Season 8, Episode 16: Losing Track of Time + Our Book Club Recs

Currently Reading

Meredith Schwartz

Allthebooks, Books, Read, Arts, Bookpodcast, Reading, Whatshouldireadnext, Society & Culture

4.7 • 1.7K Ratings

🗓️ 17 November 2025

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On this episode of Currently Reading, Kaytee and Meredith are discussing:

Bookish Moments: losing track of time reading and bookish vanity plates
Current Reads: all the great, interesting, and/or terrible stuff we've been reading lately
Deep Dive: books we think would make great book club picks
The Fountain: we visit our perfect fountain to make wishes about our reading lives

Show notes are time-stamped below for your convenience. Read the transcript of the episode (this link only works on the main site).

1:19 - Our Bookish Moments of the Week

2:29 - Snap by Belinda Bauer

6:34 - Our Current Reads

6:48 - The Staircase in the Woods by Chuck Wendig (Meredith)

10:13 - Wanderers by Chuck Wendig

10:33 - It by Stephen King

11:59 - The Maid and the Crocodile by Jordan Ifueko (Kaytee)

12:03 - Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko

14:24 - Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

15:13 - Redemptor by Jordan Ifueko

16:06 - How to Be A Saint by Kate Sidley (Meredith)

21:45 - Of Time and Turtles by Sy Montgomery (Kaytee)

21:53 - The Soul of an Octopus by Sy Montgomery

26:46 - The Black Wolf by Louise Penny (Meredith)

27:01 - The Grey Wolf by Louise Penny

32:54 - State of Terror by Louise Penny and Hillary Clinton

34:20 - The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman (Kaytee)

34:27 - The King's English Bookshop

36:49 - The Magicians by Lev Grossman

38:36 - Our Book Club Recs

39:22 - Currently Reading Patreon

40:34 - The Staircase in the Woods by Chuck Wendig

44:27 - Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros

44:38 - Curfew by Jayne Cowie

46:04 - Castle of Water by Dane Huckelbridge

48:11 - The Push by Ashley Audrain

49:19 - The Art Thief by Michael Finkel

50:15 - One of the Boys by Jayne Cowie

51:24 - Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

51:25 - Washington Black by Esi Edugyan

51:27 - The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali

51:45 - Chain-Gang All Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

52:06 - CR Season 6: Episode 2

52:42 - Check our our instagram @currentlyreadingpodcast for our book club post!

52:54 - Meet Us At The Fountain

53:02 - I wish that if you don't already follow us on Instagram, to do so now. (Meredith)

53:07 - @currentlyreadingpodcast on Instagram

53:35 - I wish to reformat my bookish hard drive (Kaytee)

51:34 - Katabasis by R.F. Kuang

51:37 - A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness

51:38 - Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Support Us:

Become a Bookish Friend | Grab Some Merch

Shop Bookshop dot org | Shop Amazon

Bookish Friends Receive:

The Indie Press List with a curated list of five books hand sold by the indie of the month. November's's IPL is brought to us from Content Bookstore in Northfield, Minnesota.
Love and Chili Peppers with Kaytee and Rebekah - romance lovers get their due with this special episode focused entirely on the best selling genre fiction in the business.
All Things Murderful with Meredith and Elizabeth - special content for the scary-lovers, brought to you with the behind-the-scenes insights of an independent bookseller
From the Editor's Desk with Kaytee and Bunmi Ishola - a quarterly peek behind the curtain at the publishing industry
The Bookish Friends Facebook Group - where you can build community with bookish friends from around the globe as well as our hosts

Connect With Us:

The Show: Instagram | Website | Email | Threads

The Hosts and Regulars: Meredith | Kaytee | Mary | Roxanna

Production and Editing: Megan Phouthavong Evans

Affiliate Disclosure: All affiliate links go to Bookshop unless otherwise noted. Shopping here helps keep the lights on and benefits indie bookstores. Thanks for your support!

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hey, readers. Welcome to the Currently Reading podcast. We are bookish best friends who spend time every week talking about the books that we've read recently, and as you know, we won't shy away
0:21.6	from having strong opinions. So get ready. We are light on the chit-chat, heavy on the book talk,
0:27.4	and our conversations will always be spoiler-free. Today we'll discuss our current reads,
0:31.7	a bookish deep dive, and then we'll visit The Fountain. I'm Meredith Monday Schwartz. I'm a mom
0:36.4	and a Mimi and a full-time CEO living in
0:39.2	Austin, Texas. And reading can make me totally lose track of time. And I'm Katie Cobb, a homeschooling mom
0:45.5	of four living in Arizona, and I have a new way to show off my reader status. This is episode
0:50.8	number 16 of season 8, and we are so glad you're here.
0:54.7	Katie, I've been thinking about reader badges and that kind of thing like we talked about a
0:59.3	couple weeks ago since we talked about it, so I'm going to be interested to hear about your
1:03.0	status.
1:04.0	Oh, yes, I'm excited to share it with you.
1:06.8	But first, let's let everybody know that we are going to be deep diving on the best books for book clubs this week. And of course, we have lots of things to say about that. Let's get started the way we always do, though. Meredith, with our bookish moments. What is yours? All right. So there is no question that the bookish moment of the week for me was momentous for me, but this is not going to seem like a big deal to a lot of people.
1:30.3	But I don't think I can even begin to explain to you how run by the clock my life is.
1:38.7	Same.
1:39.1	From the moment that I wake up in the morning to the moment that I go to bed at night, I am on the clock in two
1:46.4	minute, four minute increments, right? So, and lots of us are like this. This is not unique to me,
1:52.4	but it's very much how I run my life and the necessity of my life is that it's run this way.
1:59.1	The other day, it was a, I will say it was a weekend day. So I
2:03.9	wasn't quite in the same headspace as I am during, but even my weekend days are, are like that.
2:09.3	Same. But I sat down because I said to myself, oh, I have like this little pocket. And this is what got
2:16.1	me. It was a pocket of time that was unexpected. And I was like, I have like 20 minutes. I could use it a million different ways. Usually I would do chores. I would do whatever. I'm like, no, I'm so into the book that I'm reading, which is a book called Snap by Belinda Bauer, which I'm not going to talk about today, but you're going to hear about soon.
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 14 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Meredith Schwartz, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Meredith Schwartz and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.