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. It is the end of the year, the perfect time to take a seat, grab a drink, and reflect on all the good stuff that people manage to make

this year kind of against all odds. This week, we're going to talk about the best books of the year

with two excellent book nerds. M.J. Franklin is an editor for the New York Times

book review. MJ, hi. Thank you so much for having me. Oh my gosh. Thank you. I'm very excited.

We also have Tracy Thomas, who hosts the Stacks podcast. Tracy, welcome. Thank you. Thank you so much

for having me, too. I'm so excited. Thanks for coming. This is going to be very fun.

So I'm always curious, like, professional readers, how many books they've managed to read in a

given year. I actually, like, just hit 100, which is more than I've ever read, which I'm

kind of excited about, though. I'm not sure what that meant for my social life this year, but I'm

not going to think about it too hard.

MJ, how many books have you read this year?

I hate to say, I have absolutely no clue.

And that's because I'm so impressed.

And that's because I like, so I used to keep this spreadsheet where I like document everything I read.

But then once I started

...