Episode 29: Somewhere Beyond the Sea-quel

Hello, Hi, and welcome to Medium Lady Reads this is episode 29, “Somewhere Beyond the Sea-quel.”

October is here, as is the beautiful Autumn weather which is perfect for curling up with a great book. Erin and Jillian have 5 new books to share with you to start your autumn reading.

In this Episode:

• The ladies check-in to see how their reading has been going. 
• Time to drop into the meat of the episode! Jillian and Erin each share their thoughts and opinions on 2 books, and 1 joint book, this week. 
• Mentioned in this episode: Fourth Wing - Worth the Hype?
• Ready for this week’s hot take? Erin and Jillian dive into the hot take.
• Do you use the library? Jillian and Erin do and they love sharing what’s waiting for them at the library.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

• The Life Impossible by Matt Haig
• The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
• Kiss Me at Christmas by Jenny Bayliss 
• Strong Female Character by Fern Brady
• The Secret History by Donna Tartt
• The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon
• A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles 
• Colored Television by Danzy Senna
• Real Americans by Rachel Khong
• Notes from a Young Black Chef by Kwame Onwuachi 
• Under the Whispering Door by T.J. Klune
• The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune
• Somewhere Beyond the Sea by T.J. Klune
• Normal People by Sally Rooney
• Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam
• The Eyes and the Impossible by Dave Eggers
• Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield 
• The Wedding People by Alison Espach
• The Night We Lost Him by Laura Dave
• All Fours by Miranda July
• The Most Wonderful Time by Jayne Allen 
• Black Girls Must Die Exhausted by Jayne Allen
• Entitlement by Rumaan Alam

Transcript

So this book is really about the love of a found family, the power of uniting for change against evil, and the chaos of parenthood.

That all kind of comes together.

This is a follow up from one of my favorite books of all time, which is The House and the Cerulean Sea, Jillian and I, banter back and forth on the merits of under the whispering door versus the house and the Cerulean Sea.

I have a real soft spot for children in books, especially children in adult books that are written very, very well.

And I feel like the kids in this book, they will have my heart forever.

And I'm very, very happy.

All those kids are back plus a few more.

Hello, hi, and welcome to Medium Lady Reads.

This is episode 29.

Just like pumpkin spice, falling leaves, and ghosties are synonymous with fall.

So are books.

We have five more reviews coming your way.

Hi, everyone.

I'm Jillian and Instagram content strategist for bookish people.

A mom of two based in Buffalo, New York.

And I'm Erin, a mom of three, a hospital administrator in Ontario, Canada, and a ghost and founder of the Medium Lady Community and Medium Lady Talks podcast.

Together, we're thrilled to bring you another episode of Medium Lady Reads, a podcast about leading self-care, a passionate love for the public library, and all of our thoughts and opinions on look-culture having its moment.

Hi, everyone, and welcome back to Medium Lady Reads.

This is episode 29, airing the week of October 15th.

Let's check in.

Erin, how's your reading going?

Are you feeling the fall season?

Oh, I am feeling the fall season.

And you're probably going to be able to hear that I'm feeling the fall season in my voice.

I've got a bit of a cold.

So I hope listeners don't mind.

I'm a little scratchier than usual.

We've just been trading around family germs at my house, taking turns, being sick.

My reading pace has really started to chill out.

You know, plus like I just find I'm doing other things.

I've been watching TV.

I got really wrapped up in that Netflix series called Nobody Wants This with Adam Brody and Kristen Bell.

You know, I got caught up in the hype, but I was watching that instead of reading, or just, you know, also like spending a lot of time out of the house this fall, especially on the weekends, which is when I would like normally get a lot of my reading done.

And driving my kids around, that has like become like a new chapter of my life, mom carpool.

So yeah, but in terms of current reads, I'm currently reading two books.

The first is The Life Impossible by Matt Hague.

Matt Hague is the author of the midnight library.

It's a pretty well-known beloved contemporary classic.

The Life Impossible is about a 70 year old woman who makes a series of choices following the death of a long-lost friend.

Really enjoying that.

I'm doing that both in print and in audio.

When I'm doing my like mom carpool, that's the book that I pop in when I'm driving people around.

That's fun.

Yeah, it is actually, and the narrator has a lovely British elderly lady accent.

So she's quite posh.

She sounds a little bit like Diana, Princess Diana's accent sort of resonates in my mind.

So it's very good.

And then the second book I'm reading is called The Voyage of the Damned by Frances White.

This book came out, I think, in the summer.

This is a kind of fun book.

It's a little bit of a locked-door mystery, but it's also fantasy, and it also harkens a little bit to hunger games.

So it's these 12 districts that all make up the realm.

They're on this voyage to like a like a significant monument in their realm, but it's just the 12 of them on this boat, and they start dying.

So it's a little bit of mystery, a little bit of fantasy, a little bit of hunger games, a little bit of like intrigue and romance.

It's got a little bit of everything, but in a good way.

And I'm really enjoying that too.

So Jillian, how's your reading going?

It's going.

We're getting busier with school and session after school activities are ramping up.

We have probably basketball starting soon.

Hopefully, if I'm at makes the team.

So my reading has slowed down a little bit.

I actually got discouraged with one of the books we're going to be bringing you today, and it slowed me down even more.

Instead of reading faster, I haven't been able to pick up my pace.

So I've been going back to falling asleep.

It's just been a struggle the last couple of weeks.

I'm hoping that with better books, better choices, I'll be able to bring back my speedier reading.

But yeah, we've I've been slowing down a little bit.

Well, that's all right.

I think that that's just like part for the course.

I was just going to say, yeah, and I've been choosing my phone more over the book, which is always a problem.

It's easier to choose that and doon scroll than it is to pick up a book and read sometimes.

Yeah, that's very relatable.

I think I think everybody listening knows that the biggest thing that gets in the way of your reading is often going to be social media in your phone time.

I feel that way for sure.

Currently, I'm reading Kiss Me at Christmas by Jenny Bayless, which is her this year's Christmas book.

It's really good.

It's about a woman who is a mom and also a teacher.

And she is tasked with putting together a play.

I think she's given five or six weeks.

And she falls in love with a lawyer in the book, which is not a spoiler.

That's how the book starts.

Yeah, it's it's really good.

It's it's a little different than her normal ones.

I am getting the cozy vibe.

So you'll probably hear more about that in our cozy Christmas reads.

But it's a little different than her last one.

And if I remember correctly, her one before that.

So it's fun.

It's a fun read.

Oh, all right.

I have that one actually just came to me on Libby.

I haven't jumped into it yet.

But I'm glad you're liking it so far.

Jenny Bayless is one of my favorite holiday authors for sure.

Yeah, me too.

She does a good one every year.

Thanks for checking in with me, Aaron.

My pleasure.

And now it's time for Book Chat and the heart of our episode.

So Aaron, tell me what is the layout of your reviews today?

What are we in for?

Hmm.

Okay.

So for this week's books, I'm going to be sharing an eye opening memoir and a buzzy contemporary fiction novel.

I'm ready for Book Chat, Jillian.

What are your books like?

Oh, sounds like some good ones.

And I can't wait to learn more.

My books range from a dark academia, mystery thriller to a memoir that opened me up to see where many of my privileges lie.

Plus listeners, you may have noticed that we're both bringing only two reviews to the show this week.

That's because we both finished reading somewhere beyond the C by TJ Clune and thought it would be fun to double up our review on this highly anticipated book from one of our favorite authors.

So Aaron, what's the first book you're bringing today?

The first book I'm sharing today is going to be Strong Female Character by Fern Brady.

This was a riveting memoir about the lived experience of an autistic woman that left me pretty much rethinking everything I thought I knew about autistic folks.

Here's the setup.

In Strong Female Character, Fern Brady gives us a raw, humorous, and eye-opening look into her life growing up with undiagnosed autism.

Brady shares the highs and lows of excelling in school but struggling with sensory overload and anger that confused everyone around her.

Fern goes through years of misdiagnosis from being treated as a day patient in a psychiatric unit and has various episodes of being kicked out of the house.

She turns to stripping at one point and then she has continued risky behavior all to try and manage her symptoms and mask in front of everyone she knows.

It wasn't until she was 34 that she finally got the correct diagnosis of autism.

I would recommend this book to anyone who is a teacher, health care provider, serves the community, or anyone honestly who is an overall human who has to interact with other humans who might need their help in any capacity.

If you're in a role that requires you to serve the public, this is a great book to read.

Be aware, there is content that describes domestic abuse and sex work.

But be that as it may, I really don't think I have had such a powerful experience reading about neurodivergence in any other book.

Fern Brady makes no apologies to her reader.

She really does little if anything Jillian to comfort them.

It's your privilege to take a step away from the book if you need to do so.

Her description of the diagnosis in her 30s and then she has these flashbacks to her childhood, her adolescence, her young adulthood and days in university, then describe this sort of series of gut wrenching raw experiences that are also like deeply funny and very insightful, how Fern managed basically to mask by day and collapse by night.

Parts of this book stop me in my tracks and did require me to step away at times.

But I feel like I gained a profoundly meaningful awareness of autism, especially in women.

But what it really means when someone presents in public as high functioning, what that might mean for their home life and for those who are closest to them.

This book shattered every preconceived assumption and stereotype that I ever believed about autistics and really has dismantled any of the former beliefs that I might have held about who has autism and who doesn't.

Listeners, if this isn't treating to you, I want you to first Google Fern Brady, watch her comedy on YouTube and then read this book.

If you come away with anything other than awe, honestly, we can't be friends.

It will blow your mind.

I did this book in multiple formats.

First in print, then I went to the audio because Fern is Scottish and her Scottish accent does add to the comedy of her story.

And then later I went back to a digital copy of the book.

Eventually, I actually kind of found it hard to find the sweet spot for her accent, her Scottish accent.

And like how fast I could listen to the book while still capturing the essence of the story.

But honestly, this book was something I completely did not expect.

It blew my socks off.

I gave it five stars.

That's strong female character by Fern Brady.

I know we joke about me adding stuff to my TBR, but this one I think has to make, has to make its appearance known because it sounds amazing.

And I am always looking to learn through reading.

And I think that this is a great opportunity for that.

Honestly, I read this because of the full challenge, the 2024 full challenge, the prompt for September was to read a book by a neurodiverse author.

And actually, TJ Kloon is also neurodiverse.

So I thought, oh, well, I've got TJ Kloon's book.

So I'm reading that book.

And then I found this memoir as well.

Someone on Instagram recommended it to me.

And it starts off very funny.

It kind of disarms you with the humor.

And Fern Scottish accent definitely adds, you know, the Scots kind of, they know that that accent is funny, right?

So she kind of leans into that in the beginning of the book.

But then it's really just like story after story after story.

And it gets more and more raw.

And you really realize like this diagnosis probably saved her life because to continue beyond her 30s, it seemed very, it seems very untenable at a certain point.

And it really reshaped everything that I thought I knew about what autism is like.

And she makes reference to that in the beginning of the book.

She says, you know, most of the studies on autism were done on young male boys, like eight year old boys.

And so what we know about autism comes from this very like insulated population.

Children who like didn't have relationships didn't hold jobs were boys.

And all of these things kind of contribute to this challenge, especially for adult women to arrive at a diagnosis.

Basically, the first time she thinks she has autism, she goes to her, this is in the spoiler, she goes to her doctor and says, what about autism?

And he says, well, no, you have a boyfriend.

You couldn't have autism.

Like, basically rules that out as a possibility because she's in a healthy, religious terrible.

Yeah.

So anyway, I'm glad to hear that you that it meets the TBR check because I really think everyone should read this book.

It's excellent.

Yeah.

I'll probably listen.

I like listening.

And I said this in the last episode.

I prefer listening to my memoirs in audio formats.

So I'll probably listen to it.

And I will probably have to slow it down for myself because when I listen to individuals with accents, I tend to have to slow it way down.

Okay, Jillian, what's your first book for the show today?

My first book was a book that I found while searching Google for the quote unquote best fall books.

I wanted one of those quintessential novels that just screamed fall.

One of the first ones I came across was The Secret History by Donna Tarte.

It was recommended that this book be read in September because it is the perfect opening into fall.

So as much as I wanted to read it last year, I put it off until this September because I couldn't fit it in last year.

I loved this book.

I rated it five stars.

And honestly, I wish I could have given it more.

Here's the premise.

Under the influence of their charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at any elite New England College discover a way of thinking and living that is a world away from the humdrum existence of their contemporaries.

But when they go beyond the boundaries of normal morality, their lives are changed profoundly and forever.

And they discover how hard it can be to truly live and how easy it is to kill.

That does not do it justice.

That leaves a lot to the imagination.

But that's good because this book is nothing I've ever read before.

It is a chunker coming in at about 560 pages or so.

But it reads so well and so smoothly that you don't even notice that it's that long.

The thing about the book that keeps you turning page after page is how deeply you become immersed with the characters and the story.

Before you know it, you're right there with them following Richard, who is the main character while he walks from classes or visiting the other's apartments to talk about what they know or what they've learned.

It's just the perfect dark academia that you're looking for right now with the Halloween season upon us.

And I know that I said that you could read this that they people recommended that you read this in September.

But I'm going to tell you now you don't necessarily need to read it in September.

A lot of the book actually occurs in winter going into spring.

So I don't know why the September was recommended.

But you can read it anytime you want and it would still do a great job and give you that good not quite he be jeepy because it's not scary but it's like you get the kind of I don't know I can't think of how to put it but it gives you the good feelings of fall and and chilliness and there is some even with it being a book of out murder which is not a spoiler.

You get a lot of tea and a lot of cozy factors in there.

So you got that too.

Oh good yes.

This is The Secret History by Donna Tarte.

Amazing.

I have known about this book for such a long time.

I feel like it's a bit of an Instagram TikTok darling.

But it's published a long time ago.

Like it's a early Aughts book I think.

I believe so.

Yeah.

I'm going to put this on my list for the winter.

I have a couple of books I'm collecting for the winter like the Frozen River.

I want to read a gentleman in Moscow and I'm going to add this book The Secret History.

I'm going to lean into those books maybe like November during the sort of well in Canada we have this sort of holiday no man's land between Thanksgiving and the beginning of December.

So I might add it to my list then.

I think it'll fit in perfectly then.

All right.

So Aaron what's your next read?

Okay my next book feels kind of different from what I've recently brought to the show.

It's Literary Fiction.

Ooh a Smarty Pants book.

I'm going to review Color Television by Danzy Senna.

But be warned I did give this book a 3.5.

I don't know Jillian.

I feel like this is another Busy book.

It didn't land for me.

I wanted to like this so much more than I did and I feel like that often happens with contemporary literary fiction where it's like Busy and edgy or like dark and humorous any of those descriptions.

I should be wary of that because I'd never give those books five stars.

This book falls in the category of Morally Grey or Are They?

You know people doing kind of shitty things to one another until the patriarchy always prevails so someone wins and someone loses.

In Color Television we meet Jane, a harried mother, burnt out college instructor, dissatisfied wife and listless author.

The only thing going for Jane at least for the next year is her house sitting gig where she and her family are enjoying a slice of living that normally would never be within reach.

While pretending to be someone she isn't, Jane finds herself in the world of television and the promises Hollywood start to beckon.

What follows is a series of unfortunate events that follow Jane as she sees her vision through to the lackluster ending.

This was kind of a high anxiety read for me Jillian.

Do you know what I mean by that?

I think so.

Yeah, it's where you're like kind of reading and you're waiting for the next bad thing to happen to the character because of the choices that they're making.

I find a lot of literary fiction to be kind of like this, especially when you're dealing with Morally Grey characters.

But I did jump into this book because the first 10 pages are so were legitimately funny.

Like I laughed out loud maybe twice in the first 10 pages and that kind of took me off guard.

I thought, okay, maybe this book is actually going to be different.

Unfortunately that wears off very quickly and I found myself reading one of those books where you sort of find yourself shuddling between cringe for the main character and then also this like weirdness of a parent being like really this again.

A lot of the book felt repetitive for me and that caused me to feel more and more anxious as I waited for just one thing to finally go right for Jane and her family.

Anxiety aside, this book does explore a multitude of themes and it does that very very very well.

The contrast of folks of biracial backgrounds within or outside of the broader black community and the seduction and risk of being able to kind of easily play the part that suits who, whoever you're with.

Further to that are themes of lying and deception, those who have and have not.

In addition to kind of what it looks like from the outside and what it really feels like on the inside.

Life on TV is never going to be the same as real life.

Jane is a person that is very focused on getting what she wants in order to achieve a certain looking kind of life.

But if you lie to get your job and you lie to your boss about your qualifications while you lie to your partner about your success and you lie to your neighbors about your family, where do the boundaries of your life touch reality?

How much of your life comes beyond the screens you've built around yourself?

The end of the novel attempts to answer this question and I think readers are mixed on how successful that attempt is.

The book has a 3.72 review rating on Goodreads.

So all that to say, Julian, well, I didn't enjoy this book.

I did like it.

There's a lot to discuss within its themes.

It'd be great for a book club and I have been turning it over in my mind for a few days.

However, my biggest beef is that this book is not what it's being sold to the general public.

I mean, it's like that's not always that surprising.

Marketing is marketing and books are books.

Those are two separate things.

It's being sold as something funny and dark and, indeed, I feel like it was kind of smart and depressing.

If you liked Real Americans by Rachel Kong, you'll probably find this a good fit.

So that's my review for Color Television by Danzy Senna.

This one I actually took off my TBR.

I actually had it on hold at the library.

Not just today.

We, when I had spoken about this a couple days ago, but I had it on hold at the library and I was like number 100 and something and I just canceled the hold on it because it didn't...

I have enough anxiety issues.

I don't need a book causing me more anxiety.

Sometimes we're just wondering like what's going... what's going to go wrong or we're worried about our own futures and this whole time I was reading this book, I was like, oh my gosh, what is going to happen to her?

She's like walking on a thread the whole book.

Yeah, not not for me.

At least not right now.

Some people like that kind of tension.

So yeah, I hear you.

Okay, Jillian, what's your next book?

All right.

My next book was our buddy read for September.

I'm referring to notes for a young black chef by Kwame Anewachi.

I gave this memoir four stars.

It definitely opened my eyes to the many injustices that black people experience and the privileges that I personally have.

Kwame's memoir is told in short stories until he gets to the opening of his restaurant where you are then submerged into the traumatic ups and downs of what opening restaurant entails, especially when you're partnered with people who don't necessarily have your back.

Here's the premise.

By the time he was 27 years old, Kwame Anewachi had opened and closed one of the most talked about restaurants in America.

He had sold drugs in New York and had been shipped off to rural Nigeria to learn respect.

He had launched his own catering company with $20,000 made from selling candy on the subway and he had starred in Top Chef.

Through it all, Anewachi's love of food and cooking remained a constant.

Even when he was a young chef, he was forced to grapple with just how unwelcoming the food world can be for people of color.

In his memoir about the intersection of race, fame and food, he shares the remarkable story of the culinary coming of age, a powerful heart-felt and shockingly honest account of chasing your dreams, even when they don't turn out just as you would expect.

Despite all the hardships, things like abuse at the hands of his father or being sent to Nigeria when he was just a boy, Anewachi still perseveres.

Even in the toughest of moments, Anewachi keeps going, knowing that he'll find a way for everything to work.

This is Notes from a Young Black Chef by Kwame Anewachi.

Aaron, I know you read this book along with me and the Stephanie and Ellie, so what other thoughts do you have to add?

Yeah, so this was our September Buddy Reads.

I think it was my choice, but we have a fun way that we pick books.

Anyway, all that aside, I think that this book really stuck with me over time.

When I finished reading it, I thought, I don't know, I think I maybe gave it 3.5 stars, but I think it's probably game stars in my mind.

I would definitely give it a four now.

I think the thing that you have to realize when you go into this book is when you read a memoir, you often expect to really like the protagonist because they're a real person and you're invested in their story and you care about what happens to them.

That happens to Kwame, but Kwame doesn't really care if you like him or not.

I've never really had that experience reading memoir before.

Part of that is because as a young black man, he's had to be two steps ahead of what people think of him.

He's had to anticipate and plan and react to what people think of him before they even know what they think of him.

I feel like that really comes across really strongly in the book.

It had me even thinking about my own preconceptions, my own prejudgments about how he should have responded to hardship, how he should have felt about the things that were successes and the things that were failures.

He doesn't.

When he doesn't meet your expectations as the reader, he says, "I knew you were going to feel this way about me and I'm not surprised."

That's a jarring experience as a reader, as a white woman reading a story about a black man.

I felt like that was a deeply valuable reading experience.

It's probably like a standout experience from 2024.

Similar to Fern Brady.

That Fern Brady book, I'll be like, "Wow, I will think differently after reading this book."

When I immediately finished that book, notes from a young black chef, I didn't have that experience, but since reading it, I've been like, "Oh yeah, that's taught me something about myself as a reader."

All right, Erin.

For our last review today, it's a collaborative review of somewhere beyond the sea by TJ Clune.

Long-time listeners will know that there are a few episodes that go by where we don't mention or reference one of Mr.

Clune's books, especially my personal favorite under the whispering door, which I talk about all the time.

And if you're new to the show, you can go ahead and check out our second ever episode.

That's how much we love TJ Clune.

And you can hear us gush and fangirl about his work for a whole episode.

But today, we're going to talk about somewhere beyond the sea.

And Jillian, you have the setup.

Here it is.

This highly anticipated sequel to the house in the Cerulean Sea brings us back to Marseus Island, where Arthur Pernassus is still caring for magical children at a mysterious orphanage.

Arthur is eager to officially adopt the kids and continue to protect them from the world that once neglected him.

He's joined by Linus, the man he loves, as well as their trusted allies Zoe and Helen.

But Arthur's past won't stay hidden.

And when he's forced to confront it publicly, his family's future hangs in the balance.

And with the arrival of a new child who embraces the label, quote unquote, "monster," Arthur realizes that they are at a turning point.

Either they grow together or everything could fall apart.

Somewhere beyond the sea is a heartfelt, magical story about fighting for your family and the life you want, no matter how tough the battle.

Aaron, why don't you start with your review of the book?

I know we both gave it four stars.

I'm happy to start.

So this book is really about the love of a found family, the power of uniting for change against evil, and the chaos of parenthood.

That all kind of comes together.

This is a follow-up from one of my favorite books of all time, which is The House in the Cerulean Sea, Jillian and I, banter back and forth on the merits of under the whispering door versus The House in the Cerulean Sea.

I have a real soft spot for children in books, especially children in adult books that are written very, very well.

And I feel like the kids in this book, they will have my heart forever.

And I'm very, very happy.

All those kids are back plus a few more.

So I was really interested in the angle that this book would take.

Because when I read The House in the Cerulean Sea, I didn't necessarily need a sequel.

I didn't read it thinking like, "Oh, I wonder what's going to happen next."

It doesn't end on a cliffhanger.

Yeah.

So I was surprised because I thought this would just be a standalone novel.

So here's what I'll say.

Did The House in the Cerulean Sea need a sequel?

In my opinion, not really.

However, there were valid criticisms of TJ Klune having referenced his research while writing that book, including Indian residential schools and the 60s scoop.

And neither Jillian nor I are positioned to educate you on what that is.

But if you want to Google it, you'll find it very quickly.

So I did expect a bit more of a response to that criticism in the book.

However, while reading it, I realized how swiftly some thoughtful, intentional work can be misinterpreted by the public.

And there are very few ways to attack misinformation head on.

This book is not a direct response to criticism.

And even though that's what I expected, I'm glad my expectations weren't met.

Jillian, how about you?

What were your initial reactions to the book overall?

I love TJ Klune and I love TJ Klune's writing.

But this is not one that swept me off my feet.

It's quite like the others have.

One thing that puts me in awe is Klune's writing.

It's beautiful and lyrical and just so smart.

The writing suits me off my feet every time.

And I am just in love with it.

So even though I didn't necessarily love the book, I love his writing.

And I just get so excited reading his words.

Aaron, we're both low to criticize one of our favorite authors.

But I know you had some notes about this book and I did too.

Do you want to share first?

Yes, I do.

But I first, I think it's because I feel very loyal to TJ Klune as a writer.

I want to remind people this is a great book and you should read it.

Yes.

You should also read the house in this rule and see if you haven't read it.

And you do need to read that book first.

Absolutely.

There are a few things that trip me up.

I think it left me needing a little something when I close the book.

The middle of the story is very quiet.

Not much happens.

But this is a plot driven novel.

It is really not a character study the way some of his other books are.

Under the whispering door is very character driven in my opinion.

And somewhere beyond the sea is very plot driven.

And as Jillian said, you get beautiful writing from TJ Klune in both in both ways.

But when a book is plot driven, but the middle is slow, you kind of lose the plot.

At times, I did feel like the writing was geared towards a younger reader.

Maybe middle grade or young adult.

There is a strong good versus evil plot that actually lacks a lot of nuance, which felt like a missed opportunity for me.

The theme of this book in many ways is who gets to decide who the monsters are.

That's a primary theme in the story.

And I was waiting and waiting and waiting for a little more depth, a little less like exposition.

It's a lot of telling instead of showing there are a few clunky parts where one character explains to another character who's usually a child because there's lots of kids in this book.

Why change is important or why their voice matters, etc.

And those sort of like explanation scenes, they took me out of the setting because I could clearly see I was being manipulated to learn something from the scene.

And I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with it, but from TJ Clune, who does love and nuance and thematically is a writer I really admire, it just kind of felt heavy-handed from him.

How about you, Jillian?

Any disappointments?

Yeah, this book wasn't my favorite.

I love being able to sink back into the world of Marseille's Island and all the characters there, but I really like you struggled with the middle.

I got a little bored and I really didn't want to pick it up a couple of times and that's unfortunate because I really do love TJ Clune.

However, I did pick it back up and when they started fighting for their family and what they stood for, the book took off again and I absolutely loved it.

There is one really unique perspective that Clune adds in his acknowledgments, his desire to be the anti-JK-rolling.

Aaron, what did you think about all this?

That really stood out at me.

All of TJ Clune's books are about acceptance change and standing in the face of complacency and apathy.

All of his books are about saying, "I won't give into this, I shouldn't have to conform, I accept myself, I will care and I will fight and I believe the world should be better than what you've offered me."

I think even as I say those words, that's what gets me so emotionally riled up when I read TJ Clune.

That's what gets me so excited to read his works.

When there are good guys and bad guys and you feel the plot tense and the stakes of the story evolve, it's really interesting to read the acknowledgments because it kind of gives a broader cultural context to his decisions to do that.

So in his acknowledgments, TJ Clune purposefully calls out JK Rowling.

He says that he wants to carve a place in the world for art that is antithetical to her stance against trans people and her use of her platform, fame and following to insight, trans hate and bullying.

I felt like it was a straight line between the villain in this book, even in her name, and she who would not be named.

And there was something really candid about how he kind of put it all out there.

I really respected that.

That he named names, that he called out who he wants to be as a writer and as an author, and that he put that in this very specific book where he's trying to do a very specific thing.

I just kind of really appreciated that and it put a lot of my own expectations into perspective.

I really want to see what he does next.

I think somewhere beyond the sea could have gone even farther with that vision.

But if it's the first time he's putting that out there and this is the first book with that vision in mind, then I can see maybe where he, I don't want to say he played it safe, but where he made purposeful choices for simplicity instead of nuance.

And I did kind of keep waiting for this book to surprise me, but it never really did.

Jillian, what do you think about the acknowledgments?

I absolutely loved them.

I actually, when I was struggling in the middle of the book, you had recommended that I try reading the acknowledgments before I read any more of the book to see if that would help me understand where he was coming from with the book.

And so I did that and it did help actually quite a bit.

It helped me see the direction he was going, why he was going in this direction.

And it helped to understand the story a little bit better because while it wasn't a purposeful response to the criticisms he had, there you can definitely tell that he knew what he was doing when he wrote this book.

There's one other part that I wanted to ask you about, which is the house in Cerulean Sea is told from the point of view of Linus, who comes to the island.

He's an outsider.

Somewhere beyond the sea is told from the perspective of Arthur, who is sort of the insider, the person who's always belonged on the island.

What did you think about that switch in point of view?

I loved it.

I loved seeing it from Arthur's perspective because it allowed us to get to know him even better than we did before.

And I think that it showed us his, it's not just getting to know him as a person, but getting to know him as his magical counterpart, him as a phoenix.

What did you think about that?

I actually kind of wished it was still from Linus's point of view.

And I don't know if it's just because in the house in the Cerulean Sea, Linus is this stodgy, fuddy, dutty.

And you're waiting for him to unbutton and relax and discover more of himself, which he does through the story of the book.

And that's very satisfying.

Arthur felt more like fully baked for me.

I couldn't figure out what his character journey was going to be.

And it sort of seemed like his character journey was a little bit less, again, nuance.

Like I really feel like this book was missing a lot of nuance.

Like everything you're looking for is right there on the page, which is fine.

It's just a different way of bringing your reader through the story.

And I found Arthur harder to relate to.

Whereas I found Linus very easy to relate to.

The same with under the whispering door and the main character in that book also is this sort of like straight laced kind of angry person who's sort of like not admitting to his own life regrets until he starts to kind of open up like blossom like a flower, right?

And that's also something relatable.

I did find it hard to connect to Arthur.

And I did feel like because the story was lacking nuance that TJ Clune couldn't go as deep as he wanted to with Arthur's backstory.

And listen, maybe there's going to be more books and there's going to be a lot of opportunities for that.

I definitely think he could write a prequel.

I think we could definitely get like Arthur as a child would make a for a great book, a heartbreaking book, but but a great book nevertheless.

So yeah, I felt like it was an interesting choice.

And I guess I missed Linus because I really, but there's there's still a lot of Linus in this book.

But yeah.

Yeah, I have to say that I see your point what you're saying.

I I did enjoy Linus telling the story, but I liked the switch.

It was good to see for me.

It was good to see the different perspective.

Beyond controversy, somewhere beyond the seat continues the sweet wholesome narrative of two dads loving their adopted family.

The challenges of changing your approach to parenting as your children themselves change and how deeply you may be driven to protect them and how those intentions might go in the wrong direction when driven by fear.

TJ Clune has another new standalone book coming out in February of 2025.

And you can bet that we will both look forward to reading that and as much as we do all of his other writing and work.

That was kind of fun, Jillian, like a deep dive on one single book.

Yeah, I like that.

We'll have to do that again for his next one.

Yeah, reminds me of our fourth-wing episode.

Yeah.

Somehow we did a whole episode on fourth-wing.

We did.

We really did.

We'll have to tag that in the show notes for sure.

Yeah.

Oh my gosh.

That's true.

That's funny.

All right.

It's time for hot takes and our current thoughts on book culture.

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

Today's hot take is this.

Nicey wrapped up endings versus open ended endings is one better.

So what do you think, Aaron?

Oh, I mean, like I need a little bit of both.

Is that that's like a tepid take.

A tepid take is like, I like a little bit of both.

I really don't mind an open ended ending.

I really don't.

And I have always said this before is I like authors who treat their readers like they're smart.

And that might be some of what I'm complaining about when I talk about the like missing nuance in the TJ Clune sequel.

But I really love when an author is like, you can figure out what happens next.

You can decide.

You can pull the threads together to assume, you know, what happens next or you can you've been here along for the journey.

And what happens next isn't necessarily like also your privilege as a reader to know we can't know all things.

And I really love that.

If I think about some of my favorite books, so I guess no, I'm going from like tepid both are good too.

Like I love an open ended ending.

But it has to kind of be it has to be in the right place, right?

Like if I'm reading a romance novel and I want to happily ever after because you've like told me it's a romance novel, then I don't want anything open ended in there.

You know what I mean?

And sometimes romance novels that are open ended are very unsatisfying.

Like I would say normal people by Sally Rooney, spoiler alert, but like you should have read that book.

It's like very but anyway, it and it's very open ended at the ending.

It's very open ended at the ending and it's very dissatisfying because it is sort of a romance, I guess.

I mean, you could fight me on that, but whatever versus a book like Leave the World Behind, which is one of my favorite books of all time, has an open ended ending.

I just finished an amazing book called The Eyes and the Impossible, which is a children's book that has a very open ended ending.

If I think about our wives in under the sea, that's the one I was thinking of.

Radible book by Julia Arnsfield.

That has an amazing open ended ending.

These are books.

They just like stick with me.

They pack a punch, but I guess you kind of have to do it right.

Like you really an open ended ending is hard to get right probably.

Okay, what did Jillian?

What do you think?

I think I know what I think I know what you're going to say, but maybe not.

I like them wrapped up nicely.

I do.

I do not like open ended books.

I shouldn't say that.

I don't prefer open ended books.

There are many books that are open ended that I have enjoyed, but our wives under the sea is an example of a book that I did not really enjoy and it was open ended.

I think part of that was the open ended part that I didn't like, but then the other part was that I didn't really love the book itself.

But I just like everything wrapped up nicely and packaged in a little bow and handed the ending to me.

I just, I really like it that way.

I think the hard part is, is that a spoiler?

If I were to review a book and say it has an open ended ending, is that a spoiler?

Because that's hard information to get until you're at the end of the book, but some people really don't like it.

Yeah.

I don't know if I would call it a spoiler.

I think it would be good information to have as somebody who was going to sit down and read a book, because maybe it's a book that I would skip then.

Right.

Like I would tell you, because I know what your preference is, but I guess I mean, I also like I've shared three books with open ended endings and you should read all three of them by the way, those are amazing books.

What's a book that has a nicely wrapped up ending that you closed the book and you're like, oh, that was so satisfying.

Jillian's like, what books have I ever read?

I have no idea.

I don't know.

It's like, it's one of those, it's that situation where you're asked what your favorite book is, although I know what my favorite book is, but in some situations, you're asked what your favorite book is and you're like, you go completely blank.

I can't think of a single book.

I mean, the secret history wraps up, the secret history wraps up pretty nicely.

So I mean, you could, you could consider that one, but then, but it is, there is an open ending parts to it, the end too, that you could go along with and could take you in a different direction.

So I don't know.

All right, listeners, we want to know from you, what do you think about this hot take?

What's your preference nicely wrapped up versus open ended?

Which one's better and why?

Tell us on Instagram.

We are starting to post our hot takes in our feed.

So you might catch it on there and you can join in on the comments and see what what your fellow listeners think.

All right, we're coming to the end of the show.

We're going to wrap up with the holds list.

Jillian and I are very passionate about the library.

And because we're both avid users, we both have very active holds lists.

And we feel like that's something we don't hear a lot on book podcasts or book talk or Instagram.

We know it's something we can offer the bookish community.

And for season two, we're adding our what's up next to let you know what we'll be reaching for on our TBR.

Okay, Jillian, what's on your holds list?

I only have one of my holds lists today.

And that is The Wedding People by Alison Esbach.

I have been waiting for this book for a long time.

And I'm excited to get it.

I also am probably the next one up for The Night We Lost Him by Laura Dave.

I loved her first book or maybe not her first book, but the one that was a Reese's choice for a month, maybe about two years ago.

I loved it.

I can't think of the name of it, of course, but I loved it.

So I'm excited about this one too.

But I it says in transit.

So it should be coming any minute now.

And then for next up for me is All Forers by Miranda, July.

Here's a little promise for you.

A semi famous artist announces her plan to drive cross country from LA to New York 20 minutes after leaving her husband and child at home.

She spontaneously exits the freeway, beds down in a nondescript motel and immerses herself in a temporary reinvention that turns out to be the start of an entirely different journey.

So I'm excited about that one.

Whoa.

So I've heard some very interesting reviews of that book.

I had it on my TBR as well.

So I'll be really, really interested to hear what you think about it.

I actually had not heard of this book at all.

And then one of my favorite female comedians, Amy Poler, was on Seth Meyers and was talking books.

So like, I am obsessed with Amy Poler in a good way.

And she was talking books.

And she misses like, you need to watch the segment because it is literally your dream situation.

Amy Poler talking books.

So this was one of the first ones she mentioned was All Forers by Miranda, July.

So I am going to read it.

And I will let you know what I think.

Amazing.

It has a very cool cover too.

I've seen it.

It does.

It's beautiful.

All right, Erin.

What are you waiting for from the library?

And what's up next on your TBR?

So I still have a lot of books checked out from the library.

But on hold, I have a few that are going to be coming when they're added to the catalog.

The one that I'm looking forward to most is called the most wonderful time.

It's by Jane Allen who wrote the Black Girls must die exhausted series.

She's written a Christmas book.

So I'm very excited to read this book.

I haven't read anything new from Jane Allen in a little while since wrapping up that series.

And I'm going to be excited to hopefully maybe recommend this on our cozy Christmas reads episode which will happen later on in December.

And then in terms of what's next, I'm going to be reading entitlement by Ruman Alam.

I am probably too excited to read this book, which may not bowed well for me.

But Ruman Alam is the author of one of my favorite books of all time.

Leave the world behind.

I mentioned that earlier.

Entitlement is about this 33 year old black woman who is helping an 83 year old white man give away his billions of dollars and their friendship, their partnership and what ensues from that project to help him before he dies give away most of his money.

So I am excited to read this.

And yeah, we'll see we'll see how it turns out.

It sounds really good.

I have seen it around, but I honestly had not read the description of it.

So it sounds good.

Yeah, I'm hoping for more of that kind of nuanced reflective commentary that comes through and leave the world behind in this book as well.

But I haven't heard any reviews yet.

So we'll see.

All right.

Well, thank you so much for sharing, Aaron.

That wraps up episode 29 of Medium Lady Reads.

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

You can find me, Jillian, a Jillian finding happy and you can find Aaron at medium.lady for more of our current reads and other shenanigans.

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

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

We would need tickled pink to hear from you.

Thank you for listening.

I'm your host Aaron and I'm your other host Jillian.

Until next time, we hope that your holds arrive quickly and your next book finds you right when you need it.

We'll talk to you soon.

Bye.

Bye.