Episode 198 - Top Ten Reads of 2023 with BookTuber Russell Gray of Ink and Paper Blog

Episode 198 with BookTuber Russell Gray

Episode One Hundred Ninety Eight Show Notes

– 1st Quarter 2024 Readalong –
Our first quarter readalong is Indigo by Beverly Jenkins.  

Our Zoom discussion will take place on Sunday, March 3rd at 7pm (ET), send an email if you would like to reserve a spot. You can join the Goodreads discussion here.

We’ve also created a Goodreads thread for general romance chit chat.

You can stream the documentary Love Between the Covers for free.

– Listener Top Ten –
Let us know your Top Ten Books of 2023

– Episode Sponsor –
Book of the Month curated monthly book subscription service
Chris chose a hard cover: No One Can Know – Kate Alice Marshall
Emily chose a hard cover: A Winter in New York by Josie Silver
Use the code FORYOU to receive your first delivery for $5

– Russell’s Top Ten Reads of 2023 –  (Follow Russell on his Booktube Channel: Ink and Paper Blog)
The Road to Dalton – Shannon Bowring
Little Monsters – Adrienne Brodeur
Alice Sadie Celine – Sarah Blakley-Cartwright
Day – Michael Cunningham
Wellness – Nathan Hill (audiobook)
North Woods – Daniel Mason ((audiobook)
The Only One Left – Riley Sager
The Late Americans – Brandon Taylor
The Daughter Ship – Boo Trundle
In Memoriam – Alice Winn
Family Meal – Bryan Washington

– Chris’s Top Ten Reads of 2023 –
The Dictionary of the Book: A Glossary for Book Collectors, Booksellers, Librarians, and Others – Sidney E. Berger
Wilma Rogers – Sophia Belzer Engstrand
Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want – Ruha Benjamin (audiobook)
Endpapers – Jennifer Savran Kelly (listen to the Author Spotlight on Episode 178)
Hester – Laurie Lico Albanese (listen to the Author Spotlight on Episode 189)
The September House – Carissa Orlando
People of the Book – Geraldine Brooks
How Can I Help You – Laura Sims
The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism – Meghan Marshall
Emily Dickinson Face to Face – Martha Dickinson Bianchi

– Emily’s Top Ten Reads of 2023 –
Lark Ascending – Silas House
The Queen of Dirt Island – Donal Ryan (NPR Book of the Day conversation with Donal Ryan)
Something So Good It Can Never Be Enough – Shuly Cawood  (listen to the Author Spotlight on Episode 191)
Yogurt & Whey: Recipes of an Iranian Immigrant Life – Homa Dashtaki
Morning in This Broken World – Katrina Kittle (listen to the Author Spotlight on Episode 188)
Rough Sleepers – Tracy Kidder (audiobook)
Zorrie – Laird Hunt
The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox – Maggie O’Farrell
Let Us Descend – Jesmyn Ward
Moonrise Over New Jessup – Jamila Minnicks
Properties of Thirst – Marianne Wiggins

– Favorite Biblio Adventures –
City Arts & Lectures in San Francisco – Brandon Taylor
A Great Good Place for Books in Oakland, CA with Lauren Groff talking about The Vaster Wilds
The Old Manse in Concord, MA
The House of the Seven Gables in Salem, MA
Galivanting around Berkeley, CA with Aunt Ellen

– Upcoming Reads We Are Excited About –
James – Percival Everett release date 3/19/24
The Fury – Alix Michaelides release date 1/16/24
Real Americans – Rachel Khong release date 4/30/24
Last Night – Luanne Rice release date 2/1/24
Memory Piece – Lisa Ko release date 3/19/24
Finding Margaret Fuller – Allison Pataki release date 3/19/24
Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts: Stories and Recipes from Five Generations of Black Country Cooks – Crystal Wilkinson release date 1/23/24
The Twilight Garden – Sara Nisha Adams release date 4/9/24

– Also Mentioned –
Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
The Flame and the Flower – Kathleen E. Woodiwiss
Parnassus on Wheels – Christopher Morley
Olive Kitteridge – Elizabeth Strout
Southernmost – Silas House
Read Appalachia
Ann Patchett
The Institute Library of New Haven
Harriet Beecher Stowe Prize
The Hours film
The White Mustache Yogurt Company
Start Here: Instructions for Becoming a Better Cook – Sohla El-Waylly
The Nix – Nathan Hill
Ryan – ReadbyRyan on Instagram
The Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne
The Vulnerables – Sigrid Nunez
Lucy by the Sea – Elizabeth Strout
The Woman in Me – Brittany Spears
The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires – Grady Hendrix
March – Geraldine Brooks
Also by Brandon Taylor: Real Life and Filthy Animals
Also by Paul Tremblay: The Cabin at the End of the World, The Beast You Are: Stories, Disappearance at Devil’s Rock, and A Head Full of Ghosts
The Mad Women’s Ball – Victoria Mas (translated by Frank Wynne)
John Boyne – The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, The Heart’s Invisible Furies, and The Absolutist
Pip Williams – The Dictionary of Lost Words and The Bookbinder
McNally Editions
Barbara Kingsolver
Center for Fiction 2023 First Novel
Also by Bryan Washington: Lot and Memorial
Evidence of Things Unseen – Marianne Wiggins
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
Also by Percival Everett – The Trees, Erasure, and Telephone
Documentary about Percival Everett: Through the Writer’s Mirror
The Silent Patient – Alix Michaelides
Goodbye, Vitamin – Rachel Khong
The Leavers – Lisa Ko
The Birds of Opulence – Crystal Wilkinson
The Reading List – Sara Nisha Adams

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audiobook platform: Follow this link and use promo code: bookcougars
Shop on Bookshop.org – support the Book Cougars and independent bookstores!

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Episode 192 - Author Spotlight with Fancy Feast

Book Cougars Episode 192

Episode One Hundred Ninety Two Show Notes
KEY: CW = Chris Wolak and EF = Emily Fine

– 4th Quarter Readalong –
The Bookbinder by Pip Williams is the official book for the last quarter of the year reading within our theme of Books about Books. Our Zoom discussion will take place on Sunday, December 3rd at 7pm (ET), send an email if you would like to reserve a spot. You can join the Goodreads discussion here.

Watch the video of Pip talking about the inspiration for The Bookbinder. If you are interested, her debut novel is The Dictionary of Lost Words.

– Currently Reading – [6:14]
The Purgatorio – Dante Alighieri (CW)
The Path to Kindness: Poems of Connection and Joy – edited by James Crews (EF)
Emily reads “Turning” by Julie Cadwallader Staub
The Goth House Experiment – SJ Sindu (CW) (release date 10/17/2023)

– Just Read – [14:24]
Adversity for Sale – Jay Jeezy Jenkins (CW)
Wellness – Nathan Hill (EF)
Monsters: A Fans Dilemma – Claire Dederer (CW)
Naked: On Sex, Work, and Other Burlesques – Fancy Feast (CW)(EF)
The September House – Carissa Orlando (CW)
When a Pet Dies – Fred Rogers (CW)
Stairway to Doom – Robert Quackenbush (CW)

– Biblio Adventures – [39:30]
To wrap up Scarlet Summer, Chris and Emily went on a joint jaunt to Boston to visit Hawthorne-related sites including Brook Farm in West Roxbury, MA, the Boston Athenaeum, a meal at the Chipotle located at the site of the original Old Corner Bookstore, strolled down Pinckney Street to visit the sites where prominent 19th-centuryliterary figures lived throughout. We also got a chance to see The Embrace, a new bronze sculpture honoring Coretta Scott Kind and Martin Luther King Jr., located on Boston Common. Watch the slideshow of our day in Boston.

Emily went to Cape Cod and stopped at Herridge Bookstore in Wellfleet where she purchased The Book of Salt by Monique Truong, the Provincetown Bookshop, Tim’s Used Books, Provincetown Public Library where she grabbed a free copy of An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination by Elizabeth McCracken, and the Eldredge Public Library in Chatham, MA.

Chris appeared on Shawn the Book Maniac’s BookTube channel chatting about bookmarks from her childhood (that were made in Emily’s hometown!). You can watch it here.

– Upcoming Jaunts – [01:03:07]
Emily is heading to Maine and is hoping to do some bookstore browsing. She plans to watch Lessons in Chemistry an Apple TV series based on the novel by Bonnie Garmus.

– Upcoming Reads – [01:04:14]
The Iliad – Homer translated by Emily Wilson (CW) If you would like to join Chris in a buddy read beginning in January 2024, send an email.
Because I Could Not Stop for Death – Amanda Flower (CW)
Afterlife – Julia Alvarez (EF)

– Out Now – [01:08:42]
Let Us Descend – Jesmyn Ward
How to Say Babylon: A Memoir – Safiya Sinclair
Nothing is Missing: A Memoir of Living Boldly – Nicole Walters

– Author Spotlight with Fancy Feast– [01:09:06]
We chat with Fancy Feast about her essay collection Naked: On Sex, Work, and Other Burlesques. You can learn more about Fancy on her website, via her Instagram feed and Facebook page. We encourage you to watch the documentary Fancy Feast – The Fat Burlesque Performer.

– Also Mentioned –
National Book Awards 2023
Chain Gang All Stars – Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
Blackouts – Justin Torres
Also by SJ Sindu: Blue Skinned Gods and Marriage of a Thousand Lies
The Nix – Nathan Hill
The Second Shelf BookTube channel with Britta Böhler
The House Guest – Hank Phillipi Ryan
How Can I Help You – Laura Sims
Tipping the Velvet – Sarah Waters

Help support the Book Cougars via our affiliates:
Libro.fm audiobook platform: Follow
this link and use promo code: bookcougars
Shop on
Bookshop.org – support the Book Cougars and independent bookstores!

If you’d like to help financially support the Book Cougars,
please consider becoming a Patreon member. If you would prefer to donate directly, email for instructions.

Join our
Goodreads Group!

Check out our
BookTube Channel and be sure to subscribe!

Subscribe to our monthly
newsletter.