Let’s Talk About the Best Books of the Year (So Far)
24 July - 39 minsThe editors at The New York Times Book Review spend almost the entire year discussing, debating and sometimes arguing about the year’s best books. We’re halfway through 2026, which means it’s time for the host Gilbert Cruz and the Book Review editors Joumana Khatib and MJ Franklin to talk about some of the best releases of the year as well as a few hidden gems that captured their attention and affection.
Fiction
“Whistler,” by Ann Patchett
“The Calamity Club,” by Kathryn Stockett
“Transcription,” by Ben Lerner
“The Keeper,” by Tana French
“Kin,” by Tayari Jones
“This Is Where the Serpent Lives,” by Daniyal Mueenuddin
Nonfiction
“Fear and Fury: The Reagan Eighties, the Bernie Goetz S...
Series Episodes
Sophie Elmhirst on the True Story of a Shipwrecked Couple
Host Gilbert Cruz's conversation from last year with author Sophie Elmhirst features "Marriage at Sea: A True Story of Love, Obsession and Shipwreck" — the gripping 1970s story of a couple shipwrecked by a whale — newly out in paperback this summer.
31 mins
17 July Finished
This Author Says You Shouldn’t Be Intimidated by ‘The Odyssey’
explicitFirst, a primer from the author of “Circe,” Madeline Miller. Then, A.O. Scott on all the genres inside the 3,000-year-old poem.
43 mins
10 July Finished
Jill Lepore on What to Read This Fourth of July
As America celebrates its 250th birthday, Jill Lepore, a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, offers a reading list for the occasion. Then we round up some of the summer’s most anticipated beach reads.
52 mins
3 July Finished
Book Club: Let's Talk About 'Yesteryear,' by Caro Claire Burke
Burke’s best-selling novel, about a tradwife influencer with some surprises in store, is one of the buzziest books of 2026. On this episode, MJ Franklin discusses “Transcription” with fellow Book Review editors Jennifer Harlan and Joumana Khatib.
58 mins
27 June Finished
Art, Outrage and How the Culture Wars Began
Isaac Butler, an author and cultural historian, joined the “Book Review” podcast to discuss his new book, “The Perfect Moment: God, Sex, Art and the Birth of America’s Culture Wars.”
34 mins
19 June Finished
