The Book Review

As much as we love hearing from authors on “The Book Review” podcast, there are precious few who have read more than our staff book critics — Jennifer Szalai, Alexandra Jacobs and Dwight Garner. The three came on the show to talk about some of their favorite books of the year so far, as well as a few of the titles that helped shape their reading lives.

Books discussed on this episode:

• “Nothing Random,” by Gayle Feldman
• “Will and Attention,” by Meghan O’Gieblyn
• “The Disappearers,” by Marlon James
• “American Hagwon,” by Min Jin Lee
• “Lives Other Than My Own,” by Emmanuel Carrère
• “To the Lighthouse,” by Virginia Woolf
• “The American Way of Death,” by Jessica Mitford
• “Class: A Guide Through the American Status System,” by Paul Fussell
• “The Great War and Modern Memory,” by Paul Fussell
• “American Fried,” by Calvin Trillin
• “Alice, Let’s Eat,” by Calvin Trillin
• “Third Helpings,” by Calvin Trillin
• “On Fire,” by Larry Brown
• “Betsy-Tacy,” by Maud Hart Lovelace
• “Betsy-Tacy and Tib,” by Maud Hart Lovelace
• “Rabbit, Run,” by John Updike
• “Into the Wood Chipper,” by Nicholas Enrich
• “Cool Machine,” by Colson Whitehead
• “The Oyster Diaries,” by Nancy Lemann
• “Biological War: A Scenario,” by Annie Jacobsen
• “Nuclear War: A Scenario,” by Annie Jacobsen
• “The Story of Your Life,” by Kathryn Jezer-Morton
• “Transcription,” by Ben Lerner
• “The Wonderful World That Almost Was: A Life of Peter Hujar and Paul Thek,” by Andrew Durbin
• “Contrapposto,” by Dave Eggers
• “Brother of the More Famous Jack,” by Barbara Trapido
• “Love and Hydrogen,” by Jim Shepard
• “Trash!: A Garbageman’s Story,” by Simon Paré-Poupart

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For Min Jin Lee, the process of writing fiction usually begins with a deep dive into reality. She spends years researching, traveling and interviewing people.

That process underscored her belief that education was a common and central value for Koreans in diaspora. But it was also a complicated value, one that often resulted in extreme competitiveness and impossible expectations.

In her new novel, “American Hagwon,” she tells the story of the Kohs, a middle-class family of five. The parents are fixated on attaining the best possible education for their children, thinking it will guarantee success and upward mobility. But when the 1997 Asian financial crisis hits, they find themselves having to start over as immigrants in America.

This week, Lee returns to “The Book Review” podcast to talk about how education and community play out across her sprawling new novel, which our critic Alexandra Jacobs said “demands to be pressed into friends’” hands.

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There are few living writers as closely associated with a genre as Stephen King is with horror. Over a career spanning more than 50 years, 70 novels and hundreds of short stories, King has terrified generations of readers with books like “Carrie,” “The Shining” and “It” while also writing across multiple genres like fantasy, science fiction and crime — producing books that resist easy categorization.

One of those is “The Talisman,” the 1984 fantasy novel King co-wrote with the author Peter Straub (“Ghost Story”). It follows a 12-year-old named Jack Sawyer who discovers that he can move between our world and a parallel one called the Territories. Seventeen years later, King and Straub returned to Jack in the sequel “Black House.” They always intended to write one more book together.

Straub died in 2022, before they could. But King is now publishing that third novel in the series, “Other Worlds Than These,” with Straub still credited as his co-author. The book comes out Oct. 6. To write it King has returned not only to the world they created together but also to Straub’s writing itself, rereading his old friend’s work and trying to channel his voice on the page. In it, Jack Sawyer is much older. And the new book, like “Black House” before it, incorporates King’s epic, sprawling Dark Tower series. Part of the story is also inspired by the crimes of the 1950s mass murderer, Charles Starkweather.

This week, King joins the “Book Review” podcast to talk about finishing the series without Straub, their decades-long friendship and collaboration, his resistance to being defined solely as a horror writer and why, after more than half a century of published books, he still feels compelled to chase the next story.

Books Mentioned on This Episode:

• “The Talisman,” by Stephen King and Peter Straub
• “Black House,” by Stephen King and Peter Straub
• “Other Worlds Than These,” by Stephen King and Peter Straub
• “Ghost Story,” by Peter Straub
• “The Hero’s Journey,” by Joseph Campbell
• “Redheaded Peckerwood,” by Christian Patterson
• “The Gunslinger,” by Stephen King
• “The Eyes of the Dragon,” by Stephen King
• “The Stand,” by Stephen King
• “The Dead Zone,” by Stephen King
• “Firestarter,” by Stephen King
• “Mr. Mercedes,” by Stephen King
• “Survivor Type,” from “Skeleton Crew,” by Stephen King
• “Deliverance,” by James Dickey
• “To the White Sea,” by James Dickey
• “Robinson Crusoe,” by Daniel Defoe
• “Dune,” by Frank Herbert
• “Floating Dragon,” by Peter Straub

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Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

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Credits

The “Book Review” podcast is hosted byand produced by,and. The show was mixed by Pedro Rosado.

Special thanks toand.

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Paul Yoon’s new novel, “Etna,” follows a haunted, battle-scarred war veteran who wants desperately to go home. He also happens to be a dog — a mixed-breed shepherd trained to sniff out bombs for an unnamed military in the throes of an unnamed conflict — and he has no idea where he is anymore, or if his old farm is even still standing after so much violence. Undeterred, he ventures into the great unknown, to somehow find his way back.

The result is a powerful story about survival, the brutal cost of war and what it means to step forward after calamity.

On this episode of the Book Review Book Club, the host MJ Franklin discusses the novel with his colleagues Elisabeth Egan and Scott Heller. You can follow along, and add your own comments to the discussion here.

Other books (and poems, and a movie) mentioned in this episode:

• The “Odyssey”
• The work of E.E. Cummings
• The film “A Dog’s Purpose,” directed by Lasse Hallström (adapted from W. Bruce Cameron’s novel, also named “A Dog’s Purpose”)
• “The Vulnerables,” by Sigrid Nunez
• “The Eyes and the Impossible,” by Dave Eggers
• “Angel Down,” by Daniel Kraus
• “Marley & Me,” by John Grogan
• “Flush,” by Virginia Woolf
• “Doggerel,” by Reginald Dwayne Betts
• “Dog Show,” by Billy Collins
• “Deaf Republic,” by Ilya Kaminsky
• “An Immense World,” by Ed Yong
• “Station Eleven,” by Emily St. John Mandel
• “The Road,” by Cormac McCarthy

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Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

We Want to Hear From You

We would love to hear your thoughts about this episode, and about the Book Review’s podcast in general. You can send them to thebookreview@nytimes.com.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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MJ Franklin is in the host chair this week, in for Gilbert Cruz. MJ spoke with New York Times book critic Dwight Garner about Marlon James’s new novel, “The Disappearers.” Dwight recently reviewed the book, calling it "the novel of the decade, if not the century." With praise like that, the review itself has become a topic of conversation. Dwight talks about the novel, the moment he realized it was a masterpiece and, more broadly, his approach to criticism.

We also have a wide-ranging conversation with John Green, the best-selling author. Green is known for his young adult novels, but he makes his adult-fiction debut with “Hollywood, Ending.” We discuss the book, fame and the titles that made an impression on him when he was young.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

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