***This episode contains discussion around death and bereavement - we advise listening with caution or skipping this episode if those topics wouldn’t be right for you right now***

It’s a New Year and our first STACK of the year is here. We’re a firm believer in the power of books to change lives, but which ones specifically? We’re also virtual this episode, hot off the back of seeing Hamnet and desperate to talk about it, and we’re sharing life hacks including how to afford a New Year book haul. Plus: bao buns, surprising stats and discussing whether Stephen Sondheim is a household name.

Plus - we run through the best upcoming 2026 books to add to your TBR.

The books featured in this week’s STACK:

11.57 Solve For Happy - Mo Gawdat

14.50 Open Up - Alex Holder

18.28 East - Meera Sodha

21.06 A Heart That Works - Rob Delaney

23.56 Four Thousand Weeks - Oliver Burkeman

28.49 How Sondheim Can Change Your Life - Richard Schoch

Also featured:

Hamnet - Maggie O’Farrell

Land - Maggie O’Farrell

Hooked - Asako Yusuki

What Am I, A Deer? - Polly Barton

Vigil - George Saunders

The Things We Never Say - Elizabeth Strout

People In Love - Claire Daverley

STACK with Jake and Ella is a books podcast helping you cut through the noise to fall in love - and stay in love - with reading. Each fortnight, we’ll be sharing curated lists on a theme of the books that are worth your time.

Please follow us on your podcast player or subscribe on YouTube. Do comment and share and if you’d like to support the podcast even further, we’d love it if you could leave us a review - it’s massively helpful.

We are @stackpodcast on socials.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stackpodcast/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@stackpodcast

Please get in touch if you read any of the books from this week’s episode, or have a bookish problem for our Shelf Help section - you can literally ask us anything

STACK with Jake and Ella is an independent podcast production.

It is produced by Jake Williams and Ella Horne.

Our theme music was created by Thomas Clarke.

We’ve got our Santa hats on! This episode’s STACK is all cosy vibes for Christmas, New Year and the period in between, whatever that’s called. Jake and Ella create a stack containing crosswords, colours and predicting your own murder. Mysteries that are light on jeopardy, and won’t keep you up at night. And a listener question for the Shelf Help section takes an unexpected turn…

The books featured in this week’s STACK:

05.46 The Fellowship of Puzzle Makers - Samuel Burr

07.26 How To Solve Your Own Murder - Kristen Perrin

10.20 Shades of Grey - Jasper Fforde

12.30 All The Colours of the Dark - Chris Whitaker

15.30 The Magpie Murders - Anthony Horowitz

18.35 The Hogfather - Terry Pratchett

Also featured:

Buckeye - Patrick Ryan

Wolf Hall Trilogy - Hilary Mantel

The Eyre Affair - Jasper Fforde

The Big Over Easy - Jasper Fforde

STACK is a books podcast helping you cut through the noise to fall in love - and stay in love - with reading. Each fortnight, we’ll be sharing curated lists on a theme of the books that are worth your time.

Please follow us on your podcast player or subscribe on YouTube. Do comment and share and if you’d like to support the podcast even further, we’d love it if you could leave us a review - it’s massively helpful.

We are @stackpodcast on socials.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stackpodcast/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@stackpodcast

Please get in touch if you read any of the books from this week’s episode, or have a bookish problem for our Shelf Help section.

STACK with Jake and Ella is an independent podcast production.

It is produced by Jake Williams and Ella Horne.

Our theme music was created by Thomas Clarke.

Ella and Jake pick six tiny books that pack a weird punch, and have fun debating whether they could handle the zombie apocalypse, whether they like to know what’s going on in a book, and a man called Bigolas Dickolas.

The books featured in this week’s STACK:

3.56 Hard Copy - Fien Veldman

6.31 This Is How You Lose The Time War - Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

11.10 Heatwave - Victor Jestin

14.23 It Lasts Forever And Then It’s Over - Anna de Marcken

19.07 Second Best - David Foenkinos

21.50 Treacle Walker - Alan Garner

Also featured:

Impossible Creatures - Katherine Rundell

Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing - Matthew Perry

George Orwell’s 1984: An Audible Original adaptation

STACK is a books podcast helping you cut through the noise to fall in love - and stay in love - with reading. Each fortnight, we’ll be sharing curated lists on a theme of the books that are worth your time.

Please follow us on your podcast player or subscribe on YouTube. Do comment and share and if you’d like to support the podcast even further, we’d love it if you could leave us a review - it’s massively helpful.

We are @stackpodcast on socials.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stackpodcast/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@stackpodcast

Please get in touch if you read any of the books from this week’s episode, or have a bookish problem for our Shelf Help section.

STACK with Jake and Ella is an independent podcast production.

It is produced by Jake Williams and Ella Horne.

Our theme music was created by Thomas Clarke.