Terrible Book Club

It's the final episode of Season 9! Luna's Edge was self-published in June of 2024 by author Roxana Macias. Just like our last episode, this author contacted us and asked us to read their book. While we normally don't take authors up on these offers, the book was described as a bilingual sci-fi novel which sounded like a new and potentially fun concept for us. While we thought the bilingual aspect was squandered and this was more d...

Hail and well met, book friends! We're feeling pretty silly as we close in on the final episodes of Season 9. We travel back to 10th century Bohemia to learn the story behind the popular Christmas carol "Good King Wenceslas". Join us for a very biblically-styled tale that taught us some things but failed to get us invested in the characters.

The author emailed us about his book and, usually when we get emails from authors or PR rep...

Chris found The Wife App by Carolyn Mackler out in the wild at a bookstore in NH when he was on a trip earlier this year. Considering apps themselves are often terrible, a book about an app seemed like a good candidate for the show.

Musings and derailments include: Chris gets really upset about the recurring stereotype of shitty musician boyfriends/husbands and we wonder about several things in the text such as British chins, sendi...

This week we're discussing our experience reading Verity by Colleen Hoover. We selected this for today’s episode because it has appeared fairly often in reddit posts regarding bad books. Plus, we like to try to touch on current, popular authors when we can amidst the sea of deep weird terrible books we cover throughout the year.

Off-topic musings and derailments include: Paris Uses Maps About It™, the truth of our Dark Lord Mr. Pea...

We've released this as an alternate episode if today's regular episode is a bit too much for you on this particular day. Please enjoy the audio from a Patron-only video special from 2021 where Paris and The Mothman (Antiques Freaks Ken) play a guessing game that Chris created. You can find the original video version here if you'd like to see us in all of our three-years-ago-physical-glory.

We know you love the games we come up with...

*The US general election is TODAY! Get out there and vote in person if you haven’t yet voted early or by mail. Head to vote.org for all the information you need to help you cast your ballot.*

We've released an alternate episode for you if today's regular episode is a bit too much to listen to on this particular day. Please enjoy the Patron-only video special from...

This was recommended eons ago in the age of 2021 by Twitter user KirliaHookah who described this book as, “Hey what if we crossed Sabrina the Teenage Witch with Mean Girls poorly?" which turned out to be perfectly accurate.

Musings and derailments in this episode include: Chris's DeathNote powers, George Michael Clooney, the Dance of Tables, the limits of school guid...

Happy Octoberween, dear listeners! In honor of the season, we bring you some spook-adjacent books for October's episodes. Today, our favorite guest Mary Parker is back with the sequel to The Phantom of the Opera musical - in book form! Although it was also turned into a musical, but remember this book is not the sequel to the original Phantom of the Opera book by Gaston Leroux...yeah.

Musings and derailments in this episode include...

Julius the Nice Dragon offered us a true Patron's Choice: Return to The Dunks or choose a new path. We still had plenty of iced coffees to trade, so we made the only choice we could as Bostonians. 

We rarely recommend prerequisites for episodes, but we think you should check out our review of the first book in this series before listening to today's episode because a) it's a good episode and b) we'll address elements of the series ...

Chris read Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yaros on his own and retold the plot to Paris on this very special Twitch livestream to celebrate 200 episodes of Terrible Book Club. Afterwards, we bestow honors on the last 100 books over 11 categories in the 2nd edition of Terriblo's Choice Awards. Watch the video version of this episode for free on our Patreon!

*The general election is coming up fast! Head to vote.org to check your voter regist...

We finally got around to checking out this 2023 BookTok phenomenon thanks to our Patron Austin, who described Legends & Lattes as, "a cozy and wholesome story about overcoming your past and settling down to...side with the mob threatening to burn down your establishment.”

Despite the nerdy theme, the focus today is more on the cozy than the fantastical. Our poisoned expectations are completely subverted and we've rarely been so del...

This time, we read stuff NOT for TBC, listened to music, watched TV and movies, and played video games! After a failed guest episode, we had to fill the schedule so we decided to do another recap of the non-TBC books, music, and video games we've enjoyed so far this year like we did at the end of last year.

If this is your first time listening to this show, maybe cho...

A fateful tweet last summer by the author themselves brought this book into our terrible orbit. At first glance, it looked like a short read by someone with expertise in the field they were writing about, so we figured why not? We've never done a travel book on the show! Little did we know: our passports were about to be stamped for a journey on a AI-fueled train to capitalist hell.

Today's episode includes our usual barnyard langu...

This week we discuss Home Grown Worries by Alex Donahue. We reviewed Alex’s other book, Leon & Chris, back in Episode 114 in 2022; he’s hoping that this is an improvement on that one as this is its spiritual successor. In turn, this episode is our spiritual successor to Episode 114.

Once again, Donahue's book has great art for kids and it seems like he actually took some of our advice from last time; gone are nearly all of the mech...

You may not think you know Mazes & Monsters by Rona Jaffe, but you certainly know its 1982 movie adaptation starring Tom Hanks in his first leading role (which you can watch along with us on our Patreon). We wondered if anyone would ever request this book and that day has finally come thanks to our patron Lucek. Thanks for all of your support, Lucek (and for being patient with us when we had to ask ...

Our patron Arrant has requested another non-fiction gem for their Patron's Choice episode this year. In How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life, Dilbert-creator Scott Adams weaves together the strands of memoir and self-help and fills any extra space in this book basket with glue made of lies (seriously, he opens the book by telling you not to trust him) and a stunning lack of self-awareness...

Our patron Of The Void (The Taco Eating Unicorn of the Hot Springs) requested yet another Yahtzee Croshaw book in the hopes that we would enjoy it more than Jam, their Patron's Choice from last year. In that sense, this episode is a spiritual successor to Episode 177 where we return to Yahtzeeworld, but feel like we landed on a different continent this time. We're steeped in video game/MMORPG and fantasy tropes today, Chris is asha...

It's time for the ultimate 1990s crossover - X-Men and Star Trek, united at last! We discuss our experience reading 1998's Planet X by Michael Jan Friedman, as per the request of our Patron Fred. For once, we actually want more romance between two characters and just want there to be some stakes in a story, but I guess that's hard when you're working with popular intellectual property. Paris & Chris swap personalities, we remember ...

Our Patron Robin requested that we read and discuss VenCo for today's episode. Although they did not request the Antiques Freaks to be here, we felt we needed their support (and knowledge of antique spoons). Thanks so much for your longtime patronage, Robin, and we hope you enjoy our unhinged review with surprise guests!

Remember that if you, too, would like to have us read and review a book of your choice on the show, you can gain...