I'm Gilbert Cruz, editor of the New York Times book review, and this is the book review podcast.

We're very close to the end of the year, so close in fact that on next week's episode, we are going to reveal our top 10 books of the year.

Five fiction, five nonfiction.

It's a list that we work on all year round. We're very excited for you all to hear about it.

On this week's episode, as we do at the end of every month, we have our book club discussion.

And speaking of top 10 books of the year, this time around, M.J. Franklin and friends are talking about

one of our best books of 2020, which has been made into a new film. M.J., over to you.

Hello, and welcome to another book club episode of the Book Review podcast. I'm M.J. Franklin,

I'm an editor here at the New York Times

book review, and this week we're chatting about Maggie O'Farrow's novel, Hamlet. Hamlet came out in

2020 to great fanfare. It received a spate of rave reviews when it first published. It was one of the

New York Times' best books of 2020, and in general, it seemed to capture

the hearts of readers everywhere.

Now, in 2025, the novel has been adapted into a feature film directed by Chloe Zhao and starring

Jesse Buckley and Paul Mascal.

Because the book is back in the conversation, we thought, let's revisit it for Book Club.

And joining me in this journey is a collection of my esteemed colleagues.

We're just going to go around the table.

We have Sarah Lyle, who's a writer at large at the Times, our thrillers columnist, our Jane Austen expert.

You do many, many things, including join the book club.

Sarah, welcome.

I'm so happy to be here. Also with us is Jen Harlan, another editor at the book review.

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