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Books with Betsy

By: bookswithbetsy
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  • Summary

  • Books with Betsy is a podcast that celebrates the reading life of all readers. Each week, Betsy interviews a different person about their reading life. Listen for book recommendations, reading tips, and to join in the joy that reading brings. And remember, anyone who reads is a reader.
    Copyright 2024 All rights reserved.
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Episodes
  • Episode 12 - Establishing Empathy with Mike Finucane

    Episode 12 - Establishing Empathy with Mike Finucane
    Jul 29 2024

    On this episode, Mike Finucane, a campus minister at a high-school in St. Louis, and I discuss how books can help develop empathy. He also gives a great tip from his dad about how to tackle a large non-fiction text. We also confirm that collecting books shouldn’t be considered a bad habit if you love it. We talk about a lot of really intense books but I hope that our discussion will inspire readers to do a deep dive into some of the topics.

    Books mentioned in this episode:

    What Betsy’s reading:

    The Nix by Nathan Hill

    The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

    Books Highlighted by Mike:

    Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke

    Stories of Your LIfe and Others by Ted Chiang

    Exhalation by Ted Chiang

    The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

    Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh

    An American Summer: Love and Death in Chicago by Alex Kotlowitz

    Just Mercy by Brian Stevenson

    The Shawl by Cynthia Ozick

    Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

    The Broken Earth Trilogy by N.K. Jemisin

    Tattoos on the Heart by Gregory Boyle

    City of Bohane by Kevin Barry

    The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson

    An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden World Around Us by Ed Yong

    Other Books Mentioned in the Episode:

    All books available on my Bookshop.org episode page.

    Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

    The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert A. Caro

    The Hebrew Bible: A Translation with Commentary by Robert Alter

    Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain

    How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn

    Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

    God Knows by Joseph Heller

    Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

    Your Duck is My Duck: Stories by Deborah Eisenberg

    Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe

    Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe

    Rogues: True Stories of Grifters, Killers, Rebels and Crooks by Patrick Radden Keefe

    The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin

    There are No Children Here by Alex Kotlowitz

    The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

    Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan

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    1 hr and 10 mins
  • Episode 11 - A Series of Series with Rachel Kilthorne

    Episode 11 - A Series of Series with Rachel Kilthorne
    Jul 22 2024
    On this episode, Rachel Kilthorne, a self-processed nerd’s nerd, discusses her love of both fantasy novels and going deep on a subject in non-fiction. She names many series and discusses how she determines when to re-read or when to let go of a series. I also get to go on a soapbox rant about reading diversely, especially in genre fiction. Books mentioned in this episode: What Betsy’s reading: The Nix by Nathan Hill The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon Woodworm by Layla Martinez We Used to Live Here by Marcus Kliewer Books Highlighted by Rachel: The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones The Wayfarer Series by Becky Chambers The Sabriel Series by Garth Nix Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk The Secret Life of Groceries: The Dark Miracle of the American Supermarket by Benjamin Lorr Doppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.A. Schwab A Council of Dolls by Mona Susan Power Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood His Majesty’s Dragon by Naomi Novik Babel by R.F. Kuang Saga by Brian K. Vaughn American Wolf: A True Story of Survival and Obsession in the West by Nate Blakeslee The Dresden Files Series by Jim Butcher The Dark Forest by Cixin Liu The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism by Katherine Stewart Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz Other Books Mentioned in the Episode: All books available on my Bookshop.org episode page. The Wheel of Time Series by Robert Jordan The Essential Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson The Sandman by Neil Gaiman Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir Death Valley by Melissa Broder The Pisces by Melissa Broder The Dark Tower Series by Stephen King The First Law Trilogy by Joe Abercrombie A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin The World We Make by N.K. Jemisin Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah Blackouts by Justin Torres The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty Zorrie by Laird Hunt The End of Drum-Time by Hanna Pylväinen The Midnight Library by Matt Haig The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss The Poppy War Trilogy by R.F. Kuang Yellowface by R.F. Kuang Erasure by Percival Everett The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses by Robin Wall Kimmerer The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World by Robin Wall Kimmerer
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    51 mins
  • Episode 10 - Weird Does Not Translate to Screen with Rachel Rolland

    Episode 10 - Weird Does Not Translate to Screen with Rachel Rolland
    Jul 15 2024

    On this episode, Rachel Rolland, a hobby-enthusiast, discusses her love for weird books, including two authors with a decently large backlist that I’ve never heard of. We discuss how a book about accounting can help investigate the way we see the world, how some books just shouldn’t be adapted to screen, and her love for the bookstores where she worked.

    Books mentioned in this episode:

    What Betsy’s reading:

    The Nix by Nathan Hill

    The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

    No One Can Know by Kate Alice Marshall

    None of This is True by Lisa Jewell

    Books Highlighted by Rachel:

    Milkman by Anna Burns

    Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut

    A Song of Ice & Fire by George R.R. Martin

    Animal Farm by George Orwell

    Watership Down by Richard Adams

    The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

    Keeping the House by Ellen Baker

    13 ½ Lives of Captain Blue Bear by Walter Moers

    The City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers

    Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris

    Less by Andrew Sean Greer

    Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

    Double Entry: How the Merchants of Venice Created Modern Finance by Jane Gleeson-White

    Other Books Mentioned in the Episode:

    All books available on my Bookshop.org episode page.

    The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

    Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina

    The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde

    Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

    Hamlet by William Shakespeare

    Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen

    Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

    The Big Over Easy: A Nursery Crime by Jasper Fforde

    Shades of Grey: The Road to High Saffron by Jasper Fforde

    Jonathan Strange & MR Norrell by Susanna Clarke

    Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

    The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

    Dune by Frank Herbert

    Grant by Ron Chernow

    Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

    Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut

    Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut

    Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

    The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd

    Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris

    I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence by Amy Sedaris
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    48 mins
Art Literary History & Criticism
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