Welcome to Top Shelf Reads. On today’s episode, we chat about Chicago bookstores and an online book club. Nick reviews If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino and we share book gifting ideas for the holiday season. Enjoy the show!

00:55 -- Chicago Bookstore Adventures

• Afterwords
• Newberry (in library)
• Exile in Bookville (in Roosevelt University)
• Book Haul:
  • The Conformist  by Alberto Moravia
  • Butcher's Crossing by John Williams
  • The Bear by Andrew Krivak
  • Parakeet by Mari-Helene Bertino
  • This Thing Between Us by Gus Moreno

07:04 -- The Bear by Andrew Krivak (mini review)
10:05 -- Online book club for Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk

• Blackwell's link to buy BoJ
• Book club

17:20 -- If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino (a review)
27:01 -- Holiday Reading Gift Guide (a discussion)

Books Discussed:

• Circe by Madeline Miller
• Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn
• An Unapologetic Cookbook by Joshua Weissman
• Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk
• The Door by Magda Szabo
• The Sailor who Fell From Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima
• The Employees by Olga Ravn
• NYRB
• Wizard of Earth Sea by Ursula K. Le Guin
• Lord of the Rings by Tolkein
• The Hainish Cycle by Ursula K. Le Guin
• The Lions of Al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay
• Puffin in Bloom
• Puffin Hardcover Classics
• Juniper Gothic Horror Collection
• Blind Date with a Book

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