All the Books! is taking a holiday break, so we wanted to share this recent Zero to Well-Read episoe in which Jeff and Rebecca revisit Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol, a story so familiar it’s often mistaken for simple. They consider its moral stakes, its enduring influence on readers and society, and why Scrooge's redemption still resonates.

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This week, Trisha recommends a couple of backlist fiction books she finally got to - and loved - this year.

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Books Discussed:

Deacon King Kong by James McBride

All Systems Red by Martha Wells

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This week, Liberty and Emily discuss some of the upcoming 2026 book releases they're most excited about, including Is This a Cry for Help?, Molka, Half His Age, and more!

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Books Discussed On the Show:

Is This a Cry for Help? by Emily Austin (Atria, January 13)

Heartstopper: Volume 6 by Alice Oseman (Graphix, July 7)

Brawler: Stories by Lauren Groff (Riverhead Books, February 24)

Molka by Monika Kim (Erewhon Books, April 28)

All the World Can Hold by Jung Yun (37 Ink, March 10)

The Body by Bethany C. Morrow (Tor Nightfire, Feb 10)

Whidbey by T Kira Madden (Mariner Books, March 10)

The Secret World of Briar Rose by Cindy Pham (Kokila, June 2)

Japanese Gothic by Kylie Lee Baker (Hanover Square Press, April 21)

Half His Age by Jennette McCurdy (Ballantine Book, January 20)

The Girl with a Thousand Faces by Sunyi Dean (Tor Books, May 5)

The Caretaker by Marcus Kliewer (1201 Books, April 21)

Canon by Paige Lewis (Viking, May 19)

Breakout by Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon (Quill Tree Books, June 2)

Tata by Valérie Perrin, Hildegarde Serle (translator) (Europa, June 23)

Devil Inside by Clay McLeod Chapman (MIRA, August 11)

What We're Reading:

Crafting for Sinners by Jenny Kiefer

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

The Lamb by Lucy Rose

Cool Machine (The Harlem Trilogy) by Colson Whitehead

More Books Out This Week:

The Uninvited by Nancy Banks

The Snowman Code by Simon Stephenson, Reggie Brown

The Opportunist by Tarryn Fisher

Dig Me a Grave: The Inside Story of the Serial Killer Who Seduced the South by Richard A. Harpootlian, Shaun Assael

Love in Plane Sight by Lauren Connolly

The Once and Future Queen by Paula Lafferty

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This week, Vanessa shares some of the books she hopes to catch up on during her end-of-year reading sprint.

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Books Discussed:

Mona’s Eyes by Thomas Schlesser, Hildegarde Serle (translator)

History Lessons by Zoe B. Wallbrook

What the River Knows by Isabel Ibañez

Verity Vox and the Curse of Foxfire by Don Martin

Witches of Honeysuckle House by Liz Parker

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This week, Vanessa and Danika discuss some of December's new releases, and Liberty and Vanessa's favorite books of 2025.

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Keep track of new releases with Book Riot's New Release Index, now included with an All Access membership. Click here to get started today!

Books Discussed On the Show:

The Curse of the Cole Women by Marielle Thompson

There’s Always Next Year by George M. Johnson and Leah Johnson

The Jaguars Roar by Micheliny Verunschk, Juliana Barbassa (translator)

Every Day I Read: 53 Ways to Get Closer to Books by Hwang Bo-reum and Shanna Tan

Scarlet Morning by N.D. Stevenson

The Road to Tender Hearts by Annie Hartnett

Angel Down by Daniel Kraus

Old Soul by Susan Barker

The Bewitching by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

The Wilderness by Angela Flournoy

The Macabre by Kosoko Jackson

Queer Enlightenments by Dr. Anthony Delaney

All the (More!) Books! December 5, 2025

What We're Reading:

Joy to the Girls by Alyson Derrick and Rachael Lippincott

Mona's Eyes by Thomas Schlessler

History Lessons by Zoe B. Wallbrook

Verity Vox and the Curse of Foxfire by Don Martin

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This week, Danika talks about their favorite reads of the year.

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We’ve got the chops to match the book lover in your life with their next favorite read. And it only takes a few clicks to gift Tailored Book Recommendations! Simply head to mytbr.co/gift to get started.

Books Discussed:

The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson

Those Beyond the Wall by Micaiah Johnson

Skye Falling by Mia McKenzie

The Summer We Got Free by Mia McKenzie

These Heathens by Mia McKenzie

Sympathy for Wild Girls: Stories by Demree McGhee

I Shall Never Fall In Love by Hari Conner

The Salvage by Anbara Salam

To the Moon and Back by Eliana Ramage

Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Awakened by A.E. Osworth

This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar

House of Beth by Kerry Cullen

Spent: A Comic Novel by Alison Bechdel

Ten Incarnations of Rebellion by Vaishnavi Patel

The Original by Nell Stevens

Lu and Ren’s Guide to Geozoology by Angela Hsieh

The Tea Dragon Society by K. O'Neill

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Hello All the Books! listeners! We're off this week due to illness, but we didn't want to leave you empty-handed, so we're sharing an episode from our newest podcast, Zero to Well-Read, that covers one of Liberty's favorite books: The Secret History.

Jeff and Rebecca revisit Donna Tartt's cult classic, the OG of dark academia, The Secret History.

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This season of Zero to Well-Read is sponsored by Thriftbooks.

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This week, Sharifah talks about a couple of her best reads of the year!

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Books Discussed

The Warmth of Other Suns: The Story of America's Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad

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This week, Liberty and Patricia discuss Good Things, Art Heist, Recipes from the American South, and more great books!

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Keep track of new releases with Book Riot's New Release Index, now included with an All Access membership. Click here to get started today!

Books Discussed On the Show:

A Literary Letter for Every Day of the Year by Liz Ison 

Bibliophile Advent Calendar for Booklovers by Jane Mount

Expensive Basketball by Shea Serrano

Good Things: Recipes and Rituals to Share with People You Love: A Cookbook by Samin Nosrat

Puzzle Mania!: Wordle, Connections, Spelling Bee, Minis and More! by The New York Times Games

The Portable Feminist Reader by Roxane Gay

Art Heist: 50 Artworks You Will Never See by Susie Hodge

Six Seasons of Pasta: A New Way with Everyone's Favorite Food by Joshua McFadden with Martha Holmberg

Around the World in 80 Birds by Mike Unwin, Ryuto Miyake

Recipes from the American South by Michael W Twitty

How Comics Are Made: A Visual History from the Drawing Board to the Printed Page by Glenn Fleishman

Syme's Letter Writer: A Guide to Modern Correspondence About (Almost) Every Imaginable Subject of Daily Life, with Odes to Desktop Ephemera and Selected Letters of Famous Writers by Rachel Syme

The Mind Electric: A Neurologist on the Strangeness and Wonder of Our Brains by Pria Anand

The Year's Best Sports Writing 2025 by Hanif Abdurraqib

The New Book: Poems, Letters, Blurbs, and Things by Nikki Giovanni

Black-Owned: The Revolutionary Life of the Black Bookstore by Char Adams

Prose to the People: A Celebration of Black Bookstores by Katie Mitchell

For a complete list of books discussed in this episode, visit our website.

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This week, Liberty talks about several books that are in her orbit right now!

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Books Discussed:

The Crèche Keeper's Guild by Ware Wilkins, Faith Anthony 

The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye by Sonny Liew

Cat Nap by Brian Lees

Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid

To the Moon and Back by Eliana Ramage

Recipes for an Unexpected Afterlife by Deston J. Munden

Hunger and Thirst by Claire Fuller 

Pendergast: The Beginning by Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child 

Down Came the Spiders by Ally Russell

Banned: How I Squandered an All-Star NBA Career Before Finding My Redemption by Michael Ray Richardson

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This week, Liberty and Emily discuss The Cuffing Game, Beasts of the Sea, I, Medusa, and more great books!

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We’ve got the chops to match the book lover in your life with their next favorite read. And it only takes a few clicks to gift Tailored Book Recommendations! Simply head to mytbr.co/gift to get started.

Books Discussed On the Show:

The Cuffing Game by Lyla Lee

Beasts of the Sea by Iida Turpeinen, David Hackston (translator)

The Ferryman and His Wife by Frode Grytten, Alison McCullough (translator)

I, Medusa by Ayana Gray

Blank Space: A Cultural History of the Twenty-First Century by W. David Marx

And Then There Was You by Sophie Cousens

The Villa, Once Beloved by Victor Manibo

I’ll Make A Spectacle of You by Beatrice Winifred Iker

Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker

I'll Find You Where the Timeline Ends by Kylie Lee Baker

Hungerstone by Kat Dunn

Who Counted the Corpses: Vlad Dracula and History by James M. Donovan

The Raven Scholar (Eternal Path Trilogy, #1) by Antonia Hodgson

For a complete list of books discussed in this episode, visit our website.

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