Unabridged: The Best of 2023…So Far with Lupita Aquino, Liberty Hardy, and Greta Johnsen

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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