Okay, you're ready? We're starting. I'm going to take a drink of my champagne.

Anyone wants to. Do we cheers?

Yes. Cheers!

To a book club! Do people really ask for this?

Yes. I'm Laura Tremaine and I have 10 things to tell you and you have 10 things to tell

this show is about connection with each other and with ourselves.

And the hope is that the things we talk about here

will be fuel for better conversations and a personal awareness.

This is an interactive podcast. Each episode has a prompt

and a topic that I want you to take to your journal, text to your best friend, or

answer on social media using the hashtag 10 things to tell you.

This is a show about digging deeper and sharing our stuff.

I'll go first. It's the most wonderful time of the year. That is to say, it's the time of

year when all the best of book lists come out including here on this show where I am

joined by my real life book club friends for the fourth year in a row to discuss the best books that we read in the last 12 months.

Now I don't want to spoil it for you but this conversation is different than it has been in years past, probably because this year was so different.

2021 was a roller coaster for me personally and that was definitely reflected in my reading life.

I'm going to let my friends Yasmy Dunn and Stephanie Newman Smith introduced themselves to you, but if you've been around here

for a while, they probably already feel like old friends. We got together at my house last week in the glow of the Christmas tree and the fish tank and we had one of the best bookish conversations of the year.

So without further ado, let's get to it.

Thank you for having this recording slash meeting with me

when we actually haven't met in real life all year.

...