Our Critics' Year in Reading
8 December 2023 - 37 minsThe Times’s staff book critics — Dwight Garner, Jennifer Szalai and Alexandra Jacobs — do a lot of reading over the course of any given year, but not everything they read stays with them equally. On this week’s podcast, Gilbert Cruz chats with the critics about the books that did: the novels and story collections and works of nonfiction that made an impression in 2023 and defined their year in reading, including one that Garner says caught him by surprise.
“Eleanor Catton’s ‘Birnam Wood’ is in some ways my novel of the year,” Garner says. “And it’s not really my kind of book. This is going to sound stupid or snobby, but I’m not the biggest plot reader. I’m just not. I like sort of thorny, f...
Series Episodes
Patricia Cornwell on Her Dark Childhood and Best-Selling Novels
The crime novelist discusses her new memoir “True Crime.” Also, Daniel Kraus, winner of this year’s Pulitzer Prize for fiction, talks about his novel “Angel Down.”
59 mins
8 May Finished
‘The Book Review’ Podcast Turns 20
From Oprah to romantasy, we look back at two decades of hit books and literary trends.
1 hour 5 mins
1 May Finished
Book Club: Let's Talk About 'The Renovation,' by Kenan Orhan
Dilara, the heroine of Kenan Orhan’s debut novel, is a Turkish exile living in Italy and undergoing a routine bathroom renovation that turns out to be not so routine: When the contractors leave, she steps in and finds herself somehow transported to an actual cell in Istanbul’s infamous Silivri Prison. On this week's episode, host MJ Franklin discusses “The Renovation” with fellow Book Review editors Joumana Khatib and Dave Kim.
42 mins
24 April Finished
The Time Loop Book Series You Should Be Reading
The Book Review editors discuss Solvej Balle’s seven-book series, “On the Calculation of Volume.” Plus, a selection of translated fiction to put on your reading list.
35 mins
17 April Finished
Patrick Radden Keefe on the Mystery at the Center of ‘London Falling’
The author discusses his newest book, about a 19-year-old’s curious death and the investigation that followed.
34 mins
10 April Finished
23 Books We Are Looking Forward to This Spring
The Book Review editors discuss fiction and nonfiction that caught their eye. Plus, Ada Limón on the power of poetry.
47 mins
3 April Finished
