Hannah celebrated her birthday this week with a trip to London to visit the Samurai Exhibition at the British Museum and a wander around Covent Garden’s stationery shops. Meanwhile, Nikki has been busy assembling her miniature Book Nook model…although she still hasn’t managed to find a suitable home for her Jonathan Bailey cut-outs (!).

Upcoming Buddy Read

H is for Hawk – Helen Macdonald (Autobiography pick)

Book Blurb:

An instant international bestseller and prize-winning sensation, Helen Macdonald's story of adopting and raising a goshawk has soared into the hearts of millions of readers. Fierce and feral, her goshawk Mabel's temperament mirrors Helen's own state of grief after her father's death, and together raptor and human discover the pain and beauty of being alive.

We’ll be discussing H is for Hawk in Episode 7 (available 30th April), so why not read along with us and share your thoughts?

Book Talk

This week we dive into the great debate: e-readers versus real books. Hannah explains why she struggles to warm to e-readers, while Nikki shares why her Kindle has become a favourite.

In this episode we chat about:

• How the experience of reading on an e-reader differs from reading a physical book

• What books - and how we display and collect them - might reveal about us

• Whether men and women approach book collecting differently

• The ever-growing “to-be-read” pile: Does it matter if we buy books we never get around to reading?

• The influence of social media and book influencers on our reading habits

• When books become more than reading material - decor, identity, or even companions

• Bookshops versus the rise of digital reading

• When Kindle Direct Publishing is the only way to access work by certain writers

We’d love to hear where you stand in the e-reader vs real books debate. Join the conversation and let us know your thoughts!

Current Reading

Hannah Reads

Seed to Dust – Marc Hamer

Hannah shares why this reflective memoir has been the perfect calming read at the end of a busy day.

Nikki Reads

Nobbled at Christmas – Helen Golden (Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing)

After finishing The Lamb in Episode 5, Nikki needed a palate cleanser and this light, frothy cosy crime was just the thing.

She Speaks: What Shakespeare’s Women Might Have Said – Harriet Walter

Nikki has recently finished this one and loved its imaginative approach - revisiting Shakespeare through the voices and inner lives of his female characters.

The Great When – Alan Moore

Nikki initially found this novel challenging to get into, but is now fully immersed and enjoying its strange, inventive ideas and unusual style.

If you enjoyed the episode, please leave a comment. We’d love to hear your thoughts about any of the books or topics we discussed. And if you’re able to rate and review the podcast (it really helps others discover us), we’ll love you forever.

You can also get in touch by emailing hello@boundbybooks.co.uk

Or visit our website and explore further at: www.boundbybooks.co.uk

Nikki’s been stretching out her birthday celebrations with dinners in Shoreditch, new plants and plans to rejig her bookshelves. Hannah, on the other hand, started “reorganising” her cottage… then abandoned ship halfway through and headed to IKEA instead.

Book Talk

Spoiler Warning: This week we dive into The Lamb by Lucy Rose.

FULL spoilers ahead: plot, themes, and the ending are all on the table.

Trigger warning: We discuss difficult themes including child abuse, cannibalism, bullying, murder and toxic relationships.

In this episode, we’re talking about The Lamb by Lucy Rose; a novel neither of us can stop thinking about (or talking about).

Which raises the big question: does the fact that it lingers like that mean the book is actually successful? Along the way, we get into the tension between sensational moments and deeper meaning and whether the shock factor sometimes threatens to overwhelm what the novel is trying to do.

We spend some time appreciating the writing itself - especially the lush descriptions of the natural world outside the cottage - while also questioning how the book has been framed. Is it really a “folk tale” or an “enchantment,” as the blurb describes? That leads us into a conversation about the narration through Margot’s perspective, and how the author’s own experiences might shape the voice telling the story.

While we both admire the quality of the prose, we talk about how the plot doesn’t always live up to it and how certain ideas and bits of language start to repeat. We also unpack the expectations created by the promise of something folkloric and whether the story actually delivers on that, especially when it’s grounded so firmly in the real world, with all the logistical questions that brings.

We also tackle some of the novel’s darker elements: its depiction of child abuse, the striking (and slightly troublesome) brilliance of the opening line and the unsettling thread that links desire, sex and cannibalism. Then there’s Eden: what we expect from her as a character, what she might symbolise, whether she works as a counterpoint to Ruth and how she’s used to push the story and relationships forward.

In this episode we wonder whether our own lack of horror-reading experience affects how we respond to the book. And of course, we talk about that ending: the tension between reality and metaphor, the choice to kill off so many characters and whether the novel leaves us with any sense of hope…or just a lot of unanswered questions.

Other questions we consider:

• What themes or elements might cause readers to put the book down and what this says about our own limits and boundaries as readers.
• Whether the novel ultimately feels meaningful.
• Whether taking the reader into such a dark psychological place provides a satisfying payoff.
• Ruth as a character: why she might be the way she is, whether she has a sense of right or wrong and the question of nature versus nurture.
• Whether themes such as alienation, parental obsession, adolescence, independence and loneliness are explored in enough depth.
• How we might have changed the novel if we had written it ourselves.
• The publishing “war” over the novel and why it generated so much competition.

Books we reference in our discussion:

Fairy Tales – Angela Carter

Grimms Tales – Philip Pullman

Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold

Tender is the Flesh – Agustina Bazterrica

Upcoming Buddy Read Genre: Autobiography. Title to be confirmed in the next episode! Read along with us!

Please leave a comment about anything we’ve discussed as we’d love to hear from you, and if we can ask you to rate and review the pod (as it helps us to be seen and found), we’ll love you forever.

With Love,

Hannah & Nikki

Website: www.boundbybooks.co.uk

Email: hello@boundbybooks.co.uk

It’s been a busy week! Nikki celebrated her birthday in true nerdy, history-loving style with a trip to see dinosaurs followed by a visit to Shakespeare’s Globe. A pretty brilliant combination, if you ask us. She’s also managed to pick up a very respectable haul of birthday gifts along the way. Lucky thing!

Meanwhile, Hannah has been swept up in birthday celebrations of a slightly different kind while also deep in preparations for the Eisteddfod. If you’re wondering what an Eisteddfod is, don’t worry - we cover that in the episode!

Book Talk

In this week’s episode we dive into the world of buddy reading, exploring both the joys and the occasional downsides of sharing a book with someone else.

We chat about:

• The differences between buddy reading and reading solo

• What it’s like reading alongside others in a book group, and how discussion can completely change your perspective on a story

• Why having strong opinions about a book - and sharing them - can sometimes feel a little vulnerable

• Whether there’s such a thing as the perfect buddy read book

• The satisfaction of correctly predicting a plot twist before your reading partner does

• How a reading buddy can bring fresh insights into themes, characters and plot

• Why buddy reading can enhance and deepen the overall reading experience

• The pure joy of watching a carefully planted mystery unfold and finally click into place

Books we reference in our discussion about buddy reading:

• Homecoming – Kate Morton

• Murder at the White Hart – Chris Chibnall

• Room 706 – Ellie Levenson

• The Warm Hands of Ghosts – Katherine Arden

Hannah is reading

The Swell – Kat Gordon

Hannah is completely absorbed in this one and admits she can barely put it down. She draws comparisons with the style and atmosphere of Kate Morton’s novels and thinks it would make an excellent buddy read thanks to the layers of mystery and intrigue running through the story. Expect plenty to ponder, including: bodies discovered in the ice, themes of sisterhood and unconditional love and threads of Icelandic myth and legend.

TBR:

Seed to Dust – Marc Hamer

This mindful, seasonal piece of non-fiction follows a year in the life of a garden. Hannah will be reading it with her book group and is hoping it offers something a little deeper and more reflective than the now familiar “nature heals everything” narrative.

Nikki is reading

The Familiar – Leigh Bardugo

Nikki has just finished this historical fantasy and shares her thoughts on its setting in Spain during the Inquisition. She reflects on the rich historical backdrop as well as the carefully constructed magical system within the novel.

We also touch on how important it is for fantasy stories to stick to the rules of their own magic systems so the narrative feels satisfying and believable rather than falling apart by the end.

TBR:

She Speaks: What Shakespeare’s Women Might Have Said – Harriet Walter

This imaginative book offers a fresh take on Shakespeare’s female characters. Harriet Walter creates thirty new speeches written in Shakespearean-style verse and prose, exploring what these women might have been thinking in the moments between the lines of the original plays; sometimes playful, sometimes deeply thoughtful.

How to Lose a Goblin in Ten Days – Jessie Silver

A cosy fantasy featuring a halfling and a goblin forced into close proximity, where cultural misunderstandings and reluctant companionship slowly turn into something more. Nikki is very excited to pick this one up.

Next Buddy Read:

The Lamb – Lucy Rose

Read along with us!

Please leave a comment about anything we’ve discussed as we’d love to hear from you, and if we can ask you to rate and review the pod (as it helps us to be seen and found), we’ll love you forever.

You can also drop us a line by emailing: hello@boundbybooks.co.uk

Visit and poke around on our website by going to: www.boundbybooks.co.uk