Person
Every book John Williams recommended on podcasts
John Williams’s most recommended books
- The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James
- Essays in disguise by Wilfrid Sheed
- Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood
- But Beautiful by Geoff Dyer
- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
- New Grub Street by George Gissing
- Outline by Rachel Cusk
- Under the Glacier by Halldór Laxness
- Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
- Swing Time by Zadie Smith
John Williams is a podcaster and critic who appears on The Book Review to discuss literature, reading habits, and newly published or rediscovered works. Throughout various podcast episodes, John Williams shared several book recommendations and discussed titles that caught his attention. He mentioned reading Theodore Weesner's 1972 coming-of-age novel The Car Thief after encountering the author's obituary, and he picked up Elizabeth Hardwick's late-1970s novel Sleepless Nights as an alternative reading choice. John Williams also talked about enjoying Moshin Hamid's novel Exit West, and noted that he was rereading Denis Johnson's slender and potent 1992 short story collection Jesus's Son in honor of its twenty-fifth anniversary. Additionally, he discussed reading Eileen B. Simpson's early 1980s memoir Poets in Their Youth, which led him back to Wilfrid Sheed's essay collection Essays in Disguise because it features a review of Simpson's book. Further reading discussions included Anita Brookner's novel Brief Lives and Andy Miller's book The Year of Reading Dangerously, which John Williams described as terrific. Through these discussions, John Williams provided listeners with a diverse array of literary reflections, ranging from mid-century memoirs and short fiction to contemporary novels and essay collections.
Books recommended by John Williams
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The Portrait of a Lady
The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James is a classic 1881 novel following the spirited young American heiress Isabel Archer as she navigates European society, independence, and a disastrous marriage.
Discussed“well I finished the portrait of a lady which I read pretty quickly given how big it is”
Where to get it
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Essays in disguise
Essays in Disguise by Wilfrid Sheed is a celebrated collection of literary criticism and commentary originally written for outlets like the New York Review of Books.
Recommended“what that really did though was it sent me back to one of my favorite books of all time which is Wilfred she's essay collection essays in Disguise because he has a review of simpsons's book”
Where to get it
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Priestdaddy
Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood is a sharply witty and unconventional memoir recounting the author's eccentric upbringing in the Midwest as the daughter of a married Catholic priest.
Recommended“and then I'm continuing into Patricia Lockwood's priest daddy which I mentioned on the show last week which is her Memoir about growing up with her father in the Midwest and her mother and her sister”
Where to get it
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But Beautiful
But Beautiful by Geoff Dyer is a richly imagined, critically acclaimed book about jazz that blends biography, fiction, and impressionistic criticism to capture the lives and music of legendary jazz icons.
Discussed“last week I talked about having read Jeff Dyer just richly imagined an incredibly written book about jazz called but beautiful and because of that I kind of not only listened to some of the musicians that he wrote about”
Where to get it
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Jane Eyre
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë is a celebrated Victorian novel following the turbulent life and emotional maturation of its eponymous orphaned protagonist.
Recommended“um also heard from Rachel men's um who said to both romantic and broken heart recently a little Life by Han Yan gahara um she is also an editor here at the Times um and she said I think my heart broke and reformed every 15 pages um someone else mentioned um Bob Mayo mentioned the razor's Edge and then”
Where to get it
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New Grub Street
New Grub Street is a sprawling, 550-page realist novel by George Gissing that explores the grueling economic and moral realities of the literary marketplace in late-nineteenth-century London.
Discussed“I'm reading new grub Street still which I talked about last week by George gissing but it's a 550 page novel so and it's easy to kind of pick it up”
Where to get it
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Outline
Outline by Rachel Cusk is a critically acclaimed contemporary novel known for its minimalist style and unique narrative structure where the protagonist reveals herself primarily through the stories told to her by others.
Discussed“speaking of complex women um I'm reading Rachel cusk's new novel Transit which comes out this month and it's a follow-up to her previous novel outline”
Where to get it
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Under the Glacier
Under the Glacier by Halldór Laxness is a darkly humorous novel about an emissary sent by the bishop of Iceland to investigate peculiar happenings in a remote small town.
Recommended“I finally finished do want to mention briefly again hdor laxus's novel under the glacier which is sort of linked to the other book”
Where to get it
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Wuthering Heights
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë is a classic nineteenth-century novel exploring intense, destructive passions and the complex relationships among inhabitants of the Yorkshire moors.
Recommended“viea haran andani said weaing Heights the ultimate Forbidden Love”
Where to get it
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Swing Time
Swing Time by Zadie Smith is an intricate novel that explores themes of race, class, friendship, and cultural identity through the lens of young girls dreaming of becoming tap dancers.
Discussed“I have put aside for the moment swing Time by zadee Smith which is which I'm enjoying but which is a big book”
Where to get it
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Middlemarch
Middlemarch by George Eliot is a classic Victorian novel that explores provincial life, social reform, morality, and human relationships in a fictional English town.
Discussed“well as listeners will know I have been reading and I am continuing to read Middle March by George Elliott but that will take me a bit longer”
Where to get it
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Look at me
Look at Me by Anita Brookner is a poignant psychological novel that examines loneliness, self-deception, and the quiet struggles of a perceptive young librarian trying to navigate the demands of London's social and intellectual circles.
Recommended“the non- self-reflective one is called look at me so I get it in somehow in every book I read um I want to talk about appreciation for knowing people who recommend great books because this week I'm recommending two things very highly and I would not have read them if it weren't for friends of mine who recommended them”
Where to get it
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The Bass Rock
The Bass Rock by Evie Wyld is a critically acclaimed contemporary novel that explores generations of trauma, family secrets, and the lives of women against the backdrop of the Scottish coastline.
Recommended“it's called the bass Rock by Eevee wild wld D”
Where to get it
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Hitch-22
Hitch-22 is a candid and intellectually robust memoir by the late British-American essayist and critic Christopher Hitchens, reflecting on his political evolution, literary friendships, and eventual battle with cancer.
Recommended“and the one I'm sort of the furthest into about 150 Pages or so is Christopher hitch's Memoir hitch 22 which was published in 2010 and has a little preface added a year later when he addresses his illness”
Where to get it
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The executioner's song
The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer is a sweeping, Pulitzer Prize-winning true crime masterpiece that details the final months and execution of convicted murderer Gary Gilmore in Utah, alongside the profound fallout felt by those around him.
Discussed“I picked up Norman mailer's the Executioner song for some reason I cannot believe you have not read this book”
Where to get it
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When We Cease to Understand the World
When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamín Labatut is a gripping narrative that explores the complex historical and scientific discoveries that pushed brilliant minds to the brink of madness, successfully blurring the lines between historical fact and imaginative fiction.
Recommended“I chose a book to talk about this week that is probably setting a high bar for myself because this is a very hard book to describe it's called when we cease to understand the World by Benjamin labatut who is a writer who was born in Rotterdam”
Where to get it
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The Stone Angel
On the podcast The Book Review, John Williams discussed The Stone Angel by Margaret Laurence during two different episodes in July 2024.
Discussed“this is a book called The Stone Angel by Margaret Lawrence who's a writer who I've talked about on the podcast before”
Where to get it
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Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin is a bestselling novel that follows the complex, decades-long creative and personal partnership of two friends who design video games.
Discussed“Gabrielle Zan joins us to talk about her new novel tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow which takes us inside the world of video game design through the lives of three characters”
Where to get it
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Hold still
Hold Still by Sally Mann is a 2015 memoir by the acclaimed photographer that looks back at her life, family history, and the evolution of the medium of photography.
Recommended“I'm reading a memoir by the photographer Sally man called Hold Still it was published in 2015”
Where to get it
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Jesus' son
Jesus' Son by Denis Johnson is a slender, potent 1992 collection of interconnected short stories that explores the stark and harrowing experiences of its narrator and other fringe characters.
Recommended“first on a quick note I've been rereading Dennis Johnson's Jesus's son uh a very slender but very potent collection of short stories from 1992 cuz it's celebrating its 25th anniversary”
Where to get it
The other 415 books John Williams recommended or discussed, ranked
- Latecomers by Anita Brookner
- Other People's Houses by Lore Segal
- Should you leave? by Peter D. Kramer
- So long, see you tomorrow by William Maxwell
- The debut by Anita Brookner
- The examined life by Stephen Grosz
- Breath by Tim Winton
- Destiny and power by Jon Meacham
- Fatal discord by Michael Massing
- Foe by J. M. Coetzee
- Lives Other Than My Own by Emmanuel Carrère
- Lost Children Archive by Valeria Luiselli
- NW by Zadie Smith
- Odd Woman and the City by Vivian Gornick
- The friend by Sigrid Nunez
- The Idiot by Elif Batuman
- The odd women by George Gissing
- The Sellout by Paul Beatty
- They Came Like Swallows by William Maxwell
- All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
- Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill
- I love Dick by Chris Kraus
- Play It as It Lays by Joan Didion
- Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
- Sabbath's Theater by Philip Roth
- Slade House by David Mitchell
- Something for the Pain by Gerald Murnane
- The Magician by Colm Tóibín
- The Master by Colm Tóibín
- The men in my life by Vivian Gornick
- The Orchard Keeper by Cormac McCarthy
- The shepherd's hut by Tim Winton
- Ulysses by James Joyce
- An Immense World by Ed Yong
- Grey Bees by Andrey Kurkov
- In the Houses of Their Dead - the Lincolns, the Booths, and the Spirits by Terry Alford
- Norwood by Charles Portis
- Handcuffed by Malcolm K. Sparrow
- A way of life, like any other by Darcy O'Brien
- Keep the river on your right by Tobias Schneebaum
- No One Is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood
- Riverman by Ben McGrath
- The mountain lion by Jean Stafford
- The western wind by Samantha Harvey
- Visitors by Anita Brookner
- After me comes the flood by Sarah Perry
- Killing a King by Dan Ephron
- Son of Elsewhere by Elamin Abdelmahmoud
- The Emergency by Thomas Fisher
- The fire next time by James Baldwin
- The Great Stewardess Rebellion by Nell McShane Wulfhart
- The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by Lyman Frank Annotated by L. Frank Baum
- True Grit by Charles Portis
- Trust by Hernan Diaz
- A manual for cleaning women by Lucia Berlin
- Colonia Lebarón / the Colony by Sally Denton
- Evening in paradise by Lucia Berlin
- Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
- Keats by Lucasta Miller
- Mating by Norman Rush
- Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
- Secret City by James Kirchick
- The Crane Wife by CJ Hauser
- The Foundling by Ann Leary
- The Stranger, The Plague (Coles Notes) by Albert Camus
- The War on Cops by Heather Mac Donald
- This Body I Wore by Diana Goetsch
- Tracy Flick Can't Win by Tom Perrotta
- Unwarranted by Barry Friedman
- Welcome home by Lucia Berlin
- A Heart So White by Javier Marías
- A Jest of God by Margaret Laurence
- A Legacy by Sybille Bedford
- A murder of quality by John le Carré
- A word child by Iris Murdoch
- About Alice by Calvin Trillin
- Angel by Elizabeth Taylor
- Anna Karenina by Лев Толстой
- Antisocial by Andrew Marantz
- Approaching Eye Level by Vivian Gornick
- Aristotle and Dante discover the secrets of the universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
- Back by Henry Green
- Beautiful Animals by Lawrence Osborne
- Blood, bone, and marrow by Ted Geltner
- Book of numbers by Joshua Cohen
- Braided lives by Marge Piercy
- Brief lives by Anita Brookner
- Caleb & Kate by William Steig
- Call for the Dead by John le Carré
- Calypso by David Sedaris
- Carry On by Rainbow Rowell
- Catholics by Brian Moore
- Cloudstreet by Tim Winton
- Conversations With Friends by Sally Rooney
- Death in Spring by Mercè Rodoreda
- Dirt music by Tim Winton
- Dunbar by Edward St. Aubyn
- Early work by Andrew Martin
- Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell
- Epitaph of a Small Winner by Machado de Assis
- Every song ever by Ben Ratliff
- Everywhere I look by Helen Garner
- EXIT WEST by Moshin Hamid
- Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff
- Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin
- Ghost Light by Frank Rich
- Grendel by John Gardner
- H Is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald
- Heavy by Kiese Laymon
- Her First American by Lore Segal
- Here by Richard McGuire
- Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
- In Trouble Again by Redmond O'Hanlon
- Into the heart of Borneo by Redmond O'Hanlon
- Island Home by Tim Winton
- Jack Robinson by Jack Robinson
- James Merrill by Langdon Hammer
- Kokoro by 夏目漱石
- Leo Africanus by Amin Maalouf
- Life by Unknown
- Life Into Art by Langdon Hammer
- Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez
- Madness, Rack, and Honey by Mary Ruefle
- Man At the Helm by Nina Stibbe
- Minor characters by Joyce Johnson
- Miss Lonelyhearts by Nathanael West
- Mitz by Sigrid Nunez
- Money by Martin Amis
- Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
- Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor
- My Brilliant Friend by Chiara Lagani
- My private property by Mary Ruefle
- Nada by Carmen Laforet
- Niels Lyhne by Jens Peter Jacobsen
- Night Boat To Tangier by Kevin Barry
- Night Shift by Stephen King
- Now Beacon, Now Sea by Christopher Sorrentino
- Our spoons came from Woolworths by Barbara Comyns
- Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
- Poets in their youth by Eileen B. Simpson
- Pretty deadly by Joe Schreiber
- Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
- Ralph Waldo Emerson: Selected Essays, Lectures and Poems by Ralph Waldo Emerson
- Rebel Yell by S. C. Gwynne
- Role Models by John Waters
- Saturday Night and Sunday Morning by Alan Sillitoe
- Shyness and Dignity by Dag Solstad
- Sleepless Nights by Elizabeth Hardwick
- Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
- Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
- Tamarisk row by Gerald Murnane
- Tell the wolves I'm home by Carol Rifka Brunt
- The Anatomy Lesson by Philip Roth
- The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch
- The Bridegroom Was a Dog by Yōko Tawada
- The car thief by Theodore Weesner
- The child that books built by Francis Spufford
- The cost of living by Deborah Levy
- The Dog of the South by Charles Portis
- The Driftless Area by Tom Drury
- The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
- The end of vandalism by Tom Drury
- The evenings by Gerard Reve
- The Ghost Writer by Philip Roth
- The Good Story by J. M. Coetzee
- The hack by Wilfrid Sheed
- The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
- The Happiness of Getting it Down Right by Frank O'Connor
- The Life You Save May Be Your Own by Paul Elie
- The love object by Edna O’Brien
- The man who loved children by Christina Stead
- The missing of the Somme by Geoff Dyer
- The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
- The motherless oven by Rob Davis
- The Nun. by Diderot. Translated from the French. ... of 2; Volume 1 by Denis Diderot
- The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean
- The passion by Jeanette Winterson
- The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith
- The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham
- The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
- The Risk Pool by Richard Russo
- The road from Coorain by Jill Ker Conway
- The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood
- The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert
- The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carré
- The Temple of the Golden Pavilion by 三島由紀夫
- The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough, Colleen McCullough
- The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell
- The Time of the Doves by Mercè Rodoreda
- The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
- The undoing project by Michael Lewis
- The Watchtower by Elizabeth Harrower
- The year of reading dangerously by Andy Miller
- These possible lives by Fleur Jaeggy
- Train dreams by Denis Johnson
- Travels with Lizbeth by Lars Eighner
- We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
- Wedding toasts I'll never give by Ada Calhoun
- Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead by Barbara Comyns
- Will and Testament by Vigdis Hjorth
- Written on the Body by Jeanette Winterson
- Zuckerman unbound by Philip Roth
- 2666 by Roberto Bolaño
- A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James
- A childhood, the biography of a place by Harry Crews
- A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
- A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
- A great reckoning by Louise Penny
- A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman
- A time to be born by Dawn Powell
- A Woman Like Her by Sanam Maher
- Absolute Beginners by Colin MacInnes
- Aftermath by Rachel Cusk
- All Dressed in White by Mary Higgins Clark
- All My Puny Sorrows by Miriam Toews
- All things cease to appear by Elizabeth Brundage
- Amsterdam by Ian McEwan
- An Island by Karen Jennings
- And Then All Hell Broke Loose by Richard Engel
- Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans De Waal
- Atonement by Ian McEwan
- Autumn by Ali Smith
- Ballad Of The Sad Cafe by Carson McCullers
- Beautiful Boy by David Sheff
- Belladonna by Daša Drndić
- Beowulf by Seamus Heaney
- Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
- Big Bad Love by Larry Brown
- Black Boy by Richard Wright
- Black No More by George Schuyler
- Bringing Down the Colonel by Patricia Miller
- But What If We're Wrong? by Chuck Klosterman
- Child of God by Cormac McCarthy
- Citizens by Simon Schama
- City on fire by Garth Risk Hallberg
- Complete poems and selected letters by John Keats
- Dark matter and the dinosaurs by Lisa Randall
- Darwin's dangerous idea by Daniel C. Dennett
- Death and the Penguin by Andreĭ Kurkov
- Deep in a Dream by James Gavin
- Deep state by Chris Hauty
- Despair by Vladimir Nabokov
- Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee
- Dispatches by Michael Herr
- Elmet by Fiona Mozley
- Emerson's Ghosts by Randall Fuller
- End of Watch by Stephen King
- Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
- Every Man for Himself and God Against All by Werner Herzog
- Exit West by Mohsin Hamid
- Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli
- Family of Origin by CJ Hauser
- Find Her by Lisa Gardner
- Frederick Douglass by David W. Blight
- From Battlefields Rising by Randall Fuller
- Future Sex: A New Kind of Free Love by Emily Witt
- Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
- Giving Up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel
- Go Set A Watchman by Harper Lee
- Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
- Good morning, midnight by Jean Rhys
- Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
- Great Granny Webster by Caroline Blackwood
- Grunt by Mary Roach
- He Held Radical Light by Christian Wiman
- Heaven's Bankers by Harris Irfan
- Hi Five by Joe Ide
- High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
- Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi
- Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss
- Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner
- How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr Seuss
- If Beale Street Could Talk by James Baldwin
- If I Ran the Circus by Dr. Seuss
- In Other Words by Jhumpa Lahiri
- Independent people by Halldór Laxness
- Intimations by Alexandra Kleeman
- Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
- Jack Maggs by Peter Carey
- Jackpot by Michael Mechanic
- Jesus by A. N. Wilson
- Kafka Was the Rage by Anatole Broyard
- Killer on the Road by Ginger Strand
- Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann
- Killing Reagan by Bill O'Reilly
- Knowing your value by Mika Brzezinski
- Leave It to Psmith by P. G. Wodehouse
- Life for Sale by 三島由紀夫
- Live From New York by Tom Shales
- Living on Paper by Iris Murdoch
- Looking for The Stranger by Alice Kaplan
- Love and trouble by Claire Dederer
- Masks by Fumiko Enchi
- Miles, the autobiography by Miles Davis
- Mishima by Marguerite Yourcenar
- My bright abyss by Christian Wiman
- My Utmost by Macy Halford
- My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers
- Negroland by Margo Jefferson
- Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
- No Longer Human by 太宰 治
- Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
- Notes on a Scandal by Zoë Heller
- Odyssey : a Father, a Son and an Epic by Daniel Mendelsohn
- On Beauty by Zadie Smith
- On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin
- On the Road by Jack Kerouac
- Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy
- Patrimony by Philip Roth
- Peril by Bob Woodward, Robert Costa
- Persuasion by Jane Austen
- Portrait of a Novel by Michael Gorra
- Preparation for the Next Life by Atticus Lish
- Radetzky march by Joseph Roth
- Richard Nixon : the life by John A. Farrell
- Rules for a Knight by Ethan Hawke
- Schlump by Hans Herbert Grimm
- Shadowbahn by Steve Erickson
- Shot in the heart by Mikal Gilmore
- Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward
- Smile by Roddy Doyle
- Speedboat by Renata Adler
- The 500 hats of Bartholomew Cubbins by Dr. Seuss
- The Adversary by Emmanuel Carrère
- The art of rivalry by Sebastian Smee
- The Bell by Iris Murdoch
- The Blind Side by Michael Lewis
- The Book That Changed America by Randall Fuller
- The butcher boy by Patrick McCabe
- The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss
- The Chestnut Man by Soren Sveistrup
- The color of water by James McBride
- The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West
- The Days of Abandonment by Elena Ferrante
- The Dirt by Neil Strauss
- The Diviners by Margaret Laurence
- The Emperor of Ice-Cream by Brian Moore
- The Emperor's Tomb by Joseph Roth
- The Empty Bed by Nina Sadowsky
- The end of your life book club by Will Schwalbe
- The Evolution of Beauty by Richard O. Prum
- The Ginger Man by J. P. Donleavy
- The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
- The Golden Bowl by Henry James
- The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
- The Good Lord Bird by James McBride
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- The Guilty by David Baldacci
- The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
- The ice palace by Tarjei Vesaas
- The Interestings by Meg Wolitzer
- The Kingdom by Emmanuel Carrère
- The Kingdom of Speech by Tom Wolfe
- The Kiss by Kathryn Harrison
- The Known World by Edward P. Jones
- The Liars' Club by Mary Karr
- the lonely passion of judith hearne by Brian Moore
- The Lorax by Dr. Seuss
- The lost weekend by Charles Jackson
- The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
- The Man Who Invented Motion Pictures by Paul Fischer
- The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner
- The Master and Margarita by Михаил Афанасьевич Булгаков
- The Mistletoe Promise by Richard Paul Evans
- The Nix by Nathan Hill
- The Overstory by Richard Powers
- The Peanuts Papers by Andrew Blauner
- The perfect horse by Elizabeth Letts
- The Pharaoh’s Secret by Clive Cussler
- THE PLAGUE by Albert Camus
- The Plot Against America by Philip Roth
- The Possessed by Elif Batuman
- The prelude by William Wordsworth
- The Princess Diarist by Carrie Fisher
- The Red Rising Series Collection 5 Books Set by Pierce Brown (Red Rising, Golden Son, Morning Star, Iron Gold, Dark Age) by Pierce Brown
- The Room Where It Happened by John R. Bolton
- The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolaño
- The setting sun by 太宰 治
- The Sneetches by Seuss Dr
- The Stand by Stephen King
- The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
- The Tin Woodman of Oz by L. Frank Baum
- The Trayvon Generation by Elizabeth Alexander
- The Vet's Daughter by Barbara Comyns
- The War for Gloria by Atticus Lish
- The White Album by Joan Didion
- The Wife by Meg Wolitzer
- The wolves by Alex Berenson
- The Woman in the dunes by Abe Kōbō
- The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
- There There by Tommy Orange
- Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates by Brian Kilmeade
- Ties by Domenico Starnone
- Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John le Carré
- Transit by Rachel Cusk
- Tricky Twenty-Two (Stephanie Plum Series #22) by Janet Evanovich
- Turning the tables by Teresa Giudice
- Tweak by Nic Sheff
- Two by Two by Nicholas Sparks
- Uncertain Ground by Phil Klay
- Undue Influence by Anita Brookner
- Unreliable memoirs by Clive James
- Warheart (Sword of Truth) by Terry Goodkind
- Washington Square by Henry James
- We Were Eight Years in Power by Ta-Nehisi Coates
- What we do now by Dennis Loy Johnson
- White Teeth by Zadie Smith
- Wildlife by Richard Ford
- Winter by Ali Smith
- Working by Studs Terkel
- Written Lives by Javier Marías
- Yertle the Turtle and Other Stories by Dr. Seuss
- You too can have a body like mine by Alexandra Kleeman
- Youtubers by Chris Stokel-Walker
- Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig
Books John Williams wrote
Appearances
Other mentions (205: passing, ad reads, own books), the 30 most recent
Passing The case against sugar
“the Gary tab's book the case against sugar that you were talking about earlier on the podcast uh makes its debut on in non-fiction at number 15”
Passing The true detective
“in researching this I I came up with this incredible letter that Weisner wrote to the book review in 198 7 when we reviewed another novel of his called The True Detective”
Passing The Rain in Portugal
“number 15 um Billy Collins former poet laurate his new collection the reign in Portugal hits the list at number 15”
Passing My own words
“and then at number 12 a book that is pretty wide ranging Ruth Bader Ginsburg the the Supreme Court Justice an anthology called my own words”
Passing The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
“I read um the prime of Miss Jean Brody earlier this year a couple years ago I went on a kick”
Passing Memento Mori
“I'm GNA add that to the read MTO Mor that's my other which that one has again”
Passing The Portrait of a Lady
“she says that the inspiration for this book was Michael gora's book A couple of years ago about Henry James's portrait of a lady”
Passing Nausea
“I reread parts of it for this review and I also reread some of two other books that I really love that are uh I think antecedents of it which are sarts nausea and dust's Notes from Underground”
Passing Notes from Underground
“I reread parts of it for this review and I also reread some of two other books that I really love that are uh I think antecedents of it which are sarts nausea and dust's Notes from Underground”
Passing Moth Smoke
“someone here at the Times particularly recommended moth smoke which maybe was his first”
Passing The Magic Mountain
“I at first I thought about um The Magic Mountain which I haven't read so I picked these sort of big ambitious things”
Passing Freedom
“it's like in Jonathan fransen's Freedom there was a bit about a guy who used to be a rock star”
Passing The Power Broker
“this isn't going to turn into my power broker”
Passing The Power Broker
“I'm going to go ahead and spoil the power broker now”
Passing The Sellout
“so in America you have the the comedies that are scathing about race like the sellout or going all the way back to Huck fin”
Passing Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
“so in America you have the the comedies that are scathing about race like the sellout or going all the way back to Huck fin”
Passing Autumn
“Autumn came out last year”
Passing Travels with Charley
“the title is a nod to John Steinbeck's Travels With Charlie which was a travel log with his dog”
Passing The emissary
“it's a 60 page essentially long short story by a Japanese writer named Yoko toada called the bridegroom was a dog... our listeners might remember that last week parl seel one of our critics talked about reviewing Tat's newest novel which is called the Emissary”
Passing Finnegans Wake
“if he chooses Finnegan's wake next that's it might happen”
Passing Slaughterhouse-Five
“one was the scene in slaughterhouse 5 where he gets into the car to drive”
Passing Catch-22
“and then the other one was in catch too when hungry”
Passing The Paris spy
“so we've got at number 14 the Paris spy by Susan Elia mcneel”
Passing The Good Daughter
“at number seven another debut to the list but not by debut author by the very familiar name to the list Karen Slaughter has the good daughter”
Passing The Last Tudor
“and then another recurring best-selling author Philip a Gregory has a new book The Last tutor at number six”
Passing Barely legal
“two men Stuart Woods also a familiar name on the list and a co-writer Parnell Hall have a new book called barely legal”
Passing Any Dream Will Do: A Novel
“and then at number one again another frequent bestselling author Debbie momer has a new book called Any Dream Will Do”
“what's interesting is that Neil Degrassi Tyson who had been knocked off the top of the list is back up at number one with astrophysics for people in a hurry”
Passing Why Buddhism is True
“and then at number four the only debut to the list is by Robert Wright and it is the new book why Buddhism is true”
Passing She wore a yellow ribbon
“he left the hotel and walked to a cinema Where She Wore a Yellow Ribbon was playing”