Episode 20: Our Best Books of 2018
The Currently Reading Podcast
Meredith Schwartz
4.6 • 1.8K Ratings
🗓️ 7 January 2019
⏱️ 62 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
You've been asking for it, and now it's here: our best books of 2018 list! We are the type of people who cannot pick our books until ALL the books have been finished for the year, so this is the soonest we could record!
You'll hear a "bookish moment of the week" from each host: a Christmas gift that is perfect for an avid reader and the reason you all feel like your TBR lists explode whenever we release a new episode.
Next, we discuss what we are currently reading, and this week has an incredible variety of titles that we discuss.
This week's deep dive is a recap of our top ten books of the year for each of us. We picked the cream of the crop to share with you, readers.
As always, we finish up with A Book (yep, capitalized) that we'd like to press into every reader's hands: a gripping mystery and a two-book series that are so unexpectedly wonderful.
As always, time-stamped show notes are below with references to every book and resource we mentioned in this episode. If you'd like to listen first and not spoil the surprise, don't scroll down!
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5:08 - Little Free Library!
9:33 – The Indifferent Stars Above by Daniel James Brown
9:45 – The Best Land Under Heaven by Michael Wallis
12:25 – The Hunger by Alma Katsu
13:00 – Becoming by Michelle Obama
16:19 - The Only Girl in the World by Maude Julien
16:34 - The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
16:36 - Room by Emma Donoghue
18:56 - Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris
19:33 - Only Human by Sylvain Neuvel
19:41 - Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel
21:51 - Waking Gods by Sylvain Neuvel
22:59 - Sadie by Courtney Summers
25:13 - The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street by Karina Yan Glaser
29:10 - The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
30:39 - The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne
32:32 - The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey
33:15 - Essentialism by Greg McKeown
34:28 – The Read-Aloud Family by Sarah MacKenzie
35:03 – The Read-Aloud Revival Podcast
35:29 - American Marriage by Tayari Jones
36:39 - Braving the Wilderness by Brene Brown
37:41 - Educated by Tara Westover
40:42 - Circe by Madeline Miller
42:32 - Tattoos on the Heart by Gregory Boyle
43:37 - Calypso by David Sedaris
45:03 - The War That Saved My Life by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
45:41 - Thunderhead by Neal Shusterman
46:44 - The Word is Murder by Anthony Horowitz
47:58 - Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
49:48 - Nevermoor by Jessica Townsend
49:56 - Wundersmith by Jessica Townsend
52:41 - The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine
54:52 - Behind Closed Doors by B.A. Paris
54:58 - The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn
55:51 - Us Against You by Frederik Backman
55:55 - Beartown by Frederik Backman
56:01 - A Man Called Ove by Frederik Backman
58:44 - Britt-Marie Was Here by Frederik Backman
58:45 - My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry by Frederik Backman
*Please note that all book titles linked above are Amazon affiliate links. Your cost is the same, but a small portion of your purchase will come back to us to help offset the costs of the show. Thanks for your support!*
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey readers, welcome to the currently reading podcast. We are two bookish best friends who spend time every week talking about the books that we've read recently, and as you already know, we have big opinions, so get ready. I'm Meredith Monday |
| 0:24.5 | Schwartz a mom of four and full-time CEO living in the San Francisco Bay Area and |
| 0:28.9 | if I can't be reading books I love talking about books with Katie. |
| 0:34.0 | And I'm Katie Com, a homeschooling mom of four, aged 8 and under, living in New Mexico, |
| 0:39.0 | and I read an unbelievable number of books each year. |
| 0:42.0 | This is episode number 20, and we are so glad you're here. |
| 0:46.4 | I am so glad that you're back Katie. Did you, oh I already know you listen to last week's episode with my brother. I listen to last week's episode and I already had to live tweet you like all our like favorite |
| 0:57.5 | listeners do to us about all the comments I wanted to make while |
| 1:01.0 | listening. So funny I loved getting your comments. |
| 1:03.9 | That was hilarious. |
| 1:05.3 | I was making show notes and writing like, |
| 1:07.1 | Star, tell Meredith that she did this question |
| 1:10.1 | just to annoy me. Well, so now is your chance to say, you know, what did you want? |
| 1:17.0 | What was the biggest thing from last week's episode? |
| 1:20.0 | And listeners, if you haven't heard it, you really need to go back and listen. |
| 1:23.2 | It was the episode that I did. |
| 1:24.8 | My co-host was my brother, Scott. |
| 1:27.3 | And Scott had some big opinions that he knew at the time Katie might disagree with. |
| 1:31.6 | Okay, so obviously the biggest one for me |
| 1:34.1 | is that Scott says he listens to audio books, |
| 1:36.2 | but he will not count them as books read |
| 1:39.0 | in his reading spreadsheet for the year, |
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