The Worst Bestsellers

The Worst Bestsellers episodes:

• 04.22.2024

  Episode 239 – Ice Planet Barbarians

    Horny dragons were fun, but we’ve moved on. Onto another planet, actually. Lily Sparks, author of The Merciless King of Moore High, joined us to discuss Ice Planet Barbarians by Ruby Dixon. Upload this episode directly to your alien translator...

  
• 04.08.2024

  Episode 238 – Fourth Wing

  Y’all horny for some dragons? We forged a soul bond with comedian, writer, and Scary Mommy Sarah Aswell by reading Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros together. Listen to this episode while pondering ways to legally murder your classmates! Content warning: Here there...

  
• 03.25.2024

  Episode 237 – This Present Darkness

    The devil made us read This Present Darkness by Frank Peretti. Fortunately, we were #blessed to be joined by Izzy Wasserstein, author of These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart, who helped safely guide us through this Christian thriller. Listen to...

  
• 03.13.2024

  Episode 236 – Icebreaker

  Ice, ice, baby! Annie Cardi, author of Red, returned to the podcast to discuss the sexy skater Booktok sensation Icebreaker by Hannah Grace. Join us as we skate back to college and dirty talk our way into the Olympics! Content warning:...

  
• 02.26.2024

  Episode 235 – Sanctuary

    Nora Roberts Month continues! Heidi and Emily from Romancing the Shelf podcast returned and took us back to the 90s with the vintage romantic thriller Sanctuary. Sadly, this book has zero plates of casual pasta but it does have at...

  
• 02.12.2024

  Episode 234 – Nightwork

  Our Lady Nora Roberts has written a book about a handsome criminal who admires good architecture and casual pasta? We’re so back. Our friend and Nora Roberts expert Christine has returned to discuss Nightwork with us. Listen to this episode...

  
• 12.18.2023

  Episode 233 – Bests of 2023

  Once again, we’ve managed to sneak in a few good books this year! Here are our favorite books we read in 2023 (regardless of publication year. Long live backlist titles!) Footnotes: Boston Globe’s Best Books of 2023 (featuring Renata’s picks for middle...

  
• 12.04.2023

  Episode 232 – The Woman In Me

  We finished our adventures with the Time Traveler’s Wife but decided to linger in the 2000s for awhile longer. Friend of the Show (and the Internet’s Best Friend) Margaret H. Willison joined us to discuss Britney Spears’s memoir The Woman In...

  
• 11.20.2023

  Episode 231 – The Time Traveler’s Wife

  We held our annual Patreon Choice poll and our Beloved Patrons chose to send us back in time to 2003 with The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. Since the book is prominently set in Chicago, we were #blessed to be...

  
• 11.06.2023

  Episode 230 – The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

    A cautionary tale: too many people complained about this book online so we were dumped into an arena and forced to publicly defend it to the death. Mackenzi Lee, author of many Best Bestselling books including The Gentleman’s Guide to...

  
• 10.23.2023

  Episode 229 – Practical Magic

  Spooky season is here, so we were joined by Lily Sparks, author of the Teen Killers Club trilogy (including the latest book, Teen Killers at Large) and the upcoming The Merciless King of Moore High. We got witchy with the...

  
• 10.09.2023

  Episode 228 – Go Set A Watchman

  We just wrapped up Banned Books Week in the USA, a time to celebrate our freedom to read and also to speak up about book challenges! We were joined by Jen and Dan, the hosts of the Banned Camp podcast,...

  
• 09.25.2023

  Episode 227 – Crave

  It’s our 9th podiversary! We’ve run out of Stephenie Meyer books so we decided to have our OG guest Carrie return to check out a series whose marketing team would certainly love for us to think it was written by...

  
• 09.11.2023

  Episode 226 – Anne of Green Gables

  We’re topping off this year’s Flashback Summer with a pair of red–some would say auburn–braids. We were joined by Hannah and Marcelle, the cohosts of Witch, Please and Material Girls, to discuss Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery....

  
• 08.28.2023

  Episode 225 – The Secret at Solaire

  For Flashback Summer we decided to get away from it all with a visit to an exclusive desert spa. Unfortunately, the spa was plagued with black widow spiders, blackmailers, and other concerns. Fortunately, Kristin, the host of the Kristin Sleuth...

  
• 08.14.2023

  Episode 224 – Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging

    Breaking Flashback Summer News: in the title of the book Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging by Louise Rennison, “Angus” refers to the cat! Renata was almost as excited about this fact as she was about convincing JJ, aka S. Jae-Jones,...

  
• 07.31.2023

  Episode 223 – Anastasia Krupnik

  For this Flashback Summer episode, the Bellwether Friends Anna & Alene joined Renata to discuss Anastasia Krupnik by Lois Lowry. Sadly, Kait had to miss this one because she was busy shopping for her new poetry outfit, which would make...

  
• 07.17.2023

  Episode 222 – Trixie Belden

    Were you looking for sound medical advice to treat snakebites and rabies? Well, we do not recommend consulting Trixie Belden #1: The Secret of the Mansion by Julie Campbell for first aid training. However, we had a great time talking...

  
• 07.03.2023

  Episode 221 – Help! I’m Trapped In My Teacher’s Body

    Help! We’re trapped in the bodies of millennial podcasters! Andrew and Craig from the Overdue podcast joined us to discuss the classic switcheroo tale Help! I’m Trapped In My Teacher’s Body by Todd Strasser. Listen to this episode while your...

  
• 06.20.2023

  Episode 220 – Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret

    It’s–hey, calm down, no, put down your pitchforks, we’re not calling Judy Blume a “worst” bestseller! Absolutely not, just, please, let me finish this intro–it’s Flashback Summer! The time when we chill out and revisit childhood favorites, even when they...

  
• 06.05.2023

  Episode 219 – Without You

  Hey, we’ll be honest: we kind of phoned this one in. On a landline. You screened it? On your answering machine? Haha, a topical reference. See, we read Without You: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and The Musical Rent by...

  
• 05.22.2023

  Episode 218 – Love, Pamela

  Pamela Anderson: model, actress, activist…poet. Dame Karen Corday (of Two Bossy Dames and elsewhere on the internet!) joined us to read Love, Pamela, which…we kinda loved. Join us as we revisit the 90s with increased feminist rage! Content warning: Child abuse/child sexual abuse,...

  
• 05.08.2023

  Episode 217 – Spare

    As Americans, it’s our right to not pay attention to the British royal family. However, we’re waiving that right in order to read Spare by Prince Harry. We were thrilled to be joined by Dame Sophie of Two Bossy Dames–even...

  
• 04.24.2023

  Episode 216 – The Other Boleyn Girl

  Divorced, beheaded, subjected to an extremely long and boring work of historical fiction. Ann Foster from Vulgar History joined us to discuss The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory. We were glad for Ann’s expertise, because now we now that...

  
• 04.10.2023

  Episode 215 – Beauty Fades, Dumb Is Forever

  Did you read Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus and think, “This could really use more victim blaming?” If so: have we got a book for you! Kristen and Jolenta from How To Be Fine (and By the...

  
• 03.27.2023

  Episode 214 – Corinne

  We got tired of waiting for Stephenie Meyer’s latest book, so we checked out a book that some book bloggers are saying Stephenie Meyer wrote. Corinne is written by Rebecca Morrow, whose author bio simply states, “Rebecca Morrow is a...

  
• 03.13.2023

  Episode 213 – It Ends With Us

  Dear Ellen, our friend Vanessa from the podcast Hot and Bothered flew in from Plethora, Maine to discuss Colleen Hoover’s It Ends With Us. Millions of BookTokkers can’t be wrong…can they? Listen to this episode in Boston, where everything is...

  
• 02.27.2023

  Episode 212 – The Last Boyfriend

  Although we had to check out of the real life Inn BoonsBoro, we were able to return there through the power of fiction. We read the second book in the Inn BoonsBoro trilogy, The Last Boyfriend by Nora Roberts, with...

  
• 02.20.2023

  Episode 211.5 – BONUS – Inn BoonsBoro

    Thanks to our wonderful Patreon Patrons, we recently traveled to Nora Roberts’ bed and breakfast in Maryland, Inn BoonsBoro, along with our Resident Nora Roberts Expert, Christine, and Resident Robe Expert, Nicole! Please enjoy this bonus episode where the four...

  
• 02.13.2023

  Episode 211 – The Next Always

  It’s our first episode of the year and we’re already longing to get away from it all. So we were joined by Heidi and Emily of the Romancing the Shelf podcast to discuss the book The Next Always by Nora...

  
• 12.19.2022

  Episode 210 – Bests of 2022

  Another year has come and gone, and yet we’re still here, talking about books! For a treat, here are some good ones. Footnotes: Boston Globe’s Best Books of 2022 (featuring Renata’s picks for middle grade and YA!) Coming up next: A January hiatus. Happy...

  
• 12.05.2022

  Episode 209 – Eat Pray Love

  Democracy works: our Patreon patrons voted for us to read Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert, so we did. And we, along with our returning guest Meredith Goldstein, of the Boston Globe’s Love Letters, actually kinda…loved it? Sorry haters, we’ve been...

  
• 11.21.2022

  Episode 208 – Wish You Were Here

  Duarte’s been asking us for more feline representation, so we were joined by Phillip Mottaz, author of the Psychic Barber Mystery series, to read the first Mrs. Murphy mystery, Wish You Were Here by Rita Mae Brown and Sneaky Pie Brown....

  
• 11.07.2022

  Episode 207 – Blessings From The Other Side

    We reunited with Sydney and Delaney from Book Cult to discuss the cult-adjacent teachings of Sylvia Browne, as presented in her book Blessings From The Other Side: Wisdom and Comfort From the Afterlife For This Life. Play this one extra...

  
• 10.24.2022

  Episode 206 – Straight

  With Saturation Day (and spooky season!) upon us, Kait retreated to her queers-only bunker with returning guests Wren and Laura to discuss Chuck Tingle’s horror novella Straight. Listen to see what happens when three type-A planners read a book about the...

  
• 10.10.2022

  Episode 205 – L.A. Candy

  We got tired of reading reality TV memoirs, so instead we read a thinly-veiled reality television novel, L.A. Candy by Lauren Conrad. Some of us (Renata) enjoyed it more than others of us (Kait), but we were both thrilled to...

  
• 09.26.2022

  Episode 204 – Origin Stories

  It’s our 8th anniversary, and Stephenie Meyer has rudely not written anything new for us to read, so instead we decided to take a page from Diana Gabaldon and time travel through our past. We recorded this supersized Origin Stories...

  
• 09.12.2022

  Episode 203 – How To Be A Boss Bitch

    We were so thrilled to be joined by Bobby Finger, cohost of the Who? Weekly podcast and author of the upcoming book The Old Place! We read How To Be A Boss Bitch by Christine Quinn, the star of Netflix’s Selling...

  
• 08.29.2022

  Episode 202 – Miss Me With That

  We are once again returning to the rosy world of The Bachelor with our special guest Rebecca Kim Wells (@RebeccaWriting), Bachelor fan and the author of Shatter The Sky, Storm The Earth, and Briar Girls. This time we had the good sense to read...

  
• 08.15.2022

  Episode 201 – The Love Hypothesis

    Our sweet Flashback Summer is finally over and we’ve reluctantly returned to the world of modern publishing. Dee Ernst, author of Lucy Checks In, joined us to discuss the certified #BookTok sensation, The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood. We’ll unpack...

  
• 08.01.2022

  Episode #200 – 200th Episode Dazzling Spectacular

    It’s our 200th episode! Which means we have read approximately 200 books, and therefore we deserve a break. Walt, the professional DM from First Time at the Table (and husband to past podcast guest Annie Cardi), led a delightful Dungeons...

  
• 07.18.2022

  Episode 199 – The Door Into Fire

  When we asked Chris Collision (cohost of I Don’t Even Own A Television) for his Flashback Summer choice of childhood favorite book, he surprised us with a title we’d never heard of before. And then Diane Duane surprised us with...

  
• 07.04.2022

  Episode 198 – The Westing Game

    Happy Fourth of July! Buy Westing Paper Products! Flashback Summer continues with a book that’s such a stone-cold classic, we strongly advise that you not listen to this episode if you haven’t read The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin. Our...

  
• 06.20.2022

  Episode 197 – Night of The Living Dummy

    The day has arrived: Renata read her very first Goosebump novel. Courtney Summers, Best Bestselling author of books like The Project and the upcoming I’m The Girl, joined us to discuss Night of the Living Dummy by R. L. Stine....

  
• 06.06.2022

  Episode 196 – A Ring Of Endless Light

  As the earth makes another journey around the sun (allegedly), we return to Flashback Summer. Writer Annie Cardi (@AnnieCardi) returned to the show to discuss A Ring of Endless Light by Madeleine L’Engle, a formative read for many 90s children...

  
• 05.23.2022

  Episode 195 – Get Out Of Your Own Way

    Sure, we at Worst Bestsellers have read several self-help books over the years, but you may be asking: what about the men? Oh, you weren’t asking? Well, Dave Hollis (ex-husband of Rachel) is concerned, and he wrote Get Out Of...

  
• 05.09.2022

  Episode 194 – The Witcher: The Last Wish

  We asked a djinn to bring us a book that could be adapted into a video game, a Netflix series, and a podcast episode, and we got The Witcher: The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski. We were joined by Arielle to...

  
• 04.25.2022

  Episode 193 – The Maze Runner

  Every once in awhile it’s nice to read something that’s so bad it truly reminds us why we do what we do. We were joined by Rachel Andelman (of Union Comedy, Improv Boston, 2MB Studios, and Smiling Women Comix) to...

  
• 04.11.2022

  Episode 192 – Catwoman: Soulstealer

  What’s new, pussycat? We were joined by Meredith Goldstein, the Boston Globe’s Love Letters columnist and podcaster (and author of Things That Grow), to discuss Catwoman: Soulstealer by Sarah J. Maas. It’s a book about DC’s horniest character written by...

  
• 04.04.2022

  Virtual Live Show Announcement 2022

  Announcement: On Thursday, April 14th at 8PM Eastern, we’ll be doing a virtual live show presented by Porter Square Books! Our very special guest Margaret H. Willison will join us to discuss Get Out Of Your Own Way by Dave Hollis...