Unabridged Podcast

Welcome to Unabridged! Ashley and Jen (shown left to right in the photo) talk books, share recommendations, and celebrate all things bookish. On our blog (see our posts below!) we share bookish faves, pub day shout-outs, show notes, and book reviews.

Want to get more involved? Check out our 2022 reading challenge, join our buddy reads on Instagram, or sign up on Patreon!

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Jan 10
10 min

Five of Jen's Favorite Reads of 2021 (Part 2)

by Jen Moyers (@jen.loves.books) Oh, friends. We've come to that post that causes me so much joy and so much agony: a list of favorites. My problem is assembling books for a list. Oh no. My problem is narrowing that list because, really, I could go on forever. I'm quoting myself here, from last year's list of five (so far): "So, here's my methodology. I looked back at my monthly wrap-up posts in IG, and I ONLY allowed myself to jot down the titles of my five-star reads." Then

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Nov 24, 2021
6 min

205: L.M. Montgomery’s ANNE OF GREEN GABLES - November 2021 Book Club

For our November Unabridged Book Club pick, we had so much fun reading this classic novel, Lucy Maud Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables (Amazon | Bookshop.org). We also shared our pairings including Alan Bradley’s The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women, and Fannie Flagg’s Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man. Sara, Jen, and Ashley all have different levels of experience with this classic novel, so it was super fun discussing our personal experiences

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Sep 25, 2021
3 min

Featured Books for October 2021

October Book In October, we're so excited to be discussing Aiden Thomas's YA novel Cemetery Boys (Amazon | Bookshop.org) as both our Book Club and Buddy Read pick. We'll have two IG chats in the middle of the month, and then the episode will release on October 27th. Stay tuned to @unabridgedpod for details! Here's the synopsis: "A trans boy determined to prove his gender to his traditional Latinx family summons a ghost who refuses to leave in Aiden Thomas's paranormal YA debu

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Sep 7, 2021
4 min

Pub Day Shout-Outs! for September 7, 2021, featuring Morrow, Rooney, and Streep

by Jen Moyers (@jen.loves.books) Today is such an epic book release day that I'm afraid I can't limit myself to highlighting only three books. So, be sure to scroll to the end to check out the books I can't help shouting out. Bethany C. Morrow's So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix (Amazon | Bookshop.org) Description from Publisher: "Four young Black sisters come of age during the American Civil War in So Many Beginnings, a warm and powerful YA remix of the classic novel

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Aug 9, 2021
3 min

My Reading Challenge Made Me Do It

by Sara Voigt (@meaningfulmadness) I am so excited to talk about some of my favorite reads from my Beyond the Bookends Reading Challenge, the challenge I picked in addition to our Unabridged Reading Challenge. The thing I love about reading challenges is that they challenge (imagine that!) me to read outside of my comfort zone. My 2021 reading has gone SO much better than my 2020 reading. Here are some of my favorites from my reading challenge so far. Holly Whitaker's Quit Li

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Jul 12, 2021
7 min

Some of Ashley's Favorites of 2021 (So Far)

by Ashley Dickson-Ellison (@teachingtheapocalypse) Phew, I have read some amazing books so far this year! Every year it feels increasingly challenging to pick favorites, and that is proving to be true for 2021. I shared some favorites from my reading challenges so far in my latest Bookish Fave. Here are a few others that I have absolutely loved during the first half of 2021! This list of five favorites so far includes Kacen Callender's Felix Ever After (Amazon | Bookshop.org)

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Jun 4, 2021
3 min

Aiden Thomas's LOST IN THE NEVER WOODS - A Dark and Twisty Peter Pan Retelling

by Ashley Dickson-Ellison (@teachingtheapocalypse) In this retelling of Peter Pan, Aiden Thomas's Lost in the Never Woods (Amazon | Bookshop.org), we meet Wendy Darling as she turns 18. We quickly learn that she and her brothers disappeared five years earlier, and she was found in the woods six months later without her brothers. She has no memory of what happened during that time. In the present, she works as a volunteer at the local hospital and spends a lot of time with th

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May 3, 2021
4 min

8 Retellings of Greek Epic Poetry

by Jen Moyers (@jen.loves.books) One of the categories I've been loving for the Unabridged Podcast Reading Challenge is "Retelling of a Classic." Though I'm no expert on Greek epic poetry, I enjoy retellings of it SO. MUCH. Here are some I'd recommend: 1. Madeline Miller's The Song of Achilles - Here's my review from 2019: "I love this book SO. MUCH. Miller crafts a brilliant story rooted in mythology and in the gritty reality of love. Her interpretation of the story of Achil

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Apr 28, 2021
13 min

175: Enjoy Revisiting the Classics through Retellings

In this Unabridged podcast episode, we share some retellings of classics that we've enjoyed reading. We share our picks including Hena Khan’s More to the Story, Patricia Park’s Re Jane, Rachel Hawkins’s The Wife Upstairs. These recommendations are perfect for the retellings category on our Unabridged Reading Challenge for 2021! Bookish Check-in Ashley - Aiden Thomas’s Lost in the Never Woods (Amazon | Bookshop.org) Jen - Liz Moore’s Long Bright River (Amazon | Bookshop.org) S

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Oct 23, 2020
3 min

Samantha Silva's MR. DICKENS AND HIS CAROL - A Charming Christmas Novel

by Sara Voigt (@meaningfulmadness) Samantha Silva's Mr. Dickens and His Carol is a delightful imagining of how Charles Dickens's iconic Christmas classic, A Christmas Carol, came to be. The story follows Dickens in the weeks before Christmas as he struggles to write a Christmas-themed story to satisfy his publishers, who are dismayed at the dwindling sales of his latest book. As the pressure mounts to meet the Christmas deadline, a cast of recognizable, yet not quite totally

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Jun 24, 2020
27 min

131: 2020 Reading Challenge Check In

On this Unabridged episode, we consider where we are with our reading goals for the year, including how we're doing on the reading challenges we each selected back in January. We talk about the The Modern Mrs. Darcy Reading Challenge with @annebogel, Book Riot's 2020 Read Harder Challenge with @bookriot, and the Beat the Backlist Reading Challenge from @novelknight along with The Unread Shelf Project 2020 with @theunreadshelf. Want to listen to our original episode where we

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Jun 10, 2020
46 min

129: Re-release of Angie Thomas's THE HATE U GIVE Book Club Discussion

In light of the unjust loss of Black lives in America and of the Black Lives Matter movement, we wanted to share an episode from 2018 where, for our book club, we discussed one of our favorite YA literature books for the classroom, Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give. In the episode, we discuss the novel and share pairings including Gabrielle Union's We're Going to Need More Wine, Clemantine Wamariya and Elizabeth Weil's The Girl Who Smiled Beads: A Story of War and What Comes Aft

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Mar 18, 2020
2 min

117: The Unread Shelf with Whitney Conard - Curate that Unread Shelf and Actually Get Them Read

In this episode, we had the wonderful experience of interviewing Whitney Conard from The Unread Shelf. She joins us for our bookish check-in (we're big Camille Pagán fans!), shares the origin story of The Unread Shelf Project, and offers tips to help all of us pare down those burdensome stacks of unread books. We round out our discussion with our "Give Me One" segment, talking about our favorite teas. Bookish Check In Jen - Camille Pagán’s Forever Is the Worst Long Time (on a

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Feb 26, 2020
2 min

114: Read Alike Ideas and Lit Circles - I Think the Risk Is Worth the Reward

In this episode, we're discussing the benefits of using Read Alikes within book clubs and within the classroom. We touch on some of our favorite YA lit books, such as Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give, as well as classics like Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. We talk about strategies for making read alikes work and ways to manage the difficulties in order to reap the rewards of exploring a variety of books centering around one theme. Bookish Check In Jen - Jojo Moyes’s The Giver o

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Feb 19, 2020
2 min

113: Why Teach YA? - There's Nothing I Want More than for Kids to Love What We're Doing

In this episode, we focus on classroom teachers and talk directly about how and why we incorporated Young Adult literature into our classrooms. We talk about series we saw our students loving like Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games, Stephanie Meyer's Twilight, and Veronica Roth's Divergent, and we talk about seeing our students fall in love with books. From classics like S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders to A.S. King's Everybody Sees the Ants, we talk about using YA lit in our clas

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Jan 22, 2020
2 min

Welcome - Introduction and Overview

Just getting started with Unabridged Podcast? Welcome! We're Ashley, Jen, and Sara, and we are teachers and podcasters who are passionate about books. We have four kinds of posts here on our blog. On Mondays, we post about our Bookish Faves, on Tuesdays we do Pub Day Shout-outs, on Wednesdays our episodes drop, and on Fridays, we post book reviews. (Be on the lookout on Thursdays, too; we sometimes have an extra post then!) There are many ways to connect with us! In addition

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Nov 13, 2019
1 min

99: Debate - Classics or Not?: I Just Skipped the Scenery...and the Descriptions

What do you think of the classics? And, for that matter, how do you define classics? We take on these issues and more in today's episode, discussing the merits of Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Zora Neale Hurston, and more. Listen to the episode, and then join us on social media to let us know where YOU think about this debate. Works and Authors Mentioned Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, Emma Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, Great Expectations Ralph Ellison’s Invisible

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Oct 23, 2019
1 min

96: Update on Our Recommendations to Each Other: A Love Story . . . and Also Not

Well, we have failed at reading all of our recommendations for each other, but we had a good time with some confessions, some reflection, and some reviews of how well we know each other. In general, I'd say that we did a pretty good job recommending books for each other . . . and a pretty bad job prioritizing our TBRs. Join us on social media to share your thoughts about these books, your recommendations for each of us, and your tips for TBR prioritization! Missed out on the

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Aug 21, 2019
1 min

87: Get to Know the Hosts - A Great Story of Friendship

There's a little bit about books and a whole lot about us in this Unabridged Short episode. Learn what books we loved to teach, what scares us, and what we do outside of reading. (This is more of a stretch for some of us than others!) Feel free to share other questions for us on social media! And let us know: what's the scariest thing YOU've ever done for fun? what are your hobbies (outside of books)? what's your favorite podcast or social media follow . . . that's not book r

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Jun 26, 2019
1 min

79: Our Recommendations to Each Other - I Just Love This Book

The Unabridged crew took time in our most recent short episode (#unabridgedshorts) to recommend books to each other, which was fun . . . and a little scary! (It's weirdly vulnerable.) Check out what we chose to recommend for each other, and let us know if you have other books you think we'd would appreciate (or, of course, if you think we got something really wrong!). Jen’s Recs For Ashley - Ingrid Rojas Contreras’s Fruit of the Drunken Tree Sujata Massey’s The Widows of Mal

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