Ep 78 CRAZY REDDIT CONFESSIONS | Reacting to Unhinged Bookish Confessions! Twilight Shame, Buried Books & Spicy Secrets

Do you have any bookish confessions that you've been holding inside, waiting for the opportunity to share with a nonjudgemental group of silly girls just here for a good time? Skeletons in your closet… bookish habits that keep you up at night…things you could never tell to your own inner circle? Well, we’re here for you. You are not alone! 

Not only do we share our own biggest bookish confessions, we also make some up about iconic book characters for you (and each other) to guess, and then react to several that we dug up from the depths of reddit and threads. 

Have you ever not read the last page of a book because you loved it so much that you didn't want it to end? Bought the e-book copy when you already own the physical? Do you rate things on Goodreads based on what others might think or say? Have you ever buried a book? Yes.. you read that right. Buried. Nothing is off the table when we’re discussing your deepest, darkest bookish secrets.

We’re bringing you all of this, a fave and fail vacation edition, and a smash or pass with some rocks and a plane.

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Check out these author interviews? ⬇️

Penn Cole talks with us about Strong Female Characters, Feminist Themes, and her debut bestselling Spark of the Everflame Series! https://youtu.be/7ukNImyoObw?si=7C3Y9kOUMN4hfcKb

We interviewed Callie Hart all about her NYT Bestseller Quicksilver! Watch it here! https://youtu.be/CED5s7qDBdQ?si=8xtIRO1IzX6Rsld4

Check the official Author Interview with Lindsay Straube of Split or Swallow! Now a Barnes & Noble & Amazon best seller titled: Kiss of the Basilisk!  https://youtu.be/fknhocSNIKM

Need more ACOTAR in your life? Cook your way through Velaris with the help of Chelsea Cole and her cookbook A Feast of Thorns & Roses. Check out our author interview here! https://youtu.be/fjzmqd-x3OA?si=kNJ4D9cxvUjhp-Ik

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Besties and the Books!
• 2:25 Favs and Fail our Summer Vacation
• 15:12 Book Character’s Confession
• 17:40 Reacting to Reddit and Threads Bookish Confessions
• 50:15 Unhinged Smash or Pass

Transcript

0:00

I looked up a summary, then marked it as red. Anyway, you buried six library books in your neighbor's yard. At one point, he grows a rock beard. Apparently, it's more common than I thought. Grab the headboard. I feel that. We all[Music] Hey everyone, I'm Ashley. And I'm Liz and welcome to the Besties in the Books podcast. Hey, what's up? What's up? So, today we've got a spoiler-free episode for you where we're going to be talking all about and responding to bookish confessions. Slightly unhinged gets us a bonus. Slightly unhinged bookish confessions. We've got some from Reddit. We've got some for from threads. In the future, we'd like your guys', too. So, if you have any, let us know. Mhm. Like we would love to respond to whatever unhinged like little bookish confessions you guys have. Um but before we get into responding to all of those, thank you so much for being here. Seriously, you guys, thank you so much for taking time out of your day and your book to come listen to us weirdos talk about bookish things. Take a little breather, take a little break. We would love it so much if you would consider like, following, and subscribing anywhere you like. List your favorite podcast, including YouTube. That way you can hear our weekly episodes where we hang out, talk about books and other silly things. We also want to just say a quick thank you to anybody who is able to take time out of their day to like and review. Give a little star rating. It means so much to us and we love to be able to read those reviews and what you know finding out what you guys love about our episodes we love so much cuz we you know make sure that we do them in the future like the musical instruments and stuff. Stay tuned till the end. We will be reading off one at random that we wanted to share with you guys. So, we'll definitely be including these in future episodes. So, the more you guys submit, the more we are able to do that. But, thank you. It helps our podcast out so much and it helps us know what you guys like. And a happy crew to you. In case you missed the announcement, our crow curated merch shop is now open. So, if you are looking for more ways to support our pot over here and look cute doing it, we will have it linked down in the description box for you to shop. Thank you guys again so much for your support. It means so much to us. Well, you know, if you guys have been following along, you know that we have been on vacation. Or maybe not. I don't know when this comes out, but anyways, we were just on vacation. And so, let's just kick this off with a fave and fail vacation edition. Shall we? Great. Let's do it. Okay. So, my fave I'm like, where did it go? Here we go. I mean, I already memorized it, but I always forget my fail. Like, you know what I mean? I'm like, I don't I don't know what's block it out. Yeah, block it out. Um, so my fave from this last vacation, I had a few. Um, we saw Mulan Rouge the musical. Oh, yep. Yeah. Yeah. It was literally so good. You would love it so much. Y like you love it so much. So, um, it's a musical that's actually based off the movie. So, it's based off of Baslerman's movie. You guys all know it. I'm sure you're all obsessed with it. Like, we're very the same in that way, I feel like, over here. Um, but what I thought was really unique about it and what I did not know about it is that they update the music kind of to reflect what's popular at the time. Oh, fun. So, you still get like the classic like Elephant Medley, you still get the David Bowie, you still get the Elton John, you still get the classics that like I feel like you really need for that music, you know what I mean? That we all know and love, but then they work in a bunch of like new popular hits from right now. that. Yeah, it was great. It was really cool. Um, and so fully obsessed with that. Will, if I have the opportunity to go see that, that's one I would see again and again. So, we should go see it someday. I think that definitely you'd love it. Um, obviously seeing family is always a fave on vacation. We had a great time. Um, another fave is that I did go to the spicy librarian in Denver for the second time because it was um, romance book day or is it romance book store day? I don't know. It was like some kind of day, special day for romance books and it's an all romance bookstore in Denver that I love. So, I went there and stocked up on a few things I've been wanting. H So, that was cool. My fail was actually not being in my my town, so in Eureka when Eureka Books introduced kind of the inauguration of their romance book section. Oh, yeah. So, I've been so busy since I got back. I haven't even had time to go down there and check it out. But apparently, for the first time ever, one of our local bookstores here in Eureka has a dedicated like actual like romance section. And I am very excited to check it out. So, that's so great, but that's so wild that it just happened. Yeah, I will say I feel like one of the other bookstores has a romance section, but it's more like the Danielle Steel Mhm. Rippers. Mhm. Yeah. It's not like it wouldn't include any like romantic or dark romance or anything like that. That would be kind of like randomly filtered into like other areas that may or may not be appropriate like YA and whatnot. Um, so I'm really hoping that they took this opportunity to create a real section where we can include a lot of different subg genres within the romance genre, but I'm excited to go down and check it out. I was sad that I missed it, but hey, as far as fails go, you know, it's just something to look forward to. So, hey. Yeah. Did they release it? Did they open it up or whatever on romance day or whatever? A That's cute. I like that. Very cute. Um, but we definitely have um some bookstores here locally still and you know I've been out of town and experiences too that just have no romance section at all to speak of. So I love to see it happen honestly like not to toot our own horn but I do know that a lot of the romance books in Eureka books are there because they have been our book club picks. Yeah. So that's exciting. Definitely. Um but yeah, so those are my faves and fails. What did you have from vacay? Yeah. So, I was in Hawaii for 10 days with the fam. We had a great time. Lots to choose from. I'll talk about my fail though. Not a lot to choose from and fail, but my biggest fail was something that still hurts me to this day, literally physically. Uh, so we found, we didn't find it. It's there. It's uh we were driving off to the one of the beaches somebody recommended in Kawaii, Tunnels Beach, if anybody's familiar. And on our way there, we saw a pulloff with a big beach and a lot of parking. So, we couldn't even get to Tunnels Beach because we kind of we're leisure about our trips. I ain't waking up at the crack of dawn to get to the beach first. I'm not. If I find parking, I find parking. Whatever. Okay. So, we went to Tles Beach. Crazy [ __ ] show. Okay. No thanks. We drive back around cuz we saw this pull out with a lot of parking and stuff at one of the beaches. Like, that's great. Can't go wrong. We went into that parking. Everything's fine. It wasn't a disaster like last year. We made sure not to park in the sand. We were not stuck. It's fine. It's not that. Anybody remember that story? Um, so we we get out, we go. It's really cool. So, it's the ocean and the one of the rivers cuz Hawaii has a lot of rivers that meet. So, you have the beach sand and then a like jungly cliffside and then the river. And on the river, there's a bunch of rope swings. So, you can see where this is going. So, my 10-year-old obviously wants to do it. She's never done them before, and she's not the first to like run up to those things, but she wants to do it, but she's nervous and she's scared, but, you know, I'm motivating her. So, I obviously I got to do it, too. Even though, you know, I like I used to like rope swing in back in the day, but I'm not the same, you know, 8-year-old. You know, I got I got things that can get hurt. But whatever, I'm going to do it. even though I would rather just lay on the beach. I'll go do this with her cuz I got to motivate her. So, she's excited. She's doing it. We do. There's like three different options, right? So, you got the one down there that like older guys are doing. So, I'm like maybe not that one. It's a little high. And then you have like a thick rope and then you have a really thin one. Most of the kids were doing the thin one and like climbing up on the rocks and like jumping in like really high. The thicker one was lower, a little easier to hold on to. So, I'm like, "Let's do that one." So, we do that one. She's brave. She does it. You don't really go far because you're just like kind of like and then drop in and it's fine. It's, you know, the water's freezing because it's the river, but it's you warm up to it. It's good. So, we do that a couple times each. And then I want her to try the thin one. That's You don't have to climb on rocks, but like you'll get a better swing on it. There's more room to like swing out. So, she's scared, but I'm like, I'll go on it first. You know, that's what I should do. I should be the the the thing to look up to. Well, so I I grab onto it. I have my fake nails on, you know, luckily they're not the press on. These ones are like the gel extensions. So, but nonetheless, so I grab onto it and I do the thing. Freaking got to grab my top cuz my top's coming off. It's just a whirlwind of craziness that rope swings are. And then I realize, oh, my freaking pinky hurts real bad. So, I think my nail like snagged or the rope wrapped around it. Some kind of Final Destination crap was going on for sure on that. It's like a janky rope swing. Okay. It's like some questionable rope with like a little rope extension on there. So, something happened where my pinky got pulled while I fell in. Oh no. So, I swim. You know, we're done anyways. She's still She's not. I didn't make a scene or anything cuz I didn't even know like it happened yet, you know, and obviously I don't make a scene. I'm just like, "Oh crap, something hurts. Great." Of course, of course it does. So, she's not interested. We swim to the side. We're done. I go back. Sorry, I'm dying. We go back to the the towels or whatever. And I'm like, "Okay, it's starting to hurt more and more." So, I go grab I have an ice chest. I go put some ice on it. And then I look at it. I'm like, "Oh, it's really swollen." Great. I didn't dislocate it or anything. I think I just opposite of jammed it. Maybe pulled it or something. My nail didn't hurt, but the whole all the joints hurt. So, that's what I had to deal with for like the next day. Yeah, it looked exactly like your photo of like the random pinky incident of, you know, what was it? July 2025. So, but this I knew what happened at least. But I could see how maybe you did something and just didn't know because I didn't know in the moment that it happened, you know? Yeah. Also, I had so many different things going on, but like I was just trying not to flash people cuz my freaking top came off. So, yeah. So that is my fail is that I had a rope swing injury. At least your pinkiey's okay. At least I didn't get deg gloved. You hear about that? That's what it's called. If like a man loses can from his wedding ring can like pull the skin off of your freaking ring finger. So no, I didn't have that. It didn't break. Like nothing crazy. I knew in the moment I was like it hurts, but it I can bend it barely, but like it's kind of like when I jammed my toe. So, not as bad. It's still a little bit of swollen. Like, I can't see the pinky wrinkles as easy on the top and it was bruised for a couple days, but it was it's more of one of those injuries that only hurts when you go to use it not realizing you're using it. Like, or my four-year-old will grab my hand. I'm like, ah. You know, like hold my hand and like, sorry, don't grab my pinky. Grab anything else. Yeah, one of those. So, I can bend it. It's not a severe injury, but definitely a fail. But it But do I regret it? No. No regrets. I needed to do it. Yeah. My fave was um So, my husband went fishing one day. That's not my fave. So, my husband went fishing one day and so I had to take the girls to go do our own stuff. You know, we had to drive out to a different part of the island where the harbor was and I'm not I don't want to like drive back and just sit at the hotel. I want to go explore. Like, I have no qualms doing that. I'm like, great, I can go do this fun stuff with the kids. And so, the first beach we went to, you can consider a fail. They every once a month with the moon, which is crazy fun fact, jellyfish can jellyfish like are drawn to the moon or some kind of crazy tide thing. So this specific beach sometimes cuz they kind of built out a like lagoon with the volcanic rocks. So they have jellyfish get stuck in there at night. So there was man of war sightings and they can give some pretty bad stings. So there's a lot of people in the water anyway. So I was like, I don't know, we'll check it out. And then when we we were in there, I didn't tell my kids cuz I don't want them freaking out, but I was just aware. And then we saw some dead ones along the shoreline. So I was like, "Okay, not that one. Let's see if there's any other beaches." So while they were having like their little picnic, I looked at this other beach that was about 20 minutes up the road, but it was on a the waves were really bad where we were staying in Kawaii for that bottom half. So if you turn like around to the other side of the island, it was supposed to be good. So I was like, "Let's check it out." I go with them the 20 minutes and there's it splits off into two different areas. One area it's a little sketchy with like you know probably some homeless people or just people that like to live in their cars and but it's more populated. Like I can see people I can see a lifeguard tower but the parking it was just a little questionable you know. So I was like I don't know if that's the one that's in the pictures and the waves looked a little bit rough. And then this down this other way, I can see people like tent camping. It's like a state beach though. It's like you have to rent it out. So I was like, "Okay, I guess I'll risk it cuz you know, it's just me and the girls. So I guess I'll risk it down there and see what that looks like." I went down there. Oh my gosh. Loved it. So that's exactly what the pictures were that it's just my perfect kind of beach when I think of going to Hawaii. And it's it was just us and like, you know, a couple that was snorkeling and then a family that was barbecuing and that was it. The sand was super soft. The waves were super calm for me to just hang out with my daughters, you know, 10 feet out, still standing and feel safe and feel relaxed. And then you had all the Kauawaii mountains in the background. Beautiful. Love it. 10 out of 10. If you guys want the name of the beach, just DM me and I'll let you know because I have to look it up. I don't remember. I was going off of maps and vibes. So, it was great. Yep. That was my fave. It was The only bummer is I could only be there for like an hour because traffic was so bad in Kawaii. It took forever to get anywhere, so I had to not stay there as long as I would have wanted. Yeah. But I'll be back for sure. I'll be back. Yeah, I'll be back. I'll be back. Yeah, it's great. So, okay. So, should we just segue into bookish confessions? Let's do it. Okay. So, just to start this section, we decided it would be funny to write one of these bookish confessions from a popular book character's point of view. and then you guys can try to guess it. We have to guess it. We haven't shared them ahead of time either. Yeah. Okay. So, do you want to go first or do you want me to go first? Um, sure. I'll go first. Okay. I'm excited. All right, Liz. Here we go. Yeah. The confession is he eludes me every time. I do everything I can to destroy him. He is the last wall standing in the way of world domination. I didn't want to admit it, but since this is a safe space, I'll go ahead and say it. I feel defeated by this adolescent boy, and I don't know what else to do. It's been 15 or so years, maybe even 18 years. Who am I? Voldemort. Yes. Insummation. I love it. It's so good. Um, I wrote That's so funny. I wrote mine completely different because I thought it had to be book themed, so I doubled down on it. So, yeah. Hey, that's good. Yeah, I did a character confessing. Yeah, but yeah. Mhm. Okay, here we go. Okay. And and I obvious Okay, whatever. I'm just going to read it and then you have to guess. Okay, here we go. Okay. I steal my girlfriend's smutty books when she's out training or working in the library and secretly read them and pretend like the lines I come up with in bed are my own idea. Grab the headboard.[Music][Laughter] So, this is a character who would do this. Yeah. You don't know who it is, though. Well, the grab the headboard thing is uh you know, Cassian and Neesa. Yeah. Oh, but it's Cassian. Yeah. So, this would be Cassian's bookish bookish confession. Yeah. That I made up. So, I steal my girlfriend's smutty books when she's out training or working in the library and secretly read them and then pretend like the lines I come up with in bed are my own ideas. Okay. Like that's what Neesa read. Yeah. And so then he says it. Yeah. Oh, that's great. Yeah. I was like he probably does that. He probably would do that. Yeah. I don't even know if he would secretly steal the books. He'd be like, I'm going to read this. It's great. Yeah. Oh, that's good. Oh, that's good. Okay. So, uh why don't you just keep going? So, we kind of did a mix of Reddit and threads and like wherever we can find bookish confessions. So, here's my first one. I buried six overdue[Music] again. It's too funny. I buried six overdue school library books in my neighbor's backyard the night before we moved out of town. That's a confession. I love that. The comments were like, you know, your family still has to pay for it. Yeah. Like burying the evidence. Like what does that do? It's still there. It's still there. I will say like this is not like at the end we'll share a bookish confession. We each have um but this is not it. But I have done that before. Not with you buried six library books in your neighbor's yard. Liz, we got to talk about this. That was me actually. No, I'm just kidding. I submitted this. I'm Chingly Chang Bella. Um, no. So, I, as you did also, I'm sure, hated, you remember this, hated um, Spanish class in high school because we had a teacher who was literally horrible. And I hope they know who they are. Okay. Anyway, they deserve it. Yeah. Um, and so instead of returning our Spanish books at the end of the year, we buried them. Yeah, that is so funny. And so high school coded. Yeah. And as far as I know, buried them. I don't know that we were ever charged for those. Like, now that I'm thinking about it, cuz like my parents would not have paid for that without saying something to me. So I'm like, here's the shovel. Go dig it up. Yeah, exactly. But yeah, I don't remember ever getting charged for that. But there they still remain, I'm sure, to this day. That's more ceremonial. You know, this person's like trying to hide the evidence as if they don't just track it through the library system. Well, I'll just say it. My book is confession was going to be anyways. um that I do still have a library book that I never returned to my high school and but I do think my parents might have paid for it or just said forget it and maybe I maybe I owe him a million dollars. I don't know. But it's a brave new world. I remember. And you know what? I covet it. I treasure I treasure it. I treasure it as you say. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Have you ever buried a book for some reason? Apparently it's more common than I thought. Whether it's ceremonious or maybe you're horrified, so you got to bury it. You're scared. Maybe you have to hide the evidence. I don't know. A lot of reasons apparently. Hey, who would have thought? No judgment here. Be listen to me. Don't judge. Okay. Uh my first one. I am currently rereading the Twilight books with a friend. It is way more enjoyable than I thought it would be. Hot damn. Is it entertaining? Yep. Such bad writing. The best. Yeah. Such bad writing. So many hair pulling moments. So many eye rolls, but I love every minute. We're both married and almost 30. Hey, like what you like. That's what I said. I was like, actually, when I was looking for bookish confessions, I don't know if you noticed this, but there were so many Twilight ones. Oh, that's why I don't know if you guys can see it, but I'm wearing my Shadowbound Spines Twilight uh ho ho hoa shirt. Um because so many bookish confessions were Twilight related. Hey. Yeah. It's not a confession. It's not a guilty pleasure. It's just good. And that's okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. That's great. Why don't you go ahead and tell us your bookish confession as well? We'll just get those out of the way. Um uh yeah, I just put because I just did this and I was like,"Yeah, this is like annoying." It even annoys me. Like, you know what I mean? It even annoys me. Um I buy books that I already own just so that I don't have to pack them. Like I'll buy them on Kindle even though I already own them just so I don't have to pack them. I literally had less than a hundred pages left in a curse carved in bone and I bought it on Kindle so I didn't have to take it with me. Yeah. But hey, like guess what? You know what? Let's say let's say maybe we're saving you a $50 oversized luggage charge. So you're actually saving money. You know, honestly, I was like disappointed in myself. I was cuz it was like $14.99. Okay. That's kind of pricey, too, for like a ebook, you know? Yeah. And um but I do love Daniel Jensen, so I was like, "At least I'm supporting an author I really do love, so it's okay." But I told my husband, I was like, "I'm so disappointed in myself. Like, I should have been able to finish these like 70 pages. It's so annoying." Like, I literally to avoid this before, if I have like 30 pages, I'll screenshot it and like read them off my phone, you know? Um but this was just too many. It was like between like 70 and 100 pages somewhere in there. I was like, "No, it's too much." My husband was like,"Just buy it. It's fine." And I was like, "I appreciate your support with my unhealthy habits." Yeah. Yeah. I get it, man. I get it. Yeah. It's just too like my thinking was this. I knew that I was going to Denver, so we're flying. So, yeah, I can only have 50 lbs. I have my backpack and stuff, but here's the thing. I had to bring House of Beating Wings for Crow Month, but then also so I had to have physical pictures of that, but I knew I was going to the Spicy Librarian and then I was going to buy stuff and I was like, I need the backpack space, man. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you can't be like uh you know, Cheryl Stride situation where you rip out all the pages that you haven't that you've already read, you know? That's brutal. That's book harm. No book harm. Trigger warning. Book harm. Yeah. So So hey, I get it. I try to limit myself now, too, because like, let's face it, I'm only getting to one paperback and probably not even that, you know? So, I stopped letting myself bring more than that and just try to do Kindle. So, that and that's happens to you all the time that you only have like a 100 pages left of something. Petition petition to start doing an annual or perhaps I don't know what is it called when it's every other year. I always want to say that's bianual, but isn't that twice a year? I don't know how that works. I whatever. Once a year reading vacation where we just go somewhere and actually read. Yeah, for sure. I want to do that. I want to do that in forks. Yeah. Hey, maybe we don't do a book con next year. We just do that. We just sit in silence and read. Ha. Hey, I vote for that. Let's do it. Great. Here you guys are seeing our behind the scenes planning. Okay, there we go. Let's move on to the next one. So, this one's from Threads. Danny Doodlebug 13 confesses. She put her name out there, so sometimes we keep it anonymous, but they don't want to be. So, yeah. Hey, shout out Danny Doodlebug. I need to tell you guys something. When I'm reading a book I really like, sometimes I'll close it with just one page left and never ever finish it. I also do this with TV shows and movies. What? This gives uh like Mary Catherine Gallagher vibes. Like sometimes, what did she say? Sometimes when I'm really nervous, I stick my hands under my arms and then I smile like that. Oh yeah, totally. Like, or maybe it was the way you delivered it. I don't know. Really? That's crazy. I could never. Like, I get not wanting to let something go, but like not enough. I don't get it enough. This Who else does this out there? That's what I want to know. We'll put some polls up to these cuz maybe some people won't feel so alone. Or we could just see who the psychopaths are. Um, I would like wake up in the night and be like, I have to go read this last page. Like, it would literally keep me up at night. Guys, can you imagine that one Crescent City book, not reading the last page, not reading it? And you're just like, "Oh, I read it." And then the fandom, you know, was always freaking out. You're like, "What's the big deal?" Yeah. You didn't finish it. Or like you're trying to talk about it in casual conversation. People are like,"Well, what did you think about the ending?" And you're like, "Oh, it's fine." Yeah. Or like, "I didn't read it." The ending, it's I'm good. I love it too much. I can't let it go. That's crazy. Oh, that's brutal. That's just torture to yourself. I wonder I wonder what the Yeah. I wonder what the It says if they really like it. So it seems like they don't want to let it go. They don't want to literally close that chapter. Yeah. O every once in a while they like pull one off the shelf and read that last page just like revert to themsel or something. Yeah, maybe. Maybe. So what do you got? So this person literally left a list of four things. Oo. So I was like good for you. You got some stuff off their chest. Yeah, right. Number one, someone I knew in elementary school added me on Goodreads. For some reason, I felt like I needed to secretly compete with her in terms of how impressive my reading choices were. It felt satisfying when she marked a book I just finished as to read. I'm like, "Okay, interesting." So, that's one. Two, a couple times I've not paid enough attention to an audio book and barely knew what happened. I looked up a summary, then marked it as red. Anyways, yeah, I could see me doing this if I really don't like something, you know? I haven't done it, but I could see it happening. Like, okay, whatever. I'll just look it up. Yeah, it was like I think these are just like good readads confessions, you know? Yeah. Um, three, I've purposefully not added some runchy books to my good readads shelves because I didn't want to show how many of those I've actually read. Yeah. And then four, my good readads ratings are significantly influenced by those by the people that I follow or are friends with. So basically, they change their reviews depending on what other people do. So I guess the question there is, do your public book habits like that you're posting on good readads for example, are they influenced by outside sources whatsoever or do you just do whatever? Oh, not me. Not me either. Not me. Yeah. Yeah. I have to like um I've definitely changed my ways. I'd be a like naysayer first and foremost, you know? So, I'd have to actively not be a naysayer now. You know what I mean? Like like not anymore, but it used to be used to be me, you know? Like, oh, it's popular. Yeah. Right. Can't be that good, you know? Mhm. Yeah. We've talked about this back in the day. Like you've always been receptive and I've always been kind of like I don't know. Yeah. I'm the opposite. If someone's like, "Oh, five stars." I'm like, "Hell yeah." And like then I'll want to read it. Yeah. Yeah. I'm very and like I said, I'm better about it now, but I used to be very uh not pessimist, but like uh skeptical. Skeptical. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. Skeptical. Mhm. Yep. Yeah. I mean, a couple of times I not paid enough attention to an audio book and barely knew what happened. Uh yeah. Uh, I mean there's definitely audio books that I paid more or less attention to than others, but like I usually have a general idea of what happened. Yeah. Not nothing. Yeah. Not nothing. Yeah. Like I have no recollection or like you know we have to reference something that we listen to an audio book of two months ago and I got to go refresh my memory. That's different. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yep. And I definitely, you know, I include all of my runchy reads on good readads, too. Good or bad, guys. Good or bad. Yeah. whatever do people Okay, sorry. I guess I'm not active enough on Goodreads, guys, who follow us because I don't pay that much attention. Yeah, I put I honestly I personally I use Goodreads because I want to keep track of how many books I read and which ones I've read because boy howdy when we're doing like ranking videos or like talking about faves of the year, I'm like, "What the hell did I just read?" Like, yeah, it's very useful for stuff like that. Yeah. I go back and look through, oh yeah, yeah, this one was this year and like that book because it all blends together otherwise. So I don't pay attention to other people's good readads at all. You know, we use good reads for like reviews and reading off, but I'll like stuff if I see people's stuff, but I don't sit and scroll the feed. No, basically is what I'm saying. I used to when I first got it, but I forget about it. We have so many so many platforms we have to keep up with that it falls by the wayside. So, I really use it to track personally, but yeah, I occasionally Yeah, I'll occasionally look and if someone's reading a book that I like really really like, I'll like that they're reading it, you know? But that's about the extent of it. Like I use it to post reviews and then Yeah. Exactly what you were saying to just kind of keep track of Yeah. what we're doing so that when the time comes I have like one place I can look for like all the books I read this year. Yeah. Yeah. And I really when I see people's like a lot of us put in our Instagram too our book tallies and things like that and our reviews and stuff. So when I see personally when I see people's how many they've read a year, you know, some people it's what what month is it? August going into September here when this is going to be up. Some people have 200 books on there. It's like wow good for you. I don't think why can't I do that? I think, you know, they have a different lifestyle than I do and they're able to do it, you know, or some people read more short nollas, you know, there's all different kinds of ways and rhymes and we some people are in traffic for 3 hours every day and listen to audio books exclusively, you know, that's a lot of time that you're able to do that. So, don't basically moral of the story, here's my word of advice. Don't judge yourself against others, especially when it comes to how much people read at and anything. Everybody literally lives different lives and personalities. So what you are able to read might be different. You know, like I used to read one book every two years. Look at me now. Look at me now, mama. I think I'm at 60. I don't know. This year. Look at that. That's nuts. Pass me would have been like smack me in the face because I'm so proud of you. Amazing. Amazing work. Look at that. What do you got? Uh, Kylie's Kitchenette says, "Something that made me audibly gasp out loud when I read it." Okay. I don't like the smell of old books. Makes me feel like my hands are dirty after touching the book. They probably are, but yeah. I mean, yeah, they are, but it's going to be okay. It's okay. You don't like the smell? It always just reminds me of um I'm pretty sure it's one of the Sex in the City movies where they're reading library books and she opens it and says, "That's an oldie." Oh, yeah. You know, they don't appreciate that. Yeah. I don't think you need to always like it, but you know, it's one of those smells that's like a it's a memory. It's a trigger, you know, in a good way usually. Yeah. I there was something coming back from our trip that like um I got a I opened up our suitcase and it smelled like a mix of our hotel room and the pool and the salt water and like everything and I'm just like a what? Like it's those smells that you don't realize are there until you leave it and then you get a whiff of it again. You're like so libraries bring it back to childhood. You know any uh Royal Caribbean fans out there? I I'm such a like cruise lady. Okay, so Royal Caribbean makes a body wash that literally smells so freaking good. And they do not sell it, or at least they didn't last time I went. They don't sell it anywhere. They don't sell it at their gift shop. Nothing like that. They don't have a candle of it. Like literally, it's like sandalwood. I think it's like sandalwood, vanilla, and vetr, which are like three of my favorite smells. Yes. And it literally reminds me of this wonderful vacation me and my husband took to the Caribbean. And um yeah, it's like every time I get on a cruise ship, I'll like literally I don't even use it, okay? I have my own soap. I have skin issues. I literally just I get it in my hands and I just smell it, you know? It smells so reminds me of vacation. It reminds me Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I had the opposite happen out of Lonnie. So, anybody that goes to Disney resorts, I heard that they changed their forever. they were partnered with Aqua or some kind of random brand, H2O Plus, something like that. So, I was looking forward to it cuz it's not like a I don't remember the scent, but I remember it being pleasant. So, I was like, great. And my daughter used up all my body wash, so I'm like, cool. I'll have it at Alani when we go. So, they changed it out. Oh, no. And like I unfortunately could feel like I can still smell it on some of my stuff. It's called Malia, I think. If anybody's been there and you hated it too, please let me know because I felt like I was alone. And it was the body wash, the lotion, the hand soap. They actually had pump hand soap, which is like rare at hotels, you know. And then they had the bar soap. Literally everything smelled like that. I think it was smell like it was supposed to be aloe and something else, but it was like the bad part of the aloe. And I couldn't put my finger on it, but I literally gagged. And I went to the ABC store across the street and bought lotion and hand soap so I wouldn't have to use it. That's how much I hated it. Ew. And then everybody else in the room was using it, so I smelled it all the time. Oh, hey, Royal Caribbean. Will you please Yeah, help us out. Will you also please send us some? Thank you. Oh, that too. Yeah. Thank you. Shout out. I know. But maybe it won't be special if I could use it at home. You know what I mean? No, it is because you just do it. You just like get a little hit of it when you're having a bad day. Just go in the corner. It's literally only for smelling. Like I can't use it. It's only for smelling. So, it lasts me a long time. Oh, no. It it's still special because you it reminds you of that. That's why I watch these people that have a Disney podcast, Disney film podcast, and they talk about they used to buy mugs when they would go to Disney at the end of their trip, you know, to remember their trip. They started buying them cuz they they're coffee drinkers in their room. They'll run it the machine and everything in the room. They started buying the mugs at the beginning of their trip. So, they would use the mug during the mornings. And so now every time they go and they use that mug, they remember that specific occasion. So I just love that. It's like so special. So have I I haven't adopted that yet because I'm a dummy and forget every time. But it's the same thing with the spells, you know? It's like it literally takes you back to those moments. Well, it's why like whenever my husband actually asked me this recently. He's like, "Why are you always buying books on vacation? It's so inconvenient cuz then you have to pack them all back." That's exactly why because now it's like I know every single time whenever I open one of those old books lots of times I'll even leave like the bookmark from that bookstore inside. Like for example, we just went to the McDonald bookshop in Estis Park in Colorado which I remember is where I bought my first copy of When the Moon Hatched last year. Yeah. So yeah, it's like it's like nice to associate them with the memories. Yeah. Yes. intentionally doing that too is like another level. So, it's great. I love it. I love it. So, sorry this girl's missing out though. She doesn't like book smells. Sorry. Okay. Okay. Okay. I didn't read Harry Potter until I was an adult because when I was at summer camp, they made us listen to the first book when I was six. I haven't gotten past the annoyance I felt at being forced to read something. This applies to some classic books as well. I've avoided them simply because they were something I was supposed to read. I don't like Star Wars for the same reason because I was forced to watch one of them in class as a quote unquote treat. Oh yeah, I get I thought you might relate to that one. I get it. It's one of those um you know it's like a It's called PDA. It's And I always forget what it stands for. It's not, you know, it's not PDA like, you know, romantic. It's like avoidance. It's you're told to like something, therefore I won't. M it's like you're in the middle of doing dishes and somebody tells you to do the dishes and you're like well now I'm not going to do them, you know. Yeah. So you have to like it's a treat to like Star Wars and now I'm not going to like it. Yeah, I get it. I get that. Yeah. I feel like I'm just such the opposite. Like Yeah. It's just like if someone's like,"This movie is really good." I'll be like, "Cool. I should go watch it." But like I also don't feel peer pressure very much. So it's like a nice balance cuz I'll be like, "Yeah, I'll watch that." But I don't also have any sense of urgency to, so I'll do it someday. You know what I mean? Like I don't have any to it. Like every once in a while I get super hyped about something, but most of the time it's just like a casual Cool. Yeah. I'm glad you like And I'll definitely read books that were assigned to us back in the day. It doesn't bother me. But this person I get why people wouldn't want to though. They'd be turned off cuz it's different when you are for sure told you have to. That's why I think a lot of people, a lot of adults don't think they like reading is because they were assigned these dusty books a lot of times and told to be hyperfocused on it for usually 3 months at a time, you know, at least a month. Dissect every little part. And not that we don't like to do that. Hello, we do that all the time. But for the people that don't own behalf or also like how you choose to process information too because it's like rarely will I actually annotate a book. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like cuz to me that feels tedious and pulls me out of the story. So that's another thing is like we're encouraged to like do all this annotation and stuff too, you know, in high school. Yeah. Yeah. And focus on things that you might not particularly care about or understand yet. And Yeah. So, I get that's why we want to say to the people that don't love reading, give it a try again. Find There's something for everybody. So, find what works for you. Mhm. You know. Exactly. Yep. All right. What do you got? This person um named Love Dot and Other Stories. That's cute. I'm not a fan of spin-off series, especially not when it's a legacy spin-off series. H okay. I I get it. I get it. If you're not I could go either way. It depends on the book. It depends on the series. You know, some I'm going to eat them all up. Some I'm good. You know, like even Twilight for instance, you are currently reading the spin-off as it were, right? Midnight. I'm trying to get to it. I've been reading a lot of Anna Green Gable, so I haven't really had time, but yes, I would love to soon. So, that's on your list of priorities. Not on mine. I'm good with the first three or four. What was it? Three. Three. I'm good. Four. Okay. I'm good with the four. I don't need to move on. But like, you know, give us another Throne of Glass spin-off book. Sign me up. Rewrite the entire series based on other people's point of view. Yeah, I'll do it. Gobble gobble. Rewrite the whole thing. We get another eight Throne of Glass books. Yeah, that would be amazing. Um, honestly, I'm usually a sucker for a spin-off of any kind. A different point of view, great. Like an actual like spin-off of a side character, great. Like literally, I love it. So, yeah. H Yeah. Rarely will be will I be mad at it. Yeah. Good for you. Good for you. I almost feel like maybe that's why people are having a problem with Chris Broadvent's books, cuz they're all almost have a spin-off feel to them, you know? cuz it's all the same. I love it. We love it. But like a lot of people struggle with it, but it's unfortunate for them. But they're like, you know, two separate like two books at a time following separate people, you know. Yeah. And that's exactly that's exactly how Bridge Kingdom is. I feel like a lot of people have issues with that, too. Oh, there you go. Crack the code. Ding. Dingling. Glad we're back to saying that. It's been a while. Okay, here's a good one. I no longer care if my hardback books have a coffee or tea ring stain on them. I needed a place to put my cup. Thank you very much. Oh, I'd sooner ruin a table than a book. Yeah, personally. Yeah. I don't It's their I know. It's their own book, so like cool, I guess. But it's like So what? But now every time you look at it, you're like, I had coffee that day. I don't know. But maybe they're like, I was drinking from that Disney cup that I took on my trip, and it makes me happy to see that coffee I got from my great-grandmother's ashes or something, you know? I don't know. Like, I was drinking my great-g grandandmother while reading this book. Sentimental. It's all good. Tie it all up. You never know. No. Yeah, it's their book. Do what you want. But yeah, this couldn't be me once again. Same. It could never be me. I would be horrified if I did that on accident. That would never even happen on accident, folks. I would never set my beverage of any kind on my book, though. Yeah. You know, and I'm someone who I do I don't mind if a book is weathered in a way, you know? I don't mind if it looks red. I don't need it to be pristine. I don't at all. But I'm not going to like purposely set my cup of coffee down that I know I'm clumsy and it's always has a freaking ring around it, you know? Or like a condensation-y glass of water. Oh, forget it. Yeah, I don't like it. No, I don't like it. We don't like it. We don't like what you did there. Good for you of feeling brave to say it, though. Yeah. So, we'll give you that. All right. From Pidge 628. I like that word. I want to start reviewing more because it's so helpful to authors, but I am struggling with brain fog at the moment and that's not super compatible with reviewing. So, I just rate it without reviewing. I feel that. We all do. Yeah. Like literally, I used to be so good about writing reviews. But here's the thing. It's like I kind of fell out of the habit of writing long reviews once we started the podcast, but that's because we were constantly we're talking about the longest the longest reviews. Yeah. So, it's like that's kind of the same thing. I feel different. Yeah. I did my part. Um, so you know what? None of us blame you, man. Yeah, we get it. I commend those of you who can close that book and get all your thoughts out. I cuz the problem with me is as well as all the things you mentioned, I have a lot of problems. Um, but it's like I always need a minute to digest like a day at least. Guess what? I forget to do it after a day. So, if we're doing a podcast, like I literally have to write it down like then as much as I can or like even as we're going through the book, but I always need a day to process or else you get you get word salad in a bad way. Yeah, I think that's I mean that's hard too. I feel like most people are probably like that. I'm sure there's some people who really have a firm grasp on reality and a firm grasp on like what happened in the book and can recount it weeks later. But I think for the majority of us, we can't really hold all of those details for a super long period of time. And so it is important to write those detailed reviews if that's what you're going to do like pretty soon after finishing the book. And that's hard. Yeah, it's hard. We're busy. We're doing life, you know. We're on the next book already. We finished half of it. Sorry. Listen, I cannot pause. This is my issue and I know what it is. Aside from the fact that we're already reviewing so many books on the podcast, right? Aside from that and running a business and life living a life. Um, it's the fact that I also need usually I need to sleep on it. Okay, that's my that's my thing. I have to sleep on it before I like I will read it immediately because I usually I'd say 99% of the time I know what star rating I'm going to give a book immediately. I'm that kind of personality. But what I need to do is I need to sleep on it before I can concisely express my thoughts. I need like literally one night. Well, then my issue is that I don't want to experience reality to its full extent for the remainder of that day until tomorrow. So, I will start a new book. So, like whether that's like on Kindle or an audio book, like I need something to tide me over until the next day. And now it's too late. Yeah. Hey, and you know what happens when you miss a couple reviews? Oh no. Oh. Oh no. I saw it happen to you, I think last year, cuz you were consistently posting them and then you, you know, we started the podcast and then it's like, oh, oh no. Oh no. I'm so behind, you know, cuz you feel an obligation to do the backlog and then you're screwed. Yeah. Screwed 100%. Yeah. Now I like I I mean I think we all appreciate your um reviews that you give during the book, you know, those are helpful, too. I really like those. Yeah. Yeah. Reading on your stories. Mhm. Um so check out the real life vegan wife. She's great there. I tried to do the one page like just story like simple rapid reviews now and those seem to be working out better. So hey, if you want the long form, go to the podcast obviously you're here right now. Listen to more of these. Okay, we have so many books on here. Just search it to see if it's there. Yeah, I'm not going to write a review, too. All right. Like, come on. It's hard. It's hard. Just copy and paste the transcript. Oh my god. Imagine I just posted on good readads. Okay, so my last one. Uh, I judge people who say they read an extraordinary amount of books when they're really listening to the majority of them on audiobooks. I also use audiobooks and think they're fine, but sitting down and actually reading a 100 books a year is different than listening to a 100 books a year. And those are the facts. I would never be a dick about this, but I do silently not count it as the same. Well, you are kind of being a dick about it, so I hate to break it to you. I think what they mean is like they wouldn't say that to someone's face. Yeah. Which is good because they should punch your face. Yeah, those are inside thoughts. Yeah, those are inside thoughts. Um, it's weird to me. The only thing, okay, obviously you guys know how we feel about this. Like we believe that that is a very abbleist perspective. Um, audiobooks are books. It is reading. I think I could speak for both of us when I say that. Yes. Yes. Um, I think it's weird that they say that they use audiobooks and think they're fine. So it's like they're absorbing the information and acknowledging that they are absorbing the information but then refusing to understand that that's also reading. So where's the breakdown happening? Someone put it this way. Would you tell a blind person that they didn't watch a movie if they only listen to it because they can't see it with their eyes? It's pretty rude. Or would you tell a blind person that they've never read a book before? I mean, same literally. I mean, an audio book. Like, it's the same thing. Yeah. Come on. You know, you're still absorbing the information whether with your eyes or your ears. Yeah. So, calm down. It's just accessibility. Like, that's what it is. Yeah. Yep. Dude, that's crazy. Good for you for getting it off your chest, but also not actually saying that to anyone because that is would be a dick move 100%. Yeah. Mhm. Yep. Do you have any left? Oh, I got a million. A million. Okay. We should probably save it for another episode. So, guys, let us know if you enjoyed this and we'll definitely make sure to do another round cuz I that was only my thread ones I found, but there's a lot on Reddit as well. I know you did Reddit, right? So guys, make sure to send in your bookish confessions. You know, we gave you a lot of examples. Now, do you relate? Can you not relate? We'll put some of these up in our stories, too, so you guys can spill the beans or whatever. Uh, thank you so much. So fun. So, we're going to do a smasher pass unhinged and also we will go over that bookish review that someone left for us. Yes. Okay. So, this is inspired by my recent trip to Hawaii. We were on the beach and in Aahu there are naval and air force bases and all that jazz. We look upon the skies and oftentimes flying by are fighter jets, F-15s I think they're called. Great. Smash or pass a fighter jet F-15 if you were an airplane. Okay, so now we're on to inadimate objects. That's nice. I say if I was a if I was a plane then smash. Why not? Yeah. Look them up. Listen, there's they're the shadow daddy of airplanes. Okay. What are they called? Uh I think F-15s. All right. Fighter jets. They're very pointy. Um they're black. They're like gunmetal. They're dark. They're so They're They're very pointy. They're very pointy. I mean, they're just they look they look like Top Gun stuff. Let me see. Let me see. Let me see if it's the right one. This Yeah, baby. Yeah. Yeah, that's the one. Yeah, that's I mean it's Top Gun coded so we're saying smash all day. I'm looking at the airplanes and my husband like oh cool. You know what this would be good for? A smasher pass. They added it to my notes. Yeah. Put it there on the beach. Just in case our husbands ever start to get concerned. Oh my god. Listen, it's something about it. If I was an airplane, you kidding me? If you were an Airbus air, I think that's what they call some of the airplanes. If you were an what are the what's the whatever? I'm just talking to airplanes now. Can I hear a special I'm like I literally know nothing about airplanes. So like a Boeing 737. If I was a Boeing 737 fighter jet would be would be the one. Someone out there is nodding along. You guys get it. Yeah. Yeah. It's a sexy piece of machinery. Yeah. Um Okay. So fly to the sky. Okay. Got to move on. Got to move on. Um, I'm sure a lot of guys would be like, "Smash, too." Yeah, I'm sure. We have a couple guy listeners out there. Let us know. I'm going to ask I'm going to ask my husband. If you were a plane Oh, you probably don't even need to finish the sentence. Ask him which plane. If you were a plane, which one would you smash? A 15 fighter jet. He's like anything that Top Gun that Tom Cruz flies. Tom Cruz drives. Yeah. He loves uh, you know, what's it called? that movie. Tom Cruz or Tom Cruz in general. No, he does not lose love Tom Cruz. He loves Top Gun and Maverick. Maverick. Yeah. I mean, I love them, too. They're good. They're good movies, guys. Yeah. Okay. So, mine is inspired by uh I just went and saw the new Fantastic 4. It was great. It was excellent. Go see it. Loved it. Loved it. Um Okay. So, my Smasher pass is for Ben Grim, which I didn't know if you would know what he looks like, but he's the guy who looks like rocks. Pass? I knew you were going to say him. Such a hard pass. No pun intended, cuz he's a hard rock. I honestly don't know what he's made out of, but he looks like he's made of rocks. Is he not a rock? I thought he rocks. I thought he was rocks, too. I don't know. I mean, who knows? I've seen a better pile looking rocks pile looking pile of rocks. But this guy, see something about him is a hard pass. But fighter jet all day. I like him. I say smash. I haven't seen the movie, so I don't know as far as personality goes. Adorable. He's kind of adorable. I think you might like him. There's one point where he's kind of like dressed old timey and he's got like an old timey hat on and I'm like,"Hey, maybe then you're changing my mind." kind of like if Frank Sinatra was made of rocks. Oh, there you go. So, stay tuned, guys. I'll let you know for an update. But no, it's something about the ridges, the multiple ridges that's like I don't want my fingers to rub on them. Yeah, it might be scratchy. I don't know. I don't know how it feels. It might be. Even if it's not, I don't know. It's like opposite of a good sensation. I don't know. I'm imagining it and I don't like it. At one point, he grows a rock beard. Great. Show me. Show me. Is there a Rockbeard? What's the guy's name? Uh, Rockbeard. Let's see if I can find just like a regular picture. Yeah. Here we go. Is it just sand? It's hard. It's kind of hard to see. It's just like rocks that like E. I hate it so much more. It looks like a growth. It is. I think you might I think that when you watch the movie, you might like him. Okay. Personality. Personality. It might change the game for me. He seems like a nice person. I appreciate that about him. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, uh, yeah. Now that we've covered all of the important stuff, I'm feeling good. You feeling good? Let's go. We are going to be reading off one of your guys's user submitted reviews. So, I pulled this one from Apple Podcast. You can leave them there, Spotify. I think anywhere that you can listen to podcast, you guys can leave reviews. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day. This one is from Sunshine 5178. I found this podcast midy year 2024 and decided to try it out. I was looking for a new book podcast because most of the shows I was listening to weren't enjoyable. I listen to a couple episodes and immediately proceeded to binge listen. I caught up to the current episode right at the end of the year and now I tune in every week. That means so much to using. Oh my gosh, I'm sad I don't have multiple episodes to listen to in a day. Besties in the Books has easily become my favorite show. They are relatable and funny. The best parts are Liz's five sentence summaries and the random instruments that accompany Ashley. I miss the gong. Well, as you see, we tried incorporating a little bit more this year to the random five sentences we do. But like it's those kind of things you guys let us know that just it just means so much. We put so much work into these episodes and it's nice to hear that you guys enjoy it as well. We appreciate it so so much you guys. Uh means it means the world. Means the world. Makes my cold emo heart tear up in a good way. It's true. Yeah. We love you guys. So make sure to like, follow, and subscribe anywhere you like to listen your favorite podcasts, including YouTube. And you guys, we'll see you next Tuesday. Bye.[Music]