Writer and scholar David Wright Faladé sits down with Julie Orringer to discuss his latest book, The New Internationals, a stunning historical novel that sets a coming-of-age narrative and cross-cultural romance amidst a vibrant political moment in postwar Paris.

Kelly and Erica discuss a mega list of the best YA books of 2024, the romance bookstore boom of the last few years, and our current book club pick. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! A new year means a new Read Harder Challenge! Join…

When author and historian Martha Hodes was 12-years-old she was flying unaccompanied on a plane that was hijacked. Nearly half a century later she explores her memories of that event in her book My Hijacking, which draws on deep archival research and extensive interviews both to re-create what happened to her as a child and to understand the larger…

Kelly talks with YA author and children's literature champion Jason Reynolds about his career, writing the inner lives of teen boys, his favorite middle grade and YA books, and more. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! A new year mean…

New York State Poet Laureate Patricia Spears Jones is a poet, playwright, educator, and cultural activist. Her most recent book The Beloved Community was released in 2023. Here she is in conversation with Brent Hayes Edwards, professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature and the Center for Jazz Studies at Columbia University.…

This week we're sharing a rerun of a favorite episode from last year in which Erica speaks with Madeline Berberian-Hutchinson about being a 16-year-old NYS and NYC Youth Poet Laureate Finalist and co-founder of a literary arts magazine, and Kelly talks with author Veronica Chambers about Ida In Love and Trouble, Black historical YA, and more. Subsc…

Join author and professor Deondra Rose as she discusses her new book The Power of Black Excellence: HBCUs and the Fight for American Democracy with activist Angelo Pinto.

Erica gets into some new YA fantasy graphic novels, comics, and manga she's excited to read in the new year. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! A new year means a new Read Harder Challenge! Join us as we make our way through 24 tasks…

Caoilinn Hughes joins fellow author Brandon Taylor to discuss her latest book, The Alternatives, a story of four brilliant Irish sisters, orphaned in childhood, who scramble to reconnect when the oldest disappears into the Irish countryside.

Josephine Quinn sits down with award-winning poet Ken Chen to discuss her book How the World Made the West. Quinn's book poses a bold challenge to “civilizational thinking” on the origins of Western culture—that is, the idea that civilizations arose separately and distinctly from one another. Rather, she locates the roots of the modern West in ever…

Jean Strouse sits down with Pulitzer Prize–winner Hernan Diaz to discuss her latest book Family Romance: John Singer Sargent and the Wertheimers. Strouse's account illuminates a period of tumultuous social change that saw the declining fortunes of the British aristocracy, the dramatic rise of new wealth on both sides of the Atlantic, and the birth …

Kelly and Erica discuss their year in YA reading, looking back at their favorite books and themes that emerged. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! At Tailored Book Recommendations, we’ve recommended over 150,000 books to readers of e…

In her new biography, The Elements of Marie Curie, Dava Sobel explores not just on Curie’s legendary genius, but the 45 women who worked in her lab—from Marguerite Perey, who discovered the element francium, to Curie’s elder daughter, Irène, winner of the 1935 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Sobel chronicles Curie’s remarkable life of discovery alongside…

This week on Hey YA, Kelly talks about five upcoming 2025 YA anthologies you'll want on your TBR. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! At Tailored Book Recommendations, we’ve recommended over 150,000 books to readers of every type. And…

Daniel Saldaña París speaks with Chloé Cooper Jones about his latest book Planes Flying over a Monster, which explores the cities where París has lived, each one home to a new iteration of himself. These now diverging, now coalescing selves raise questions: Where can we find authenticity? How do we construct the stories that define us? What if our …

Kelly and Erica discuss some of the YA books out in December that they're the most excited for. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! At Tailored Book Recommendations, we’ve recommended over 150,000 books to readers of every type. And w…

Dive into the Library’s collections for true tales of crime and chicanery from some of the city’s most outstanding lawbreakers. Beloved actors and performers read stories mined from the Library’s collections about the words and deeds of New Yorkers who lived on either side of the letter of the law.

This week, Kelly talks with Maggie Tokuda-Hall about book banning, its impacts on teens, and what Authors Against Book Bans is doing in response. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! Keep up to date with the world of books and reading …

Beloved artist and author Maira Kalman sits down with author Rumaan Alam to discuss her new collection of illustrations, Still Life with Remorse, her most autobiographical and intimate work to date.

Vanessa and Erica talk about the perfect YA books to gift, plus some other little goodies for others, or—let's be real—yourself. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! Keep up to date with the world of books and reading with Today in Boo…

Celebrating The Joy of Connections, the last book of beloved icon (and long-time New Yorker) Dr. Ruth Westheimer. Co-authors Allison Gilbert and Pierre Lehu are joined by Dr. Ruth's children, Dr. Miriam Westheimer and Dr. Joel Westheimer, in a conversation moderated by WABC-TV's Bill Ritter.

Erica speaks to Susen Shi, the New York Public Library's Young Adult Staff Engagement and Support Manager, about the library's list of the 50 best YA books of the year. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! Keep up to date with the worl…

Glory Edim, the founder of Well-Read Black Girl, discusses her new memoir, Gather Me, an ode to the power reading has had on her life and to books’ ability to help us understand ourselves.

Vanessa and Erica talk lotería, a land where Christmas is year-round, predatory and dark magic, and the best new YA out in November to add to your TBR. Subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. To get even more YA news and recommendations, sign up for our What’s Up in YA newsletter! Keep up to date with the world of books and re…