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WSIRN Ep 111: A lifetime mother-daughter book club

We have a one-of-a-kind episode for you today! I have the pleasure of chatting with Emily and Daniela Loose, a mother-daughter duo from New Hampshire who have been reading together for Emily’s entire life. Today we discuss how reading is both enjoyable and also an enjoyable way to spend time with the people you love, especially when reading snacks are involved. Emily went off to college this fall, so we also discuss the pain of having to wait too long to talk to your book buddy about what you’re reading, and how texting in all caps about a book you just read is totally acceptable. This week we also touch on books for book people, Swedish children’s books, the pleasures of re-reading, and reading Dr Seuss for the first time—as an adult. This one is so much fun and perfect listening for this time of year. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

What Should I Read Next #111: A lifetime mother-daughter book club with Daniela & Emily Loose

Books mentioned in this episode:

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• Harry Potter
• Dr Seuss
• Sense of Direction: Pilgrimage for the Restless and the Hopeful, by Gideon Lewis-Kraus (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, by Jules Verne (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• The Well of Lost Plots, by Jasper Fforde (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Shades of Grey, by Jasper Fforde (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Carry On, Jeeves, by P. G. Wodehouse (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• When Breath Becomes Air, by Paul Kalinithi (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Inferno, by Dan Brown (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Eleanor & Park, by Rainbow Rowell (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• The Fault in Our Stars, by John Green (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Four Seasons in Rome, by Anthony Doerr (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• The Bookman’s Tale, by Charlie Lovett (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• First Impressions, by Charlie Lovett (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• The Lost Book of the Grail, by Charlie Lovett (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Every Heart a Doorway, by Seanan McGuire (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy, by Sheryl Sandberg (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, by Angela Duckworth (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World, by Adam Grant (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success, by Adam Grant (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)
• The Hero and the Crown, by Robin McKinley (Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound)

The 2018 Reading Challenge:

Readers, get more out of your Reading life this year with the 2018 Modern Mrs Darcy reading challenge. The goal of the 2018 Reading Challenge is to read amazing books in 2018. To do that, you need amazing books and time to read them. We can help.

We’ve created 12 categories this year designed to give you the best possible reading experience, and we’ve created free, downloadable tools for you that are pretty, practical, and all kinds of motivating.

Click here to get started and to get your free reading challenge kit. I can’t wait to read with you in 2018!

What do YOU think Daniela and Emily should read next? Tell us all about it in comments. 

32 comments

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  1. Rissie Lundberg says:

    Thank you for this episode! I have been waiting for a discussion of P.G. Wodehouse. My favorite book by him is “A Damsel in Distress.” Have you read it? I’ve recommended it to others as “Downton Abbey, if Downton Abby were a comedy.” Lots of upstairs/downstairs comedic drama to enjoy. Happy reading!

    • Heather says:

      Hoozah to PG Wodehluse! One of my favorite authors. And he wrote tons of novels and short stories. I’d recommend Code of the Woosters if you like Jeeves. I’ll have to try Damsel in Distress!

      • I love Code of the Woosters too! I have it on Audible and listen to it at least once a year. It’s one of my happy books. … I love that the two of you read together. It makes me want to read with my mom and with my sisters. Thanks for sharing your story!

        • Diane Reece says:

          Love Wodehouse–a newer discovery for me. Such descriptive sentences! One of the first I listened to was Cocktail Time. Not often does a book make me laugh out loud. Now I want to purchase Wodehouse so I can underline and note all those sentences that produce the guffaws.

  2. Bonnie says:

    Thanks for the episode! My teen (14) and I have not been reading together as much this year and it makes me sad. Just hard to fit in reading with all the kids (also 5 and 9) every night and still get them all to bed at a reasonable hour 😉 I am a huge Fforde fan but haven’t read those with my daughter–just the first book in the Dragonslayer series.

    Thought that you might like to read books by Atul Gawande for the memoir/medicine/philosophical musings genre. Complications, Better, and Being Mortal all great reads.

    Recently finished the Lost Book of the Grail and the main character references Wodehouse and Carry On Jeeves in particular so you might want to check that one out first 🙂

  3. Elizabeth Brink says:

    My mom and I also read a lot of the same books and discuss them, though we read individually and not aloud together, so this episode was particularly delightful for me. I’m 10 years older than Emily, so I say “Good luck and keep it up! The relationship between you and your mom will only get better.” Also, I love P.G. Wodehouse, so I was jumping up and down to hear him mentioned. My personal favorite is The Mating Season.

    I thought Anne’s recommendations were excellent. I put Grit on hold at the library just now. I love Robin McKinley, too.

  4. Loved the segment. Reading to children is so important and that it has carried on reading together is magical … such special memories that will last forever. My three children are all avid readers … when my two daughters were away at university we chose to all read the same book at the same time and talk about it through email and on our phone conversations … the book was The Fionavar Tapestry – a fantasy by Canadian author Guy Gavriel Kay. While not necessarily my genre the book has remained one of my favourites because of this shared experience. My oldest daughter is now an English teacher … inspiring her high school students in the joy of reading. We all share book recommendations and what we are reading all the time. We have listened as a family to audio books since they were little … especially on car trips. Got some great recommendations from them and felt Anne gave some other great suggestions. One I would suggest is Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore.

  5. Megan says:

    My sister texted and said she needs us to read all these books! What a fun episode! I will say I’d totally be mortified to read Every Heart A Doorway with my mom though! It was a fun book and I can see the dark Grimm-like fairy tale feeling you mentioned but goodness! There were a few lines I’d be editing to read with my mom, ha! I blush easily though!

  6. Mary Ellen Gordon says:

    PG Wodehouse and Jasper Fforde are favorites of mine too. I think it’s the combination of cleverness (about language for Wodehouse and literature for Fforde) and goofiness that makes them so great, and with that in mind, if Daniela and Emily haven’t read Douglas Adams yet, they should do so immediately starting with the Hitchhiker’s Guide. I think they might also enjoy books by Connie Willis. She isn’t quite as goofy as Wodehouse and Fforde, but her books definitely have goofy moments and will scratch Emily’s itch for good fantasy. My favorites of her books are a series about Oxford historians who time travel to study history. My favorites within that series are Blackout and All Clear. The whole series doesn’t need to be read in order, but those two should be as they are both set during the Blitz.

  7. Amanda S. says:

    I really enjoyed this episode! I felt compelled to come over here and comment though…. NOOOOOOOO!!!!! You should have read past the first 50 pages! If you read this book out of context of the others I could see why you would say that about the beginning. If you know the character you immediately recognize that he has some sort of short term memory loss and that is why he is behaving that way. He clearly has amnesia from something traumatic that happened and is still himself in spite of it. I would recommend going back and reading the Langdon books in order and then you would enjoy this book! 🙂

  8. Marla Jensen says:

    I think you might like The Wingfeather Saga by Andrew Peterson. The first book is On the edge of darkness. It is fantasy with a fantastic made up world. It is probably considered a kids book but very enjoyable for all ages.

  9. Nicole Netkin-Collins says:

    If you’re getting into Robin McKinley, I highly recommend Spindle’s End (beautiful sleeping beauty re-telling) and Sunshine (if you’re okay with another book about vampires!). I also think you might find Carry On, by Rainbow Rowell to be a lot of fun (it’s sort-of Harry Potter fan-fiction).

  10. Marion says:

    I enjoyed this episode. Thanks for the recommendation of Jasper Fforde’s The Well of Lost Plots. I have never heard of this author before. I will be checking this one out at the library soon. I would like to recommend The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker. I read this novel a few weeks ago. Wecker does an excellent job of intertwining fantasy, history (set in 1890s NYC), immigration, and spirituality into a fine read of a novel.

  11. Brooke says:

    I LOVED this episode! Daniela and Emily are a delight. What a wonderful, fun, special tradition. I would love to begin this with my own children one day. Some titles I think they might like: The Night Circus, Jamaica Inn, Watch Me Disappear (could lead to some interesting discussions!), The Alice Network

      • Kelly Face says:

        If you want so.ething similar to Charlie Lovett, you may want to try the author Matthew Pearl. He writes mysteries concerning 19th century authors. The Dante Club, is about an actual group of friends that are helping Henry Wadsworth Longfellow with his translation of The Divine Comedy. The mystery concerns a series of murders that occur that reference The Inferno, and can only be inspired by the groups work.
        The Dante Chamber include one member of the original group, but you meet a different cast of characters including Christina Rossetti and her brother Dante Gabriel Rossetti bringing Dante in in another context.

        Two others that are favorites are The Last Dickens and The Last Bookaneer.

  12. Michele says:

    Wonderful, sweet episode. My daughter just got married, so I was thinking about our times together while listening to this mom and daughter. I listened to loads of Audible books with my kids, as we were in the car a lot, and they were required to read quite a bit for their classical education. We enjoyed The Perilous Gard by Elizabeth Marie Pope, and I think this would be a fun read for mother and daughter. The Boston Girl by Anita Diamant, would be a fun read-a-loud, though I did LOVE Linda Lavin narrating on Audible – maybe LISTEN to this one together. 84, Charing Cross Road is charming & short. You could get through that gem in a couple of hours.

  13. Lauren P. says:

    I just read Every Heart a Doorway and really enjoyed it! And YAY for recommending Robin McKinley! I found her when I was in middle school and several of her books (Blue Sword, The Hero and the Crown, and Sunshine) are regular comfy and nostalgic re-reads for me!

  14. Jill Wade says:

    Fun episode. Have you ever read the Mapp and Lucia novels by E.F. Bensen? It’s an older British series that reminds me a bit of Wodehouse. It’s delicious and very funny. Queen Luci is first in the series.

  15. Courtney says:

    Oh Anne, what a great episode this was! Not only were Emily and Daniela delightful, but the list of titles discussed in it were fabulous. I was so thrilled to hear you recommend Charlie Lovett — I adored both “The Bookman’s Tale” and “The Lost Book of the Grail.” They are certainly meant for lovers of literature, and would be perfect for Emily and Daniela to read together. I might also recommend reading “The Millionaire and the Bard: Henry Folger’s Obsessive Hunt for Shakespeare’s First Folio.” It’s a non-fiction account centered around literature and book lovers.
    But it’s probably long enough that they’ll have to wait until summer vacation to tackle it.
    🙂
    Also, this episode inspired me to finally delve into P.G. Wodehouse; I can’t wait to see what everyone raves about.

    Thanks again for such a wonderful podcast!

  16. Amberly says:

    I love Jasper Fforde! If you like his humor, I think you’d like Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe series. They’re about a reclusive New York detective and all of the cases that come his way – the humor is very dry and (I think, at least) the characters are delightful. I also love Mistborn for fantasy. I’m not a big fantasy reader, but a friend made me read it – and made me try it without reading the description on the back cover. Its summary sounds a little silly, but the book itself is so well thought out, the characters are endearing, the dialogue is funny, and it’s all-around a fantastic read. I think you’d enjoy it!

  17. Rebekah says:

    This is fantastic! What a joy to read with your daughter, Daniela. Emily, I just read Borderline (The Arcadia Project #1) by Mishell Baker. I think you would love it! It’s fantasy that is more adult and I thought of you!

  18. iHanna says:

    Yeah. So I just listened to ONE episode of your podcast and now my whole reading list for next year is filled? OMG, I can’t work next year, I need to just read, read, read. 🙂

  19. iHanna says:

    BTW, did I not pay enough attention or was NO Swedish children’s books mentioned at all? That is kind of sad, we have soooo many good ones! Let me know if you need a list. 😉

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