I hope you have as much joy.

Is that it?

Yeah.

I will because I get to listen to the episode first.

That's the best part of editing.

Hahaha.

Hello, hi, and welcome to Medium Lady Reads.

This is Episode 11, the joy of the buddy read.

Hi everyone, I'm Erin, a mom of three,

a hospital administrator in Ontario, Canada,

and the host and founder of the Medium Lady Community

and Medium Lady Talks podcast.

And I'm Jillian, an Instagram content strategist

for Bookish People, a mom of two,

based in Buffalo, New York.

And together, we're thrilled to bring you

another episode of Medium Lady Reads,

a podcast about reading as self-care,

a passionate love for the public library,

and all of our thoughts and opinions on book culture

having its moment.

Hello, everyone.

We're so excited to bring you a very unique episode

because not only is it Erin and I here with you today,

but also our dear Bookish friends, Stephanie Cunningham

and Ali Openlander.

With the help of Stephanie and Ali,

we're going to be talking all about buddy reads,

what they are, how we work, hours, and eat what we might improve.

But before we get into the meat of the episode,

let's check in.

How's everyone's reading going?

Ali, we'll start with you.

It's going well.

I am reading a great book,

called The Fire Let You Go by Kennedy Ryan.

I do love it.

I'm just not flying through with it.

I've had a big transition in my life, so just, I'm not fully,

fully devoting all my time to it,

as I would when I was on a journey leave.

I love that, Ali.

Okay, Steph, you're up.

How's your reading going?

It's going really well.

I feel like I had some project books to get through.

We had a buddy read that we all kind of had to get to the finish line of.

Then I had done some gift books that I was trying to get through.

Then I had a plane ride to get here to our buddy read retreat.

I feel really accomplished because I've gotten a lot done.

I think that gives me the freedom to be like,

oh, I've done enough reading for this month.

I can fill in the rest with fun.

It just gives me a little bit more freedom in my reading.

So it's going really well.

You feel like you've satisfied your Am I a good reader?

Yes.

Exactly.

You're like, I am a good reader this month,

and I can do other things.

Yes.

Can we just pause and talk about these gift books that Steph just mentioned?

Yes, we can.

I don't know.

Can we talk about that now?

We totally can.

So the beauty of this episode is we are recording in person.

So the acoustics might be a little bit different,

but it is the first time Jillian and I are recording side by side.

Usually we record virtually.

And it's the first time we're meeting in person and spending,

we're spending the weekend together in the cat skills.

So, yeah, tell us about Stephanie's project slash gift.

So, Stephanie, I have no words,

but she asked us all earlier this summer what our favorite books were.

We all just assume just because we talk about books all the time.

We come to this cabin and there we each have a beautiful stack of gifts from Steph.

And one of the gifts is our favorite book that she read and annotated.

What she loved about it, what she didn't like about it,

what she wants to discuss with us.

Again, hoping probably that we will reread these books and then connect with her.

It was just so thoughtful.

These books were hard read.

You guys should have some very heavy favorites.

Yeah, heavy favorites.

And she gifted us our favorite books with her own little kind of love notes in them.

Yeah, it's like a permanent prize possession.

I don't know your stamina to do that because I think when people think of their favorite book

and maybe listeners will also think of what their favorite book is,

there's a lot of reasons that maybe your favorite book is your favorite book.

But probably it was emotionally impacting you in some way.

Probably the characters were appealing to you in one way.

Perhaps the writing or the prose was particularly like New Onsen Beautiful.

And most people I know when I ask them what their favorite book is,

it's like, you know, probably an epic drama of some sort.

And so stuff you gave yourself, the assignment of reading epic dramas,

not only reading them, reading them with the timeline and with a little bit of homework

because they all came with at least a couple hundred little sticky tabby notes

that are color coded by your love legend.

Yeah, you guys had really hefty favorites, but it was fun to get to read what makes people them.

That was a fun endeavor.

Yeah, so my favorite book is Cutting for Stone by Abraham Bracase.

Jillian, what was yours?

It was a tree grows in Brooklyn, but I don't remember the author.

Oh, that's okay.

And mine was The Snowchild by...

Yeah, I can't remember the author either.

I put the sleep, yeah, The Snowchild.

So Steph, are you wrecked from these books?

They... I wouldn't put them in my favorites.

They were definitely an endeavor to embark on.

But they were fun.

Oh, glad they're done.

And gifted with your whole heart.

Yes, it was an incredible gift.

It was an incredible dedication to that gift.

So Steph, yeah, we can give you a pass on reading for like as long as you need to.

At least until our next buddy read.

Thanks for sharing.

Okay, Jillian, it's your turn. How's your reading going?

It is going well.

I know I've last couple of times it hasn't been going so great,

but this last few weeks,

I finally feel like I'm getting into a groove.

I'm reading books that I enjoy.

I've stopped forcing myself to read the new releases that everybody else is reading just because it feels good.

I'm reading a book I own, which is not normally something I have.

I usually from the library and it feels good because while I could just sit on my shelf forever,

I'm actually putting it in Q and reading it.

And that makes me really happy.

Yeah.

And what about you, Aaron? How's your reading going?

My reading is going okay.

Honestly, the last few days or so, we've been like planning this trip and really excited.

I've been trying to finish one Chonker book, which is Outlive by Peter Attia.

I think I talked about that in our last episode.

And I've also been trying to start another Chonker book,

which is The Covenant of Water by Abraham Vergase.

I might the writer of my previous favorite book.

So I don't know. I'm very intimidated by really dense page books.

So I don't know. I'm a little bit like, kind of want to rush through Outlive,

but it's a big book. And then I know that on the other side of that big book is another big book waiting for me.

And yeah, I'm just kind of navigating that.

But I feel like I haven't really done very much reading on this reading retreat.

Yeah. Same.

Which is great.

I think I've read a page.

It should be perfectly honest.

Oh, okay. Thanks everybody for checking in.

We are going to pivot to the meat of our episode, which is the joy of the buddy reads.

So we'll tell listeners what a buddy read is.

And I got the idea for a buddy read from Listening to the Currently Reading Podcast,

which I wouldn't say is like generally a must listen for me on a weekly rotation.

I try to get at least part, if not all of their episodes.

And one thing they had both mentioned, both of the host's Meredith and Katie,

and they mentioned that they do buddy reads, which is they have a buddy.

And with their buddy, they pick a book and they sort of read it together and paste themselves through the book at the same time.

And they text each other their reactions to the book.

And this seemed to be something that brought them a lot of joy together.

And so that generally is the definition of a buddy read.

It's different than a book club because a book club is sort of, here's the book, everybody read it by a deadline.

And then come with your fully formed thoughts about the book.

The buddy read is much more about taking a book, cutting it into segments,

and then everybody meeting up to talk about the book as you make your way through those segments.

And we do that on WhatsApp. We have a buddy read chat.

We each pick a book that goes into like a randomization because randomization is my favorite thing.

And so we each kind of have a stake in picking the book.

And we read that person's book.

And then we make our way through. We have what we call a pacing matrix.

And so we all kind of say like, is everybody at the next section?

And when the last person makes it to that section, then we hop on the chat and we dish.

We dish hard about the book.

And sometimes we cast the book.

And sometimes we make direct comparisons to the book.

Some of the books have been adapted to film or TV.

And that's always like kind of additional fun extra to talk to.

But it adds a lot of texture to our reading lives, at least I'll speak for me.

And yeah, I think that overall, this was sort of something I didn't know I was reading.

I was looking for in my reading life.

But after we recorded the cozy Christmas reads, Jillian and Steph and I last Christmas,

we sort of like stayed on chat and we kept kind of chatting about books.

And we sort of accidentally read, Verity by Colleen Hoover altogether.

And we were like, we should do this with a little more structure.

And then we invited Ali.

And ever since then, ever since February of 2023, the four of us have been reading one book a month.

And so that's kind of the general overlay of the buddy read.

We started with each of us picking two books.

Initially we were picking, we had books that were newer.

And then we realized that it was more difficult to get a hold of those books for all of us at the same time.

So we swapped that out and we started choosing books that were a little bit older,

so that the books would be quickly available to all of us.

We each put two on this, the spreadsheet, this buddy reads spreadsheet that we have.

And then Erin will take all of those and once a month put them into a spinny, digital spinny thing.

That is a technical term.

And whatever book it chooses, we go with.

And we each have gone twice now, right?

And I just had my third.

We just finished my third and we're reading Ali's third this month.

Well, for November.

Yeah, because this is our tenth month.

We've gone through two full cycles of all of us choosing a book.

Yeah, yeah, that's true.

And then whenever we make our way through a chunk, we just repopulate the spreadsheet with new picks.

Yeah, so that's our process, but I wanted to, before we go any further, I want to talk about what Ali and Steph and Erin, you two,

what the strengths of the buddy read, what you think that those are for us.

So in the past, like when I read, I read a book, I covered a cover, obviously not on one sitting,

but I don't really think about it.

This buddy read definitely makes me encourage me to go deeper on.

Why did this? Why do you think this?

Or why did that character do that?

And then Erin and Jillian, purpose further, and they say, like, what are the strengths of this book?

What strengths of this author? What are the weaknesses?

And these are all things I wouldn't think about if it's a book I'm reading on my own.

Yeah, no, I think that's right.

It brings a lot of thoughts to the book that you would have that I didn't think of myself.

And so, especially we've gotten into some, like, mysteries and thrillers, and it's like, what do you think's going to happen?

Do you think it's this? Do you think it's that?

And like, all of the speculation is fun, but it just brings a whole different angle to it than what I would think of on my own.

And I also think it just keeps me accountable to reading and getting a book done.

Sometimes I'm like, I'm too tired, I don't want to do it, but I'm like, oh, I have to get caught up.

I'm the last one, and I have to get caught up.

It just is a fun way to make sure that I'm continuing to read.

I think we try to keep it like low pressure.

Yes, it's very low.

But there is still a bit of accountability.

I think, you know, if you know that you're the last person making your way to a section, and I love that.

I love that.

Yeah, and you know people are waiting to talk about it, but you haven't been able to make your way through it.

I think we've all been really honest to say, I've got some stuff going on.

I'm not going to be able to move into that.

And then the other beautiful thing about it, I think, is that we share all those other things that are going on.

Like in between each pace, each matrix or each like milestone in the book, we're talking about our lives.

We're talking about our partners and our kids and our work, our parents, you know.

And so we're connecting on like a friendship level.

And then we kind of like really like dish on the book with these books.

And I think that it's added a layer of like we came together because of books, but we're very deep friends.

And the books are just like almost like a fun thing that we do together, even though it started with the books.

Right. They're the secondary characters in our lives.

Yes, yes.

And our group.

Yeah, that's true.

It's like the book, the book of the month is the fifth buddy.

I think one of my favorite parts that we started doing, and this is new to me, is taking and putting real life actors and actresses into the characters in the book.

Because that's not something I've ever done ever reading.

And that's something Erin brought to the group because she does that.

And it's her way of bringing, prolonging the feelings that the book gives her.

And I love it because it gives us the opportunity to not only prolong the book, you know, and enjoy it together, but it introduces me to new actors and actresses that I've never heard before.

Erin knows a lot of actors and actresses.

And you're like naming people and I'm quickly googling them.

And meanwhile, who do we want to cast as this person? And I'm googling hot male blonde actor because I don't know any of the names.

But it does make it fun.

I do also think it's good for us to like, it's been good for me to recognize like this like healthy discourse that's kind of low stakes about books in general because like, Stephanie, for example, we've been bantering back and forth about books for years.

We typically hate what the other one loves.

And I think in a previous life, I would have really taken that to heart.

Like I would have really like probably been really wanting to fix that or really wanting to see that as a problem, but because we all do it in the buddy read where I'll like this book is not working for me.

I cannot hang or somebody being like, I am so into this book. I love this.

I love the writing. This is like right up my alley.

And someone can be like, I'm enjoying it, but or someone can be like, yes, me too.

That it's kind of neutralizing that that it brings you to a middle ground of a book that you could either.

Have written off as loving or hating.

Yeah, maybe not seeing the alternate point of view.

And it brings everybody to that middle point of ground of like, oh, you're right. That was good.

I would have overlooked that or, oh, you're right. I was like saying this was all great, but right.

That was problematic. I didn't really pay attention to that.

So it just brings everybody to this neutral ground instead of like the polarizing opposites of lover hate.

Yeah, I think that's like beautifully said.

And I need more of that in my life in general.

Not just with books.

Yeah, agreed.

Okay, thanks to F and Ali for your sharing what you think the strengths are.

We wanted to pivot from talking about strengths to sort of like using this as an opportunity to workshop the buddy read a little bit spontaneously.

Speaking of things that everybody loves and some things that maybe some people don't like as much.

What do you think if anything is there anything that you would want to change about our process?

And I've kind of like thought about this question too.

I don't know if I have any good.

I think for like matrix saying, break it up.

I think that should be the responsibility of the person who picks that book.

Oh, I know it's hard because like we read copies that we get a physical copy from the library.

Yeah, some of us do.

That copy is easier to look out to where to break it up as opposed to the e copy.

But I think maybe that should be the responsibility of the person who's book it is.

That's good.

That's a great idea.

Oh, no, it's for part of that task often.

That was balls on Jillian and Aaron.

Do you think so?

Because I actually didn't really pay attention to that.

I feel like it's pretty balanced.

But I do like the idea because we don't have to say who's turned it.

It just we automatically assume if it's Ali's book, Ali's matrixing it.

I want to know if anyone wants to take over the spin.

Because I will randomize, I love spinning it and I will like basically I'll spin it on my computer.

I'll spin the wheel that has our books on it.

And I'll take a video with my phone and I'll send people the results so they can see the results in real time.

I get tremendous joy out of that and I feel like if I were to keep that accountability that would be very selfish of me because I'm sure it's

would be fun for other people too.

And so I'm happy to like share that and make that a little bit more diplomatic if people want.

But you're all shaking your head.

No, I would be willing to share the load if it was a burden to you.

It's not.

But I would be able to enjoy it.

When you guys are like, I'm ready to spin.

They're ready to spin.

All right, okay, great.

I thought for sure somebody would be like, I'd love to spin.

Somebody may get in a shirt that's a spin master.

People are going to think you're just really in shape.

I mean, I don't know if the t-shirt would trick them.

There's some other signals that may be, I'm not in fact just spin master.

What else about the process?

Like we don't have much of a process when it comes to picking books.

Should we think about that?

Our process is basically books published.

Two or twenty eighteen.

Is that our product?

Yeah, usually.

Eight twenty eighteen or earlier.

No, but none of us have read.

That none of us have read.

That's true.

Yeah, I can't be a book.

Some of us have read.

We usually list the name and the genre and the genre and how many pages it has.

That's right.

So we can kind of see, oh, we're having too many of this type.

Mm-hmm.

Or we should try to include something else.

But we've had a pretty good variety just coincidentally.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, without too much effort.

So maybe we don't need to really be too effortful about that.

No, no.

I think we leave it free.

I think we adjusted a lot like something in the beginning.

Like we thought we had to have a more rigid framework for everything than we did.

We're like, should we divide it by this many chapters and should we check in on this day?

And should we do it like to we a lot?

I think in the beginning we had dates we were going to check in and then maybe we were going to do a Zoom call at the end.

And then we realized like we love framework, but we need a lot more freedom within the framework.

And we are very chill with like, hey, whenever you get caught up, I'm caught up or I'm here, you know,

and we're there's no pressure to do it by a certain date.

We just kind of are very go with the flow.

So something we pivoted with a little bit at the beginning that I think is working well now, but we altered a little bit as we went on.

I love having the chance to talk this through because most of our conversations happen by WhatsApp, which means we're not always synchronously throwing things out there.

And sometimes what most often happen is two of us are synchronously chit-chatting.

And then the others of us show up and they're like, you have 38 unread messages.

38 if you're lucky.

Yeah, that's pretty fun too.

And then one of our chronic things is we're like, story, I'm getting caught up and we have a rule, another rule in the group chat, which is like, it's a no apologies, no apology zone in the group chat.

But I actually hadn't appreciated until you said that how much we've iterated on the process and how much we've been like, is this working?

Would people be okay if, and usually people throw it out that way?

And everybody's like, I'm okay with that, I'm okay with that, or I like that we do this. Sometimes we throw it out changes and people have been like, I'm actually okay with the way it is.

But you're right, and I had actually forgotten that we thought we would give ourselves more deadlines. So let's say we typically split most books into four parts.

And then we'd say, okay, we're going to read part one by February 7th.

We're going to read part two by February 14th. We're going to be part three by February and so forth.

And then on the 28th, we'll all come on Zoom. We've never done that. It doesn't work for our lives. What works for us is to say, will people be free at 8 p.m. to hop on the chat?

And most of the time, I'm multitasking my life when we're like really getting into a book. I might be like sitting on the couch watching TV with the kids, even like cleaning the kitchen and then like standing at my kitchen basically furiously writing my opinion about book.

But and that really works.

Isn't that so much more fun though? Then just like cleaning your kitchen.

Infinitely more fun. Infinitely more fun to have. Brandtic book talk.

Is there anything you'd want to change, Julian?

No, I honestly find the whole process enjoyable and I love it. I wouldn't change anything.

All right. Well, then we're not going to change anything except Ali's suggestion to assign the matrix to the person who picked the book.

All right.

So as of this recording, we've been doing buddy reads for about 10 months and I think the whole process has meant so much to each of us.

So I thought we could spend some time discussing what our buddy reads have meant to each of us and the friendships that we formed.

I think the fact that we are all for a recording this episode and what we was just like the whole picture of it.

Like the trip made it out of the group chat. Like we and like Aaron said we are talking about so much more than the books in between the book like chats.

Like we know everything about each other's lives and spouses and kids and like you guys are some of my kids biggest cheerleaders and you've never met them.

You know, and so I think it's just been a real place of community and fun and join my everyday life.

I was just, you know, it's way more fun to be talking to you guys through my day while I'm doing my tours than just doing tours alone.

Like it.

So it's just brought such a great sense of community and friendship.

What about you, Ali?

I think I would say the blessing first or after like our initial like this book chatter once we grew together virtually is we had no like fear of expressing some of our like fun.

Some of our like frustrations are needing help or advice with each other.

I don't know if it's because like we didn't know we should like connect with each other physically and person and we were we had the phone.

We had some kind of distance.

That's not so good.

We didn't like make us afraid but like we really grew like from chatting the books maybe for the first two months to just like getting more in depth in our conversations about like life and what's going on in the world.

And just like advice if we were having a tough day with like children and work etc.

We would like confide with each other and probably felt safe because we were somewhat removed from each other physically.

And then that just like made our relationships like for our friendships deeper.

I totally agree with you.

But I wonder if that the first layer of safety was like being able to disagree about a book.

And then we were like okay that level of disagreement is safe.

Not that we disagree with each other in other ways but it's like I'm safe to be who I am and say what I think in this group chat.

Maybe I can bring other areas of my life to be supported.

And I love what you said Ellie because we're not in each other's circles without the group chat.

We all kind of know each other via slightly different spheres of influence which is really interesting.

And I like I wouldn't run into any of you in the day to day.

And I do think that that helps because it's kind of like I know that you three are my safe space because I don't really worry about saying something that you're then going to say or think about you know my kids when we hang out next time or my husband the next time you see him to be like.

Oh I'm you know annoyed because I know Aaron was complaining about something that Nick did whatever whatever you know like there's always that dynamic and you kind of like hold back because you're not sure how what you say to someone is going to impact how they think about the rest of your life.

I don't know if I'm saying that properly but no I understand what you're saying.

Yeah.

And what about you Jillian? It has meant so much to me because I struggle to make friends in like my day to day life.

So to be able to meet people you know three other women online and to develop a very deep friendship because even though we aren't in each others in person day to day lives we are in each others day to day lives.

Otherwise has made and then to sit here and and feel like we've known each other for years and not have any of the awkwardness that you often feel with some new friendships is incredible to me and it is meant a whole lot to me to have you all in my life.

So I am very grateful for that.

Yeah likewise I think that's well said I think we all feel that yeah from that lovely warm fuzzy Jillian we're going to dish a little bit because we're going to talk about since we've been doing this for 10 months we have quite a lot of books to talk about.

So let's at least pin it.

What if we read I can't remember.

Okay so the one thing we should do here which I'm going to do.

Oh you have the chocolate there okay.

So staffs people are going to want to know the chocolate so staff and you're going to hear a bit of crinkling.

Staff tell us what are the chocolates.

Your ridiculous gift giving is my love language.

I love giving gifts and so along with their books I made little copies of miniature versions of the books that we read wrapped around her.

She's nuggets chocolates so it's little chocolates that look like all of the books that we read this year so they're pulling out those chocolates so we can see what we read this year because we can't remember without a visual aid.

Did anybody buy any of the book I haven't bought any of the books I've only gotten them from the library.

I've also only gotten them from the library Jillian have you bought any I purchased purchased the audio version of presumed innocent because my library didn't have it available right away and I could not read the physical book it was too hefty.

Definitely.

Okay so let's talk about these books with these amazing chocolates in front of us and I'm going to try to take a picture so if you're following us on Instagram at medium lady reads you can see these amazing amazing book chocolates.

I don't even know if I can get a great picture of them.

What have been your favorite books that we've read so far?

One in a million boy was just that was Aaron's pick it was so beautiful the writing was so beautiful the relationships.

Oh I cried yeah I remember mentioning on an older podcast with you if a book makes me cry so you can start.

I've started yeah yeah so one in a million boy yeah one in a million boy by Monica Wood is the kind of book that you remember how it made you feel even if like you don't necessarily remember exactly what happened.

This is a great book I think it was published in 2016 definitely like would definitely recommend to the our listeners for sure so good that was another one that like it would it's been interesting the difference between some of us read them on audiobook some of us read the book and read them on ebook and that one my library only had the audio so I was the only one that read audio and I was like not feeling it I was like guys this is terrible and you guys were like it's so lovely it's my favorite book I love it so much and I was like but why.

I had to have you guys convinced me that it was good nothing and I was like okay you're right it was good but I would not have gotten there on my own just like muscling through the audio.

Has it grown on you though? No.

I have the tomato I need to make that tomato cake.

I have the recipe of my phone.

Oh my god there's a recipe that was in the book and we were in tabby tomato soup cake.

Tomato soup cake.

Yeah. We should have made that this weekend. It's been amazing.

Alright Steph what have been your favorites? What was your favorite?

I really liked the family upstairs by Lisa Joule was such a good balance of like just creepy enough but like so it wasn't really a thriller and it wasn't super like a mystery but it would have had that like adventure mystery kind of feel.

Yeah it's like a domestic thriller domestic suspense novel.

Yeah that's the first Lisa Joule I ever read this book has grown on me over time I think I gave it four stars I would probably definitely give it like a hard 4.5 stars now.

Has anybody read more Lisa Joule? She had a new one that just came out.

No I did I read.

You read the sequel.

I did read the sequel and I listened to that one on audiobook and it was good it wasn't as good but it was still fine.

And then she had another one called look it up quick.

Here and get it this out.

Then she was gone.

Oh yeah and it's definitely this a similar feel where it's like she toes that line of like this is a little bit creepy but I'm not too creeped out to keep reading it kind of mystery suspense kind of.

Lisa Joule is like am I going to read something that's going to be IK?

Yeah.

You keep reading your waiting potential for but you don't quite get there and then you feel safe at the end that she never actually iqt you out.

Yes but you're like something's going to be I just know it and then it's not so I really like that book.

And that was our first book the family upstairs by Lisa Joule was our first book and that was a very good one to start with.

I felt like when we did that I was like this is going to be a killer part of my life I'm so into this.

And I think we had more did we do five five milestones for that one or six maybe.

I think we were sort of like dabbling with it to figure out how many how many parts to make our way through but anyway there was a lot to talk about in that book.

We did four.

I think four is our average.

Yeah four is supposed to be what we I think the one we did the way I used to be was five.

But for the most part it seems to be four.

Jillian do you have any favorites?

I did one and a million boy is probably my top favorite and then Lisa Joules the family upstairs would be my second favorite.

So the same ones I already mentioned but they were both very good books very intriguing.

I really liked the storyteller by Jody Pico whose choice was that?

That was the guy's one.

Was that yours Ellie?

That was the guy's one.

I really liked that one.

I still I really liked it.

I think there's nobody quite like Jody Pico.

I know she's like very mainstream and she publishes she produces a lot but I just don't think anybody writes like her.

I think she's smart and she treats her meters like they're smart and I always appreciate an author who embraces the intelligence of the people they're writing for.

It was not an easy book to read but I just like it really stuck stuck out to me.

I would say that was like one of my favorites for sure.

I also very much liked what I saw in how I lied.

Really?

Yes.

I did enjoy that one.

I liked that we were following a younger woman.

I thought it was very progressive for the time it was published.

I can't remember was it published in the 80s?

It was an older book.

2003 back in 2008.

2003 back in 2008.

Oh, eight.

There we go.

That's an amazing.

It was written in like the 50s.

Yeah.

Shortly after the war.

That was when it was set.

Yeah.

I did enjoy that one.

I feel like what I saw in how I lied was sort of the middle for me.

Home fire was the middle for me.

And between sisters was the middle for me.

These are books that sort of like didn't leave an overall impression.

Like maybe I think I gave 3.5 stars to all of them.

Why are you laughing?

No, nothing.

Just because the bottom ones was the bottom ones.

I mean, they deserve it.

They deserve it.

They're not wrong.

Okay, we've asked you what your favorite books were.

But we have to tell people about the books that just got us real mad.

So we've never we've never DNFed a book.

No, no, no.

Are we allowed to do that?

Do you remember?

No, there was one book we debated DNFing.

Do you remember?

I think it was this.

I think it was the way we used to be here.

Yeah, it was.

So the way we used to be by Amber Smith, I think.

The way I used to be.

What did I say?

We used to be.

That's Barbara Streisand.

The way I used to be by Amber Smith.

The way I used to be by Amber Smith is young adult fiction.

And the opening of the book is a sexual assault of a 13 year old.

Yeah.

And it is a tough hang all the way through.

There's not much redeemable about it in my eyes.

It was.

It was awful.

It's.

I think it has been all over.

It was.

Tiktok.

That was another one of those where I was like, I appreciate what you're trying to do.

Like, I really appreciated the just insight into how a victim of sexual assault

would feel and like how that would make them act.

I just think it was really poorly executed.

I did not enjoy it.

And I didn't really think it should have been a YA.

Yeah.

Like, I wouldn't know what teenagers read.

I know.

Yeah.

That's an interesting point.

That was YA.

What I saw and how I lied is also YA.

I think those are the only two YA's that we read.

We thought about DNFingit.

And we decided not to.

Do you remember why?

I don't really remember.

I think it was just because it was not sitting right with any of us.

It was that opening sequence just really set us off.

My least favorite was the one we just finished, presumed innocent.

It was just I could not get into reading it.

And I took a very long time to get into the audio version of it.

It was just not my favorite whatsoever.

I think that is probably, we can all agree on that being our least favorite.

No, it's not my least favorite.

It's not my least.

No, no, no.

I would say the way I used to be is my least followed by lie to me.

And then I was just really innocent.

Yeah.

I really liked the audio of presumed innocent.

Yeah.

It's read by Ed Herman.

It was.

It was, he's an audio.

The grandfather and I think he's passed away.

But I really did.

I really like, I thought the audio book performance was great.

And he totally captivated me.

The writing is problematic in many ways.

Yeah.

Presumed innocent by Scott Turo is like a legal procedural.

It's the first of maybe 13 books set in this like fictitious Kindle County.

It was written in 87.

87.

It was the oldest book on our list.

Now I'm wondering what's the newest book on our list?

Just out of curiosity.

Oh yeah, maybe right.

The newest is the Family Upstairs by Lisa Juleen 2019.

Home of Fire is in 2017.

Okay, there we go.

So we liked the most contemporary book the most.

We just liked the old book the least.

That's interesting.

There's just so much of this book that doesn't hold up.

If you did a sensitivity reading of it, you would be, it would be filled with highlights.

And that I think made it like hard to get through.

And the end was book or something satisfying.

Just like.

But that one was one again where like I probably wouldn't have gotten it through on my own.

But you chimed in and said, hey, I switched over to audio.

And I'm really really loving this narrator.

And then we all one by one switched over.

Oh yeah.

And ended up switching to audio and enjoyed it a lot more.

And he is a really great narrator.

And so it made it definitely more of a involving story.

And I like, I wouldn't have got there by myself.

My library didn't have the copy of it, a physical copy of it.

And so I was on hold for a digital copy.

And that way it was a while.

And I know, yeah, and I downloaded the audio version from my library as well.

I would not have been able to read this book.

It's so weird because this book presumed innocent.

I started reading the digital copy.

And it was like my brain could not translate the prose.

I could see the words and I could not connect a narrative into the story.

And then once it turned into audio.

And I've never had that problem with the book before.

Yeah, I struggled with the same thing.

I felt like I was reading paragraph after paragraph and not remembering what I read.

Mm-hmm.

Is Scott Turo our only male author?

Yeah.

Fascinating.

Yeah.

And I'm also very interesting.

And I'm only noticing that as I look at the chocolates.

But also like look at this author lighting me is that, no, this is a woman.

I know.

That's what happened.

Oh, JT Ellison.

Yeah, and her resume, the SJ Watson, like that style of John Rahoud, the women writer, doesn't

put her, the female author doesn't put her name.

Yeah.

It's like an initial.

Mm-hmm.

Do you think that they were trying to market to a non-female audience?

Or like they didn't want to exclusively market to a woman, to women?

Because these covers actually, they look similar.

Maybe this is not great podcast content, but they both have like gray backgrounds with red

and black.

Mm-hmm.

I don't know.

That's just interesting.

And the other ones have like pink and flowers and pictures of women on them, you know, food

for thoughts.

Well, what are we reading right now?

Oh, our next book.

Yeah, Ali.

What's our next pick?

All grown up.

That's my pick for November.

So after our retreat, I'm going to go home and divide it up and make our matrix.

I can't remember the author's name.

Jamie Burlton.

The fun thing about that one, though, is you guys actually took Buddy Reading to a different

level and started listening to the audio version together on your right here.

We did.

And we're literally listening to the book together in the same spot.

That's right.

And as enjoying the audio version, I mentioned to Erin that I am still going to read the hard

copy.

And why do you think you're going to do that?

I am a visual learner.

Yeah.

So I thought maybe why I did not like presumed innocent because I was listening to it on the audio

book.

Don't retain what I'm hearing the same way as if I'm reading it.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I think that's fair.

I think it really depends on the narrator.

I think the narrator of all grown up is pretty generic.

Like generic narration, not a lot of dynamic performance, I guess, and I don't know the word.

I'm looking for us.

But it's, you're right.

And I think we sort of thought we would all try the audio on the drive.

And so Ali and I got a couple of hours in and I think you guys didn't listen at all.

And so we are sort of, we had strong reactions to the first two hours of the audio book that

we listened to.

So I think we probably won't listen to any more of it on the drive home and then Ali will make the matrix and we'll all dive into it.

But I will really be excited to hear what you guys think about it.

All right.

I'm really excited because this is our hot take segment.

And hot take is an opinion usually formed off the cuff and with little research, sometimes provocative.

And I'm excited because we get to have our first hot takes with guests.

And today's hot take is when they change the book cover to the movie poster or TV show cover,

what are your thoughts Stephanie?

We'll start with you.

I hate it.

I hate it.

Like, I don't even know why.

I like to come up with the pictures in my head myself.

And so like maybe if I've already read the book and then the movie is coming out, like I'm like,

okay, whatever, like I've already made up my own pictures.

But like if I haven't read the book yet and then I'm like, you're like forcing your character pictures on me.

And I don't like it.

I don't like it.

And I don't want like a Timothy Shalame face on my bookshelf.

You don't want Timothy Shalame on your cover of Little Women?

No.

I just want the original cover.

Okay.

I have a slightly different take.

And I think that's because I always wonder about people who read the book after watching the movie.

And if you were intrigued by the movie and you grab the copy of the book that has something that's already recognizable to you,

what do we think about those covers appealing to or enticing to people who don't read a lot,

but maybe want to dip into a book because they watch the movie and they really loved it?

Do we think that a movie cover can really entice someone who doesn't pick up a lot of books

to read?

Probably.

I mean, it likely does pick entice somebody who is not a reader but is really into the movie to pick up the book and read it.

I would bet that I mean, there's got to be a reason that they do it.

Right.

That's what I was thinking.

It must sell books.

Yeah.

But most book lovers that I know load a movie cover, like a cover with actors on it.

I do.

I don't like it because I think the author typically has such a say in the cover of the book and they put so much effort into finding the perfect artist,

the perfect picture, the perfect whatever.

And it goes and changes to this movie show cover that they had no say in.

And I just, I don't like it.

I don't like it at all.

It won't stop me from buying a book that is really good if there's no other way to get it, but it would not be my first choice.

All right.

I wonder what our listeners think.

Please share with us on Instagram.

You can tag us at medium.

Top Lady for Erin or me at Jillian Finding Happy or you can tag the podcast at medium lady reads.

Okay.

We're going to talk about what's on our holds list of the library.

I can go first because I have mine up.

So I actually have, oh, that is exciting.

I have four books waiting for me.

I have eight on hold, but four waiting.

I will teach you to be Rich, which is by Rameet Sethi.

I have Drive Your Own Damn Bus by Julia Christina.

Hello, Kingdom by Kira Jane Bucston.

And then I'll grow up by Jamie Attenberg.

Are those first two nonfiction?

Yes, they are.

They're both nonfiction, which I don't like because I usually only read one nonfiction a month.

So I'll probably have to return one before I read it, but, oh well, what can you do?

Holds come up when they come up.

Steph, what do you have?

I have a lot.

I use my holds list on the library as kind of like my TBR.

And so I constantly am maxed out on hold, but ones that are about to come up soon,

is One Dark Window by Rachel Gillick.

And everybody keeps telling me that's a good like, make you feel good after you read fourth wing,

and you feel that void.

And so I'm excited to dig into that one.

The House in the Cerulean Sea, which is by your guys favorite TJ Clown.

I have in the company of witches and Tessa Bailey's Wreck the Holes,

which I want to read and like before Christmas time.

Very nice.

Ellie, what about you?

I have quite a few.

So ready for pick up, I will grab them on Mondays,

T for the Road by Shantel Gerton.

What Wild Women Do by Carmen Brown?

One is in transit right now, three holidays in a wedding by

Uzma Jala Luden.

I love her.

Her Rises Stiply.

And then I have the Wishing Game by Meg Schaeffer in the company of witches,

which we recommend and go in.

Asking for a friend by Carrie Claire.

Carrie Claire is a local Toronto author.

It happened one Christmas by Shantel Gerton, Happiness Balls,

which was from Gillian's recommendation.

And then the Women in Me by Britney Spears.

That book is getting incredible reviews.

Yeah.

In the company of witches, the author actually...

The Wild List, listen.

Listen to our podcast.

And she commented on our Instagram post and then said she had to go back and listen.

So that was very exciting.

And now we're like spreading the word,

letting everybody know that they should listen.

Because it is such a good, cozy read.

Yeah.

And I read when the crows away, it's also great.

I've read it down right now.

The second one is great too.

And so, Orally Wallace, if you're listening, we want you to publish more books.

Okay, here's my holds.

I don't know if this is because it's coming soon.

But Iron Flame is at the top of my list right now.

Yeah.

And it says pending.

And I don't know if that's because it's not in the queue yet.

Or if they're going to release it to me soon.

Because Iron Flame publishes on November 5th.

7th, you would know.

I would.

Another great book that I'm looking forward to is called Champions of the Fox.

It's a third in a series.

It's like a Young Adult Fixed Series.

The first is called The Children of the Fox.

The second one is called The Seekers of the Fox.

This is the third book.

I really love these books.

They're really, really fun, propulsive, young adult fiction.

That's coming soon.

And then I have The Starling House,

which is the new book by Alex E. Herrow.

That I think is coming very soon.

She wrote The Once in Future Witches

and The Ten Thousand Doors of January.

Yes.

So that's her new book.

So those are the three.

It seems like they'll come pretty soon.

And I'm going to be in trouble because I...

I have that covenant of water hanging over my head, man.

Do I just like save it for another time?

Do I buy a copy and read it at Christmas one?

I'm going to be on vacation.

I got to be honest.

I feel like you really should because you've had it for a while

and you haven't opened it.

And you keep going back and forth with it,

which makes me think that you're not really into it.

And why not save it for when you are really into it?

Okay.

You heard it here for me.

I'm going to return it.

That's what friends are for.

And wait for the paperback version.

Do you think that will be better?

I don't know.

It's heavy.

And it's a thick book.

Okay, we're going to add one final section,

which is usually Jillian and I will do Instagram made me buy it.

But instead of Instagram made me buy it,

we're going to do a special edition,

which is the book village made me buy it.

So we're presently in the Catskills.

We're visiting Hobart, which is considered New York's book village, I guess.

And if you've never been to the Catskills,

you must go next year in the fall when the colors change.

And if you've never been to Hobart,

we would highly recommend it.

We've had an amazing time.

And we all bought a lot of stuff while we were in Hobart.

So we're going to share what we were influenced to buy because of Hobart.

All right, who wants to go first?

Let's have Steph go, since it's her idea.

Nice.

Okay, I bought four books and they are all for my children.

I love doing read-alouds with my kids.

It brings me so much joy and I'm always looking for really good read-alouds.

And so my first one is the Wild Robot by Peter Brown.

And I didn't know anything about it before we went into one of the shops.

And it just looked really good.

And so I'm looking forward to that one.

The next one is Sophie Choir by Jonathan Oxseer.

And it also looks like a good middle grade read-aloud.

Then I also bought the Dragons of Blue Land,

which is by Ruth Stiles Gennett.

And she wrote my father's dragon.

And I actually had no idea that there were others in that series.

And so I'm excited about that one.

That was one of my favorite read-alouds as a kid.

And then a picture book called Cunningham's Rooster,

because my last name is Cunningham.

And I thought that was cool.

One of the other things we should mention is that one of the hallmarks of all these bookstores in Hobart

is that the majority of the stock is used or secondhand.

So that also was unexpected.

I didn't really expect that.

And it was a really lovely part of visiting all of these bookstores.

The majority of their inventory was previously owned.

Pre-loved and a little bit cheaper than buying.

Definitely.

Okay, so I bought three picked up three books.

And they are all, I would say, considered probably YA.

And of Green Gables, it is my favorite.

If you remember on an episode with Aaron many, many years ago,

I recommended it as a summer read.

I picked up You Truly Assume by Layla Sabrine

and Gwen Stars are scattered by Victoria Jamison and Omar Muhammad.

And when Stars are scattered is a graphic novel.

And then in terms of swag, I did get a I read band books tea

as well as band guns, now books sticker and a bookworm pin for my Jane Jocket.

Oh, I love that pin, that a Namel pin.

It's so cute.

All right, Jillian, what'd you get?

Okay, so I got some for my kids and some for myself.

I got also the Wild Robot by Peter Brown.

Very excited.

I think that I bought it for my son.

I think he's going to love it.

I got You Should See Me in the Crown by Leah Johnson.

I got Camp Zero by Michelle Min Sterling.

And I got a children's book in a jar by Deborah Marcero.

And then as far as swag is concerned, I got my kids some bookmarks,

a couple of little sketchbooks.

You got a tote bag?

I did, I got a tote bag.

I'm super excited about the tote bag, but I think that was pretty much it.

What do you mean?

Oh yeah, I got book earrings too.

Thank you for the reminder.

Why did you get that book in a jar?

For Esther, because it is so sweet.

It is about...

It's really beautiful illustrations.

It is about the number of things you have to do.

It is about the number of things you have to do.

It is about the number of things you have to do.

I got...

I actually didn't buy that many books.

I bought a book called I Know A Lady, which was in this antique book shop.

It was sitting there on the shelf.

It called to me.

I picked it up.

I read the whole thing.

By the end of the book, I had tears in my eyes.

You all came upon me in the section.

I was like, I'm not crying.

I felt like I immediately had to buy that book.

Then I bought a book called Wolf Hall, which was the Booker Prize winner in 2009.

I only know that because that was the sticker on it.

It is a book I wanted to read for a long time.

That was the same thing.

I was sort of like, I want this book.

I bought it.

It is a very like used battered copy of Wolf Hall.

That should be fun.

Then I got a fair bit of swag.

I got a small change purse that mimics the cover of Jane Eyre.

I also got a tote.

I got book earrings as well.

I got my husband a t-shirt that is about like forest preservation.

I got a hanker chief that has birds on it.

This is not bookish merch, but this is just what I hauled.

Then I got two very, very funny to me postcards that say Mr. and Mrs. Cat skills.

They are cats.

I just love them.

I don't know why I'm not really a cat person, but that really appealed to me.

That's what I got.

I love it.

Yeah, I love it too.

Okay, everyone.

That wraps up episode 10 of Medium Lady Reads.

Medium Lady Reads is a spin-off of the Medium Lady Talks podcast and Instagram community.

You can find me, Erin, on Instagram at medium.lady.

And you can find Jillian at Jillian Finding Happy for more of our current reads and other shenanigans.

You can also find Stephanie at Stepski.

And you can find Ali at Allie Up and Landr.

And of course, you can follow the podcast on Instagram at Medium Lady Reads.

If you liked this episode, please share it with another bookish friend or post on IG and be sure to tag us.

We would be tickled pink to hear from you.

Thank you for listening.

I'm your host Jillian.

And I'm your other host, Erin.

Until next time, we hope that you're full to drive quickly.

And your next book finds you right when you need it most.

We'll talk to you soon.

Bye!

A lot of the time what I choose to read.

Could you?

Just.

What?

So you don't need that.

Immediately editing.

I don't know what I'm saying.

I'm just amazing.