We're back from the Holidays. Happy New Year. We list what we think are the best books we read in 2025, which are not limited to but do include a lot published in 2025.

Christina's Books

5. Lost in the Garden by Adam Leslie

4. Blood for the Undying Throne by Sung-Il Kim, translated by Anton Hur

3. A Drop of Corruption by Robert Jackson Bennett

2. The Starving Saints by Caitlin Starling

1. The Unworthy by Agustina Bazterrica

Steph's Books

5. Full Negative by Jenn Lyons

4. The Eyes are the Best Part by Monica Kim

3. Blood for the Undying Throne by Sung-Il Kim, translated by Anton Hur

2. Mirage City by Lev AC Rosen

1. The Devils by Joe Abercrombie

Josh's books

5. The Devils by Joe Abercrombie

4. Among the Burning Flowers by Samantha Shannon

3. Full Negative by Jenn Lyons

2. The Raven's Scholar by Atonia Hodgson

1. The Incandescent by Emily Tesh

Your hosts are Steph Kingston (@StephOKingston), Christina Ladd (@christinaladd), and Joshua MacDougall (@FourofFiveWits). You can find us all on Bluesky. Our art is by Mangoyu Art (@MangoyuArt), and our music is by Bad Sparrow (@BadSparrowMusic). You can find us on BlueSky, and Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Josh and Steph discuss the lovable and tragic monsters of Joe Abercrombie's The Devils.

Your hosts are Steph Kingston (@StephOKingston), Christina Ladd (@christinaladd), and Joshua MacDougall (@FourofFiveWits). You can find us all on Bluesky. Our art is by Mangoyu Art (@MangoyuArt), and our music is by Bad Sparrow (@BadSparrowMusic). You can find us on BlueSky, and Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Big Corpo "We're your family now" Energy from Jod in these chapters as we discuss the infamous soup scene, Harrow being bone horny, and boy howdy, do we pick a lot of books with immortals who suck.

Your hosts are Steph Kingston (@StephOKingston), Christina Ladd (@christinaladd), and Joshua MacDougall (@FourofFiveWits). You can find us all on Bluesky. Our art is by Mangoyu Art (@MangoyuArt), and our music is by Bad Sparrow (@BadSparrowMusic). You can find us on BlueSky, and Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We discuss how much we love the 2nd book in @sung-il-kim.com's The Bleeding Empire series. New locations, new characters, surprising returns, and an ambitious but nerve-wracking ending are delved into here.

Your hosts are Steph Kingston (@StephOKingston), Christina Ladd (@christinaladd), and Joshua MacDougall (@FourofFiveWits). You can find us all on Bluesky. Our art is by Mangoyu Art (@MangoyuArt), and our music is by Bad Sparrow (@BadSparrowMusic). You can find us on BlueSky, and Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Happy Halloween Season. This year's scary Bookling was picked by Steph, The Eyes are the Best Part by Monika Kim. On this episode, we're rooting and feeling for the serial killer, for the most part. Be warned if you don't like eyeball stuff, this may not be the one for you.

Your hosts are Steph Kingston (@StephOKingston), Christina Ladd (@christinaladd), and Joshua MacDougall (@FourofFiveWits). You can find us all on Bluesky. Our art is by Mangoyu Art (@MangoyuArt), and our music is by Bad Sparrow (@BadSparrowMusic). You can find us on BlueSky, and Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Josh goes off on John and his old Lyctors in these middle chapters. Steph digs through the clues. Christina praises the use of asymmetrical information serving multiple twists. Ortus is the real MVP and sees the Cool S.

Your hosts are Steph Kingston (@StephOKingston), Christina Ladd (@christinaladd), and Joshua MacDougall (@FourofFiveWits). You can find us all on Bluesky. Our art is by Mangoyu Art (@MangoyuArt), and our music is by Bad Sparrow (@BadSparrowMusic). You can find us on BlueSky, and Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We discuss what is up with Ianthe, Ianthe's weird room, the unserious Emperor's decor, Harrow and John's conversation about her birth, and hints about what BoE is. We are also wistful for Harrow's door diary.

Your hosts are Steph Kingston (@StephOKingston), Christina Ladd (@christinaladd), and Joshua MacDougall (@FourofFiveWits). You can find us all on Bluesky. Our art is by Mangoyu Art (@MangoyuArt), and our music is by Bad Sparrow (@BadSparrowMusic). You can find us on BlueSky.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The paperback edition of Blood of the Old Kings by Sung-il Kim and translated by Anton Hur is out today, so we are re-releasing our interview with both of them from last year. The cast loved this book when it was originally released and found this interview to be a delight, and hope you do too. The second book Blood of the Undying Throne is out next month and we plan on covering that as well for a Bookling, so look forward to that.

On this Off the Books, we are interviewing Sung-il Kim, author of Blood of the Old Kings, and Anton Hur (Toward Eternity, transl. Blood of the Old Kings, I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki by Baek Se-Hee) to discuss Kim's book, falling empires, publishing, translations, technofeudalism, and what's next for The Bleeding Empire series.

Your hosts are Joshua MacDougall (@FourofFiveWits), Christina Ladd (@christinaladd), and Steph Kingston (@StephOKingston), and you can find us all on Bluesky. Our art is by Mangoyu Art (@MangoyuArt), and our music is by Bad Sparrow (@BadSparrowMusic). You can find us on Twitter, BlueSky, and Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.