Don't be alarmed. It's just two dads here to engage in their yearly tradition. If you're seeing this, it's because we really love you and miss you. Enjoy!

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Hey there, it's been a minute. We've been struggling to hit a consistent schedule recently and we wanted to talk to you, our listeners, about this and how we'd like to update the show going forward to better fit in with some of the changing aspects of our lives.

We still love to read and react to these books together, and we want you to be a part of that, but we're going to shift some of our focus away from regular releases, and follow a bit more of our passions, which hopefully will include the ability to do more author interviews, like the one at the end of this episode with Intisar Khanani who we met at GenCon!

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

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Matt lacks the language of classical literature which meant his mind was measured and ripe for Zach Weinersmith's graphic novel depiction of Beowulf. EJ is bringing a bit more book-smarts to this beat, but honestly we're both just relishing in the rhythm of reading a prose as composed as this.

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

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We finally get to have a very special guest on JDRB! Cole Wehrle is here to join us as a fellow dad with a deep love for Lloyd Alexander. He loves the Chronicles of Prydain so much he made numerous overt references to it in his board game Oath, by Leder Games! But this isn't a board game show! Let's talk about the first book!

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

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A year ago we read The Skull by Jon Klassen. And in it, Jon puts forward the idea that stories are interesting to retell in just the way you remember them. So we took that as a challenge and agreed to meet up one year later to see how well we could remember the story of The Skull.

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

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Where'd all the picture books go?! Don't worry, we're done with all that heavy TEEN stuff, and we're incredibly ecstatic to talk about Carson Ellis' work. Seriously, this is maybe an all-timer...

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

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Matt read this graphic novel when he was 19 years old and boy I tell ya that's just a real wild time to be reading something like this. He decided he wanted to make his friend EJ sad for a little while, so he made him read it to. But what's it like to read it as an adult? Let's check in...

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

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This is one of those books that has some delightful merit that we just bounced off of. It's an action-filled romp through an inventive world and maybe you just shouldn't listen to books like that like they're going out business. Either way, let's pick apart what didn't work for us!

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

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It's a big ol' finish line this week at JDRB. With this episode, we will have read all of the "critical path" Avatar books and comics that we intent to read (until these cool new Roku books come out...) So let's celebrate!

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

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An episode so nice we recorded it twice! But also, JUST KIDDING, this isn't nice at all. This is possibly the most spiteful, angry book we've ever read and we loved every single page of it. What if Medieval China was just as patriarchal and oppressive, but also had giant mechs that fed off of the energy of the male pilot's female concubine? That one sentence should be enough to get you to read this book, so I don't know what you're still doing here...

If you want to chat with us and recommend books or tell us your reaction to book we've covered on the show, please email us at [email protected]

Music by Russian Baths: https://open.spotify.com/artist/07N9Lr8AIzUbDzjPXUXTLr?si=vegRwDLXSF-IpupxjuEPJQ