Good Books Bad Banter

Are we on the cusp of discovering our next great fantasy series? A Darker Shade of Magic gave us a slow start but we think it's only setting the scene for the other books in the series. We are smitten with Lila but is that really a surprise? We didn't think so either. This book left us with a lot of question marks, ones we're eager to get answers to asap. You can find a Darker Shade of Magic on Ki...

Another Friday episode? We're getting back on track baby! And what better way to start your Friday than a breakdown on Icebreaker?! Everyone and the mother loves this book and for good reason! It has every trope and cozy moment a hockey/figure skating romance could ever have and we ate up every single bite. We both give it 5 stars because not every book you love has to be an intense masterpiece, s...

We're back with a quick episode on Firekeeper's Daughter. We're blown away by how this YA novel touches on so many issues that face Native American communities like drug addiction, racism, and sexism. While our episode was on the shorter side our love for this novel isn't. We highly recommend this to any age reader not just the youngins. Please check trigger warnings before picking up this novel o...

My Happy Place is sitting somewhere in the mountains and Tori's is living out of a van traveling the continental U.S. Emily Henry gave us such complex and real character development that it hurted(,: - As we're writing this, we realized that we didn't even rate this book because both of our brains were going ninety-to-nothing! Tori gave it a 4.5 and Maddie gives it a solid 4. These romance book po...

Whew baby do we have an episode for you today! Maddie and Tori have FINALLY finished HOSAB! Discussing Crescent City and all its theories is not for the weak when the internet exists y'all. Maddie and Tori go over all their favorite moments, theories, and Quinlar details! Are Hunt and Bryce our fave SJM couple? It's so hard to choose because they're all so incredible, ugh brb seaching for my Hunt/...

We're back to getting y'all episodes and with new music! Who is she?! Shout out to our friend Wojtek who made us our killer new intro/outro music. Today's episode we have the OG trope withs a Hades and Persephone retelling. We've got the villain who is only pretending to be a villain, grumpy x sunshine, and lots and lots of smut. Can a girl really ask for more? We go down the rabbit hole of Katee...

Crescent City House of Sky & Breath aka a lesson in edging. In this episode we talk about the first 300 pages of CC2 and so much is going on!!!!! Rebels, thunderbirds, theories galore, a love triangle?! Mommy Maas is feeding us and it is scrumdiliumptious y'all. But if Bryce and Hunt could hookup a little faster THAT'D BE GREAT cause Tori is dying. We're not sure who to trust but we know baby...

Another day, another episode and we're bringing something different this week! Tori and I are talking about all of the popular theories of our favorite books, recent news in the book world, and just overall thoughts on our favorite characters and stories! Lets be honest, we all know Maddie didn't finish CC2 and thats why we're bringing you this instead but, we hope you like these ragtag/catchall e...

Theoretically, Jack's ballsack being flush against me would be a great thing but hearing that sentence out loud made me spiral. Ali Hazelwood continues to give us the best rivals to lovers story lines. Her books are perfect between intense fantasy novels or if you're in the mood for a lighthearted romance to make you feel all giggly! Never thought I'd find science so sexy 🤪Up Next: Crescent City...

First ESA, now MMATL, Carley Fortune really has us in a chokehold!!!!! We adored Fern and her story with Will, her story with her mom, and Carley's perfect way of writing dual timelines. This story is perfect for all the romantics who dream of meeting their soulmate, spending a whole day with them exploring a city and feeling the tension build! If Carley is good at anything, it's ripping our heart...

Say it with me - "A dragon without its rider is a tragedy, a rider without their dragon is dead. Welcome to the FOURTHHHHHHH WWWWWIINNNGGGG!!!" How appropriate is it that our 50TH EPISODE on the pod is fucking FOURTH WING! Yet another shadow daddy has been added to the growing list, and another female character Tori & I are completely ecstatic for. You'll hear all about our theories, secrets,...

We're back y'all! We took a break last week because life has been hectic and Maddie has been struggling with stress and burnout at work. Sadly, because work takes up so much of our time it tends absorb all our energy that we have reserved for hobbies and fun and fulfillment. For readers that's always a tough hit to our ability to sit down and get into our books. Thankfully things feel like maybe t...

We're coming to you guys crystal fucking clear today, we finally set up our new mics!!!! Can you hear a difference in our voices? Great now you can hear absolutely everything we have to say without that STUPID static that literally sends Maddie over the edge lol. Gideon the Ninth was the subplot of this entire episode. Yet another strike out, how does this keep happening?! This book had all the ma...

We're back for another episode baby and we are hyped up on the OceanGate drama LMAOOO. We start this episode by chatting about the ocean cause wtf but we quickly head into our three updates where Maddie talks about how her damn job is stressing her tf out and Tori has had a weird ass day with a broken AC and outta pocket pets. Guncle is so heartwarming and heart wrenching at the same time we were...

a radical queer 70's ghosts stuck in modern reality on a subway train, who just happens to meet the love of her life - a red headed bisexual? this has our names written all over it and it was such a refreshing turn from all of the doom and gloom duds we've had in the past few weeks! we stan an all queer cast and if you're looking for something that won't make you think but feel all the rainbow fee...

Tori & Maddie are singing their praises for Song of Achilles. Beautiful, soft, poetic, this book is everything we've been needing to get out of this book slump. In this episode Tori pops off with her notes & quotes and thankfully Maddie happily let her rattle on about how sad this story was but how much she loved it too. I hope we can all find someone who will wait for us in the darkness....

Y'all we have been SO unlucky these last few weeks and Ninth House was a solid meh. But, fear not, it was not all a complete failure, we did like this book the most out of all the dark academia books we've recently read! Alex is a phenomenal main female character and we think this series just had to set up everything before we descend into hell. And you know us we love a good free fall into the da...

What the actual fucketh you guys. This book is a waste of your time please DO NOT READ. It put Tori in a shit mood and Maddie was there to kinda stave off the simmering anger. The best part of this episode was reading all the one star reviews validating the hate for this book. I think we simply are not dark academia babes. We can't handle no plot all vibes, we gotta have a good story. Hopefully Le...

Autumn was the epitome of the typical teenage school girl stereotype that everyone recreates on TikTok. Maddie put it down for good after chapter 17 while Tori realized that she was Autumn all throughout high school - talk about instantaneous emotional damage(: We've been personally victimized by booktok too many times to count, we shouldn't be surprised this was a major over-hype. Next Episode: I...

What happened one summer? You fucked a fisherman? That sounds pretty hot, Captain. Maddie and Tori are smitten by this small town romance that was the perfect palette cleanser after CC1. With 4 & 5 star ratings we definitely recommend this book to everyone, especially men that need dating help because Brendan is the blue print for grumpy men. Sailors beware, after this book we're feeling inspi...

Genuine question, will you guys ever get tired of us gushing over anything and everything that SJM writes? No? Great, we didn't think so. The second half of this book took each of us on a ride, for Maddie it was until 5AM and for Tori it was crying excessive tears in the car with her worried partner in the drivers seat! We don't have to tell you that this story is elite, IFYKYK, and we are literal...

This bonus episode is for you, you dirty little whore 😋 This episode is all about Priest, suggested, shockingly, by Maddie?!?!?! I know, I was surprised too! We're both glad to have finally read this since its been circling Tik Tok for months and on our radar. We had way too much fun with this episode. We spilled TMI, and we absolutely can't wait for our next smutty book! Until next time, little...

You're that bitch, I'm that bitch, she's that bitch, we're all that bitch and Bretman is THE bitch. Maddie and I both listened to the audiobook for this and Bretman was the voice actor - let's just say there's no other way to take this book in! Yuh. This book feels like a flow of consciousness and it soothed Tori's little ADHD brain. Next Episode: Crescent City House of Earth & Blood Part 2Fol...

This week we found out that all multiple POV books are NOT made equal. At this point we'll have to change our name to BAD BOOKS BAD BANTER. Yet another DUD but, at the very least, we disliked this book so much we had too much to talk about! Tori and I both felt like this story had so much untapped potential but it got sucked into the vortex of abstract, hyper pretentious, 2 dimensional characters...

This story was a dark horse in our line-up and we are so happy we rode into it blind! Tell me why I want 7 freckles that look like a constellation now? Talk about making fictional characters my personality. We were each so happily surprised by this novel and it even got a 5 star review and a promised re-read from Tori! Still can't tell who I want more though, Henry or Luke - such a tough decision!...