Ep 444 - New Year Book Tracking!

Summary

Reading Glasses Ep 444: New Year Book Tracking!

January 8, 2026
Hosts: Brea Grant & Mallory O’Meara

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Brea and Mallory dive into their book tracking methods for the new year, discussing what works, what they’re changing, and how tracking impacts their reading lives. They share listener feedback, reflect on last year’s reading data using Cawpile (a detailed book tracking spreadsheet), and test out a bookish candle. The conversation is casual, funny, and full of practical insight, perfect for anyone wanting to get more organized about reading in 2026.

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What We're Reading

[00:34-04:14]

• Brea Grant: Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson
  Explores affordability, economic systems, and how regulation impacts housing.

  "The problem with people not being able to afford housing and the problem with having unhoused people on the street is that there’s not enough homes. There’s literally not enough homes." – Brea [01:33]

  Brea is struck by how the book challenges her existing perspectives, especially around housing policy, and appreciates its leftist but nuanced take.

• Mallory O'Meara: A Physical Education by Casey Johnston
  A memoir/science hybrid about the transformative power of strength training and how it changed the author’s – and Mallory’s – relationship with her body.

  "Powerlifting changed my life. It’s one of the things that, besides, like, learning how to read, truly is, like, changed my life so much for the better." – Mallory [03:20]

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Listener Feedback

[04:19-08:20]

• Lindsay from Chicago: Highlights how Little Free Libraries adapt in times of crisis, serving as hubs for not just books but also community support (e.g. sharing ICE alerts and legal aid zines).

  "It reminds me of when the little free libraries housed masks and toilet paper in the dark days of the pandemic." – Lindsay (email, read aloud)

• Meredith from Massachusetts: Shares a journey from falling out of reading to rekindling her love for it, thanks to the podcast. Notes the positive influence of identifying as a mood reader, and how podcast recs have led to more five-star reads.

  Fun banter ensues as Brea attempts a New England accent to much amusement:

  "For some reason, my V turns into a little goblin voice." – Brea [07:47] "A true New England accent is wicked hard for people to do." – Mallory [07:53]

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Main Discussion: New Year Book Tracking

[14:01–33:19]

Tracking Systems Review

[14:01–18:28]

• Both hosts use Cawpile, a detailed book tracking spreadsheet that tracks multiple aspects of reading, including ratings, formats, genres, and more.

  • Brea also uses Goodreads for quick updates.
  • Mallory employs a “three-pronged” system:
    • Cawpile spreadsheet (on computer)
    • Book Buddy app (on phone)
    • Physical journal (Rhodia notebook)

• Physical Journals—Staying or Going?

  • Brea is dropping her physical journal, admitting she simply wasn’t updating it.
  • Mallory keeps hers more out of habit than need, saying:

    "I never feel like it’s a pain to update any of these. I get excited to fill out my Cawpile." – Mallory [17:27]

• Both agree that tracking should feel fun, not like an obligation.

Tweaks and Additions for 2026

[18:28–18:53]

• Brea considers returning to a physical journal, perhaps inspired by their own published reading journal.
• Mallory is officially done updating Goodreads and leaning away from Storygraph, noting:

  "Cawpile tracks so many more things. Anything else feels like a chore." – Mallory [18:49]

Year in Review: Using Cawpile Stats & Insights

[22:30–30:13]

• Terminology Banter:
  The hosts riff on being “Cawpile-pilled,” struggling with internet lingo:

  "There’s a 20-year old listening to this who's bleeding out of their eyes." – Mallory [23:14]

• Impact of Cawpile:

  • "I like it because it makes me examine my choices… when I have to say, oh, I’ve read five male authors in a row, I go, maybe I should consider reading a woman." – Brea [23:38]

  • Mallory praises Book Roast (the creator of Cawpile) and highlights how monthly goals, visible in Cawpile, helped her reading resolutions.

• Notable Graphs & Data:

  • Author familiarity: Brea shocked to learn nearly 50% of authors she read were ones she’d read before.

  • Genre surprises: Brea read more horror and literary fiction than science fiction this year.

    "Who am I? Who is this woman?" – Brea [26:33]

  • Mallory’s top genres: Romance, nonfiction, and horror, attributing this to the romance podcast and personal reading goals.

  • Getting books: Library books made up over a third of Mallory's reading.

  • Format breakdown: Mallory’s reading was 60% physical, 22% ebook, 16% audiobook.

  • New releases: Half of Mallory’s books were new releases.

• Personal Tracking Tactics:

  • Mallory tracked her "wheelhouse" (reading catnip) words for each book, producing a word cloud:

    "The top two are erotica and horror, but small town was way bigger than I thought." – Mallory [29:32]

  • Considering tracking DNFs (books not finished) next year.

• Columns on the Chopping Block:

  • Mallory might stop tracking series vs. standalone ("We’re not big series people") but Brea likes being surprised by discovering a book is part of a series.

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Book Tech Test: Scented Shelves "Dracula's Castle" Candle

[31:16–33:19]

• Candle Review: 8oz Dracula’s Castle candle from Scented Shelves on Etsy ($15).
  • Scent described as “Yankee Candle vibes” and reminiscent of walking into Michael’s at Christmas.
  • "It was forest. This was not Dracula’s backyard, this is Dracula’s castle." – Mallory [32:16]
  • Good burn time and “throw,” but scent not their favorite.
  • Verdict: 4 out of 5 pages, would try more from seller—just maybe not that scent.

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Notable Quotes

• "Powerlifting changed my life. It’s one of the things that, besides, like, learning how to read, truly is, like, changed my life so much for the better."
  – Mallory O'Meara, [03:20]

• "It makes me examine my choices. It makes me really think about the book."
  – Brea Grant on using Cawpile, [23:38]

• "There’s a 20-year old listening to this who's bleeding out of their eyes."
  – Mallory O'Meara, joking about keeping up with internet pilled/piled terminology, [23:14]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• What We’re Reading: 00:34–04:14
• Listener Feedback: 04:19–08:20
• Book Tracking Methods: 14:01–18:28
• Cawpile Review & Year-in-Data: 22:30–30:13
• Bookish Candle Test: 31:16–33:19

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Resources & Recommendations

• Cawpile Spreadsheet (by Book Roast)
• Book Buddy App
• Reading Glasses Book Tracking Journal (their custom tracker)
• A Physical Education by Casey Johnston
• Abundance by Ezra Klein & Derek Thompson
• Scented Shelves Candles on Etsy

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Final Thoughts

The episode is jam-packed with practical advice for tracking reading throughout the year, reflections on personal reading data, and plenty of good-natured hilarity as the hosts navigate everything—from spreadsheeets to the mysteries of “being pilled.” If you want to be more reflective and intentional with your reading, there’s loads here to inspire you to find (and fine-tune) your own favorite tracking method.

Transcript

[Mallory O']

Foreign. You're listening to Reading Glasses, a show about book culture and literary life designed to help you read better. I'm author and book devourer Mallory o'.

[Meara]

Meara.

[Bria Grant]

I'm Bria Grant, filmmaker and e reader. This episode, we're talking about how we're tracking our books for the new year. Plus, we're going over our caw piles from last year. That's right. We're going to tell you what that is. If you just instantly listen to the show for the first time, we're going to tell you what it is. And we're testing out a bookish candle that I think smells like the mall.

[Mallory O']

Oh, yeah. But first, Bria, what are you reading?

[Bria Grant]

I am listening to a book that a lot of people listened to this last year. It's called Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson. Did you listen to this one?

[Mallory O']

No.

[Bria Grant]

So basically, it's about, look, we're living in a time where nothing is affordable. Everything's bad, everything's bad. And the question is, like, why is that? And, like, what can we do to change that? And it may be answers that we all find a little bit uncomfortable. And right now I'm in a section about housing and like, how used to you could buy a house with two. Two years of your salary, you know, and now that is not the situation. And like, why. When did that change? What made that change? What made us be like, oh, houses should be like a big investment. Like, what. What changed? Like, in the economy, but also, like, the way we view resources and getting into some stuff that's like, you know, made me go like, yeah, you know what? Maybe I'm. I'm doing this incorrectly, or I bought into this weird system that we've. And like, the problem with housing, and this is just one section of the book, but the problem with people not being able to afford housing and the problem with having unhoused people on the street is that there's not enough homes. There's literally not enough homes. We've set up regulations to where the problem. So, like, that. It's something that, like my little leftist, you know, so it's making me not question my leftist beliefs because obviously this is very. It's a very leftist book, but it also is making me think about things that I haven't thought about in a specific way.

[Mallory O']

Yeah.

[Bria Grant]

Before, you know, where it's not just about, you know, in Los Angeles, we recently passed this density law where we. We're trying to build more density, and there are a lot of people who are against it. People who are on the left. And, like, I understood why they were against it, but this book is, like, made me go, like, making me, like, really think through my belief system and, like, the system that I have bought into. And, like, what does it mean to have abundance? What does it mean to live in abundance? Where everyone has abundance.

[Mallory O']

Yeah.

[Bria Grant]

And not just us. A great book. A lot of people have been telling me to read it, so I'm. I'm really enjoying it. I'm listening to it. What are you reading?

[Mallory O']

I talked about this book in our end of the year episode. Last year, I finally got the audiobook from the library. I'm reading a Physical Education by Casey Johnston. Johnston with a T. It's the Lady Weightlifting memoir.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah.

[Mallory O']

And it's funny for me to read this book because it really is just, like, preaching to the choir. Like, there is no, like, who else on earth is this book? Like, if. If this book is trying to convince you of something, I am already convinced of it. I have been a powerlifter since 2019. It radically changed my life and my relationship with my body. And that's. I mean, that's what this whole book is about. It's about this woman who had a really disordered relationship with her body, as a lot of women in this world do. She went through a lot of things. Her. She went through a death in the family, and she got out of a bad relationship, and she used to be a runner, which is funny because that's what I used to be before I moved to Los Angeles and decided to start lifting weights. And it, like, radically changed life. Her relationship with her body, how she ate. And it's. Even though it is so. So made for me, it's still so wonderful to hear it, to hear some science behind it, to hear about other women doing it. Like, powerlifting changed my life. It's one of the things that, besides, like, learning how to read truly is, like, changed my life so much for the better. I used to really struggle with disordered eating and powerlifting just completely made me look at myself in such a different way. And it's really fun to hear about another woman' journey kind of along the same path. It's a great memoir. It's kind of. It's kind of like Half Met. Like, a lot of books are now like, half memoir, but half, like, science.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, I love that.

[Mallory O']

Which we love. We still haven't really come up with a good term for that, but it's fucking great. And I highly recommend it for anybody who's. Who loves. Who like me already does not need to be convinced but is curious about lifting weights and what it could do for you. Highly recommend it. So that is a Physical Education by.

[Bria Grant]

Casey Johnston and mine is Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson.

[Mallory O']

Foreign so we want to take a moment share some listener feedback. Lindsay writes in hi Brian Mallory I wanted to write in to share the ways that little free libraries are saving our communities with more than just books. I live in Chicago where ICE and Customs and Border Protection are absolutely wreaking havoc on our community. Same thing's going on here in Los Angeles. I don't think I can overstate how much damage and suffering they have caused in all areas of our lives. As absolutely disgusting and horrific as the situation is, the one bright spot is how our community has responded. Lookout networks have popped up in every neighborhood neighborhood and folks are keeping watch at hospitals and schools which are sadly targeted by these shithead cowards. The humble free library has stepped up too, offering a place to dead drop dozens of whistles which are used to alert people that ICE is active in the area as well as homemade Know youw Rights scenes and information how to Recognize a Judicial Warrant. It reminds me of when the little free libraries housed masks and toilet paper in the dark days of the pandemic. I know people set out their little free libraries with the idea of sharing books with the community, but like big public libraries, they have proven to be a way for us to help one another in a hyperloop local way. Thank you for your podcast. I look forward to every week and especially now I find it to be a bomb to my nervous system. Please continue to do your great work of community building. Seems like we need it now more than ever. This is awesome.

[Bria Grant]

It is cool.

[Mallory O']

So incredible. So cool. And if people outside of the and doesn't matter where you live in this country, this is a I wouldn't even think of to do that. But what a great spot to put to put those things and that people are printing these zines and God.

[Bria Grant]

Very cool.

[Mallory O']

That's so awesome.

[Bria Grant]

Great. Hyper Local is great. Meredith Roden and said hello from Mallory's old stomping grounds, the North Shore of Massachusetts. Say Massachusetts with an accent.

[Mallory O']

Massachusetts. Nice.

[Bria Grant]

I just wanted to write in and say thank you for all the work you do and how much it has improved my life when it comes to reading another media consumption. Like the majority of listeners, I was an avid reader in childhood who lost the spark with assigned reading in high school. My parents were we're also not big readers so all we ever had in the house were a few Daniel Steele novels which I wish I would have picked up as a teen to start my smut journey sooner. Shout out to Reading smut.

[Mallory O']

Love it.

[Bria Grant]

With no guidance, I spent my early adulthood picking random books up at book swaps and little free libraries and got my feel of the mediocre. Since discovering your podcast in 2020, figuring out my wheelhouse and that I'm a mood reader has made all the difference now, literally my whole TBR and essentially all the books I've read in the last five years have come from reading glasses and I have had infinitely more five star reads. So thank you specifically for the hard work you into anticipated and favorite books of the year episodes. Mallory, shout out to you.

[Mallory O']

Thank you.

[Bria Grant]

I also want to say that as an anime nerd, some hot book tics, Slide whistle. I like that we wrote Slide Whistle have also helped a lot in my enjoyment of other media. For example, not feeling guilty for dumping a show after a few episodes, choosing an option from my to be watched list based on genre slash mood, and developing an anime wheelhouse. Hope that might help some of my fellow Glasser Weebs.

[Mallory O']

Weebs.

[Bria Grant]

What's a weeb?

[Mallory O']

I think it's. It's a word for someone who likes anime. Oh. Neither of us are anime people, so that's just a world that we don't really move in. Okay.

[Bria Grant]

Hope that might help some of my fellow Glasser Weebs out there. Thank you for the podcast and Mallory, get the over. Yeah. To New England.

[Mallory O']

No, no, you gotta do it. I want to hear Bria do it.

[Bria Grant]

All right. I'm bad at accents. It's actually a problem for me.

[Mallory O']

I.

[Bria Grant]

Get the fuck back over here.

[Meara]

Over here.

[Bria Grant]

Over here.

[Mallory O']

It's hard. It's hard to do in life.

[Bria Grant]

Get the back over.

[Mallory O']

I will say a new.

[Bria Grant]

For some reason, my V, it's like turns into like a little goblin voice.

[Mallory O']

I will say a true New England accent is wicked hard for people to do. It is something that New England people love to make fun of. Is like movies that are set in New England. I'm immediately like, come on now.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mallory O']

I that. But good New England movies I'm always like, really excited about. But it's painful listening to someone who does it who's not from here. Try to do it.

[Bria Grant]

You don't want me to try it again?

[Mallory O']

If you want.

[Bria Grant]

Over. Over here. Over here. All right. You want to remember?

[Mallory O']

Well, I do, I do. I want to say to Meredith, I actually had a couple New England events planned last year but I had to cancel. I had like a whole east coast thing that I was gonna do and something happened and I had to cancel the whole thing. But I would really like to do some New England. We went to Connecticut for Story Fest a few years ago. Connecticut doesn't almost doesn't count as New England though. It was great. We love Story Fest. We'd love to come back but but I would love to do I'd love to go to New Ha Maine, Mass. I, I, I. I'm very homesick all the time. And then Meredith Wheelhouse is multi generational family dramas near future speculative fiction coastal New England towns Queer romance Excuse me, Queer romance musings on death, Biographies of comedians where they talk about their mental health issues. Spoiler it's all of them so you can email us at reading glasses podcastmail.com if you want a list of all the books we talk about on the show delivered to your inbox every month, you can sign up for our newsletter. There's a link in the show notes and reminder. This is our book tracking episode. If you are physical to track your books. And Bri and I wrote a book last year we designed our own book tracking journal with the glasses in mind or potential glasses in mind. So if you're looking for a really cute, aesthetically pleasing, fun, but very functional book tracking journal that has it's not just like title and author this place for you to track doorways and wheelhouses and all the stuff we talk about on the show. So if you if that kind of language of that kind of way of thinking about a book really helps you and you want to track that, get our journal. It's less than $20 and it's real cute. You can email us at reading glasses podcastmail.com if you want a list of all the books we talk about on the show delivered to your inbox every month, you can sign up for our newsletter. There's a link in the show notes. And before we talk about book tracking for 2026, we're gonna take a quick break. Reading Glasses is sponsored in part this week by Apron Notebooks. Folks, it's the new year. You know we're big notebook heads over on this show. I am a notebook fiend. I'm a pen person. I'm a notebook person. I'm a washi tape person. I'm a post it person. I love stationery. I love desk stuff. So you can trust me when I say paper notebooks are awesome. It is a super flexible system for whatever you want it to be you can tackle your to do list. You can set goals. And the thing that I love most about these notebooks, okay, I have a lot of notebook opinions, and I really don't like notebooks that are too structured. I have a hard time with a lot of notebooks because I'm like, well, what if I need an extra page for this day? What if I want to make a little list in between these other places? And it's just, it's frustrating to me when, when I can't do that. But apron notebooks are very. If they were. If an apron notebook was a house, it would be very open concept. It's so flexible. You can skip days, weeks, months. You don't have to worry about wasting space. You can only use the feature that you want. It comes with a handy little ruler to make sure that you can, like, make lines between different tasks and different days. And it is designed to be recycled, which is really, really cool. One of the things I'm doing in this new year, I've been doing it for a while. I've been trying to stay off my phone, trying to stay off screens, and that makes my notebooks even more important. Because the problem is if I keep a list of something in my notes app, on my iPhone, I have to fight my way through the goblin city of the rest of my phone to get there. I open up my phone and I'm like, oh, I got texts, I got emails, I got this, I got that. You don't have that with a notebook. It's fantastic. I love it. I am a religious notebook keeper and I have started using my apron notebook to track some of my goals for the new year. So if you are looking for a really simple, inexpensive, trust me, I have been buying notebooks for a really long time and some of them can get really pricey. These apron notebooks are very, very reasonably priced in the notebook market. If you are looking for an inexpensive, easy to use notebook, maybe you've never used notebooks before. Maybe you're like, I want to start making, making hard copies of lists. Maybe you want to get into the notebook game. But then you look up bullet journaling, or you look up anything to do with notebooks and you get really overwhelmed because there's a lot out there. Apron notebooks are really fantastic to start your notebook journey with. They're so easy to use. I really, really like mine. I've been using it to track my, my writing, how many words I'm getting a day, make sure I'm reading and exercising every day. If you are bursting with with energy to start the new year and you have all the stuff you want to do. An apron notebook is a fantastic way to keep track of it all and to keep you on track. So get your to do list under control today. Go to apron notebooks.com and use code glasses for 10% off your first order. That's apron notebooks.com and enter the code glasses to save 10% on your first order. That's aron notebooks.com classes.

[Meara]

I'm Jordan Crucciola, host of Feeling Seen, where every week I have a different actor, director, or writer as my co host. And whoever that co host may be, it is a sure bet that we are digging deep and having a great time doing it.

[Bria Grant]

I love that you just said that. Yeah, I mean, if I were gonna join a cult, I think this might be be it.

[Meara]

A fresh look at your favorite film and a peek behind the curtain at how movies get made.

[Mallory O']

Oh, okay.

[Bria Grant]

I'm gonna tell you this whole story.

[Mallory O']

Okay.

[Bria Grant]

I almost got fired from that movie.

[Meara]

You should be listening to Feeling Seen.

[Mallory O']

I had so much fun. I love what you're doing.

[Bria Grant]

I hope I did okay.

[Meara]

New episodes every week on Maximum Fun.

[Mallory O']

This week, it's a new year, which means it's time to start a new yearly book tracking method or methods. What are we using? What are we dumping? And are we trying anything new? So first off, let's remind folks what we used last year. Bria, what were your. What was your. All your methods?

[Bria Grant]

You and I both use a spreadsheet called Copile, which, like you, has a bunch of questions if you don't know about it.

[Mallory O']

We did an episode on it last year. I'll put a link.

[Bria Grant]

But it's like. It's a spreadsheet with, like, everything from, you know, who wrote it, publisher, the year, number of pages, and it keeps track of everything, but also, like, makes little graphs. It makes little graphs, which we love the graphs. And then also a rating. So, like, rating for your enjoyment of the book, for how you want your.

[Mallory O']

That's what cat pile is. It's. It's care.

[Bria Grant]

Like, that's the character atmosphere.

[Mallory O']

Yeah. Each letter stands for a different thing that you're rating in the book. And then the. The spreadsheet takes the average of all those ratings of those seven things and gives you your rating for the book.

[Bria Grant]

So I use that. I also use Goodreads just to track with immediacy because, like, I will just be like, I read this. It's 2:00am I don't want to Go into my copy. But I can say, like, I read this, so just ignore. But Cawpile is where I keep all the juicy details. And I have added my own categories. What about you?

[Mallory O']

I had a three pronged approach. Three prong. Three prong.

[Bria Grant]

So you're still doing it. Okay, go ahead.

[Mallory O']

Yeah, so I still, I did cop out on my computer for the same thing. Like I would. I, I don't do the Cawpile part of Cawpile, which is funny. Like, I don't put the ratings for character. No, I don't use that. But I like the spreadsheet, so I have that on my compute. I have book buddy on my phone. My longtime platonic life partner Book buddy. And then I still have a physical journal. I use an A4 lined Rhodia notebook. So what do we, what do we like? Are we dumping anything? We keeping all this stuff? You keeping everything, Bria?

[Bria Grant]

I'm gonna keep it. I've added my own little things of tracking audiobook narrator because I, I, there are some ones I like and I need to know who they are and then author's nationality. I'm doing my own version of like, Read the World, which is what Tracy from the Stack does a Read the World thing. So I'm just like keeping like us. That's on. Like my compile spreadsheet, but on. But yeah, this is kind of, this is. I think my, my system's really working. I have let go of my physical journal, though.

[Mallory O']

Wow.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, it's actually right here. And that's very. The last time I updated it.

[Mallory O']

I am actually really surprised about that.

[Bria Grant]

You're such a journal person. I love a physical journal, but I, I found that I wasn't updating it and I don't think I've updated it since.

[Mallory O']

I wonder if you're having the same problem that I'm having, which I'm about to talk about.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, I haven't updated it since last year.

[Mallory O']

Wow.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah. Yeah. 20, 24. Yes. What are you doing?

[Mallory O']

What are you doing? So I love all three of mine. My whole, my whole three prongs. Love every prong because they all, for me, they serve a different purpose. Cawpile, that gives me the details about the types of books that I'm reading because I like to be able to track my formats, my genres, and I like seeing that that gets updated every week. My book buddy keeps track of how many books I've read for the year and what my favorites are. And that gets updated as soon as I finish. Like your goodreads and my journal because like keeping a hard copy and that gets updated once a month. But honestly, like you, the physical journal is not something I consult. I used to consult it, but with Book Buddy and Compile, I just don't look at it at this point. It's like I used to track a bunch of things in it. It's just now it's just title, author, letter, grade, no other information. But I think the key is I never feel like it's a pain to update any of these. I get excited to fill out my cawpile. I give a lot of satisfaction putting a new book into my book buddy. I'm keeping them all in 2026. I just like having physical book journals. And just like last year, even though Tracy wants me not. Wants me not to do this, you are under strict orders to burn all of them. But all of my physical journals, sure, of course. But I do like having them and I don't really know why.

[Bria Grant]

No, I like a physical journal. I With my to do lists and everything like that. I usually do a physical journal. It's kind of weird that I've given up on that.

[Mallory O']

I am quite surprised.

[Bria Grant]

I really don't need to write.

[Mallory O']

No, I don't need my physical journal. It's purely. I just. For some reason I like having it. I think it's because I've just been doing it for so long.

[Bria Grant]

Ye. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I haven't actually, so it's only been a few years since I started it and stopped it.

[Mallory O']

So I've been doing it since like 20. 20. 2014. Yeah.

[Bria Grant]

That's a long time.

[Mallory O']

Long time. Yeah.

[Bria Grant]

Then I think you should keep doing it.

[Mallory O']

Yeah. So do we want to try anything out? Do we want to add anything? Are we good? I love.

[Bria Grant]

We're just both cop half fans. I mean, if I had a beautiful journal, like maybe the one we made, which I should just use, I definitely have a copy just sitting here. Like, I might want to do a physical thing again because I do love writing in a physical journal. I feel like writing longhand print journal.

[Mallory O']

Which is fountain pen friendly, by the way.

[Bria Grant]

I feel like writing longhand does. Really does something for me.

[Mallory O']

It's nice.

[Bria Grant]

It makes it feel real.

[Mallory O']

Yeah.

[Bria Grant]

What about you?

[Mallory O']

No, I. I really think that I need to accept that for the foreseeable future. I just have no interest in sharing my reading on social media. If you listen to the show for a long time, you know that it's something I've been really struggling with forever. I haven't even been on my personal pages on it. I haven't used my. I haven't regularly looked on Instagram since last summer, since June.

[Bria Grant]

Oh, nice for you.

[Mallory O']

I just have been. I don't like being on social media. I don't think I'm ever going to use Goodreads to track again for that reason. And Copyle has kind of taken over storygraph for me. Like, I don't. I just. I We did one whole year where we use storygraph and we liked it. But Cawpile tracks so many more things. Anything else feels like a chore. So I think I'm really happy with my my three methods. So we are going to go through our Cawpiles, but we're going to take a quick break first and if you have thoughts about how you're tracking your reading this year, you can send them to reading glasses podcastmail.com. Reading Glasses is sponsored in part this week by zocdoc. Folks, it's the start of the new year. You're trying to get things done. You're trying to start off the right way. And I guarantee you there's people listening to the show who have not been to the doctor in a long time. Maybe you need to go to the dentist, maybe you need to go to the gynecologist. Maybe you just need a physical. And you've been putting it off for a long time, maybe even years. But you really want to start this year off on the right foot. ZocDoc has got you covered. It is a free app and website that helps you find and book high quality in network doctors so you can find somebody you love. It doesn't matter what you're looking for. You're looking for a dermatologist. You're looking for a primary care doctor. You're looking for a new eye Doctor. There's over 200 specialties offered on Zoc. You can easily search by specialty or symptom to build the care team that is right for you. Stop putting it off. Make 2026 your year of health and keeping on track with your body. When you're ready to book a doctor, you can see their real time availability and click to book instantly. There's no phone tag. There's no waiting around. You know, everyone knows the sinking feeling of leaving a message on a doctor's machine. And maybe you'll get a call back next week. Maybe you'll get a call back next year. Booking a doctor can give you so much stress and so much anx. Trust me, I know. I am a person who doesn't like being on the phone. I really don't like calling things. I hate it. It's very stressful for me. Zocdoc takes all that stress away. Finding healthcare should not be the trickiest piece of your life. Zocdoc makes it easy to find and book an appointment with a doctor that you are going to love. Take something that can normally be really stressful and make it easy. Stop putting off those doctor's appointments and go to Zocdoc.com classes to find and instantly book a doctor you love today. That Zocdoc.com glasses that's Zocdoc.com glasses Zocdoc.com glasses thank you, Sockdoc, for sponsoring this message. Glasses. On Judge John Hodgman. The courtroom is fake, but the disputes are real.

[Brian]

Brian would say I'm the Gumby of this family. He's just not claiming to be. Gumby is an un Gumby.

[Mallory O']

Like, no, it's just Gumby and I being our authentic selves.

[Brian]

So what's your complaint? Too many sauces.

[Mallory O']

There are no foods on which to put the sauces.

[Brian]

Have we named all the sauces on the top shelf yet?

[Mallory O']

Not. Not even close.

[Brian]

You economize when it comes to pants.

[Meara]

Truly, it's not about the cleanliness of the pants.

[Brian]

Well, why isn't it? This is what I want to know. Judge John Hodgman. Fake court, Weird cases, Real judge justice. On maximumfun.org YouTube and everywhere you get podcasts.

[Mallory O']

All right, we're back. And wow, Bria, we really got copied. Piled. Huh? We really it. I am, it's safe to say, call piled. Well, because it's. When don't. When people say like, you're into something, it's like something piled.

[Bria Grant]

Oh, I think I'm too old for this line.

[Mallory O']

Yeah, something pilled or piled.

[Bria Grant]

Pilled.

[Mallory O']

Is it pilled?

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, it is pilled. Pilled is one. Maybe piled one too, though.

[Meara]

I don't know.

[Mallory O']

Wow. I've never heard anyone say it out loud.

[Bria Grant]

Pilled.

[Mallory O']

Pilled. All right, we're cop pile. Pilled.

[Bria Grant]

Like when you like, take some, like people say you're red pilled or black pilled.

[Mallory O']

Oh, I thought like, oh, like, well, like I'm real. Slide whistle pill. Does that make sense?

[Meara]

Nope.

[Mallory O']

What?

[Bria Grant]

What are you trying to say?

[Mallory O']

Like you're really into something.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, I think it's pilled. Wow.

[Mallory O']

There's a. There is a 20 year old listening to this who's bleeding out of their eyes.

[Bria Grant]

Literally. Like they're actually. They're actually already on the doorstep. They're like, please, we. I have to explain to you.

[Mallory O']

They're gonna take our microphones away.

[Bria Grant]

Oh, my God.

[Mallory O']

Jesus Christ.

[Bria Grant]

Take them away. That's fine.

[Mallory O']

Anyway, I think it's very safe to say that Cawpile took our reading lives by storm. It really, really completely changed our tracking methods. How do we feel after a year of using it?

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, well, I used it last year, too, but I think, yes, yes. I like it because it makes me examine my choices. It makes me really think about the book. It also, like, when I have to say, like, oh, I've read five male authors in a row, I go, you know, maybe I should consider reading a woman. Or, like, I'm actually gonna bring that.

[Mallory O']

Up in a little bit.

[Bria Grant]

Like, there's, like. It does kind of, like, make me think about my choices. And so. And I appreciate that that's in which I'm not. I was not reflecting on things that way when I was just doing, like, a Goodreads or whatever. What about you?

[Mallory O']

Oh, my God, I wish. I think next time we're in Edinburgh, we need to go find Book Roast and Baker a bunch of cookies and by. Bake them, buy them, because I don't bake cookies. But Book Roast, who is the inventor. Book Roast has her own YouTube channel. She does a lot of fun, bookish stuff. She has a magical readathon that I know people are really into, but she does. She invented Cawpile and she does, like, a new version of it every year. And I just. I love it. What a bookish hero she is. And even by the end of the year, after a whole year of doing it, I really found myself excited to update it and look at my graphs. We love to look at a graph, especially if it's a graph that shows information about my life, like. Like, it really helped my reading life. That's the thing is that. So I had. It was very important for me to set monthly reading goals instead of a yearly reading goal, because that forces you to keep doing it regularly instead of just reading a hundred books in December. And the thing about Compile is it shows you how many books you're reading every month. And that was so helpful for me for my audiobook goals, to show me how many audiobooks or how many hours of audiobooks I was listening to per month. Month. I really think a big part of hitting my resolutions was using my compile.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah.

[Mallory O']

All right. So there's a lot of graphs in Cawpile, which is. So I. You use the actual Cawpile part I do not. But in addition to that, you fill in a lot of information about the book. You can use as much or as little as you want. I use almost all of it. You know, the format, the genre, the year it came out, how many pages, which graphs were the most interesting and helpful for us.

[Bria Grant]

So there was one that tells you if it's a new author versus one you read from before. Almost half the authors that I read are ones I've read from before, which does not feel like me. I feel like I am a person who is always looking for something new and exciting. So it's very strange to me that that is a situation and I think I need to make sure I'm giving new authors a shot because I am obviously, like, sticking. Sticking to the ones that I know. So that was interesting.

[Mallory O']

So mine was 43% read from before and 56% new.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, mine is 50. I think it was almost 50% that I've read from before. But it's just. For me, that's not something I.

[Mallory O']

You like trying new things?

[Bria Grant]

I like trying new things. I. I don't like sticking with the one thing. And then I also read way more horror than science fiction.

[Mallory O']

That's wild.

[Bria Grant]

And I think I did last year too, actually, and folks were changing. I read more literary fiction than science fiction. Science fiction.

[Mallory O']

That's wild.

[Bria Grant]

And that.

[Mallory O']

Like, what the.

[Bria Grant]

Who am I? Who is this woman?

[Mallory O']

Who is this.

[Bria Grant]

Who is this woman? Who.

[Mallory O']

Blonde woman, not. She's not eating chocolate, so who knows?

[Bria Grant]

I actually have some in the other room to grab in a second.

[Mallory O']

Okay, never mind.

[Bria Grant]

It's me.

[Mallory O']

It's me.

[Bria Grant]

Don't worry, it's still me. It's me. I pull up a mask and it's.

[Mallory O']

Still me, but you, but kind of chocolaty underneath.

[Bria Grant]

But literary fiction, which I do read, but I'm just surprised that I'm. It's more than science fiction. Science fiction.

[Mallory O']

Well, over the past few years, you've been reading a lot more weird literary fiction.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, that's true.

[Mallory O']

Which I think maybe is scratching that itch for you.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah, maybe that's. Yeah, that may be right.

[Mallory O']

Stuff like Emily Henry, or not Emily Henry. Stuff like Annie Harnett. That's literary, but, like, has a little bit of sci fi or fantasy.

[Bria Grant]

Right. But I would categoriz it as literary fiction.

[Mallory O']

I wonder if that's what it is.

[Bria Grant]

This is a user generated thing. So it's like, what am I categorizing it?

[Mallory O']

Yeah.

[Bria Grant]

You know, so maybe it is science fiction, but. Yeah, what about you?

[Mallory O']

Same for me. The genre breakdown was really interesting. My top three were romance, non fiction, and horror. Romance makes sense because I'm reading at least one book a month for our other show. Yeah, I don't think it would be up there if you took the 12 smut books out of that. But I'm very proud to be bouncing back with nonfiction. That's something that I've been trying to do more the past few years. The how you got it graph was also really interesting to me. So there's like a how you got this book. So it's like, do you own it? Did you get it from the library? Was it a gift? Is it an arc? Library books make up more than a third of my reading now, which is really interesting.

[Bria Grant]

That's a lot for you.

[Mallory O']

Yeah, that's a. I've been getting a lot more library books, which is interesting to note.

[Bria Grant]

Ebooks or physical?

[Mallory O']

Here? I'll. I'll tell you my breakdown. Physical was 60% ebook, 22%.

[Bria Grant]

Wow, that is a lot for you.

[Mallory O']

And audiobook was 16. That is a lot for me. Also, half of my books were new releases last year.

[Bria Grant]

Wow.

[Mallory O']

Fully half of them. I really. I was like, wow. I'm. I really stayed on top of my. My podcast reading. And like I said, almost 57% of the authors I read last year were new to me. So just this is stuff that I had never really thought about before. And now I'm. I'm tracking and it was really interesting. There's so many things that get tracked in caught pile. Are there any columns we're going to stop using or do we want to add?

[Bria Grant]

No, but I do need to, like, do the tracker for some reason. My tracker, I have to, like, program it to track the things that I'm. Because it doesn't give me graphs based on the things that I've added. Yeah. So I might fix that. But no. What about you?

[Mallory O']

I don't track DNFs and I'm considering doing it for the new year. Okay. I know a lot of glasses do it, and I'm considering it. I think it'd be interesting to see the breakdown of, like, how many books I finish versus versus.

[Bria Grant]

Not because they do have a dnf.

[Mallory O']

Yeah. So I think I'm. I'm gonna try that. Also, I. I texted this to you a few weeks ago. I tracked my wheelhouse items for all of my boats.

[Bria Grant]

I know. This is amazing. We should put this on the. On the Instagram.

[Mallory O']

Yeah. I put it in a word bubble and it Was. So I basically just copy pasted all of the words. And as I told Bria, this only works if you put a hyphen between like multiple. Like it's not haunted house. It has to be haunted hyphen house because it will just count haunted and house as two separate words. But I did that the whole year and it was so interesting to see and I'm definitely want to keep doing that. So as Brie, you can see the top two are erotica and horror.

[Bria Grant]

Yes, that's Mallory in like just a. Yeah, erotica and horror.

[Mallory O']

But small town was way bigger than I thought. Yeah, art was pretty big. As Bria pointed out. Queer.

[Bria Grant]

Obviously smut is also as big as horror. Basically.

[Mallory O']

Yes. Historical memoir, romance, monsters, romantasy, broken family magic, literary ghosts, art history. Those are the big ones. So it was really interesting to see like the things that I like of all the books I finished, those were the big ones. So I definitely want to keep doing that. The only thing that wasn't interesting to me that, that I might stop doing is series versus standalone books.

[Bria Grant]

Oh, I like it.

[Mallory O']

Yeah. Really?

[Bria Grant]

Yeah.

[Mallory O']

Because again, I think the problem is you and I read a lot of starts of series for our other show, but we don't read. There was only two series that I really read this year, the Shady Shady Hollow books and the Edinburgh Nice books. So wasn't really. But we're not big series people. No.

[Bria Grant]

But a lot of times I. I'm like, no, not a series. I'm like, oh, this was part of a series. You know, that's it like surprises me.

[Mallory O']

And who knows, maybe it'll become interesting. Maybe our reading tastes have been shifting so I. Maybe I'll become a big series reader again, get into some cozies. But we would love to hear what sort of things people track in a journal and a spreadsheet if you're using Cawpile. If there's a particular aspect to a book that you track that we haven't thought of, let us know. Send it to reading glasses podcast gmail.com. Time to test out some book tech. Advances in bookish technology. Okay, we love a bookish candle review on this show and it felt right to get one in early in the new year. Etsy did not tell us who sent this. So this isn't a thing with Etsy. We know the shop, but we don't know the person who sends it. So sometimes you do.

[Bria Grant]

They can leave a note.

[Mallory O']

This one I don't think had one. So if this was you, email us, let us know, we'd like to show you out. Thank you to the glasser who got us this. So this is an 8 ounce bookish candle from a shop called Scented shelves on Etsy, which is a great name name. This is Dracula's castle scent. It's supposed to be like a light, fresh, foresty smell. They are 15 again for an 8 ounce candle. What do we think of this, Bria?

[Bria Grant]

This smelled like a Yankee candle to me. This was giving Yankee candle vibes. This was. I like the idea, but it felt like I walked into a Michael's at Christmas.

[Mallory O']

Yeah.

[Bria Grant]

You know, like it's cute. The candle was cute.

[Mallory O']

I called it Dracula's dentist's office.

[Bria Grant]

That's right. It was. The smell was just very basic. And I think, look, if you are a Yankee candle, Stan, like, go for it. This is what you're looking for. But it's cute. It's a cute candle. But I was not sold on this candle.

[Mallory O']

And it was interesting because for Dracula's castle, you're expecting stone. A castle. Y smell.

[Bria Grant]

It was forest.

[Mallory O']

Yeah. This is not Dracula's backyard. This is Dracula's castle. But so this is a kind of weird review because neither of us really like the smell, but I do have to say the candle itself shelf was great. Long burn time.

[Bria Grant]

Oh, yeah, for sure.

[Mallory O']

Great throw. For a smaller. For sure.

[Bria Grant]

You like, take the top off and you could smell it.

[Mallory O']

I was really impressed. And it's very cute. It's in a cute little glass jar for 15 as a big candle slut. That is pretty good.

[Bria Grant]

Because candles are getting the price is right.

[Mallory O']

So expensive. Absolutely.

[Bria Grant]

I have an 80 candle downstairs.

[Mallory O']

Oh, my Lord. It does smell really good.

[Bria Grant]

They gave me a gift card. I had a gift card.

[Mallory O']

So I mean there's some can. There's a couple different candle companies I stopped buying from because they're just too expensive. Yeah, it's crazy for something I'm gonna set on fire. Oh, thank you. So for $15, a nice 8 ounce candle that has a long burn time and a great throw. This is. I would actually buy candles from the seller, but maybe in a different scent. If, like, if you want a bookish themed candle or you're just a candle person. I think scented shelves is a really great company to go with.

[Bria Grant]

Agreed, Agreed. I think we should order some more from them just to see, like, see the variety because they were good. It was a good candle.

[Mallory O']

So four out of five pages. I would give it a full five pages. If the smell was better, I'd give it another three. Okay.

[Bria Grant]

Yeah.

[Mallory O']

So thank you to the person who sent this to us. Please let us know if it was you. And if you have book ideas for us to test out, send them to reading glasses podcast gmail.com and as always, we want to thank the wonderful mods who run our Discord server and our Facebook group. And remember, you want to, you want to get a cool T shirt, you want to show off your love of reading and help us pay the growing bills that we have for this show. We folks, we pay to send out the newsletter every month and we pay to be able to use this, this Riverside, which is how we like record video content. We have to pay for all of that and we've been using the proceeds from our Void merch store to do that. So if you want to buy a cute bokeh shirt and also keep this show running, it's a great way to do it. And if you like the show, please write and review us on the podcast listening app of your choice. It's great for us and helps us reach more readers. You can email us reading glasses podcast gmail.com find us on Instagram at Reading Glasses Podcast. Thanks for listening and thanks for reading. Maximum Fun. A worker owned network of artist owned shows supported directly by you.