I'm Natalie Moore. I fell in love with soap operas when I was just five years old, and I still

watch them. Their television's longest scripted series and have zero reruns. Now let me tell you,

soap operas aren't just some silly art form. They are significant. In this season of making,

Stories Without End from WB EZ Chicago.

Join me as I share how the genre began, their social impact, and why these stories endure.

Listen, wherever you get your podcast.

From WBEZ Chicago, this is Nerdette.

I'm Greta Johnson. We did it. We made it to another weekend. Coming up, Veronica Roth tells us about her new dystopian mystery.

So with my tinfoil hat on, I say our smartphones are already surveilling us.

But first, let's grab a cup of tea and a book and sit back and relax with two professional readers.

With us this week, we have Lupita Aquino.

She raves about books on Instagram as Lupita reads.

Lupita, welcome to the show.

Thank you for having me.

I'm so excited to talk books with you.

Yay.

We also have book critic Bethann Patrick, who's also the host of the literary true crime podcast, Missing Pages. Bethann, hello. Hello, Greta. So glad to be here with you and Lupita, one of my favorite bookstagramers. Right. Yes, this is going to be fun. So since you two are such great readers, I think we should just talk books today. So I can't believe this is accurate,

but it is almost November. And I saw a tweet the other day that said,

essentially like, we're slowly approaching Let's Circle Back top of next year season,

which I thought was hilarious. But, you know, that means for those of us who spend a lot of time reading and talking about books, it's almost time for like the best of the year conversations, which is wild to me.

So I'm curious how many books you've read so far this year. Lupito, do you know your number?

Yeah, I have read about 60 books.

...