Here by popular demand is our first Unabridged mid-year best of’s (so-far) episode, featuring a trio of our favorite bookish friends – Book Riot’s Liberty Hardy, Lupita Aquino (aka @Lupita.Reads) and Nerdette’s Greta Johnsen. We list and discuss our favorite 2023 releases we’ve read, the backslist we’re obsessed with, and a few picks we’re looking forward to in the back half of the year.
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Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes. You can also find what we talked about on Amazon.
- Nerdette (WBEZ Chicago)
- “Ep. 195 The Best Books of 2021 with Lupita Aquino and Morgan Hoit” (The Stacks)
- “Ep. 131 The Undocumented Americans by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio — The Stacks Book Club (Lupita Aquino)” (The Stacks)
- “Ep. 127 Crushes and Controversy with Lupita Aquino” (The Stacks)
- @Lupita.Reads (IG)
- All the Books! (Book Riot)
- The Dog of the North by Elizabeth McKenzie
- The Portable Veblen by Elizabeth McKenzie
- National Book Award
- The Dog of the South by Charles Portis
- Kevin Wilson
- Take What You Need by Idra Novi
- “Nerdette Book Club: Idra Novey on ‘Take What You Need’” (Nerdette, WBEZ Chicago)
- Better the Blood by Michael Bennett
- “Nerdette Book Club: Michael Bennett on ‘Better the Blood’” (Nerdette, WBEZ Chicago)
- The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty
- The City of Brass by S.A. Chakraborty
- Hijab Butch Blues by Lamya H.
- “Reading While Lapsed: A Conversation with BookTok Icon Lupita Aquino” (Lapsed)
- “Ep. 253 I Tend to Write About It with Lamya H.” (The Stacks)
- We Were Once a Family by Roxanna Asgarian
- “Child in viral Portland police hug photo missing, 5 family members dead after California cliff crash” (Shane Dixon Kavanaugh, The Oregonian)
- We Were Once a Family by Roxanna Asgarian (audiobook)
- Rough Sleepers by Tracy Kidder
- Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder
- Paul Farmer
- Jim O’Connell
- The People Who Report More Stress by Alejandro Varela
- The Town of Babylon by Alejandro Varela
- Going Zero by Anthony McCarten
- Marin Ireland
- Bottoms Up and the Devil Laughs by Kerry Howley
- Deep as the Sky, Red as the Sea by Rita Chang-Eppig
- Big Swiss y Jen Beagin
- The Night Flowers by Sara Herchenroether
- Rivermouth by Alejandra Oliva
- A Living Remedy by Nicole Chung
- Promises of Gold by José Olivarez
- “Ep. 258 Long-Suffering Basketball Fans with José Olivarez” (The Stacks)
- Angie Cruz
- Soledad by Angie Cruz
- Let It Rain Coffee by Angie Cruz
- My Government Means to Kill Me by Rasheed Newson
- Bayard Rustin
- Fred Trump
- Larry Kramer
- The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells
- Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
- The Bad Guys by Aaron Blabey
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer (The WB)
- Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
- The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel
- Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
- William Shakespeare
- Last Night in Montreal by Emily St. John Mandel
- The Singer’s Gun by Emily St. John Mandel
- The Lola Quartet by Emily St. John Mandel
- “Your summer books preview” (Nerdette)
- Lucky Red by Claudia Cravens
- Flores and Miss Paula by Melissa Rivero
- The Affairs of the Falcons by Melissa Rivero
- “Best books of 2021” (Nerdette)
- MJ Franklin
- Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward
- More is More by Molly Baz
- Chicky Chicky Bread Bread (Molly Baz from Instagram)
- Raw Dog by Jamie Loftus
- Tom Lake by Ann Patchett
- The Fragile Threads of Power by V. E. Schwab
- How Much of These Hills is Gold by C. Pam Zhang
- Land of Milk and Honey by C. Pam Zhang
- Blackouts by Justin Torres
- We the Animals by Justin Torres
- We the Animals (Jeremiah Zagar, 2018)
- Company by Shannon Sanders
- Danielle Evans
- Creep by Myriam Gurba
- The Great White Bard by Farah Karim-Cooper
Connect with Liberty: Instagram | All the Books!
Connect with Lupita: Instagram | Twitter
Connect with Greta: Instagram | Twitter | Nerdette
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