Season 8, Episode 34: Books That Grow + Our Reading Traditions

The Currently Reading Podcast

Meredith Schwartz

Arts, Society & Culture, Books

4.6 • 1.8K Ratings

🗓️ 30 March 2026

⏱️ 55 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

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

Bookish Moments: books that grow as we read and book festival serendipity
Current Reads: all the great, interesting, and/or terrible stuff we've been reading lately
Deep Dive: partaking in bookish traditions
Before We Go: our new segment featuring bookish friend posts and a sleeper hit brought by Meredith

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

1:31 - Bookish Moments of the Week

2:46 - Red Winter by Cameron Sullivan

5:40 - All Systems Red by Martha Wells

5:49 - Sandwich by Catherine Newman

5:50 - Wreck by Catherine Newman

7:02 - Birding with Benefits by Sarah T. Dubb

7:03 - Honey Bee Mine by Sarah T. Dubb

8:02 - Current Reads

8:34 - The Inn at Penglas Cove by Lauren Westwood (Meredith)

13:08 - The Man Who Died Seven Times by Yasuhiko Nishizawa (Kaytee)

17:37 - The 7 ½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton

18:04 - Wrong Place Wrong Time by Gillian McCallister

18:34 - The Extra by Annie Neugebauer (Meredith)

19:05 - Book Talk, Etc

20:08 - Talking Scared Podcast w/ Annie Neugebauer

23:50 - Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara (Kaytee)

24:01 - CR Season 7: Episode 16

29:10 - @wguidara on Instagram

29:34 - The Murder at World's End by Ross Montgomery (Meredith)

31:35 - An Unlikely Story

33:24 - The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett

34:27 - How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin

35:36 - The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow

36:18 - Waterstones

39:15 - Outlander by Diana Gabaldon

39:24 - The Ten Thousand Doors Of January by Alix E. Harrow

40:24 - Deep Dive: Our Reading Traditions

45:27 - The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

45:29 - Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh

45:32 - Beauty by Robin McKinley

48:47 - BookPage

49:23 - Before We Go

Kaytee highlights a bookish friend post

49:37 - The Better Mother by Jennifer van der Kleut

Meredith brings a sleeper hit

51:09 - The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker

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. March's IPL is brought by our lovely friends at An Unlikely Story in Plainville, MA.
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 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

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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 already know, we won't
0:21.7	shy away from having strong opinions, so get ready. We are light on the chit-chat, heavy on the book
0:27.2	talk, and our conversations will always be spoiler-free. Today we'll discuss our current reads,
0:31.7	a readerly deep dive, and a little something bookish before we go. I'm Meredith Monday Schwartz. I'm
0:37.0	both a mom and a Mimi and a full-time CEO living in Austin, Texas.
0:41.3	And sometimes books can be confuzzling.
0:44.3	I'm Katie Cobb, homeschooling Mama 4, living in Arizona.
0:47.8	And I think book festival serendipity is even more magical than library serendipity.
0:52.8	This is episode number 34 of season 8, and we're so glad you're here.
0:57.6	Oh, that's a high level.
0:59.1	That's a high level of serendipity book festival.
1:03.4	It really is, and it's hard to manage.
1:05.4	You can't just walk into a book festival every weekend when you've got an extra hour, right?
1:10.6	Exactly.
1:11.3	That's what makes it so high level.
1:13.8	Confuzzling, Meredith.
1:15.1	That's what we're going to be talking about in a minute.
1:17.1	But first, I'll let everybody know that our deep dive today is about our reading traditions.
1:21.6	This is from a listener question.
1:23.9	I'm excited to get into what kind of traditions we have around our reading lives and
1:28.4	reading years. But first, we'll get started the way we always do with our bookish moments. What is
1:33.0	confuzzling you lately, Meredith? Well, okay, this is one of those things where I'm like, I don't think
	...

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