Podcasts
Brian and Barbara review the latest books topping the hardcover fiction list. Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Five essential facets are rated: GRAB & GRIP (does the story pull us in); SHE GOT FLAIR (does the writing crackle and pop, or lie there, dead on the page); BEAM ME UP (is this is a world we'd want to visit); NEW BEST FRIENDS (what about the characters?); and ALL THE FEELS (emotional impact of the read).
Brian and Barbara engage books as passionate, life-long readers; we're always on the lookout for the next great imaginative realm. Join us as we sift the bestseller list for that priceless find, a book that goes there and takes us with it.
"The God of the Woods" by Liz Moore reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the suspense novel The God of the Woods by Liz Moore, 28 weeks and counting on the New York Times hardcover fiction list.
Twenty minutes with us and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #31 of bestseller, recorded February 1, 2025.
"James" by Percival Everett reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the novel James by Percival Everett, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of December 29, 2024.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #30 of bestseller, recorded December 31, 2024.
"Funny Story" by Emily Henry reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the novel Funny Story by Emily Henry, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction lists of May 12 and May 19, 2024.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #29 of bestseller, recorded November 30, 2024.
"Eruption" by Michael Crichton and James Patterson reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Eruption by Michael Crichton and James Patterson, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of June 23, 2024.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #28 of bestseller, recorded on October 5, 2024.
"You Like It Darker" by Stephen King reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book You Like It Darker by Stephen King, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of June 9, 2024.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #27 of bestseller, recorded on September 17, 2024.
"Remarkably Bright Creatures" by Shelby Van Pelt reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt, 53 weeks on the New York Times hardcover fiction list from May 22, 2022, to August 4, 2024.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #26 of bestseller, recorded on July 30, 2024.
"The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store" by James McBride reviewed
Brian and Barbara review James McBride's new novel, The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, the Barnes & Noble fiction book of the year for 2023 and a New York Times bestseller for 37 weeks.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #25 of bestseller, recorded on June 22, 2024.
"The Women" by Kristin Hannah reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book The Women by Kristin Hannah, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list since February 25, 2024.
In her new novel of historical fiction, Kristin Hannah takes us to the era of the Vietnam War, following Frances Grace McGrath (“Frankie”) as she tries to make her family—especially her Dad—proud by joining the Army as a combat nurse. After two tours of duty, Frankie comes home a changed person, now a skilled surgical nurse with deep, life-long friends, new love interests, and a sharper understanding of the war itself. As difficult as it was to survive life in a combat zone, Frankie finds it just as challenging to adjust to a society deeply divided over this American war, and unwilling to acknowledge the heroism of the women who risked their lives serving it.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #24 of bestseller, recorded on April 12, 2024.
"First Lie Wins" by Ashley Elston reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book First Lie Wins by Ashley Elston, number five on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of January 21, 2024, and the Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick for January, 2024.
Evie, the main character in this debut suspense novel, is a thief—a high end thief, who goes undercover to steal art, jewels, proprietary business secrets, or whatever her mysterious boss, Mr. Smith, tells her to get her hands on. She’s very good at what she does, but her latest job is … complicated: she may be falling for her target, the hunky financial planner Ryan, she’s being investigated for a murder she may or may not have committed, and it looks like Mr. Smith may be souring on her employment, a situation that could be deadly for Evie.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #23 of bestseller, recorded on March 9, 2024.
Overview of Fiction Bestsellers, January, 2024
Brian and Barbara introduce ten new bestselling novels that entered the New York Times hardcover fiction list in January of 2024.
Twenty minutes with us and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #22 of bestseller, recorded February 24, 2024.
"Let Us Descend" by Jesmyn Ward reviewed
Brian and Barbara review Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward, number five on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of November 12, 2023, and the Oprah Bookclub pick for October, 2023.
Two-time National Book Award winning novelist Jesmyn Ward invites us to descend into the hell of race-based slavery in the antebellum South, telling the story of Annis, a young woman separated from her mother in the Carolinas and sold into the brutal sugar production economy of Louisiana.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #21 of bestseller, recorded February 3, 2024.
Best of 2023, Part 2
Brian and Barbara complete the review of 2023 by recognizing the hardcover fiction bestsellers with the highest (and lowest) social media ratings, counting down the top ten best selling bestsellers of the year, and sharing our favorite books of the year just past.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #20 of bestseller, recorded January 22, 2024.
Best of 2023, Part 1
Brian and Barbara take a look back at the 191 books that made the New York Times bestselling hardcover fiction list last year, choosing the best of the best of 2023.
With "Bestie" awards given in categories such as "Best Opening Line," "Best Cover Design," "Best Social Media Response," "Best Selling Book of the Year," and, of course, "Best Book of the Year" (not necessarily the same as biggest seller of the year), we help you figure out whether to read them ... or regift them.
Episode #19 of bestseller, recorded January 14, 2024.
"Dirty Thirty" by Janet Evanovich reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Dirty Thirty by Janet Evanovich, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of November 19, 2023.
Stephanie Plum, Trenton, New Jersey’s most famous fictional detective, is back in her thirtieth adventure, this time trying to apprehend a fugitive who thought a good way to escape the tedium of his assembly line job at the local button factory would be to commit armed robbery of a jewelry store. Can Stephanie track him down and get paid before her rent is due, while dealing with car wrecks, fire-bombings, amorous ex-lovers, an assistant who thinks her apartment is haunted by an ogre—a real ogre—and a golden retriever who remains perpetually hungry no matter how recently, and often, he’s been fed?
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #18 of bestseller, recorded on January 6, 2024.
"The Exchange" by John Grisham reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book The Exchange by John Grisham, number one on the November 5 and November 12, 2023, New York Times hardcover fiction lists.
Attorney Mitch McDeere, having escaped a mob-corrupted Memphis law firm at the end of author James Grisham’s 1991 breakthrough novel The Firm, resurfaces fifteen years later in Manhattan, now a junior partner in the largest international law firm in the world. Mitch returns to Memphis to seek a reprieve for a convicted killer, then heads overseas to lead a team suing the erratic Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi for failure to pay a billion-dollar construction bill. A young member of Mitch’s team is kidnapped by terrorists, and the pressure on Mitch to get her back builds to the breaking point when his wife Abby is pulled into the ransom negotiations.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it--or re-gift it!
Episode #17 of bestseller, recorded on December 31, 2023.
"Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow" by Gabrielle Zevin reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin, one of the bestselling hardcover fiction books of 2023.
Childhood friends Sadie and Sam meet up again in Boston of the mid-1990s—Sadie an MIT undergrad, Sam at Harvard—and discover they make a great videogame design team. Zevin’s coming of age novel, named to multiple “Top Books of 2022” lists, follows the challenges and triumphs of Sadie and Sam as tech whizzes and as human beings while the world of videogaming evolves through and around them.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #16 of bestseller, recorded on November 28, 2023.
"Holly" by Stephen King reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Holly by Stephen King, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction lists of September 24 and October 1, 2023.
Private detective Holly Gibney, introduced in King’s Edgar-award winning mystery novel Mr. Mercedes, gets her own book, and her own case: tracking down a pair of octogenarian college professors with an appetite for abduction and murder before they strike again.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #15 of bestseller, recorded on November 10, 2023.
"Tom Lake" by Ann Patchett reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Tom Lake by Ann Patchett, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of September 3, 2023.
In her ninth novel, award-winning author Ann Patchett builds a story within a story. Secluded on the family’s cherry orchard due to COVID, the Nelson family picks fruit together while listening as their mother, Lara, reveals the full story of her romantic involvement with one of the world’s most famous actors, Peter Duke, who she shared a stage with in a 1980s production of Our Town at a Michigan theater known as Tom Lake.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #14 of bestseller, recorded on October 7, 2023.
"Demon Copperhead" by Barbara Kingsolver reviewed
Brian and Barbara review Barbara Kingsolver’s Pulitzer Prize winning book Demon Copperhead, forty-four weeks on the New York Times hardcover fiction list as of September 17, 2023.
In her acclaimed new novel, Kingsolver reimagines the story of David Copperfield, transplanting Dickens’ classic hero from Victorian England to late 1990s Appalachia, where the young Demon struggles to thrive and survive while facing challenges of poverty, prejudice, abuse, neglect, and addiction.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #13 of bestseller, recorded September 9, 2023.
"Fourth Wing" by Rebecca Yarros reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the “romantasy” book Fourth Wing, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list for six weeks (so far), from July 23 to August 27, 2023.
In the adult fantasy novel blowing up BookTok, romance author Rebecca Yarros introduces us to the world of the Empyrean: dragons, gryphons, magic, and young cadets like Violet Sorrengail managing complicated love lives while fighting the odds (and each other) to claim the honor of riding their own dragon and wielding their own signature powers in defense of an embattled homeland.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #12 of bestseller, recorded on August 20, 2023.
"The Five-Star Weekend" by Elin Hilderbrand reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book The Five-Star Weekend, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list from July 2 to July July 16, 2023.
In the latest novel from Elin Hilderbrand, “Queen of the beach read,” beloved food blogger Hollis Shaw gathers four friends from different stages of her life for an impeccably curated getaway weekend on Nantucket, as she seeks to begin rebuilding her life after a tragic family loss.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #11 of bestseller, recorded on August 13, 2023.
"Identity" by Nora Roberts reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the romantic suspense novel Identity by Nora Roberts, number one selling book on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of June 11, 2023.
Baltimore bartender Morgan Albright's life is turned upside when a psychotic serial killer steals her identity and kills her roommate. Emotionally devastated and financially ruined, Morgan moves back to the Vermont home shared by her mother and grandmother, and painstakingly begins putting the pieces of her life back together--new job, new love interest--while facing the brutal reality that the killer is still out there, waiting for the opportunity to complete his attack on Morgan, the one that got away.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #10 of bestseller, recorded on July 30, 2023.
"Only the Dead" by Jack Carr reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Only the Dead by Jack Carr, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of June 4, 2023.
The sixth novel in the Terminal List espionage series finds Navy SEAL and CIA operative James Reece locked in a federal supermax prison, accused of organizing the assassination of the President of the United States. His mission, beyond surviving months of solitary confinement, is to figure out who pulled the strings behind his arrest, and to stop them before they carry out plans to sow chaos in a global balance of power already strained by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #9 of bestseller, recorded on July 24, 2023.
"Happy Place" by Emily Henry reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Happy Place by Emily Henry, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list for five weeks, from May 12 to June 25, 2023.
Harriet and Wyn are the perfect couple--well, except they broke off their engagement five months ago and haven't yet told any of their friends. In this romantic beach-read set in a Maine resort town, we see how it goes when two ex-lovers join their friends for a week-long getaway and agree to pretend they're still together--even sharing the same bedroom--so as not to spoil the perfect happiness of their best friends' wedding day.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #8 of bestseller, recorded on July 10, 2023.
"Simply Lies" by David Baldacci reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Simply Lies by David Baldacci, number one novel on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of May 7, 2023.
In Baldacci's latest thriller of psychological suspense, single mother and former detective Mickey Gibson is drawn away from the security of her desk job--tracking down the hidden assets of deadbeat billionaires--and back into the field when an anonymous call by a suspicious, possibly psychotic woman lures her to the site of a stashed murder victim: accountant Harry Langhorne, who'd been hiding from the wrath of the New Jersey crime family he long ago betrayed.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #7 of bestseller, recorded on June 24, 2023.
"Dark Angel" by John Sandford reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Dark Angel by John Sandford, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of April 30, 2023.
In the second suspense novel featuring Homeland Security agent Letty Davenport (the adopted daughter of Minneapolis detective Lucas Davenport from the 32-volume "Prey" series), Letty is partnered with NSA computer nerd--and reluctant field operative--Rod Baxter and charged with infiltrating a terrorist hacker organization known as "Ordinary People" before they can wreak havoc upon a major U.S. city by crashing its energy system.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #6 of bestseller, recorded on May 10, 2023.
"I Will Find You" by Harlan Coben reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book I Will Find You by Harlan Coben, number one novel on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of April 2, 2023.
Coben's new thriller of murder and mistaken identity: five years into a life sentence for killing his three-year-old son Matthew, David Burroughs gets unexpected evidence that Matthew is still alive and resolves to escape his maximum security prison, find his son, and figure out what really happened.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #5 of bestseller, recorded on April 26, 2023.
"Lessons in Chemistry" by Bonnie Garmus reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list for FOURTEEN weeks from December 25, 2022 to April 23, 2023 (in other words, from Christmas to Shakespeare's birthday--or is it his deathday?).
In this stunningly successful debut novel, single mother Elizabeth Zott confronts the entrenched sexism of early-1960s corporate culture as she makes ends meet by developing the kind of cooking show she thinks housewives need, while hoping to find a way back into the field of her first passion, research chemistry.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #4 of bestseller, recorded on March 25, 2023.
"Storm Watch" by C.J. Box reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book "Storm Watch" by C.J. Box, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of March 19, 2023.
In the 23rd novel of his suspense series, Wyoming Game Warden turned homicide detective Joe Pickett races against gathering storm fronts to solve the murder of a University of Wyoming professor, his partially decapitated body spotted outside a mysterious high-tech facility hidden in the remote wilderness.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode 3 of bestseller, recorded on March 18, 2023.
"Encore in Death" by J.D. Robb reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Encore in Death by J.D. Robb, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of February 26, 2023.
In this, the 56th novel in the author's futuristic "In Death" suspense series, New York City detective Eve Dallas investigates the murder of stage and film star Brant Fitzhugh, who collapses at his wife's glittering play-opening party, poisoned by cyanide slipped into his champagne cocktail.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #2 of bestseller, recorded on March 11, 2023.
"Hell Bent" by Leigh Bardugo reviewed
Brian and Barbara review the book Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo, number one on the New York Times hardcover fiction list of January 29, 2023.
In this follow-up to her bestselling fantasy novel Ninth House, Galaxy "Alex" Stern must navigate the magic, violence, and guarded lore of Yale University's secret societies to break her friend and mentor Darlington out of purgatory.
Twenty minutes with us, and you'll know whether to read it ... or regift it!
Episode #1 of bestseller, recorded on February 2, 2023.