Literal Neighbors

This week, we read Min Jin Lee's Pachinko, a multigenerational story that (episode spoiler ahead!) one reviewer thinks we get way too intimate with. We ruminate over the mafia, discuss caring for permanently injured family members, plan for our summer break, and we even eventually remember the format of our own show!

This week, we read Kirsten Miller's The Women of Wild Hill, and this is a rare occasion where both the one- and five-star reviews make the book sound equally appealing. We're also discussing the housekeeping tactics of ghosts and wondering if they have a skincare routine, or a "GRWM while I inspire generations to take down the patriarchy and billionaire class" that we can check o...

This week, we're digesting Herman Koch's The Dinner, and we're just wondering exactly how long a Dutch dinner is. Long enough for some field trips, flashbacks, and lots of pinky-pointing, and after all that, we aren't entirely sure what we ate.

This week, we read Esi Edugyan's Washington Black, and if you've ever thought that stories about enslaved boys in the 1800s really needed some more scenes of the Arctic circle, we have great news for you. We're diving (see what we did there?) into some of the emotions and growth our main character experiences, debating some choices some characters make, and wondering what can be in sto...

Listen, some people can get a burger when they were expecting pizza and still really, really enjoy the burger. Some people will have pizza or nothing. So if you pick up this 'lesbian vampire drama' and expect to have something extra spicy delivered, but instead you end up with a juicy, pg-13 burger -- you should give it a shot. And by burger, we mean this week's read, V.E. Schwab's...

Julie Chan Is Dead by Liann Zhang has some surprises in it, but perhaps the biggest surprises are our coverage of math and spelling this week. We're also discussing the amenities in our recording space, surprising displays of affection, a bit about how we'd handle that #sponcon life, and who our last phone calls would be -- or if we'd even intended to make them at all.

This week we revisited old friend of the pod Gabrielle Zevin, and read The Storied Life of AJ Fikry. This book has us learning New England geography, some music history, and a little bit about the Marvel universe, all while we sing the praises of good chocolate and the merits of sending your neighbor home when they've had too much sugar and caffeine.

This week we're talking about Lisa Ko's The Leavers, work mistakes, being too silly, and the merits of layered tops. We'll meander through our thoughts about this book and the characters, their actions (or lack thereof), and their reasoning, and we'll top it all off with some talk about the thrilling world of being an adult with an extra day off.

Come sit by the fountain, we need to bestow our thoughts onto you about Allan Levi's Theo of Golden. We're going to sketch out our feelings about it for you, and we ain't holding back, so grab a cup of the best coffee ever and get ready.

This week, we read Ta-Nehisi Coates' Between the World and Me, and we are really digging around for some levity, so we really want to point out that greeting people across a large space with your hands raised in a "W" was probably never actually cool. Coates' short read framed as writing to his son gives us plenty to talk about and, somehow, a refreshing lack of optimism.

Get in the spaceship, loser, we're going to save Earth! This week we went along for a long, treacherous ride with Andy Weir's Project Hail Mary. We're making friends, doing science, and debating how much we'd fail at working together if this really happened. We're also discussing an alleged conspiracy theory -- but is it really conspiracy if it's true?

Kazuo Ishiguro brings us into the mind of an artificial friend with Klara and the Sun, and we have some lingering questions about this world we're looking into. What does it mean to be lifted? What are we saying about religion? And most of all, why are these people still driving cars?! Listen along as we chat about this Nobel prize winner's somewhat futuristic, sunny novel that introduces...

Marjan Kamali's The Lion Women of Tehran has us talking about how insane it is that far less than half the people can decide how a country can be run, to the detriment of pretty much everyone -- seems bizarre, right?! We're also talking about dogs doing stunts, snow, and the movie of the year, so for a heavy topic (at an increasingly heavy time), we've still got plenty of nonsense to d...

This week we're celebrating our 100th episode! We have games, we have snacks, and we almost have an idea of the books we've read for these last 100 episodes! Join us as we try to remember some of our past books, see how our picks stack up to some of the "best of" lists, and choose the top three ice creams out of (checks notes)...three different ice creams.

We finished up Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl this week, and who knew we'd be talking about Doritos two weeks in a row? The biggest lesson we've learned in this second half is that everyone is garbage, and lots of people are creepy garbage. Know what's not creepy? The new friends in the neighborhood we're also spending some time talking about!

Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl is half over, and while we aren't totally sure how we feel, we know one thing: Nick is gross. We have thoughts about his grossness, frito pie, Cheba Hut, and so much more this week, so listen in while we contemplate what's in store for this gem of a human next week.

Jacqueline Harpman's I Who Have Never Known Men has left us with, conservatively, approximately one million questions, and we couldn't be happier to get into the non-existent weeds with everyone about them. From talk of existential crises to 'are there bugs?', we've got plenty to get into -- so listen in, and, oh yeah -- abolish ICE.

Today we're celebrating two years of reading books together! We're giving you a recap of the books we've read this 'semester' and deciding how they've aged in the last week. If there's anything we've learned from this crop of books, it's that we have a lot to learn, and even more that we should remember, so you can expect our usual bouts of forgetfulness and unc...

This week, Taylor Jenkins Reid brings us the Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo...and with that many spouses, we obviously have to spend some time on some 'bedroom' talk. We're contemplating what a world with a closeted Elton John looks like, and we'd like to know what kind of hot guy everyone thinks Harry is, all while we dive into the moral conundrums that Evelyn puts us through.

New year, new illnesses, and a new take on last week's book topic! This week, we read Mineko Iwasaki's not-quite-clapback to last week's book with her Geisha, A Life. We're talking about what we learned, what we didn't learn, what we wished we learned, and what we couldn't learn from this book, all while fighting off whatever plague robbed us of our voices.

Pour yourself a proper cup of tea or sake, we're talking about Arthur Golden's Memoirs of a Geisha. This fictionalized memoir has some real-life issues and controversy around its publication, and amidst discussion about portraying culture accurately in a made up story, we're also talking tamales, driving age, and how much easier it'd be to manage geisha with smartphones.

It's a new year, and we hope you're all experiencing it in chronological order for your life. For the holiday, we read Oona Out of Order by Margarita Montimore. This time travel-ish story tackles the heavy questions: how do you successfully make and manage a ton of money with the benefit of future knowledge? And: How unreasonable is it really to just stay home for one holiday? We'll ge...

Frederik Backman's lengthy titled My Grandmother Asked Me To Tell You She's Sorry was our read this week, and some of us have Wurse sized regrets about it. It's on theme for those who celebrate Christmas this week, and we're chatting about some previous parties and how we're spending the coming holidays -- with not a fantasy land in sight.

Agnes Martin-Lugand's Happy People Read and Drink Coffee gave us a lot to think about, like "What kind of dog is that?" and "Does this book need a sequel?" We're catching up after one trip and before another one, and this (thankfully?) quick read has us happy that our friends are less selfish, our weather's less chilly, and, mostly, that our neighbors are less mean...

How long can you hold your breath? How long can you stay in freezing cold water? This week, we read Lisa See's The Island of Sea Women. If we weren't already humbled by our terrible inability to remember or pronounce names, we'd absolutely be humbled by the strength and abilities these women possess. Oh, and our ignorance about basically any asian history, since we're pretty humble...