[00:00:00] ANNE BOGEL: Hey readers, I’m Anne Bogel and this is What Should I Read Next?. Welcome to the show that’s dedicated to answering the question that plagues every reader, what should I read next? We don’t get bossy on this show. What we will do here is give you the information you need to choose your next read. Every week we’ll talk all things books and reading, and today we are doing a fun and informal midyear reading check-in.

Today I’m talking books with team member Shannan Malone. You heard from Shannan just a few weeks ago when we reshared her very first appearance on the show. But since then, Shannan has become a familiar voice around here and one of my favorite people to talk with about what I’ve been reading lately.

Today, Shannan and I are checking in on how this year has been going so far reading-wise, and what we are most excited about in the coming months.

[00:01:04] We’ll consider whether we’re actually reading what we want to be reading this year, whether we have any intentions to pivot for fall and winter months, and if or how our reading tastes and desires have evolved since we last checked in on this publicly back in December.

Checking in midyear like this is a great practice to make sure you’re aligning your intentions with your actual reading choices. It doesn’t have to be all formal and fuzzy. You’ll hear that Shannan and I are just talking today about the reading life.

We will share reflective practices or questions to help you conduct your own midyear check in, if you are so inclined. But regardless of how you approach your reading life or when you’re listening to this episode, this is, above all, a call to ask yourself, what do you want from your books right now? Because reading time is precious, and we want to help you feel good about how you are using yours.

Let’s get to it.

Hi, Shannan. Welcome to the show.

SHANNAN MALONE: Thank you for having me again.

[00:02:01] ANNE: Oh, my gosh, it’s my pleasure. I’m so glad you’re here. You and I have talked about this a lot in preparation to get together on this episode, and also because we are both readers who talk books. So we want to set this up for our listeners, like why we’re having this midyear check-in, which isn’t something that we’ve had on the podcast really, unless you count Our team’s best books summer check-ins that have become a tradition around here since way back in 2020.

So we are really viewing the midyear point as an opportunity to revisit and assess what we are reading and what we want to read. And that episode that I referred to, we hosted that back in 2020 with Cincinnati area reader, Courtney Wallace. Readers, I really recommend going back and listening. It’s Episode 246. It’s called Does your reading life need a midyear checkup?

[00:02:52] In that episode, Courtney and I talk about her experience in doing a midyear evaluation. Something I realized in talking with Courtney was how often we hear readers who share all their readerly goals and hopes and dreams and resolutions at the beginning of the year, and then they share their recaps and assessments and spreadsheets and critiques and data analyses at the end of the year. But it’s much rarer to see readers stepping back and taking stock midyear.

In fact, Shannan, the last time you and I talked about this, when I say publicly, I mean in our What Should I Read Next? Patreon community. But we recorded that in December and we shared it in January. And it’s all about reading resolutions.

SHANNAN: Yes.

ANNE: It was great. We’ll talk more about that in a moment. But the reason for this midyear check-in is that August Anne and Shannan are not necessarily the same readers that January Anne and Shannan were. And so we got to evaluate, like, are we on a track that is now going the wrong direction? Because other things in our lives and our tastes and realizations, you know, like things change. And we can pivot as readers.

[00:04:01] I don’t know about you all, and Shannan, I don’t know about you, but sometimes it’s such a gift to have some reading decisions pre-made. And sometimes I can be so locked in on what I thought I wanted that I don’t always realize that, hey, that’s not working for me anymore. So this is a time to stop and consciously say, like, is that still working?

SHANNAN: For sure. I’m known to get thickheaded is the word about trying to stay on a track even though it’s going in the wrong direction because that’s the track I decided to be on.

ANNE: And you’re not a quitter. You wouldn’t bail.

SHANNAN: I’m not a quitter. And I put so much thought to getting on that track. I’m like, This has to be right, you know? Then it’s like, “No, it’s not anymore. You need to get off. You need to get off that train. It’s going to run direction.”

ANNE: Yeah. Sometimes with the best of intentions, we can make ourselves really miserable. Because I hope you hear me like where I’m like laughing as I reference… Because I use the Q keyword, the quitter word? Sometimes that’s exactly what we need in our reading lives in the rest of our lives to be like, whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa, this is not working. Let’s do something different.

[00:05:10] And because we are grown readers who are not reading most of the time for grades or assessment or any kind of external… and it is true that we are accountable to our book clubs. Some of us are still students, or students again, but we have a lot of control over what we’re reading. So like, let’s use that agency to make some good choices.

SHANNAN: Yes, let’s.

ANNE: For today’s conversation, we are drawing inspiration from that episode with Courtney Wallace, and she was drawing inspiration from the Midyear Book Freakout Tag on Bookstagram. So hat tip to them, Ely of Earl Grey Books and Chami of Read Like Wildfire. They created this tag way back in 2012.

Courtney did her Midyear Book Freakout reflection after she started her BookTube channel in 2020. So we are drawing loose inspiration from that structure. But we will put the link in show notes if you would like to go down the rabbit hole of all the BookTube videos and conversation around this specific tag.

[00:06:18] SHANNAN: It’s so much fun. I’ve done it regularly I guess, since Courtney’s episode. And it’s so much fun to do. I’m like, I need to do a quarterly Midyear Freakout. It’s so much fun. So yeah, looking forward to it.

ANNE: So said with love and affection, you freak out a lot in the reading life, do you?

SHANNAN: I freak out a lot in real life. It definitely translates into the reading life.

ANNE: I think sometimes the best thing that we can hear as readers is “it’s not just us”. Like those things we do that we think, like, “Are we doing this wrong? Are we overthinking this? Are we underthinking this? Are we really screwing this up?” it can be so reassuring just to hear we are not alone in that. So Shannan, thank you for owning that.

SHANNAN: Yes.

ANNE: Here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to start by discussing some big-picture questions about what has unfolded from late December, early January, when we are making plans and then embarking on implementing those plans in our reading life.

[00:07:24] That sounds really lofty, but you’re going to hear in just a second that my number one goal was to read a wide variety of books I enjoy. Like there wasn’t any strategic plan exactly there. Shannan’s is a little different.

SHANNAN: I remember thinking, “Anne wants to read it all.” And how do you do that?

ANNE: Listeners, if you can figure out how to make that happen, please let me know. I’ll get on that immediately. There will be a strategic plan for that.

But really, I held my intentions very… they’re very broad. There were many, many, many, many different roads I could have taken to fulfill the things I thought I wanted. So we’re going to talk about those big picture questions, and then we’re going to move into more of a lightning round with… you’re going to hear a lot of specific book title recommendations there.

SHANNAN: Awesome.

ANNE: All right, let’s do it.

SHANNAN: All right. So, Anne, at the beginning of 2024, what did you think you wanted from your reading life? We hinted that it was very broad, but can you define “broad” a little bit?

[00:08:31] ANNE: Can I define “broad”? Okay, Shannan, I know you know, and listeners, I imagine that Shannan really wishes she could convey to you how much this is true, that I like to hold my options open. I like to give myself flexibility. For much of what we do behind the scenes, you can know that it looks like a plan. So we have a path forward that is adaptable and held loosely in many places.

That can be a weakness as well as a strength. It’s not always our team members’ favorite. Like, Anne, let’s just nail this down. But I don’t want to nail down what I’m reading for the year in January. So I did go back and listened to that episode we recorded in Patreon, which was so much fun. It’s called Our Reading Resolutions for the Year. And it’s mostly focused on yours because you are much more specific.

But I wanted to read a wide variety of books I really enjoy. That is, minus the verb tense, a direct quote from back then. But I got a little more specific. I said that I wanted to read mainstream books, like big books that readers are broadly reading. And I cited Babel back then as an example because I love to talk about books with others.

[00:09:43] But I also wanted to read really niche sleeper books that might fly under the radar, but then surface those so I can talk about those with other readers as well.

I said that I wanted to read books that challenged me and made me think in new ways that took me around the globe, I wanted to read some long, sprawling books that I could stay with for a good long time and also some short, quick books that delivered compact reading experience that were… that like… Oh, I’m trying to use a boxing analogy and it’s breaking down. Despite the two boxing books I’ve read. But books that really punched above their weight there. That’s what it is.

And also some gently weird stuff. Like Elizabeth Weed came on the podcast and talked about how a thimble full of weird was a whole vibe in the publishing landscape right now, books that just had a thimble full. And I wanted to find some of those. But that’s really as specific as I got.

[00:10:43] SHANNAN: I think that’s pretty specific.

ANNE: I thank you. Thank you very much.

SHANNAN: So how has that played out? Have you gotten to any of those things or not gotten to any of those things?

ANNE: I mean, in some sense, how could I not? You all know me. You hear me talk about books all the time on the podcast. It was kind of a given. But I know I said that I wanted to be really thoughtful about my choices and very aware that there is no plan to read everything.

Like I could spend the rest of my life and not finish reading all the books that were published yesterday. There’s just not that much reading time. But I did want to feel like I’d use my time well, my precious limited reading time.

Also, I wanted to be very conscious about the mix. Because I’ve learned that a healthy… not balanced necessarily. It doesn’t need to be even, but a healthy assortment of old and new and various genres and some books that are just pure escape and some that are… This is me trying not to be pretentious. But just like seriously amazing great works of literature, you know? Like I want all of those things.

[00:12:02] But some of the things I didn’t think to ask for have been some of the things that have been such a struggle this year. Like, ooh, I didn’t think to hope for just consistent reading time. That was really a struggle for me in the first and second quarters. And I missed it. I missed it.

I feel like I should say why because it’s very clear in my head. And it just all comes down to like I am a reader who loves to read and books are my job, and also, I’m a person where books are part of my life. They’re only part of my life.

So for personal reasons, my mom died. She got sick and then she died very quickly in early January. I mean, that took over everything for a while.

When my dad had died, I read a book a day as a coping strategy, like a peaceful centering experience in the early weeks after he died. And I kind of thought at first that it might be the same after my mom died, but we were so, so busy with practical stuff.

[00:13:07] And I was reading, but I was reading like family albums. And we were traveling and I wasn’t reading. Which was obviously not the main thing in this whole conversation. But this is a conversation about the reading life specifically. So, that is what’s driving this conversation, though that clearly didn’t drive this type of my life.

But I know that we’ve all experienced personal tragedies and personal crises. And it’s been so interesting to me how sometimes those create abundant reading time because that’s the only thing I can do. Like you were just reminding me of when I had lung and airway issues in early 2023 and all I could do was sit on the couch. And I read a lot.

SHANNAN: Right. I remember you saying that.

ANNE: So much. So much. I didn’t listen to any audiobooks at all for like six weeks, which was really different because I wasn’t allowed to climb stairs to do laundry or stand up for a long time to do dishes. But yeah, I just didn’t expect that.

[00:14:07] Then when I got back to reading again, the only thing I wanted to read were family dramas. I branched out a little bit, but I really leaned into that. And you can see that there’s a lot of that represented in the Summer Reading Guide because that’s what I always love. But also, I didn’t branch out as far in January, February, March, as I typically compel myself to do as a reader because of my job.

You entered the year with a very different set of intentions. So tell us, what did you think you wanted from your reading life at the beginning of 2024?

SHANNAN: I get very specific.

ANNE: I love that about you. I mean, we balance each other out.

SHANNAN: That is true. That is true. So I have had a reading project consistently for a long time. Basically, 2024 was a narrowing in, I’ve noticed, of my reading goals.

[00:15:07] So 2022 I was open to abundance and possibility. And that carried over a little bit into 2023. And then I really felt myself kind of wanting to focus.

2022 was my heck yeah reading year. So if I heard about a book, and my response was, heck yeah, I want to read that, then it went on my list. 2023 was my “Don’t wait. Don’t save it” reading year because I discovered in 2022 that I was saving a lot of those heck yeah books. So in 2023, if I wanted to read it, I didn’t save it. I just jumped right in. So that was a narrowing of my goal.

So in 2024, I wanted to have a more focused approach. I only wanted to read and savor the things that I knew I would enjoy and let the things that I said matter to me to actually let it matter.

[00:16:07] So this year’s goal was five-star reads. So I’m aiming, for most of my reads, a good percentage, I’m thinking above 80, need to be four and five-star reads this year. That’s the goal.

ANNE: Need to be.

SHANNAN: Yes, need to be. For me. Like, again. I’m trying to hold things more loosely, as you have taught me, but I really do want them, the majority of my reads to be four and five stars.

ANNE: So how’s that played out so far?

SHANNAN: In anticipation of this episode, I went ahead and did the numbers, and so far, I am at 86%.

ANNE: Wow. Okay, we’ve had some really interesting conversations about some things that you have learned thus far in the year about those four and five-star reads. Can you tell all of us a little bit?

[00:17:02] SHANNAN: Well, one of the things that I have noticed is that the five-star reads are what I would call hard books. Meaning they’re talking about subjects that could be contemplative, reflective, difficult. There may be some difficult subjects involved. There may be tears. There may be anger. They’re definitely reactionary in me, in my spirit. Sometimes I can’t handle those. So most of that 86% is four stars. They’re not five stars. They’re four stars, which means I really liked it.

ANNE: I remember when we were first talking about that, I think you were in a season where you were kind of looking for lighter escapist reads, and they weren’t really working for you the way you’d hoped. Am I remembering this right?

SHANNAN: Yes. Those are three stars. Lightest escapist for the most part, those are like your, for me, mysteries, detective series, thrillers. In the past, those have been mostly three-star reads, but they’re escapism for me because if it’s a detective series, there’s going to be a crime and it’s going to be solved.

[00:18:21] Five-star reads tend to feel a little bit more ambiguous. You don’t know how the ending is going to be. You don’t know if it’ll be a happy ending. You don’t know if it’ll be a sad ending. So there’s a lot more ambiguity in my five-star reads, I’m noticing. And that feels a little dangerous to me right now.

I have a lot of uncertainty and we don’t know what’s happening in the world. I kind of retreat in the books where I do know what’s happening and I do know that it’s going to end in a particular way.

ANNE: Shannan, at this point in the year, is that still what you want?

SHANNAN: Yes, I do. I do. Listeners, this is a little behind-the-scenes look, but in the notes, you mentioned something about squirrels.

ANNE: Here, we’ll jump ahead. What do I especially want for my reading life between now and the end of the year? I think I wrote “no nervous squirrel energy”.

[00:19:27] SHANNAN: I can relate to that 100%. There’s been a lot of nervous squirrel energy, or at least the dog in Up where they’re like, squirrel! That has been happening a lot this year. I do want to calm that down a little bit and really focus again on the four and five-star reads that I really do want to read.

ANNE: Okay, this is not a sentence I thought I’d uttered in this hour, but what are your squirrels?

SHANNAN: Squirrels can be so many things. A book with a pretty cover.

ANNE: Yeah, that’s a classic.

SHANNAN: Or a book that’s on Bookstagram that just keeps showing up all the time, all the time, all the time, and you’re like, Oh, well, I guess everyone’s reading that. Maybe I should read that.”

In our episodes before, I mentioned I’m an enneagram 6. So I’m always looking outward like, Oh, what is everyone else reading? Well, maybe I should read that.

[00:20:33] Squirrels for me… I’m also very not just a reader, I’m a watcher. I love watching movies and shows. And Squirrel is a good television show. Like, oh, and then I’m not reading as much as I had wanted to.

ANNE: So you want to continue on your four and five-star books filter?

SHANNAN: Yes, I do.

ANNE: Is there anything you want to add to your shortlist of what you want for the rest of 2024?

SHANNAN: No, no. I think because again, I’m a planner, I’m pretty solid in what I wanted. My trick is to actually do the things that I say I want to do.

ANNE: Heard.

SHANNAN: What about you? Are you still wanting those things or are you going to shift a little bit?

ANNE: Oh, I mean, a wide variety of books I really enjoy. Mainstream and like niche books that fly under the radar, challenge taken around the globe, long, short, a little bit weird, like, yes, I think. I think that’s pretty evergreen. But I can get more specific on some of the things that I say I want.

[00:21:44] This would sound so boring to some people, but I want a steadiness in my reading life now. So by my own nervous squirrel energy, I mean right now I am deep in choosing the books for our Fall Book Preview that’s taking place in mid-September for our book lovers and our patrons, and our a la carte community.

And y’all, you got to come. The selections are so good. You need to hear more about them so you can make intelligent, thoughtful choices so you don’t have that nervous squirrel energy. I don’t know. Some people love them and that’s fine.

SHANNAN: I could agree with you there because you gave me one of those titles earlier this week and it was squirrel and I’m in the middle of it and I’m about to finish it.

ANNE: Given the context, I’m not sure whether to be delighted or horrified.

SHANNAN: I’m thinking it’s probably definitely gonna be at least four and a half. I’ll see how it ends to see if it can go to

five-star status.

[00:22:46] ANNE: Okay, I’ll take it. No regrets. Okay. In that case, what I’m looking for is acceptance. I can’t read everything. So really thoughtfully, what will help me feel satisfied about how I’ve spent my limited time? I try to think of it like a menu at a restaurant that I’ve been wanting to go to for a million years and you’re there and you can’t eat the whole menu. So you thoughtfully choose. Like it all sounds amazing. You think it would all be wonderful. This is not a perfect analogy with all the books in front of me.

So what do I really want to choose to enjoy? Because if I just plowed through my dinner, that wouldn’t do it justice. No chef would be happy to see you devour your entree in three bites. And yet that enthusiasm to want to experience it is real.

I’m just really trying to get curious about like, what are the books? What is right for me? What is right for me right now? What can I bring to our readership that would be interesting and additive to their reading lives? I just want to feel steady.

[00:23:54] I know for me that reading a variety of genres, like if I read a lot of page turners in a row, then that does something to my expectations about pace and how quickly I turn the pages, and it’s so fun to fly through like a mystery or a romance.

But if I’m flying through everything, then I need to make different choices. I think about the genres because some books you cannot read quickly. And I want some of those books in my regular mix.

I’m also finding that I need to be deliberate about reading the old stuff. Because if I don’t want it on purpose, then when I am in a season of reading for Fall Book Preview or Summer Reading Guide, that’s what’s really easy to exclude. So I’m keeping my priority TBR list in front of me.

Something that accidentally worked really well for me in the spring and early summer was I was reading new and forthcoming books in print, often but not always on my Kindle and I was listening to backlist books that were sometimes just a few years old, but sometimes really old. And that was really working for me.

[00:25:05] But it just so happened that I listened to a few new releases real quick on audio, and then I started looking for more new releases and realized, whoa, hang on, hang on. If I don’t make adjustments in what I’m reading in print, and I’m no longer reading backlist on audio, that means I’m no longer reading backlist. And I’m not as happy with my reading life when that’s how it goes for a month or more at a time. So I’m trying to be conscious of that.

I also have a few reading projects that are keeping me exploring into interesting territory and really grounded in my intentions. We’re working on short stories for Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club this fall, and I’m currently scanning and reading for collections. And I’m reading essay collections for a different project.

And I’m always on the hunt for Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club selections. And we like to read a mix of old books that are readily available at the library and newer works.

So I like how those two specific timely projects and that one ongoing one, since we’ve been doing Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club since 2016, are also naturally broadening my selections.

[00:26:12] SHANNAN: Right. That sounds great.

ANNE: What about you? What do you especially want between now and the end of the year?

SHANNAN: Well, I have a book project too that I’m doing with team member Donna called 24 Books in 2024. And that is where we are trying to read 24 books from our shelves that we already own and that we have been saying we have been wanting to read for a very, very long time. Brigid has joined us with this. Or actually, technically, I joined Brigid and Donna. They had planned it and I was like, “Let me in.”

So that has been kind of helpful in helping me choose the books that I’m reading and keeping that intention. So if it’s not a five-star read as I’m going through the first few pages, or maybe the first few chapters, and I’m like, Okay, I can let this go. And it’s also clearing out my TBR shelf, which I really had a goal to do this year.

ANNE: Yeah, 24 books is a lot of books. That’s one every other week for the year.

[00:27:19] SHANNAN: What I have been able to do, though, is DNF a lot of books that were on my shelf and say, No, this is not for me. I’ve done 17 DNFs this year and have sent them back out into the world for other readers to enjoy. So I’m very happy about that. And I’ve probably read six books that were all four stars and above. So I’m really happy about that.

I want to borrow what you want from your reading year into mine. I think that steadiness that you are talking about and that intention is something that I really need to focus on this year. I need to slow down and savor my reads, especially since I’m well into my goals and probably will meet them.

I feel like the second half of the year is when I do slow down my pace and say, Okay, I’m probably 10 books away from my annual goal. So I can slow down. I can savor. I can enjoy. I can appreciate a good sentence instead of hurling through to get to the next read.

[00:28:28] ANNE: I like that for you. Well, Shannan, the steadiness is yours for the taking. And also I’m loving the visual of you just like banging on the door. Like, Guys, guys, let me in. Let me into the 24 books plan.

SHANNAN: Yeah, I did.

ANNE: I really enjoyed hearing you talk about how you realized that when you’re asking for four and five-star reads, you’re asking for a certain kind of book in a way you didn’t realize. I’m wondering if there were any other pivotal moments, conversations, realizations, even reading experiences that really clarified for you something about yourself as a reader or something about yourself as a reader right now?

SHANNAN: I’m not sure. Do you have any? And maybe as you’re talking, I might think of one.

ANNE: A little bit. You know how sometimes someone articulates something sometimes just totally off the cuff and it really sticks in your brain and sometimes in a very purposeful way? When I talked with Lauren Groff at Word of South… and y’all, I’m not actually even sure if this was a green room conversation or if this happened on stage on audio that you could go back and listen to.

[00:29:44] But she talked about the difference between books as entertainment and books as art. And part of me thinks, I don’t know how comfortable I am with that distinction. So I thought that was really interesting.

One of the questions I’m always asking myself about the books I’m reading is, what is the author trying to do? What kind of experience are they trying to create for the reader? What kind of story are they trying to tell?

And look, the fact that the author intends that thing doesn’t necessarily mean that they achieve that. You know, that that’s what the reader experiences on the other end. But the intention is an interesting question.

I’m often asking myself in the context of reviewing something, well what is this work trying to be and is it succeeding? And I’m really uncomfortable in the critical chair if that’s not obvious.

Part of me wants to reject that as a dichotomy because I think it can be a false one. But also being able to ask myself, as I’m choosing my next read, do I want something entertaining or do I want something with superb craft? You can hear I just made that an “or”. And I don’t like that.

[00:30:56] I talk about how I love compulsively readable literary fiction. Like I want artful entertainment and I want entertaining works that are beautifully crafted. And I think those things do exist, but I don’t always have to have a blend. And just asking myself like, Do I want a book that will take me away or do I want a different kind of reading experience?

See, now I’m trying to make it a dichotomy. Here’s what I’m trying to say. Asking myself, what am I looking for right now? And having those options that Lauren Groff stated in my internal vocabulary to use as I’m looking for books, that’s been a useful tool. Those have been useful like two-word combo in the conversations I’m having with myself about books.

SHANNAN: That’s interesting. I wonder if I would add a third.

ANNE: Oh, please do.

SHANNAN: Like you have art, entertainment, and edification.

ANNE: Oooh.

[00:31:56] SHANNAN: When you were talking about art, books that are more, you know, well-crafted, I’m thinking New York Times best 100 books list, you know?

Then you have the entertainment more side of things, which is I’m thinking everybody else’s list that they created, you know, which is less. I like to use literary and high and lofty.

The best analogy for me with those books is do I want to watch the movie that’s going to win the Academy Award or the one that’s fun and everyone wins? Because those are two totally different movies, you know?

ANNE: Okay, over the weekend we watched a movie whose title I cannot remember, but it’s about Chris Evans, who’s a likable guy who can’t get a girlfriend. My kids were like, “This isn’t real,” but whatever. And Ana de Armas, who’s a spy… and the reviews were only okay.

[00:32:53] And my daughter was like, “You know what? I’m willing to take a chance on it because I want to be entertained. I want to giggle. I really like those two characters. So, you know, I’m not expecting anything great. I just want to be amused.” We ended up being quite happy with our IMDb 5.6 out of 10 rated movie.

SHANNAN: I know. I know. The hubs always says, “Well, the critics hated it.” He said, “Let’s watch it. It’s probably good.” So yeah, that’s what I’m thinking of when you were talking about that. And I do think that’s good.

You know, with my five-star reads, I feel like those would be more artful and edifying category. But then life circumstances happen and you know, I think, nope, just want to be entertained. And that’s probably going to be a three-ish star read for me. And I have to be okay with that also.

ANNE: I hear you. And also I keep wanting to say, it’s not a binary. Like, I don’t think there’s books over here that are art and then in a whole different section of the bookstore, the library, or your life, there are these entertaining books.

[00:34:08] SHANNAN: I think being able to entertain is an art form.

ANNE: Yes. Yes. Although we can’t leave this topic behind without asking for an example of a book you wouldn’t call edifying.

SHANNAN: Oh, those are probably my memoirs and my self-help type of books.

ANNE: The story was good for my soul?

SHANNAN: Yes. And the books that teach me something. There are a lot of those. Some things that I’m learning are more challenging than others, those would be the hard books that I mentioned earlier.

ANNE: Yeah. Now that you’ve said that, I can think of many that you have passed my way that that word absolutely applies. My hold just came in for someone else in my family to read How to Keep House While Drowning, speaking of. Does that count for you?

SHANNAN: It does.

ANNE: Amazing. Okay, we’re going to try to do something really bold here that I have not historically proven to be wonderful at.

SHANNAN: What’s that? A lightning round?

ANNE: And that is a lightning round. Yeah. Okay, here’s what’s going to happen. You are going to ask me questions and I’m going to answer them succinctly. I’m going to give you an answer and then I’m going to stop talking.

[00:35:19] What we’re going to do is turn the tables in Patreon. So in Patreon, Shannan and I are going to talk a little bit more about your challenge and give readers an update since they first heard about what you were thinking for 2024 there and then you get to do the lightning round. And I’ve seen some of your short answers. I don’t know that they’re so lightning either.

SHANNAN: We’ll do our best. All right. Shall we go?

ANNE: Yes. I’m ready.

SHANNAN: Listeners, these are some of the questions from the Midyear Freakout Tag. We’ve taken some of them, changed a few, but we’re using those as our inspiration. Okay, number one. Best book you’ve read so far.

ANNE: Okay. Well, something we’ve talked with readers about is that when you identify the books that are really working for you, it can illuminate for you what really interests you and what you’re liking right now. And I tell readers I find it helpful to look at their top five selections.

[00:36:26] So I’m going to use some restraint and only share three. Loved and Missed by Susie Boyt, The God of the Woods by Liz Moore, and Enter Ghost by Isabella Hammad.

SHANNAN: Awesome. Number two: best sequel you’ve read so far.

ANNE: Oh, okay. I read a sequel at the beach. It was amazing. Better than the original. So good. So fun. So timely. And it’s going to be a Fall Book Preview Spotlight title, so I’m not going to tell you about it till then.

SHANNAN: Okay. Number three: new release you haven’t read yet but want to.

ANNE: Oh, the Ina Garten memoir, Be Ready When the Luck Happens, coming in October. Give it to me right now. I wish.

SHANNAN: Number four: most anticipated release for the second half of the year.

[00:37:24] ANNE: I have to tell everybody that my notes on this question are a bunch of question marks followed by all caps, YOU SHOULD SEE MY WALL, because that’s where I’m planning out Fall Book Preview. Like there’s seriously 200 titles written on my wall and I’ve read so many good ones too. This is such a good season.

But I will go for the maybe not as likely to already be on your radar picks. There’s a new book coming from the French author, Maylis de Kerangal called Canoes. It’s a short story collection that also includes the novella. I fell in love with her with Painting Time, and I read everything she’s written that’s been translated. And I am very eager for a new one, especially, it looks like this collection is going in a different direction than the fiction that I’ve read has.

Also, I don’t think this one would be on my radar if I hadn’t already read and loved some of her translated works. But Tina Kover has a new translation coming out. It’s called The Ogre’s Daughter, which that title wouldn’t grab me, the cover wouldn’t grab me, I wouldn’t even be sure of the genre. But it’s historical fiction.

[00:38:26] I’ve loved every book I’ve read that she’s translated. And I don’t know if that’s her skill as a writer, taking it from French to English, or if it’s the kind of works that she tends to translate, but I’m really excited to pick that up as well.

SHANNAN: Number five: biggest disappointment.

ANNE: Oh, okay. I tell readers that evaluating what didn’t work is often more informative than looking at what did work.

SHANNAN: Yes, that’s been my experience.

ANNE: Yeah. For me, this is often a case of expectations meeting reality. That’s not unique to me, obviously. I’m going to obliquely say I read a string of romance novels this spring when I was looking to complete our love story category in the Summer Reading Guide, and I found it incredibly disappointing.

The reason that it really got me, that I took it kind of personally, was the early reviews. And some reader-gushing from readers I knew was so enthusiastic. Like this is a slam dunk. But they didn’t mean for me.

[00:39:39] As much as I know better, sometimes I have to stop and remind myself that quite often it can seem like everybody loves a book, but that doesn’t mean you’re going to love it too. And so I felt like I just want a fun escapist story and I was looking in the wrong place.

I’m going to twist your question. There’s a book in the Summer Reading Guide by Monica Wood called How to Read a Book and it’s basically the opposite of the downfall of expectations and reality meeting.

This book is about three lonely, hurt people who come together. A bunch of the story takes place inside a women’s prison. A book club in that women’s prison is incredibly important.

I don’t want to go into detail about the plot, but I will say it made me very nervous because I thought this subject matter needs to be handled impeccably or this is either going to be a disaster or just sappy and melodramatic. And it was gorgeous.

[00:40:49] SHANNAN: Number six: biggest surprise.

ANNE: Okay, I’m going to redirect on the lightning round thing. I read a Laura Lippman story collection called Seasonal Work. The stories were quintessentially Laura Lippman and also so short, so punchy, and really effective in that format.

Also, There’s Always This Year, that’s the Hanif Abdurraqib nonfiction work — that was me struggling to describe it — about basketball, but about so much more than basketball that just made me go like, Wow. Also, I’m not an NBA fan, but I am a fan of this book. That was a great experience.

SHANNAN: All right. Number seven: favorite new author or debut or new to you.

ANNE: Ooh. Hanif, not debut, but new to me. And I did do what I intended to do, which was then go back and explore his backlist. Also, Xochitl Gonzalez, who we just talked to in Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club.

[00:41:53] I had been putting off reading Olga Dies Dreaming. I didn’t read that when it came out, but I read it at the beginning of the year. No, that’s not what happened. I read Anita de Monte Laughs Last first, and I read this… Oh gosh, it might actually have been in late 2023.

But I read it, loved it, was so glad she had another novel. Then I read Olga, loved it. Then I discovered she’d written all these pieces for The Atlantic. So, read all those. Love those.

We just talked with her in book club. She’s talking about her third book, which I want to read immediately. It’s not ready. It won’t be ready for a while. But the way she described it, I thought, “Oh, I’m so glad. I’m so glad that we met. Writer to reader.”

SHANNAN: Number eight: newest fictional crush and or favorite character. This question is so fun.

ANNE: Anita de Monte, especially after talking with Xochitl in book club, because she talked about how she went to hang out with the real-life inspiration for Anita de Monte with her ghost at the art museum in Rome. But a badass female artist who gets revenge on her terrible husband from beyond the grave, like, yeah, I was there for it.

[00:43:05] SHANNAN: Number nine: book that made you cry.

ANNE: Oh, well, there were a lot of these this year, in part because I was really emotional and in part because of what I was picking. But Loved and Missed, my favorite — I already said — by Susie Boyt, Sandwich by Catherine Newman, and Same As It Ever Was by Claire Lombardo. Just to give you three. That’s just the tip of what we could talk about.

SHANNAN: We’re going to end on a happy note with question number 10: book that made you happy.

ANNE: Oh, okay. We might actually end on a frustrating note because I’m not going to tell you the title. But remember how I just said that my biggest disappointment was this string of romance novels that were just not for me that I read this spring?

SHANNAN: Mm-hmm.

ANNE: I read a sports romance just last week that was set in the world of college basketball. It comes out this fall. I loved it so much. It covers some heavy stuff, and yet I loved it so much. It made me so happy. It was a great reading experience.

[00:44:07] Oh, and I read it on my birthday, which just felt really lucky. Like, thank you, universe and the internet, and Publishers Weekly for helping me find a book that I just loved. Extremely entertainment and wonderfully written. It was a debut. I can’t wait to talk about it as a fall book preview spotlight title.

But I will say I’m also reading the new Jessica Joyce right now. I have 30% to go. I feel like she’s not going to let me down. I loved You, with a View that I read, I think, earlier this year on audio.

Now I’m listening to the audio of her brand new book called The Ex Vows. It’s not a title I love because I’m still not exactly sure what it’s supposed to mean and I’m 70% of the way through the book. But I’m really happy that her sophomore novel is still fantastic. It just makes me happy. It’s fun. It’s escapist. It’s way spicier than I remember her first book being. Readers, if you want to know that. Yeah, it’s lots of fun.

Oh, I want to say, Shannan, tell me about a book that made you happy. But that’s for Patreon.

SHANNAN: Yes.

[00:45:10] ANNE: Well, we’re gonna have fun talking about that soon.

SHANNAN: Yes, we are. So answering the questions, Anne, what insight did they give you? Do you have direction going from here? Or what do you think?

ANNE: I think it’s really lovely to take a minute or 20 and take up purposeful pause and look back at all the good stuff I’ve read. Because it’s not all been good stuff by any means. I feel like if I’m reading all good stuff that I’m not taking chances in my reading life. And I’m really happy when I take chances in my reading life. That’s where I find the stuff that ends up being superlative material.

But just to take a pause and see what’s working and appreciate the wide variety of amazing books I’ve gotten to read, and also think about what I can still read between now and the end of the year.

I said I wanted steadiness. And I think just the process of stepping back and looking at the big picture of my reading life right now has steadied me. And I’m grateful for that. Also, it’s super fun.

[00:46:18] SHANNAN: It is.

ANNE: What about you?

SHANNAN: Can I say same? You said it so eloquently. I do enjoy looking back. I do enjoy seeing what I’ve experienced. I’m not naturally a positive person. I would naturally probably go to what I have not done that I wanted to do. But listening to you just now say what you said, it just warmed my heart. And it’s like, yeah, I really should be thankful and grateful for what I have done, what I have read, what I have enjoyed, and look forward to what’s coming up next.

ANNE: Well, thank you. And thank you for joining me for a wonderful conversation.

SHANNAN: Thank you for having me.

[00:47:20] ANNE: Hey, readers, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Shannan today. If you are conducting your own midyear reading check-in, we would love to hear what you learned and what stood out to you.

You can comment on 0our show notes page to let us know that. That’s also where we’ll list all the titles we talked about today. You can always find those notes at whatshouldireadnextpodcast.com.

Keep up to date with all the happenings here at What Should I Read Next? HQ by subscribing to our email updates. You can do that at whatshouldireadnextpodcast.com/newsletter.

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Subscribing and downloading each new episode is a quick, easy, and free way to show your support for our show. It really does make a difference to us as podcasters. Thank you so much.

[00:48:13] Thanks to the people who make this show happen. What Should I Read Next? is created each week by Will Bogel, Holly Wielkoszewski, and Studio D Podcast Production. Thank you to my co-host today, Shannan Malone. Readers, that’s it for this episode. Thanks so much for listening. And as Rainer Maria Rilke said, “Ah, how good it is to be among people who are reading.” Happy reading, everyone.