accomplished each year in our reading. Reading should serve you. You are not beholden to a number. You're not beholden to making sure that you've hit your Goodreads goal for the year. Like, it's too much. You're putting too much weight on it. Lay that down.

[B]

Exactly. There is so much in our lives that are just pushing us to be a certain way or have it be accomplish a certain thing. I have said a million times on the show, I have got to have an area of my life where I just let it be what it wants to be in that moment. And sometimes it's a whole season, and sometimes it's just on a particular day. I hear a lot from people who say, one of the things that I feel compelled to do is that I have to read every book that my book club chooses, even when I absolutely don't, and it'll throw off my reading for an entire month. And to that I say, okay, you have to think about what result are you looking for. Is the reading as a part of that book club important enough to you for whatever reason? And I think you should be really clear about what those reasons are that you put off reading things that you like instead. Or are you feeling like you should be a part of a book club? Maybe this book club is not the right one for you.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And maybe you could consider setting that book club down and just freeing yourself or just deciding you're not going to actually read the book if it doesn't call to you and you just tell the people in your book club didn't call me, and I wasn't going to let myself get stuck behind it. So I would love to hear the conversation, but that's where I am right now. So options in how we handle Something like that, right.

[A]

And I think that really leads to joy, serendipity and happenstance in reading, which is kind of how I grouped that idea of like getting stuck behind a book. And that could be over committing on reading plans or over reliance on a single recommendation source like Oprah's Book Club or Read with Jenna or the New York Times Bestseller List and saying, well, these are the books and this is my limited pool that I'm allowed to pull from. If you're never allowing for something wildly off the beaten path to find you, if you're never straying from the beaten path, nothing wildly off the beaten path will find you because that's not where the books are, right? Not the ones that are going to serve you in that way. And if your book club is choosing all your reads and then you're getting stuck behind them because it takes you three weeks to read 300 pages because you are bored to tears or because the writing is garbage or because you just don't like that thing, then you're missing out on all the serendipity and the happenstance and the joy of letting something else guide your reading.

[B]

I think whenever you are feeling the word should about your reading, at least for me, that's when I try to be really present and say, am I taking my own reading too seriously? I mean, you know, one of the things that we talk about, Katie, is like, how often do we let ourselves read into series when we feel like for the show we shouldn't do that? Well, that's a governor that. I decided a couple of years ago I was going to take off my own reading and say, you know what, I'm going to read what I want to read. Because that is in fact what's good for my reading, which is what is good for me as a book podcaster. But for every reader, what are the shoulds that you can take off? I mean, I heard from someone this week who said, I struggle with feeling like I need to read award winning books or nominees, especially when like the booker lists are coming out or the National Book Award is coming out. I was talking about the Hugo Award. Those can all be great bookish projects. They can be great ways to say, like I do one booker book every year, which one of these would fit? But feeling like all of your books need to be serious or credible, have some gravitas. That is one way that I see a lot of people taking their reading too seriously. And I will say, preaching to the choir here, I feel like to the group who's listening to us. But for a lot of people who are not currently reading at all in their lives, I feel like this is the single biggest element where they feel like, well, either I don't know what to read or, well, the books that I kind of feel pulled to don't feel like they're not smart enough. They're not smart enough. They feel like they're not worth my time if I'm going to say I'm reading.

[A]

Are they real books?

[B]

Are they real books? This is a category of should that I think we work really hard here on the show to drill out of everybody. But this is a place where we really need to be evangelizing to our friends who are not currently reading a lot. It's like, but what if you just said you could read this Girl Falls in Love with a Dragon book instead of Stone Yard Devotional.

[A]

Both great books.

[B]

Both great books. But what if. What's keeping you from making reading a habit in your life is these shoulds about is this book important enough? So that's a place where people take their reading way too seriously.

[A]

Yes. Absolutely agree. I think there's also a seriousness to A, recommending books to others and B, having feels about other people's reading. Right. So judging which books other people keep on their bookshelves or haven't read or have read.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

If you are taking your reading so seriously that you are bereft at somebody not having read Stone Yard Devotional, why so serious? Right? Like, let their reading lives be their own. And nobody is judging your reading in the same way. You don't have to prove to any of us that you're capable of reading this literary masterpiece by Ocean Vuong. I'm positive it's gorgeous, but nobody cares if you read that or not. You don't have to prove anything to us. Yeah, I feel the same way about feeling ownership over public reading services like the library. Goodness. We got so much pushback on poor Roxanna for saying that she racks up library fines, and it's totally fine with her because she's willing to pay them. And that's how using the library works for her. The library is a public service. What somebody else does with the library, other than these poor librarians who were like, listen, I've had somebody show up and drop their pants at the library fines desk. That's not something I'm for. But paying your fines on time, that doesn't bother me at all. It's okay to lay down any ideas about how somebody else's reading life should go.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

You don't have to take their reading life so seriously. It's okay. It's okay, right?

[B]

Well, I feel like people who get really police y about any of these things. I say this as someone who tends toward this kind of thinking, are sometimes some of the people who struggle from that seriousness most. You know what I mean? Like, they are the most. And again, I struggle with being this kind of person. I naturally put rules on myself about the dumbest things. One of the things that I've really just gotten much better at in the last seven years we've been doing the show is DNFing. I think that's a place where. Why are we so serious about every book that I start I have to finish.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And then also, when we have people in our lives who refuse to dnf, maybe we don't give them. Like, we can say, like, hey, you know that you can set that book down. Right. But maybe that person is just fundamentally not built that way, and we cannot give them crap about it.

[A]

Yeah. They don't need a TED Talk. Right.

[B]

That's another way that we cannot take our reading so seriously. Of course. And this doesn't happen in this group. I feel like Katie. I feel like this is done and dusted in this group. But out in the. In the wild, this audiobooks don't count as real reading thing. That's still a thing that people are talking about, Katie.

[A]

It still is. Constantly. I see it all the time still. And you're right. Not in the bookish friends group.

[B]

No.

[A]

If anything, it's like, hey, how are you guys logging this on your spreadsheet? Can I double count audiobooks? Because I read them and listened to them, and we're like, yeah, girl, more power to you. Like, enjoy everything, you know?

[B]

Right. Which leads to another way that we can take our reading too seriously. We can take it too seriously where we can track too much, or we can take it too seriously where we decide we're not going to track anything at all. And that. That becomes a part of our personality.

[A]

Because vibes are more serious than numbers. Right.

[B]

Than data. Exactly. So either one of those big extremes I think we need to at least be walking through and thinking, am I taking this part of my readerly identity too seriously? Is it keeping me from finding the joy in all of this? You know, if my mom. My mom doesn't feel this way, but if a hypothetical mom felt really strongly that e readers are destroying the book world, she's taking that too seriously. They're not destroying the book world. They just might not be right for Mom. Mom might not ever use an e reader.

[A]

Right.

[B]

She loves to own physical copies of books. That's great. And then there's someone else who feels like owning physical copies of books is wasteful and wasteful of space and too maximalist. Again, why are we spending any time not only stealing anyone else's joy, yucking anyone else's yums, but also, where are we yucking our own yums?

[A]

Oh, my gosh. Yes.

[B]

That's the thing that I think is. I mean, we could talk all day about how people flame and da, da, da, da online about, you know, whatever. Whatever you do, you. I spend a lot of time yucking my own yums just in my life in general.

[A]

Yes, Yes. I like this, but I shouldn't. So I need to lay it aside. I need to set it aside.

[B]

I am really trying to adopt a new way of thinking for my own self in my life in general, because I've really done a pretty good job of adopting this in my reading life. As a starting point of, like, it's okay that I want to read a totally smutty book about Peter Pan right now, because I will be on to something else that feels good to me in a different. It's okay if for 10 years I read only cozy mysteries. That's okay. Let's not take all of these pieces so seriously.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

For other people, certainly stop telling anyone else how they should read or not read or do or not do in the book world. Let's keep this as a place of joy, but then also stop yucking our yums.

[A]

I love it when people use the phrase that's none of my business to describe something happening in their own hearts and their own lives. So, like, oh, you know, smut is not for serious readers. But that's none of my business, because it doesn't matter. That's the epitome of yucking your own yum is to say that thing and then say, you know what? That's none of my business. I don't care about that. And it's none of my business what somebody else decides is important in their reading life. And it's none of my business what I've decided is unacceptable in my reading life.

[B]

So what I'm getting from that Katie, as an enneagram, one with an extremely mouthy inner critic, I could say, when she says things to me like, that.

[A]

I could be like, like, Meredith is not a blah, blah, blah. Well, that's none of my business.

[B]

That's none of my business. That's an interesting way to think about it, Katie.

[A]

When people say, that's none of my business, it makes me clench with joy every time.

[B]

Yeah, that's interesting.

[A]

I'm like, yes, that's none of my business. I like it. Let's take it less seriously. Maybe that's none of your business. Your own business. None of my business for sure.

[B]

All right, so, listeners, your job this week is to think about, highlight, bright line. Listen for the places in your reading, maybe in your life if you want to, but in your reading where you are saying should, and see if you can find one or two of those shoulds about other people or about your reading to remove and see what happens. Just use it as an experiment.

[A]

Figure out what's none of your business.

[B]

I love it. All right, let's visit the fountain.

[A]

All right, Meredith, I am wishing first, even though you didn't invite me to. But that's fine because I'm so excited about my wish this week. I, like, interrupted you.

[B]

My invitation was implicit. Katie, please.

[A]

Perfect. I think you were about to say, katie, what are you. And I was like, nope, I'm ready. I got this. So I this week, am wishing. And honestly, Meredith, I would like you to make this happen. I wish for a show about readers not in competition, just hanging out with each other. So in real time. The next season of Great British Baking show debuted this past week. Yesterday. I'm not a huge TV watcher. I will occasionally binge a show. I did watch the Pit, of course, because Meredith told me to, especially by myself. But this is something I mark on my calendar and schedule into my life as God and his angels intended. So I'm caught up, of course, But I also. It creates a vibe. I sit down, I watch an episode, and then I can go straight from there to a Netflix fireplace and I can pick up my book. And I'm just in this, like, contented place in my life, right? So as I picked up my book, which was My Beautiful Catabasis by RF Kuang, I was looking at the Netflix fireplace, and I had percolating in the back of my head this idea of how to make a show for and about readers that has the vibes of gbbo. It's not a competition, so there's no competitive nature to reading. But even when they are in competition on Great British Bake off, the bakers support each other and hug each other and cheer each other on, and they say, good job when somebody's coming back from the table for judging. And maybe that's quintessentially British. Or maybe it's the low stakes. You don't win a million dollars. You get a cake plate if you win, you've done the most amazing baking anyone has ever seen in their lives, and they give you a plate if you win. It's just low stakes. Everything's low stakes. So here's what I'm picturing. This show is a limited series, and you could put it on a few times throughout a reading retreat weekend or a week. I need to work on what the actual heck it would be about. But why would you watch this instead of a real show? What job does it do? It could be interviews or conversations that encourage us to watch a single episode and then get into our own reading lives more. It's like reader boot camp, but without the yelling. Mm. So you would sit down, you would maybe talk to. There would be an interview portion, like Finding Our Roots by Henry Louis Gates, where we talk a little bit about this reader's life and we talk about what they've laid down in their reading life, and they talk about some of their favorite recommendations. And you could put it on when your book club people are showing up, as people are dropping their snacks off at the counter before you actually sit down to have your structured conversation. It's creating a vibe. It's giving you. The books are fun to talk about, and we're all here for the right reasons. Vibe.

[B]

I like this idea.

[A]

It has no commercial appeal. It's not marketable at all. But I want GBBO for readers. That's what I want. Yeah.

[B]

I mean, I love the idea of someone sitting down in a bookstore with a bookseller and talking about everything, you know, about their reading life and what they're loving and what they're wanting more of. And then the bookstore owner going and grabbing a stack of books and then coming and recommending each one, one by one. Now, would that be totally commercially successful? No. But I do feel like there's some things on YouTube that you can find where some people are doing things like that. And that may be the closest that we're going to get. But I'm all about a GBBO for readers. I think that would be wonderful.

[A]

Right. I just want that feeling. But even more book centered, or at all book centered.

[B]

I will tell you that my Fountain Wish this week is actually an update on last week's Fountain Wish, which, before the show had even aired, I already had my wish granted by the absolutely fantastic Chrissy, who has been editing our show. When she heard me say it during her edit she got ahold of me and said, okay, Meredith, you said your wish was that you could take a screenshot and then in just like one click, you could send it to your own email, because that's something that you do 20 times a day. Chrissy, let me know that you can use Apple Shortcuts to create a lot of different things. I really had never looked into Apple Shortcuts. Maybe there are people who are like, what? This is something I use all the time. It's a lot more complicated than I think most people are going to want to dip into. It's not super intuitive, but get you a friend maybe, who can walk you through it. Chrissy is not available for this for everyone.

[A]

No.

[B]

She did create some overall instructions for how she solved my specific problem. So if that's something that you want, you can send us an email and we will send you the PDF that she created. But she is not available for tech support. She is not available to walk you through it. I want to be super clear about that because I am not going to put her out there like that. But if you also love the idea of having the ability to, like, screenshot something and immediately send it to a particular place, we can at least maybe get you a little further down that road by providing those instructions and shortcuts, was the answer. Apple Shortcuts, which exists on all of our phones. Who knew? And how great it is to have a wish granted that quickly.

[A]

Oh, my gosh. It seriously is great. And we're going to do you one better. So if you click through to the main site for the show notes for this, like, go to the actual Currently Reading website. I will link that PDF document so you don't even have to ask somebody for it. You're just going to click from your podcast app straight into the Currently Reading show notes for this episode and it will be there just like our transcripts are every week.

[B]

Oh, great.

[A]

And one last step to get the shortcuts of your dreams. It's going to be great.

[B]

Exactly. So you have to actually go to the Currently Reading website and our Show Notes page is what you need to click through to not just the show notes on your podcast player.

[A]

Right. It will not move over a document into the podcast player. So we have to make the PDF live on the website. Okay.

[B]

But while you're over there on the Currently Reading podcast website, you can take a look at our list of hundreds of books that we pressed. You can take a look at our list of best books for babies 0 to 3 years old, lots of great things over there.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And then transcripts for every episode. All right, Katie, that is it for this week. As a reminder, here's where you can connect with us. You can find me I'm Meredith, Meredith Monday Schwartz on Instagram and you can.

[A]

Find me, Katie@notesonbookmarks on Instagram. Our show is produced and edited every week by Megan Putabong Evans with amazing assistance from Chrissy Whitley. You can find Megan on Instagram at most of megansreads full show notes with.

[B]

The title of every book we mentioned in the episode and timestamps so you can zoom right to where we talked about. It can be found in our show notes and on our website@currentlyreading podcast.com youm.

[A]

Can also follow the show at currentlyreading Podcast on Instagram or email us@currentlyreading podcastmail.com.

[B]

And if you want more of this kind of content, you can join us on patreon. For just $5 a month, you can become a bookish friend. You get so much more content. You get fantastic community and you keep this show commercial free. If you also want to help us, you can rate and review us on Apple podcasts and shout us out on social media. Every one of those things makes a huge difference in our being able to find our perfect audience.

[A]

Yes, bookish friends are the best friends. Thank you for helping us grow and get closer to our goals.

[B]

All right, until next week, may your.

[A]

Coffee be hot and your book be unputdownable.

[B]

Happy reading, Katie.

[A]

Happy reading, Meredith Sa.