Medium Lady Reads
Medium Lady Reads is a podcast about reading as self-care, a passionate love for the public library, and plenty of thoughts and opinions about book culture having its moment.
Medium Lady Reads
Episode 37: Ebooks or Physical Copies - Which do you prefer?
Hello, hi, and welcome to Medium Lady Reads. This is episode 37, “MLR Ep 37 Ebooks or Physical Copies - Which do you prefer?”
Welcome back to Medium Lady Reads! The snow banks are sky high, but spring is right around the corner, we swear - and this week Erin and Jillian are sharing various books that you can add to your Spring TBR.
In This Episode:
- To start the show, Erin and Jillian check-in on how their lives and reading is going.
- Erin starts the show off with her first review, followed by Jillian and her review.
- Each woman shares 3 books in this episode.
- Mentioned in this Episode: Episode 33: Cozy Christmas Reads 2024
- Next up, the ladies discuss their Hot Take for the episode, tune in to learn what it is.
- Finally, it’s time to check in with what the ladies have on hold and what they’ll be reading next.
Books Mentioned In This Episode:
- The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston
- The City We Became by N. K. Jemisin
- Private Rites by Julia Armfield
- Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield
- Lunar New Year Love Story by Gene Luen Yang
- Into the Woods by Jenny Holiday
- Canadian Boyfriend by Jenny Holiday
- Tell Me More: Stories about the 12 Hardest Things I'm Learning to Say by Kelly Corrigan
- The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus by Emma Knight
- The Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin
- The Hike by Drew Magary
- First Lie Wins by Ashley Elston
- The Secret History by Donna Tartt
- The Bones Beneath My Skin by TJ Klune
- Beyond Anxiety by Martha Beck
- Penitence by Kristin Koval
- The Big Questions of Life by Om Swami
- Good Dirt by Charmaine Wilkerson
- Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson
- Beautiful Ugly by Alice Feeney
- Oathbound by Tracy Deonn
[Music] Hello, hi, and welcome to Medium Lady Reads.
This is episode 37.
The Snow Banks are sky high, but spring is right around the corner.
We swear.
And today we're sharing a variety of books you can add to your spring TBR.
Hi, everyone.
I'm Jillian, an 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 the host 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 reading as self-care, a passionate love for the public library, and all of our thoughts and opinions on book culture having a small minute.
Hi, everyone.
Welcome back to Medium Lady Reads.
This is episode 37, airing the week of March 4th.
Grab yourself a hot tea, sit back, and enjoy all the books that we'll be introducing you to today.
Hi, Jillian.
It's good to see you.
How's your reading going?
Reading is going well.
I've had a pretty good stretch of reading, pretty much choosing that over scrolling, which is always a plus.
However, kids have been on break, and well, that was mostly laid back.
I didn't get as much reading done as I hoped.
By the time I could read, I would be mostly exhausted and would just end up scrolling my phone.
So there's been a mix of the two.
When I have the chance to read, I'm scrolling, but then at night, I've been able to get some reading done.
Thankfully, they go back to school on Monday.
Nice.
Yeah, the flu is also around our house, which was not fun.
I avoided getting it, it seems.
I am the only one that got a flu shot this year, so that could be why.
Although, estrogen didn't get it either, but who knows?
Maybe it was just a man flu, and I don't mean that it was like an insult, but just Emmett and Shamist got it.
So who knows?
But that led me to take more on, so Shamist could recuperate, and that took some of my reading time as well.
But despite all that, February has been a great reading month.
I've had some great books that I've read, pretty much all five stars.
Nice.
Other than a couple of ones that I've read with Esther, which I do count, I'm currently reading The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston, and really enjoying it.
It's a couple of years old now, but here's the synopsis for you.
Grieving and guarded, Clementine has a plan to keep her heart safe, until she meets a charming man in her late aunt's apartment.
The catch, he's living seven years in the past.
As their connection deepens across time, Clementine must decide if love is worth the risk, even when the timing is all wrong.
Mm-hmm.
No, I am about 75% through with this book, and I am absolutely loving it.
I can't stop turning pages.
Yesterday, I think I read for about an hour and a half, and I got through about, maybe it was more like two hours, but either way, I got through about 150 pages, and it was just so good.
Yeah.
So that's what I'll be doing after we are done recording today is going and reading.
Oh my gosh, that's great.
That's a really good one.
I think I read that not last summer, but the summer before, maybe, and it's a great.
It was great.
It's great, very memorable.
Yes, it's a great book.
So how's your reading going, Erin?
Yeah, I mean, I feel like there's not too much new going on.
We're just trying to survive the rest of the winter.
I've got a house full of boys who are definitely ready to spend less time inside.
You know, a little bit more bickering, a little bit more timeouts, a little bit more.
I feel like everybody's kind of running out of, out of like, patients with each other.
We don't have our winter break until March 10th, so we still have a couple of weeks to survive before everybody gets a bit of vacation.
And still, lots of evening drives to baseball, lots of weekend birthday parties or play dates along with everything else.
I feel like life is very full, but it's very good.
And knock on wood, we've done OK this viral season.
I'm still waiting for the other shoe to drop.
You know, it's not over till it's over, but all in all, I think virus wise, we've been keeping our head above water.
That's great.
Yeah, it is actually a relief.
And I'm always like nervous to say that.
I'm just opening the door for viruses to come and attack us whenever I say, like, hey, we haven't been sick.
That's really great.
Now, life is good, but I do feel like I've been a bad reader lately.
And I don't think this is real.
I think it's just like this monkey on my back.
My TBR is all over the place.
I haven't been keeping up with my tracker.
I have a ton of overdue books.
And I'm kind of in like analysis paralysis about like, what do I want to read next?
I've enjoyed books while I'm reading them.
But then when I finished them, I kind of feel like less enthusiastic than I felt while I was reading them, which is just like this weird feeling.
And I've had Gillian a really hard time reading multiple books at a time, which is usually my jam.
Like, usually I'm perfectly happy to have three, sometimes even four books on the go.
And I don't know.
Right now, I just feel like I can focus on one book at a time.
And then that makes me feel stressed about how much I'm reading, et cetera, et cetera.
But all in all, current reads.
So yesterday, I finished our buddy read that we DNFed.
It's our first book that we ever DNFed as a group.
But I think it was very clear that it was a solid DNF for us as a group.
And I decided to keep reading it.
It's The City We Became by N.K.
Jemsen.
This is a fantasy sci-fi novel about a group of people who are granted special knowledge and powers to save New York City.
They kind of act as the avatar of New York City.
I've really simplified the premise quite a bit there.
The book is very weird.
And we did decide it wasn't fit for us as a buddy read.
But I decided to switch to audio.
And that was a great decision.
The audio felt like a movie.
It was amazing.
It even had sound effects and music.
The audio is narrated by Robin Miles, who is an extremely talented narrator.
And for those of you who remember the reading goals episode, one of my reading goals is to listen to more narrators that I love.
So Robin Miles will 100% be added to that list.
And what did you think of the book?
I really, really liked it.
I think I gave it four or 4.5 stars.
I definitely finished the rest by audio.
It's part of a duology, which I didn't know when I recommended it for our buddy read.
Usually we don't do serialized.
Although I guess we have done a couple, but it doesn't end on a cliffhanger.
But it definitely ends in a way where you would-- I would conceive that I'll pick up the second in the duology eventually, maybe later in the summer.
Cool.
I liked it, but I always knew I was going to like it.
And that's why I put it on the list.
But it gets less weird, but it doesn't-- it's kind of a mix.
It's like a comic book met a wrinkle in time.
It's like very genre-- it's pretty genre dense.
It's pretty genre heavy.
It was good.
I liked it.
It was very different.
It made me think a lot.
There are some themes in there about allyship and privilege.
And I felt like the writing is very impressive.
I returned it on Friday, I think.
Maybe Thursday doesn't matter.
And I was very like thrown-- like I tossed back and forth.
Do I return it?
Do I keep trying to read it?
And in the end, I decided to return it because I had a bunch of books waiting for me to be picked up.
And I knew that even if I do want to read this book, it's not something I'm going to read right away.
So I ended up returning it.
Yeah, and now you're reading the seven-year slip and loving it.
So it was a good choice.
Yeah, that's true.
Good choice.
All right, let's jump into our reviews for today, Jillian, what do you have on deck for this week's episode?
This week, I'm excited to bring a graphic novel love story, which was so good, a nonfiction memoir that is full of essays, and a contemporary fiction that has magical realism mixed in.
How about you, Aaron?
What are you bringing to the episode?
I'm bringing a literary speculative fiction about three sisters at the end of the world, a perfect future romance for your summer reading list, and a five-star new release that I hope gets more hype in 2025.
OK, Aaron, you're up first.
What's the first book you're bringing to the episode?
My first review is a book that was a struggle for me, and then in the end, redeemed itself.
Jillian, you're going to laugh.
I'm talking about private rights by Julia Armfield.
Julia Armfield's private rights is a haunting atmospheric novel that drops you into this world.
It's been raining for almost a decade long enough that the land itself is changing, and long enough that old superstitions and these strange rituals have kind of started creeping back into everyday life.
It's this sort of subversive, religious overtone to general society.
And then against this eerie waterlogged backdrop, we meet three estranged sisters, Ila, Irene, and Agnes, who come together after their father, who was a cruel but brilliant architect, has is passed away.
These estranged sisters have this reunion at their father's most famous creation, which is this glass house that is designed to rise above the floods.
And there's this shocking revelation in his will that kind of splits up their already fragile connection, and they're forced to confront not just their past, but this unsettling reality of the present, which is this world of sort of like oppressive, continuous reign.
As their lives spiral further apart, they start to realize there's actually something bigger and more strange at play.
Something linked to the long ago disappearance of their mother and the strangers who have always kind of seemed a little too interested in their family.
Given that their father was famous, they always kind of wrote this off.
But more and more is kind of revealed as the book goes on.
You may hear me kind of stumbling along as I try to describe this book.
And it's because the book really left me feeling unward in the best and worst ways, which is funny because a lot of the book takes place in a setting that is flooded.
It's slow.
This book is kind of moody.
It's intentionally withholding.
Armfield doesn't give you all the answers, and that can be frustrating, but also really, really compelling.
I couldn't DNF, despite how much our buddy reads group had to hear my whining about the story.
Private rights does remind me a lot of her previous novel, Our Wives Under the Sea, in the way that it leans into ambiguity.
It makes you constantly kind of question what's real, what's being left unsaid.
Are these narrators reliable?
But the setting in private rights made this an even more anxious reading experience for me.
The idea of a collapsing world, a planet drowning under relentless rain, it made me feel like I was kind of floating along the story rather than like really sinking into it.
And I remember really sinking into the story, Our Wives Under the Sea.
Now, even though that's how I felt, and I didn't love that feeling, I do think that's what Armfield wanted.
I think she's someone who's very inspired by the horror genre.
She's very inspired by putting readers kind of off their seat a little bit.
So I did struggle with parts of this book.
I also found it so beautifully written.
I couldn't stop annotating.
And then there's the ending.
Julian, the last 15 pages gave me whiplash.
After moving through this novel at this like dreamlike, slow, floaty pace, I was suddenly turning pages so fast I could barely keep up.
It made me rethink everything that came before in the beginning of the book, or in most of the book.
And it left me a little bit shaken and also in awe of how powerful of a writer, Julia Armfield is.
So I'm wrapping up my review.
I've said a lot.
And this is a tough book to recommend because it's not going to be for everyone.
It is unsettling.
It tested my patience.
But for readers who really love books that lean into tension and atmosphere, rather than tidy resolutions, Jillian, private write is a powerful, deeply layered novel.
It wasn't a five-star reading experience, but it is undeniably a five-star book.
And I'm really, really glad that I stuck with it.
I wish so badly that I would enjoy this book because it sounds so excellent.
You will do it.
I love the horror genre.
I love it.
And I really want to love this book, but I did not enjoy our wives under the sea.
And this sounds like it's even more-- like Julia Armstrong is kind of reaching more into her, leaving things left unsaid.
And I just can't.
I would be too frustrated, I'm sure.
Yeah.
And I think if it hadn't been for those last 15 pages and all of the annotating that I had done, yeah, it's such an odd atmospheric book, but it's going to find the right reader at the right time.
So I still had to bring it to the show.
Absolutely.
And I'm sure there are people who will love it.
I am just not one of those people.
All right, Jillian, what's the first book you're sharing with the pod for today?
The first review I'm bringing to the show is "Lunar New Year Love Story" by Jean Luan Yang.
This is a graphic novel that is full of love and romance and was just so good.
I gave it five stars.
Here's the premise.
Valentina Tran was named after Valentine's Day, which used to be her favorite holiday.
But when Val learns the truth behind what happened with her parents and why she's been being raised by a single father, she realizes true love is a lie.
This is reinforced when she meets the spirit of St.
Valentine, who tells her she and her family are cursed to always be unlucky in love.
Val is ready to give into her fate until one lunar New Year festival, where a mysterious lion dancer hands her a paper heart and zing, Val becomes determined to change her destiny, prove St.
Valentine wrong, and give her a heart to the right person.
Meanwhile, lion dancing is the only thing that has given Jay peace after his dad's passing.
It also keeps him connected to his father's side of the family.
Both Jay and his cousin Leslie notice Val at the lunar New Year festival.
And for some inexplicable reason, Jay hands Val a paper heart.
But it's Leslie with his K-pop good looks who start to date Val.
Jay still feels this connection with Val and feels it somehow tied to how he feels about losing his father.
Both Val and Jay struggle with the spirits who haunt them as they are inextricably brought together in a love story that is satisfying, sweet, and moving.
The book explores more than just a high school romance.
There's parts that handle the relationship between friends and the relationship between parents.
It's complex without being difficult to follow.
And this graphic novel was heartwarming and the artwork is absolutely beautiful.
I highly recommend this book.
That's "Lunar New Year Love Story" by Jean Luen Yang.
I'm immediately adding this to my library holds.
I'm like searching for it in Libby right now.
I think I will love this.
This sounds great.
It's like a young adult graphic novel.
It was very good.
Easy to read.
I flew through it.
And it's got love.
And the only reason I wouldn't recommend it for, let's say, my niece or even Emmett who loves graphic novels is because there's like a spooky aspect to it.
Oh, with the spirits.
Yeah.
But they might be able to handle it.
I might be being too protective with them, but it's still really good.
It's quite excellent.
Yeah, I've just placed hold.
I'm third in line.
So we'll see.
I look forward to reading this.
And I definitely wanted to read more graphic novels in 2025.
So thanks, Jillian.
Great recommendation.
You're welcome.
All right.
It's your turn again, Erin.
What's your next review?
OK.
I'm really excited to talk about Into the Woods by Jenny Holiday.
If you're looking for the perfect book to put on hold for your summer TBR, this is it.
And I'm sharing it now because if the hold list gets long, which I suspect it will, you might not get your hands on it until the season of campfires and cabins is in full swing.
Jenny Holiday is the author of Canadian Boyfriend, one of my all-time favorite romances.
I've mentioned it during Cosy Christmas Reads episode this last year with our Buddy Readers, Mally and Steph.
And I was really excited.
I think Jillian, you or somebody on the Buddy Reads chat mentioned that Jenny Holiday had a new book coming out this winter.
I was even more excited to find out Into the Woods takes place in the same world as Canadian Boyfriend.
And this time, instead of following Rory and her story, we're with Rory's boss and her friend, Gretchen Miller, who owns the dance studio in the town where Canadian Boyfriend takes place.
So here's a little bit of setup.
Gretchen is about to turn 40, which is a real refreshing change from the usual like 29-year-old heroine of most romance novels.
Gretchen is officially done with the dating scene.
And she's tired of settling for surface-level relationships when what she really wants is a committed partnership.
So after one last very disappointing attempt at romance, she heads into the woods to be the dancer and residence at a summer arts camp.
It's supposed to be a break, a chance to focus on her business, Miss Miller's dance studio, and to transition into her next chapter, what she jokingly calls her "cron era."
But what she doesn't expect is Teddy, a famous rock star fresh off of a very public band breakup, whose begrudgingly agreed to be the camp's musician and residence while secretly plotting his revenge album.
From the moment they meet, they completely misread each other.
He assumed she's just another fan, and she writes him off as itself absorbed jerk.
But as anyone who's been to summer camp knows, being out of your usual environment has a way of shifting perspectives.
And as Gretchen and Teddy spend more time together, by the lake around the campfire, installing moments between mentoring campers and working on the final camp showcase, they start to let their walls down.
They challenge each other, but they also understand what it means to be at a crossroads in life, to feel stuck, but still hopeful that something better is ahead.
I gave this book four stars.
One of the things I loved most was how focused the storytelling was on their relationship.
I don't know about you, Jillian, but lately, I found some romances have so many moving parts.
They've got like secondary plots, big external conflicts, and the main couple doesn't get enough time together.
But into the woods really lets us live in the romance.
We spend so much time with Gretchen and Teddy, watching them push past their initial judgments, develop a slow, layered connection, based on some shared childhood experiences.
It's also a really fun setting.
I personally spent time at camps, like the one in this book, and I thought Jenny Holiday did a great job capturing that world.
So this is a book that feels perfect for summer.
It's got Camp nostalgia, banter, and a romance that's about two people really seeing each other.
So if you love romances with grumpy meets sunshine, energy, force proximity, and just the right amount of emotional depth, then you should definitely add this one to your list, and that's into the woods by Jenny Holiday.
I have immediately added it to my TBR.
I have not read Canadian boyfriend yet.
You won't need it to enjoy the story.
But I absolutely know how much you love Canadian boyfriend.
So I'm like, all right, I need to try and jump on the Jenny Holiday bandwagon.
So we'll start with this one.
I think you'll like this one a little bit more than Canadian boyfriend.
I don't want to say there's lying in Canadian boyfriend, but there might be a little bit of withholding the truth for self-preservation in Canadian boyfriend that could definitely be labeled as lying.
And there isn't any of that.
There isn't any of that in this one.
That's good.
So I will read that and have to let you know what I think of it.
All right, Jillian.
I'm looking forward to your next review.
The second book I'm bringing to the pod is Tell Me More, Stories About the 12 Parties Things I'm Learning to Say by Kelly Corrigan.
This was another five star read.
Here's the premise.
And Tell Me More, Kelly shares a deeply personal, unfailingly honest and often hilarious examination of the essential phrases that turn the wheel of life.
And I don't know, Corrigan wrestles to make peace with uncertainty, whether it's over-invitations that never came or friends agonizing infertility.
In no, she and Myers-Herff mother's ability to set boundaries and her liberty, liberating willingness to be unpopular.
In Tell Me More, a facialist named Tish teaches her something important about listening.
And in I was wrong, she comes clean about her disastrous role in a family fight and explains why saying, sorry, may not be enough.
With refreshing candor, a deep well of empathy, and her signature desire to understand the thing behind a thing, Corrigan swings between meditations of life with the preoccupied husband and teenage daughters to profound observations on love and loss.
This book was full of grief, but much of it was told through happiness.
The author is clearly learning how to cope with the loss of her father and the loss of a dear friend.
And everything is put through that lens.
But it doesn't ruin the book.
It makes it better.
I felt like I was sitting with a close friend while she told me what's been going on in her life.
I did you the audio version of the book, which was read by the author, and it was worth it.
And I would recommend it.
Listen to that way.
If you want a book where you'll feel the feels that I definitely recommend this book, that's Tell Me More by Kelly Corrigan.
I love this book.
I read this book maybe three years ago.
I have distinct memories of folding laundry while listening to it.
And just like crying over some of the essays, it's really, really beautiful.
And Kelly Corrigan is kind of like one of those voice of a generation kinds of people.
She's not a brunette brown, and she's not like a glen and oil.
But she definitely has a style.
And she definitely really speaks to, I think, the experience of being in middle age.
The essays are absolutely beautiful, but be prepared to like, wade through loss, and to the relatability of her writing just like cuts you right through.
She's incredible.
Yeah.
There are things that tend to get me reclept our topics about children, and children growing older, and how other people are dealing with what they wanted.
She has an essay about how she wanted four by 40.
She wanted four children by 40, and she ended up with two.
And that story.
And like, there's so much in there about her children.
And it really got me.
I know one essay I was bawling my eyes out.
I don't remember which it was, but it was towards the end.
And it's relatable and beautiful, and just be prepared to feel the fields, like I said.
Yeah.
Yeah.
She got me with her essays about her dad.
Yeah.
And yeah, I mean, certainly me thinking about my relationship with my own dad, and what's changing for him, and for us.
Yeah, but wow.
What a good, that's a good book.
That's a really, really great.
And for sure, by audio, I think I did it by audio too.
Yes, well worth it.
Yeah.
You know, it's funny when you, like, I've read hundreds of books since I read that book, but it still sticks with you.
Yeah.
It's a standout, standout read for sure.
All right.
Okay.
Back to you, Erika.
And tell us about your final book.
My gosh.
The last book already.
Okay.
The final book I want to talk about today is the Life Cycle of the Common Octopus by Emma Knight, which came out just last month in January 2025 and was recommended by our buddy Reed BFF, Allie Openlander.
Allie read an advanced reader copy, and she raved about it.
And so I got my copy.
I think I was a couple in line when it released.
And here's the publisher's description.
Arriving at the University of Edinburgh for her first term, Penn knows her divorce parents back in Canada are hiding something from her.
And she believes she'll find the answers here in Scotland, where an old friend of her fathers, now a famous writer, noticed Lord Lennox where he lives.
When she's invited to spend the weekend at Lord Lennox's centuries old estate with his enveloping, fascinating family, Penn begins to unravel her parent's secret just as she's falling in love for the very first time.
As Penn experiences the sharp shock of adulthood, she comes to rely on herself for the first time in her life.
A rich and rewarding novel of campus life, sexual awakening, and ultimately of the many ways women relate to themselves and to one another, the Life Cycle of the Common Octopus asks, to what extent we need to look back in order to move forward.
For me, this book was a really enjoyable contemporary fiction read.
It's one of those novels that feels absorbing and effortless in the best way.
It was exactly what I needed.
It was easy but not unsatisfying.
It's almost the polar opposite of private rights.
What really stood out to me were the themes, the transition from childhood to adult independence, the evolution of female friendship and how the decisions we make in early adulthood become really defining moments in our lives.
I especially love the friendship between Penn and Alice.
It's not alluded to in the publisher's blur, but Penn starts university with a Canadian friend named Alice.
They leave Canada together and they go to Scotland together to attend university together.
There are a lot of moments of layered friendship that happened throughout the book.
Their relationship to me felt authentic.
It had all the warmth and complexity of a deep long term friendship.
Someone you've known since childhood and you're bringing that friendship with you into adulthood.
As the story progressed, there are themes of motherhood and difficult life choices that emerged in a way that added even more depth.
There's a really lovely romance subplot that kept me engaged and balanced out some of the heavier themes.
It's not the central focus, but it does add a layer of warmth and emotional investment that I really appreciated.
One of the things that I keep saying and I really love most about the life cycle of the common octopus is that it has layers, but it's not overly complicated.
The writing is thoughtful and accessible.
It has this natural flow between the different parts of the plot, different parts of the story.
If you typically enjoy contemporary fiction with rich character development in a strong sense of place, I think this is one to add to your list.
I can see a lot of our listeners really loving this book.
It's a read with Jenna Pick, so it's got that energy.
I think we've found consistently.
We like the read with Jenna Pick.
I know Jillian, you've mentioned that before.
I think this would make a great book club pick.
And so again, if you love books that explore big life questions while still being incredibly readable, I highly recommend keeping an eye out for this one.
And I hope it actually gets a little bit more buzz.
I haven't seen it getting enough buzz in my opinion.
So that's my review of the life cycle of the common octopus by Emma Knight.
I actually put this on my TBR after Ali had read it.
And it came in.
I picked it up on Thursday of this past week.
So I have it waiting for me and I can't wait to get to it because even more so now, now it sounds really good.
You read the blurb and it's one thing.
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I think I was looking at 2020 or something.
I think I was looking at 2020 or something.
And there was a picture of a book I'd taken at a bookstore.
And I was like, oh, well, I forgot completely about that book.
I put the book on hold.
I think I read 10% of it.
I decided to DNF.
But that's funny.
Yeah.
You know, we often like we're always like hoarding books into our TBR.
That's true.
That's true.
I'm terrible going back to the books that I think I want to read.
I'm usually reading what's ever right in front of my face.
I am too.
But I'm trying to get better about going through my TBR.
It may be not all the way back to the very beginning because as I've mentioned, and I think we've talked about before, goodreads is not great at letting you remove books from your TBR there.
And so I have books on there that go all the way back to 2009, 2008, when I first started.
And those books, I can almost guarantee that most of them are not books I'd want to read now.
So I go back a couple of years.
Maybe I probably go back to 2020 and see what was on there.
Maybe even 2018, you find a gold, gold and you know, nugget like this one.
But it's fun to go back through and see what you like.
Yeah.
It is fun.
You're excited about it at the time that you put it on your list.
So why wouldn't you try to read it now?
Yeah, I love that.
So listeners, hey, what you need to do is like hop in your TBR, hop in your photo reels, hop in your saved files or whatever you've got going on.
Maybe you've got a Pinterest file for books and go like way back and see what has passed you recommending to current you.
And check out those books and see how good you were at knowing your reading style.
Like I also feel like right now I spend so much more time thinking about books and paying attention to books.
And my hobby is reading that I'm better at choosing what I think I want to read now.
But I haven't really tested that theory out either.
If you do read a book from the back list, be sure to let us know on Instagram tag either, you know, Aaron or I or the podcast at medium.
Dot lady for Aaron at Jillian finding happy for me or at medium lady reads for the podcast.
I honestly would love to see that.
Yeah, me too.
Me too.
All right.
It's time for hot takes and our current thoughts on book culture.
A hot take is an opinion formed off the cuff and with little research, sometimes provocative.
Our hot take for the day is ebooks versus physical books, which do you prefer Aaron you can go first.
I think ebooks like I really don't want to say ebooks, but if I'm being totally honest, my preference is an ebook.
And I think that's because of just like the mental space that I'm in right now.
I have a stack of physical library books that I keep shying away from.
I have like a mental block.
If I pick up a physical book and it's a chunker, I'm like, no, no, no, I couldn't possibly.
And I have my new little like clicky remote do hikki thing for my my cobo.
And I'm always less intimidated to pick up an ebook than a physical book.
Although in my breakdown, my reading breakdown that I did last year, it was about half and half digital to physical and then about 20% audio.
So I don't know like it doesn't really pan out in my data, but right now lately, I found physical books feel really intimidating.
And I do think actually as I talk this through that it also like maintains a bit of attachment to my phone when I'm like reading a physical book.
I feel like it really takes me away from my phone, which I want, which I want.
But in the last couple months, I felt very like attached to my phone into like having my phone near me and to be I'm definitely checking it more often.
I think my average screen time is up at least 30 minutes to an hour every day.
So I don't know if also the e reader, the idea of the electronics feels like similar or if I'm reading off of my phone or my iPad, I don't know like I'm definitely right now.
I prefer ebooks for sure.
What about you, Jillian?
What are your thoughts?
So physical books is what I typically turn to, but I don't know if that's because I'm impatient.
And when you are waiting for an ebook from the library, it almost takes longer.
I think I heard that because the digital versions, both the audio and the ebooks are more expensive.
So the library won't buy as many copies of them.
So I end up reading physical books.
I read an ebook maybe every three months or so.
But when I'm reading an ebook, I really like it.
You know, I really like not having the huge book at my hand and I like being able to pick any book I want out of my library, my personal library and my Kindle and read it immediately and not have to wait for it.
But I have to say physical books tend to be where I turn to.
I do enjoy a physical book and the smell of them.
I do.
I love the smell of physical books.
As long as they don't have people's hand cream.
That's right.
That's right.
You know it.
All right, folks, what do you think physical or ebooks?
We should do a poll on our on our Instagram and see what people think if they prefer ebooks or physical books.
It's a good idea.
When we post our sound bite, we can do that.
Good idea.
Good idea.
Okay, we're going to wrap up with the holds list.
Aaron and I are very passionate about the library.
And because we're both avid users, we have a very active holds list.
I feel like that's something we don't hear a lot about on book podcasts, book talk or IG.
So we know it's something we can offer the bookish community.
Plus we'll be sharing what's up next so that the listener know what we're reaching for on our TBR.
So Aaron, what's on your holds list?
Okay, I'll be honest, like I shared at the beginning of the episode, my library holds list needs a bit of housekeeping.
I feel like it's all over the place.
I haven't been very organized about my TBR.
I have no idea what's due, what's overdue.
It feels like everything's overdue.
And I'm sure that's not true.
But sometimes I just get paralyzed by the books I have and the books I want to read and I just kind of freeze up while the books keep coming in.
I'm in this weird mode right now and I think it's just too much winter and I'm tired and I need some vacation and sunshine and the decision fatigue of the rest of my life is creeping into my reading life.
And I do also feel like this sort of fear of missing out when it comes to reading and I don't want to send books back because I want to keep them so I can read them.
It's a little bit of the like 2023 Jillian experience that you kind of had yourself caught up in.
So I'll have to kind of pay attention to that and figure out how to kind of unlock that a little bit so I can just relax and enjoy reading for what it is.
Yeah, it's a much better feeling.
Yeah, yeah, well, I need I need all your tips and tricks.
So you can help me out.
Maybe my book therapist right now on hold I have the hike by Drew Marguery.
This was recommended by a male books to Graham account called CJ talks books.
He's always recommending different but very compelling titles and his taste is also kind of lines up with some of my favorite books.
The hike is about a man who's on a business trip.
He decides to take a hike to unwind.
But partway through the journey he realizes he's ended up on a quest that won't be so easy to walk away from and it's described as part folktale part video game.
Yeah, also on hold I have oath bound by Tracy Dionne, which is the final book in the legend born series.
This is a fantasy YA series about a young black woman who discovers she is the chosen descendant of King Arthur.
And next up I have either first lie wins by Ashley Ellison or the secret history of Donna, this is not the secret history of donator.
Sounds like an egg at the Christie.
Yeah, the secret history of donator.
Okay, the secret history by Donna tart.
I have both of those books first lie wins is overdue, but I think I could read it pretty quickly.
And then I still have a couple of weeks with the secret history too many books too little time.
But Jillian, that was like a lot of angst for the holds list.
It's too angsty.
So you take over from here.
Tell us what do you have on your holds list and what will you be reading next?
First I want to say first lie wins or the secret history both are great books, but you I can almost say that you'll finish first lie wins like that pretty quickly.
Oh, okay, so I can have the best of both worlds.
Yeah, yeah, I would say go with that one first and then dive into the secret history when you are ready to, you know, it's a longer.
It's a chunker, but it's it's good.
It's really good.
Perfect.
Okay, so I don't have any holds books on hold currently just like I said I picked up everything on Thursday and I had five or six books in there, but I'm still anxiously awaiting the bones beneath my skin.
I my library still has not updated to show that they have the book yet, which is driving me bananas because it came out I think February six.
So here we are almost a month a month out and still don't have it.
I'm also a couple in transit.
I have beyond anxiety, curiosity, creativity and finding your life's purpose by Martha back.
I've heard about that one penitence by Christian Koval and the big questions of life by Ohm Swami.
All in transit.
So hopefully those will get to me this week and I'll pick them up sometime.
As far as what's up next, I'm going to be reading Good Dirt by Charmaine Wilkerson.
Here's a quick synopsis for you when Abby Freeman's brother is murdered her family's life in a centuries old stoneware jar, shatter in an unsolved mystery that captivates the public.
Years later, fleeing a media storm, Abby escapes to France, only to find herself drawn back to the past she's tried to leave behind.
And uncovering the lost history of the jar, she may finally unlock the truth about her family, her future and herself.
I am very excited about this book.
I loved Charmaine Wilkerson's other book, Black Cake.
Oh, that's why the name sounds familiar.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, it was an excellent book.
So I'm excited about this one.
I just got to finish not that I want to rush through it because I'm enjoying it so much, but I just got to finish seven years slip and then I'm jumping into Good Dirt.
I haven't read Black Cake yet.
I feel like I'm the only person who hasn't read it.
Well, get on that.
I'm kidding, of course.
I do my best, okay?
I know there's only so much time in so many books.
It's yeah, it's just unbelievable because sometimes I feel like I have so many books on deck.
I could decide what my TBR for the next year.
Yeah, like I could easily set myself up with six to eight books a month and just and never think about a TBR again.
But then something amazing would come up and I'd be like screw all those books.
Well, that's that one.
That's the truth.
It's like and I'm I'm I would say I'm part mood reader part by the book.
Like I like to schedule ahead of time.
If I make a schedule for myself, I want to stick to that schedule, but I'm also a mood reader and I'm like, yeah, I don't feel like reading this right now.
Yeah, I think I'm going to read something else, which is how I got to read seven years slip because I was going to start reading beautiful ugly by Alice Fini.
And I decided that I wasn't going to read it.
I didn't want to read it right now.
So I returned it to the library and chose seven years slip instead.
So and it worked out because I think I really like this book more than I would like Alice Fini.
It's about a wife disappearing and I just it seemed like some things that might trigger me right now.
I have some cars some driving anxiety.
So I decided that I would skip it.
So I think I made the right decision.
Good for you.
Good for you.
All right, everyone.
That wraps up episode 37 of Medium Lady Reads.
Medium Lady Reads is a spin off of the Medium Lady Talks podcast and Instagram community.
On Instagram, you can find me Aaron at medium dot lady and you can find Jillian at Jillian finding happy 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.
It really helps us continue to grow the show to reach more readers.
Thank you for listening.
I'm your host Jillian and I'm your other host Aaron.
Until next time, we hope that your holds arrive quickly and your next book finds you right when you need it most.
We'll talk to you soon.
Bye.
Bye.
[Music]
