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Greg Cowles’s book recommendations in 2016

183 books · 44 episodes · Greg Cowles’s most recommended books, all years →

Every episode from 2016, newest first

How Octopuses Are Like Aliens

The Book Review · 2016-12-29

The Vegetarian by Han Kang · recommended · at 41:12
The Sellout by Paul Beatty · discussed · at 41:29

Michael Lewis and Arianna Huffington

The Book Review · 2016-12-16

A Child's Christmas in Wales by Dylan Thomas · recommended · at 37:38
Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh · discussed · at 40:22

The 10 Best Books of 2016

The Book Review · 2016-12-09

The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between by Hisham Matar · recommended · at 21:12
Zero K by Don DeLillo · recommended · at 31:24
Scoop by Evelyn Waugh · recommended · at 43:37

100 Notable Books of 2016

The Book Review · 2016-12-02

Happy all the time by Laurie Colwin · recommended · at 37:54

Michael Chabon Talks About 'Moonglow'

The Book Review · 2016-11-18

Night school by Lee Child · discussed · at 37:16
The Chemist by Stephenie Meyer · discussed · at 37:39
Strangers in their own land by Arlie Russell Hochschild · discussed · at 38:21
Hillbilly Elegy by J D Vance · discussed · at 39:11
Moonglow by Michael Chabon · discussed · at 41:24
War and turpentine by Stefan Hertmans · discussed · at 42:27

War Stories

The Book Review · 2016-11-11

The wrong side of goodbye by Michael Connelly · discussed · at 46:58
Gunslinger by Jeff Pearlman · discussed · at 48:24

John Grisham on 'The Whistler'

The Book Review · 2016-11-04

The Mothers by Brit Bennett · discussed · at 32:54
The Whistler by John Grisham · discussed · at 33:27
Shaken by Tim Tebow · discussed · at 33:35
A lowcountry heart by Pat Conroy · discussed · at 34:03
The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead · discussed · at 34:48
Today will be different by Maria Semple · discussed · at 34:50
Commonwealth by Ann Patchett · discussed · at 34:56
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë · discussed · at 37:27
Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys · recommended · at 37:33

Thrillers and True Crime

The Book Review · 2016-10-29

Swing Time by Zadie Smith · discussed · at 36:45

The Rise of Hitler

The Book Review · 2016-10-14

Chronicles by Bob Dylan · discussed · at 53:15
War and turpentine by Stefan Hertmans · discussed · at 54:07

Sing for Your Life

The Book Review · 2016-10-07

Ninety-Nine Stories of God by Joy Williams · recommended · at 36:02
300 arguments by Sarah Manguso · recommended · at 37:15

American Apartheid

The Book Review · 2016-09-30

Home by Harlan Coben · discussed · at 41:18
Hero of the empire by Candice Millard · discussed · at 41:44
Old Filth by Jane Gardam · discussed · at 44:45

Simon Schama's 'The Face of Britain'

The Book Review · 2016-09-23

Nutshell by Ian McEwan · discussed · at 37:58
Commonwealth by Ann Patchett · discussed · at 38:05
Wisdom from the Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben · discussed · at 39:13
Today will be different by Maria Semple · discussed · at 41:36
The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between by Hisham Matar · discussed · at 42:04
Reputations by Juan Gabriel Vásquez · discussed · at 43:05

Maureen Dowd on Clinton and Trump

The Book Review · 2016-09-16

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles · discussed · at 34:43
Here I Am by Jonathan Safran Foer · discussed · at 34:53
Love Warrior by Glennon Doyle Melton · discussed · at 35:33
The Red Bandanna (Young Readers Adaptation) by Tom Rinaldi · discussed · at 36:45
Best. State. Ever by Dave Barry · discussed · at 37:05
Razor Girl by Carl Hiaasen · discussed · at 37:09
The Pigeon Tunnel by John le Carré · discussed · at 37:23
Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly · discussed · at 37:27
Yabo by Alexis De Veaux · discussed · at 41:14
The lonely city by Olivia Laing · discussed · at 41:58

Inside The New York Times Book Review: Mark Thompson's 'Enough Said'

The Book Review · 2016-09-09

Washington Square by Henry James · recommended · at 45:17

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘ADHD Nation’

The Book Review · 2016-08-26

There is simply too much to think about by Saul Bellow · discussed · at 42:12

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘I Contain Multitudes’

The Book Review · 2016-08-19

So long, see you tomorrow by William Maxwell · discussed · at 36:57
Herzog by Saul Bellow · discussed · at 37:19
Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill · discussed · at 39:09
Last things by Jenny Offill · discussed · at 39:37

Inside The New York Times Book Review: Megan Abbott’s ‘You Will Know Me’

The Book Review · 2016-07-29

The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware · discussed · at 39:05
So long, see you tomorrow by William Maxwell · discussed · at 42:21

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘We Are Not Such Things’

The Book Review · 2016-07-22

The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford · discussed · at 41:53
Miami and the siege of Chicago by Norman Mailer · discussed · at 42:28
James Baldwin: Collected Essays (LOA #98) by James Baldwin · discussed · at 43:11
Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe · discussed · at 43:33

Inside The New York Times Book Review: The Life of Helen Gurley Brown

The Book Review · 2016-07-15

Belgravia by Julian Fellowes · discussed · at 34:41
Magic by Danielle Steel · discussed · at 34:56
Bush by Jean Edward Smith · discussed · at 35:04
Bobby Kennedy by Larry Tye · discussed · at 35:18
Seinfeldia by Jennifer Keishin Armstrong · discussed · at 35:22
The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford · discussed · at 38:18
Collected Poems by Adrienne Rich · discussed · at 38:24
Of Woman Born by Adrienne Rich · discussed · at 39:26

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘You’ll Grow Out of It’

The Book Review · 2016-07-10

Crisis of Character by Gary J. Byrne · discussed · at 36:22
If You Can Keep It by Eric Metaxas · discussed · at 36:58
House of Nails by Lenny Dykstra · discussed · at 37:24
Chaos Monkeys by Antonio Garcia Martinez · recommended · at 40:43
The Obelisk Gate by N. K. Jemisin · recommended · at 41:50

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Hogs Wild’

The Book Review · 2016-07-01

Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler · discussed · at 35:45
White trash by Nancy Isenberg · discussed · at 36:07
Paddling North by Audrey Sutherland · recommended · at 38:58

Inside The New York Times Book Review: Why Populism Now?

The Book Review · 2016-06-24

City Primeval - High Noon in Detroit by Elmore Leonard · discussed · at 48:01
Get Shorty by Elmore Leonard · discussed · at 48:25

Inside The New York Times Book Review: Susan Faludi’s ‘In the Darkroom’

The Book Review · 2016-06-17

Barkskins by Annie Proulx · recommended · at 40:41

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Before the Fall’

The Book Review · 2016-06-03

The Passage by Justin Cronin · discussed · at 38:31
Tribe by Sebastian Junger · discussed · at 40:02
Grief is the thing with feathers by Max Porter · recommended · at 41:55

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets’

The Book Review · 2016-05-27

The Fireman by Joe Hill · discussed · at 43:37
32 yolks by Eric Ripert · discussed · at 44:07
The Gene by Siddhartha Mukherjee · discussed · at 44:33
Tribes by Nina Raine · discussed · at 46:30
The Days of Abandonment by Elena Ferrante · discussed · at 48:01

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘The Romanovs’

The Book Review · 2016-05-20

Valiant ambition by Nathaniel Philbrick · discussed · at 35:55
The Big Picture by Sean Carroll · discussed · at 36:17
The Secret War by Max Hastings · discussed · at 36:53
Everything you know by Zoë Heller · recommended · at 38:51

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘The Romanovs’

The Book Review · 2016-05-20

Valiant ambition by Nathaniel Philbrick · discussed · at 36:09

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘The Gene’

The Book Review · 2016-05-13

Grit by Angela Duckworth · discussed · at 38:43
The Days of Abandonment by Elena Ferrante · discussed · at 40:39
Before the Fall by Noah Hawley · recommended · at 41:04

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Pumpkinflowers’

The Book Review · 2016-05-06

Zero K by Don DeLillo · recommended · at 52:42
Everybody's Fool by Richard Russo · recommended · at 54:28

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Listen, Liberal’

The Book Review · 2016-04-29

My Struggle : Book 5 by Karl Ove Knausgård · discussed · at 24:20
Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld · discussed · at 25:36
Unreliable memoirs by Clive James · recommended · at 29:16
Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov · discussed · at 29:33

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Old Age: A Beginner’s Guide’

The Book Review · 2016-04-22

The Obsession by Nora Roberts · discussed · at 34:54
Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda, Jeremy McCarter · discussed · at 35:36

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘At the Existentialist Café'

The Book Review · 2016-04-15

Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly · discussed · at 35:25
The Murder of Mary Russell by Laurie R. King · discussed · at 35:45
Family jewels by Stuart Woods · discussed · at 36:03
Miller's Valley by Anna Quindlen · discussed · at 36:19
The 14th colony by Steve Berry · discussed · at 36:33
The Beast by J. R. Ward · discussed · at 36:43
As Time Goes By by Mary Higgins Clark · discussed · at 37:06
Disrupted by Dan Lyons · discussed · at 37:15
Lab Girl by Hope Jahren · discussed · at 37:34
Becoming Grandma by Lesley Stahl · discussed · at 38:05
The third wave by Steve Case · discussed · at 38:27
The Sleep Revolution by Arianna Huffington · discussed · at 38:41
The Rainbow Comes and Goes by Anderson Cooper · discussed · at 38:52

Inside The New York Times Book Review: The Life of Louisa Adams

The Book Review · 2016-04-08

The little red chairs by Edna O'Brien · discussed · at 31:09
The Ancient Minstrel by Jim Harrison · discussed · at 31:27
Lust & wonder by Augusten Burroughs · discussed · at 33:41

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Spain in Our Hearts’

The Book Review · 2016-04-01

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson · discussed · at 39:17
The Summer Before the War by Helen Simonson · discussed · at 39:28
The Nest by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney · discussed · at 39:49
Fool Me Once by Harlan Coben · discussed · at 40:40
Back From the Dead by Bill Walton · discussed · at 41:48

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Girls and Sex’

The Book Review · 2016-03-25

Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier · discussed · at 30:12
At the Edge of the Orchard by Tracy Chevalier · discussed · at 30:32
The last runaway by Tracy Chevalier · discussed · at 30:38
Dark Promises by Christine Feehan · discussed · at 30:43
Deep blue by Randy Wayne White · discussed · at 30:48
Property of a Noblewoman by Danielle Steel · discussed · at 31:17
Private Paris by James Patterson · discussed · at 31:28
Rightful heritage by Douglas Brinkley · discussed · at 31:56

Inside The New York Times Book Review: American Eugenics

The Book Review · 2016-03-18

Clawback by J. A. Jance · discussed · at 37:45
The waters of eternal youth by Donna Leon · discussed · at 37:55
The steel kiss by Jeffery Deaver · discussed · at 38:07
Fire touched by Patricia Briggs · discussed · at 38:13
Off the Grid by C. J. Box · discussed · at 38:22
Love, loss, and what we ate by Padma Lakshmi · discussed · at 39:23
Conspiracies of the Ruling Class by Lawrence B. Lindsey · discussed · at 40:29
Smarter Faster Better by Charles Duhigg · discussed · at 40:46

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘The Profiteers’

The Book Review · 2016-03-11

A few of the girls by Maeve Binchy · discussed · at 40:11
The Gangster by Justin Scott · discussed · at 40:30
All the single ladies by Rebecca Traister · discussed · at 40:54
The legends club by John Feinstein · discussed · at 41:29
The immortal Irishman by Timothy Egan · discussed · at 42:01
American girls by Nancy Jo Sales · discussed · at 42:26
Evicted by Matthew Desmond · discussed · at 42:45
Seven Brief Lessons on Physics 8-Copy Counter Display by Carlo Rovelli · discussed · at 43:28

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘All the Single Ladies’

The Book Review · 2016-03-04

A Gathering of Shadows by V. E. Schwab · discussed · at 49:28
Wedding Cake Murder by Joanne Fluke · discussed · at 49:50
A Girl's Guide to Moving On by Debbie Macomber · discussed · at 51:12
Playing to the edge by Michael V. Hayden · discussed · at 51:33

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘A Mother’s Reckoning’

The Book Review · 2016-02-26

Midnight Sun by Jo Nesbø · discussed · at 30:31
The Widow by Fiona Barton · discussed · at 31:19
Cometh the Hour by Jeffrey Archer · discussed · at 32:14
The industries of the future by Alec Ross · discussed · at 32:44
Leonard by William Shatner · discussed · at 33:13
Conviction by Juan Martinez · discussed · at 33:24
A Mother's Reckoning by Sue Klebold · discussed · at 33:48

Inside The New York Times Book Review: Love and Death

The Book Review · 2016-02-12

Breakdown by Jonathan Kellerman · discussed · at 43:52
Brotherhood in Death by Nora Roberts · discussed · at 44:16
On my own by Diane Rehm · discussed · at 44:25
Originals by Adam Grant · discussed · at 44:25
Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell · discussed · at 45:16
Pax by Sara Pennypacker · discussed · at 46:14
Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys · discussed · at 46:24
Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys · discussed · at 46:30

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘Infinite Jest’ at 20

The Book Review · 2016-02-05

The Swans of Fifth Avenue by Melanie Benjamin · discussed · at 44:31
The Bands of Mourning by Brandon Sanderson · discussed · at 45:09
NYPD Red 4 by James Patterson · discussed · at 45:20
The only game in town by Mohamed A. El-Erian · discussed · at 45:38
Cure by Jo Marchant · discussed · at 46:04

Inside The New York Times Book Review: Bill Bryson on Britain

The Book Review · 2016-01-29

Even dogs in the wild by Ian Rankin · discussed · at 40:11
Feverborn by Karen Marie Moning · discussed · at 40:28
Warriors of the storm by Bernard Cornwell · discussed · at 40:47
Blue by Danielle Steel · discussed · at 41:12
Why the Right Went Wrong by E. J. Dionne · discussed · at 41:40
Dark Money by Jane Mayer · discussed · at 42:01
The road to Little Dribbling by Bill Bryson · discussed · at 42:32
When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi · discussed · at 42:55

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘City of Thorns’

The Book Review · 2016-01-15

The guest room by Christopher A. Bohjalian · discussed · at 32:26
Star Wars: The Force Awakens by Alan Dean Foster · discussed · at 32:44
The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins · discussed · at 34:01
Being Mortal by Atul Gawande · discussed · at 34:14
When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi · discussed · at 34:48

Inside The New York Times Book Review: ‘The Defender’

The Book Review · 2016-01-08

Binge by Tyler Oakley · discussed · at 38:21
Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff · discussed · at 38:23
H Is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald · discussed · at 38:29
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr · discussed · at 38:48
The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins · discussed · at 39:12
The Martian by Andy Weir · discussed · at 39:42
The Revenant by Michael Punke · discussed · at 39:47
Brooklyn by Colm Tóibín · discussed · at 39:54

Other mentions in 2016 (102: passing, ad reads, own books)