We asked the past year’s podcast-guests for the favorite books they read in 2017 and the books they hope to read in 2018 for our special year-end Guest List episode! Three dozen guests participated, so listen to the show to hear about their picks, and use this page to check out all the books, as well as their past episodes!

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If you’d like a guide to the episode, detailing the order of the speakers and when their segments begin, please scroll to the bottom of the page.

The Guests

Pete Bagge (37:00)

• Old Home Town – Rose Wilder Lane

Kathy Bidus (39:10)
Kathy’s 2018 goal

• Just the Funny Parts: And a Few Hard Truths About Sneaking into the Hollywood Boys’ Club – Nell Scovell

Sven Birkerts (24:25)

• Known and Strange Things: Essays – Teju Cole
• The Radetzky March – Joseph Roth
• Transit: A Novel (Outline Trilogy) – Rachel Cusk
• assorted late-night meditations on – WG Sebald

Sven’s 2018 goals

• Upstate: A Novel – James Wood
• Between Eternities – Javier Marias

RO Blechman (4:35)

• Arbitrary Stupid Goal – Tamara Shopsin
• Six Poets: Hardy to Larkin: An Anthology – Alan Bennett

RO’s 2018 goals

• something by – Jane Austen

Kyle Cassidy (15:45)

• American Impressionist: Childe Hassam and the Isles of Shoals – Alexandra de Steiguer
• The Phone Book – Robert Herman
• The Ultimate Metallica – Ross Halfin
• The Tolstoys in the 21st Century – Oleg Tolstoy
• The Art of Movement – Ken Browar & Deborah Ory
• The Arrangement: A Novel – Sarah Dunn

Graham Chaffee (4:05)

• A Manual for Cleaning Women: Selected Stories – Lucia Berlin
• Works – Jussi Adler-Olsen

Howard Chaykin (39:45)

• Kill All Normies: Online Culture Wars From 4Chan And Tumblr To Trump And The Alt-Right – Angela Nagle
• Warner Bros: The Making of an American Movie Studio (Jewish Lives) – David Thomson
• Two Moons: A Novel – Thomas Mallon
• Friends and Traitors – John Lawton
• The World of Tomorrow – Brendan Matthews
• Manhattan Beach – Jennifer Egan
• The Force: A Novel – Don Winslow
• Defectors: A Novel – Joseph Kanon
• The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters – Tom Nichols

Joe Ciardiello (18:35)

• Black Elk: The Life of an American Visionary – Joe Jackson
• My Favorite Thing Is Monsters – Emil Ferris

John Clute (20:15)

• Ka: Dar Oakley in the Ruin of Ymr – John Crowley
• The Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
• The Unconsoled – Kazuo Ishiguro
• When We Were Orphans: A Novel – Kazuo Ishiguro
• Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro
• The Buried Giant – Kazuo Ishiguro
• White Noise – Don DeLillio

John’s 2018 goal

• Robicheaux: A Novel (Dave Robicheaux) – James Lee Burke

John Crowley (8:40)

• Lincoln in the Bardo: A Novel – George Saunders

John’s 2018 goal

• Purgatorio: A New Verse Translation – Dante, tr. Merwin

John Cuneo (14:35)

• Who Is Rich?: A Novel – Matthew Klam
• All My Puny Sorrows – Miriam Toews
• Lit: A Memoir – Mary Karr

Ellen Datlow (32:50)

• The Changeling: A Novel – Victor LaValle

Ellen’s 2018 goals

• What Happened – Hillary Clinton
• Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life – Ruth Franklin

Samuel R. Delany (31:00)

• Chubz: The Demonization of My Working Arse – Huw Lemmey

Nicholas Delbanco (13:45)

• Lincoln in the Bardo: A Novel – George Saunders

Nicholas’ 2018 goal

• Grant – Ron Chernow

Barbara Epler (25:15)

• Mrs. Caliban – Rachel Ingalls
• I Am the Brother of XX – Fleur Jaeggy
• These Possible Lives – Fleur Jaeggy
• Debths – Susan Howe

Barbara’s 2018 goals

• The Emissary – Yoko Tawada
• The Chandelier – Clarice Lispector
• Some Trick: Thirteen Stories – Helen DeWitt
• The Marvellous Equations of the Dread: A Novel in Bass Riddim – Marcia Douglas

Joyce Farmer (31:20)

• The Feminine Mystique – Betty Friedan

Joyce’s 2018 goal

• Scenes from the Life of Matias Almosino (in Greek) – Isidoros Zourgos

Sarah Williams Goldhagen (18:55)

• A House Among the Trees: A Novel – Julia Glass
• Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies – Jared Diamond

Paul Gravett (10:40)

• Driving Short Distances – Joff Winterhart
• Portugal – Cyril Pedrosa
• A Bride’s Story, Vol. 1 – Kaoru Mori

Paul’s 2018 goals

• Tumult – John Harris Dunning and Michael Kennedy

Liz Hand (7:30)

• Ka: Dar Oakley in the Ruin of Ymr – John Crowley

Liz’s 2018 goals

• Uncommon People: The Rise and Fall of The Rock Stars – David Hepworth
• Anna Karenina – Tolstoy

Vanda Krefft (19:45)

• Stoner – John Williams
• The Loved One – Evelyn Waugh
• A Handful of Dust – Evelyn Waugh

Vanda’s 2018 goal

• War and Peace – Tolstoy

Michael Meyer (9:45)

• The World Broke in Two: Virginia Woolf, T. S. Eliot, D. H. Lawrence, E. M. Forster and the Year That Changed Literature – Bill Goldstein

Cullen Murphy (17:30)

• Cuz: The Life and Times of Michael A. – Danielle Allen

Cullen’s 2018 goal

• Stalin: Waiting for Hitler, 1929-1941 – Stephen Kotkin

Jeff Nunokawa (38:10) (pictured above)

• Early Auden, Later Auden: A Critical Biography – Edward Mendelson

Jeff’s 2018 goal

• The Life of Samuel Johnson – Boswell

Mimi Pond (29:35)

• My Favorite Thing Is Monsters – Emil Ferris
• Hostage – Guy Delisle
• The Price of Illusion: A Memoir – Joan Juliet Buck
• Washington Square – Henry James

Mimi 2018 goal

• My Favorite Thing Is Monsters Vol. 2 – Emil Ferris

Eddy Portnoy (3:30)

• Busy Dying – Hilton Obenzinger

Eddy’s 2018 goals

• anything by – Blexbolex

Keiler Roberts (28:35)

• A Life of Adventure and Delight – Akhil Sharma
• Family Life: A Novel – Akhil Sharma
• The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee – Sarah Silverman
• The Customer is Always Wrong – Mimi Pond

Martin Rowson (27:05)

• A Dance To The Music Of Time – Anthony Powell

Martin’s 2018 goals

• Let’s Kill Uncle – Rohan O’Grady

Matt Ruff (21:25)

• The Night Ocean – Paul La Farge
• The Fact of a Body: A Murder and a Memoir – Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich

Matt’s 2018 goals

• Mnemonica: On The Memorized Deck – Juan Tamariz

Ben Schwartz (36:15)
Ben’s 2018 goals

• How to Read Nancy: The Elements of Comics in Three Easy Panels – Paul Karasik/Mark Newgarden

Vanessa Sinclair (17:55)

• We Were Eight Years in Power: An American Tragedy – Ta-Nehisi Coates
• Hello America: A Novel – JG Ballard

Vanessa’s 2018 goals

• Violent Borders: Refugees and the Right to Move – Reece Jones
• To Hell and Back: Europe 1914-1949 – Ian Kershaw
• Play It As It Lays: A Novel – Joan Didion
• The Hysteric’s Guide to the Future Female Subject – Juliet Flower MacCannell

Ann Telnaes (14:10)

• The Soul of the First Amendment – Floyd Abrams

Michael Tisserand (33:50)

• Ali: A Life – Jonathan Eig
• How to Read Nancy: The Elements of Comics in Three Easy Panels – Paul Karasik/Mark Newgarden
• My Favorite Thing Is Monsters – Emil Ferris

Michael’s 2018 goals

• Chekhov-Saunders Humanity kit – as guided by George Saunders
• The Brothers Karamazov – Dostoevsky

Gordon Van Gelder (5:35)

• The Night Ocean – Paul La Farge
• Apollo 8: The Thrilling Story of the First Mission to the Moon – Jeffrey Kluger
• A Likely Story – Donald Westlake
• We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves: A Novel – Karen Fowler

Gordon’s 2018 goals

• Ka: Dar Oakley in the Ruin of Ymr – John Crowley
• The Origin of Species – Charles Darwin
• Ethan Frome – Edith Wharton

Shannon Wheeler (9:15)

• My Favorite Thing Is Monsters – Emil Ferris

Shannon’s 2018 goals

• Persepolis Rising (The Expanse) – James S.A. Corey
• A Collection of Essays – George Orwell (and maybe his novels, too)

Wallis Wilde-Menozzi (11:50)

• The Noise of Time: A Novel – Julian Barnes
• The Sense of an Ending – Julian Barnes
• Keeping an Eye Open: Essays on Art – Julian Barnes
• Autobiography of Red – Anne Carson

Wallis’ 2018 goals

• Confessions – St. Augustine

Matt Wuerker (3:00)

• Al Franken, Giant of the Senate – Al Franken

Matt’s 2018 goals

• Cat’s Cradle: A Novel – Kurt Vonnegut

Gil Roth (40:40)

• Survival In Auschwitz – Primo Levi
• Stranger in a Strange Land: Searching for Gershom Scholem and Jerusalem – George Prochnik
• After Henry – Joan Didion
• The Year of Magical Thinking – Joan Didion
• Bad Rabbi: And Other Strange but True Stories from the Yiddish Press – Eddy Portnoy
• Moving the Palace – Charif Majdalani
• Lovecraft Country: A Novel – Matt Ruff
• Private Citizens: A Novel – Tony Tulathimutte
• For the Relief of Unbearable Urges: Stories – Nathan Englander
• Area X: The Southern Reach Trilogy: Annihilation; Authority; Acceptance – Jeff Vandermeer
• Ka: Dar Oakley in the Ruin of Ymr – John Crowley
• The Peregrine – JA Baker

Gil’s 2018 goals

• Slouching Towards Bethlehem: Essays – Joan Didion
• Plutarch’s Lives Volume 1 – Plutarch

BONUS: Patrick McDonnell!
(He sent his in the day after we recorded)

• Krazy: George Herriman, a Life in Black and White – Michael Tisserand
• I Am That – Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Patrick’s 2018 goal

• I Am That – Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj (as he does every year)

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Guest List Sequence

Pete Bagge – 37:00
Kathy Bidus – 39:10
Sven Birkerts – 24:25
RO Blechman – 4:35
Kyle Cassidy – 15:45
Graham Chaffee – 4:05
Howard Chaykin – 39:45
Joe Ciardiello – 18:35
John Clute – 20:15
John Crowley – 8:40
John Cuneo – 14:35
Ellen Datlow – 32:50
Samuel R. Delany – 31:00
Nicholas Delbanco – 13:45
Barbara Epler – 25:15
Joyce Farmer – 31:20
Sarah Williams Goldhagen – 18:55
Paul Gravett – 10:40
Liz Hand – 7:30
Vanda Krefft – 19:45
Patrick McDonnell – writeup only
Michael Meyer – 9:45
Cullen Murphy – 17:30
Jeff Nunokawa – 38:10
Mimi Pond – 29:35
Eddy Portnoy – 3:30
Keiler Roberts – 28:35
Martin Rowson – 27:05
Matt Ruff – 21:25
Ben Schwartz – 36:15
Vanessa Sinclair – 17:55
Ann Telnaes – 14:10
Michael Tisserand – 33:50
Gordon Van Gelder – 5:35
Shannon Wheeler – 9:15
Wallis Wilde-Menozzi – 11:50
Matt Wuerker – 3:00
Gil Roth – 40:40

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