It’s finally here and it’s exclusive to The First Edition members! If you’ve been waiting to dive deeper into Laura Dave’s world of secrets, survival, and second chances, this is your moment.

✨Tap the link for instant access to:

📚The combined duology book club kit for The Last Thing He Told Me and The First Time I Saw Him

📖Individual book club kits for each book if your group is reading them separately

🍋 Thoughtful discussion guides, themed food menus, activities, and door prize ideas done for you

Whether you’re planning your next meeting or building out your future book club calendar, these kits are designed to make hosting effortless and unforgettable.

👉Tap the link to access the kits now and let’s turn your next book club into an experience.

📖The Last Thing He Told Me https://tinyurl.com/muazhatm

📖The First Time I Saw Him

https://tinyurl.com/hyry4jcn

📚The Last Thing He Told Me & The First Time I Saw Him Book Club Kit!

https://tinyurl.com/y7cm5bea 

❗️Don't forget to come back and tell us how your meeting!

💥Happy reading!

If The Last Thing He Told Me and The First Time I Saw Him is your next book club read, you’re going to want in on this!

We’ve created exclusive, The First Editions members only book club kits designed to deepen the discussion, elevate your meetings, and fully immerse you in Laura Dave’s world of secrets, survival, and second chances.

The First Editions will get access to:

📚 A combined book club kit for discussing both books together

📖Individual book club kits for each title if you’re reading them separately

🍋Themed discussion questions, easy food menus, activities, and door prize ideas

Whether your group is just meeting Hannah and Bailey for the first time or you’re ready to unpack the entire journey from Protect her to second chances these kits are made to do the heavy lifting for you.

👉Join The First Editions to unlock the kits and turn your next book club into an experience you’ll still be talking about long after the last page.

Reading The Last Thing He Told Me and its follow-up, The First Time I Saw Him, as a book club turned out to be a total game-changer. We realized quickly that these aren't just mysteries, they are deep dives into the messy, complicated ways we protect the people we love. Every single one of us latched onto something different, and the debate in the group chat was electric.

Here is the Roundtable breakdown from our meeting:

✨Kaci: I was hooked immediately by the high-stakes premise of book one. A missing husband and a cryptic note that simply says Protect her? I was in from page one. But what really stayed with me was the evolution of Hannah and Bailey’s relationship. Watching two people who don’t trust each other slowly forge a bond out of necessity and then love felt incredibly real and emotionally satisfying.

✨Stacey: For me, the tension was the star. I loved how quiet and controlled the suspense was. There were no over-the-top explosions, just a mounting sense of dread as the layers of Owen’s life were peeled back. Every new piece of information made me question who he really was, and honestly, I’m still not sure how I feel about him. He’s the ultimate enigma.

✨Lisa: I connected most with Bailey. Her anger, her grief, and her initial mistrust of Hannah made total sense for a teenager whose world just blew up. I appreciated that she wasn’t written as instantly warm or forgiving; she had to earn her way there. By the time we reached the end of the first book, I felt fiercely protective of her.

✨Ashley: Then we hit the sequel, and that’s where my jaw dropped. I did not expect the shift in perspective or for Owen to resurface the way he did. I loved how much faster-paced the second book felt it was high-octane and stressful in the best way. I tore through the chapters because I desperately needed to know if they would actually get out safely.

✨Alisha: I was definitely the emotional one in the group! Seeing how Hannah and Bailey had managed to build a quiet life together after everything they went through really got to me. This part of the story felt less like a traditional mystery and more like an exploration of the cost of love and whether people truly deserve second chances when the past comes knocking.

✨Jess: I’ll be honest I had the most mixed feelings about Owen. While I appreciated getting the answers and the closure the sequel provided, I loved how much these books asked us to sit with moral gray areas. There is no easy right or wrong answer here, and that’s exactly what made our book club discussion so incredible.

Together, this duology gave us everything: suspense, deep emotional stakes, and a redefining of what family really looks like. Laura Dave has a gift for making the extraordinary feel personal.🏠🖤

✨️Thank you to our secret Santa from the Book Lovers Secret Santa Gift Exchange for sharing the Last Thing He Told Me and Scribner for sharing The First Time I Saw Him with us!

❔️If your book club were split on whether a character deserved forgiveness, would you be the one to passionately defend them or would you grab the snacks and just watch the debate unfold? 🍿📚💬

Hi there book club friends!

We are a week in to our first book of the year, The Lies of Locke Lamora, and the conversation over on Discord has been so much fun! It has been really interesting to me to see how differently we all read, to what level of detail we examine our books, and what we like and don't like. There have been some perfect examples where what bothers one person is exactly what another person likes, and I think this is one of those really fun things about reading. Most importantly, the discussions have been very insightful and respectful, and it seems like everyone is comfortable expressing their opinions (both positive and negative), which is the main goal for me!

For those of you who are not on Discord, each week I'll put up a post covering a section of the book, and a few prompt questions. You can feel free to chat about whatever, or respond to the questions.

One warning : I will clearly label each post with the section of the book, but know if you go to the comments or read past the spoiler line, there will be spoilers for those chapters. Please do not spoil future chapters in this section.

For this week, this post covers the Prologue, and Section I: Ambition (Up through Chapter 3 and Interulde: The Last Mistake). So if you read on: SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Questions:

How do you feel about the split timeline structure? Which timeline (Present or Past with Chains) do you find more engaging?

How did you feel about the world building so far - too much, too little, like/dislike the way it is presented?

Who or what do you think is following Locke?

What is your biggest question at this point in the book?

What did you think about the festival at The Shifting Revel, and what does it reveal about the world of Camoor?

Remember, there is always chat going on in the Discord, and be on the lookout next week for a poll about an online chat wrap up!

The new year means a new crop of books being published. Which means you have the opportunity to try out a new genre or author. You have the chance to get recommendations from friends, near and far.

I actually posted on my substack, so check out the list of my most anticipated books to learn more!

Kristian's Most Anticipated Books of 2026

Anyone else claustrophobic? Did the Descent give you nightmares? Yeah…me too.

Caves terrify me. It’s super easy to get lost in them. Not to mention that people will go into narrow tunnels (that CAN COLLAPSE ON YOU) to get to other areas of the cave. Some of these tunnels can only be accessed by going under water.

See…that’s a whole lotta nope for me.

The below novels are either on my tbr or I have read (I’ll specify beside each one). They all center on or feature a cave at some point.

Please let me know if I’ve missed your favorite! I’m always looking for more cave horror.

The Anomaly by Michael Rutger (tbr)

The Sleeping Land by Ella Alexander (tbr)

The Maw by Taylor Zajonc (tbr)

Into The Sublime by Kate A Boorman (read)

The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling (read)

The Enigma of Amigara Fault (featured in Gyo) by Junji Ito (read)

Ararat by Christopher Golden (tbr)

The Reddening by Adam Nevill (tbr)

The Long Low Whistle by Laurel Hightower (read)

It’s time for another DIRECTOR’S CUT REVIEW. Today I’m talking about The Caretaker!

Book: The Caretaker

Author: Marcus Kliewer

Page Count: 320

Genre: Horror

Subgenre: Grief, Rituals, Anomalies, End of the world

Series: No

Setting: Michigan

Other Works by This Author: We Used To Live Here

Comps: Observation Duty (game) meets Lock Every Door

My Rating: ✨✨✨✨✨

Release Date: 4/21/26

Quick Summary: A woman strapped for money takes a house sitting job that promises to pay well. However, the duties she must perform have a lot riding on them. If she does not follow the rites correctly, something sinister may be unleashed.

My Thoughts: Kliewer does it again 🙌🏻 This author truly knows how suck a reader in and get them to stay until the very last page. The tension in this book had me on the edge of my seat. There were so many scenes where I wanted to jump in and make Macy focus on the task at hand.

Speaking of Macy, let’s talk about her character. She’s had a hard time ever since her dad’s accident. She’s been taking care of her sister who has some issues but is a good kid overall. I really liked Macy. Don’t get me wrong, she drove me crazy sometimes. Like I needed her to finish the darn rites. But she had a very strong voice and I loved how much she cared for her sister.

Just like We Used To Live Here, this book delivers on scares. There were several scenes that had me spooked. You can’t trust anyone in this book. I loved that this book reminded me of Observation Duty. It actually has a similar premise to a short story I’m writing for an anthology this year, and was a great inspiration! My story will also focus on a woman getting trapped in a dangerous job while caring for a loved one. But that’s where the similarities will end!

If this one was not on your radar I highly recommend adding it! It relaxes 4/21/26. You all get an early access to my thoughts on this book! My goodreads and insta thoughts will come closer to the pub date per request of the publisher!

Happy (?) Saturday, mis internet amigxs,

This has been a heavy week and I hope all of you are taking good care of yourselves.

Please make sure to mark Wednesday, February 4th at 8:00 PM EST for our chat with Esperanza Hope Snyder, author of our January book club selection, Orange Wine. I'm really looking forward to speaking with her. If you're new here, we usually chat with the author for 30-40 minutes then we open up Q&A to book club members, so please start thinking of your questions for Esperanza now! Of course, we're chatting all month on Discord, so please join us there if you already haven't.

Also, in case you missed it, I've been running a challenge for myself on YouTube this month, challenging myself to post every single day in January. I'm not certain I'm going to make today's deadline, but I have some reviews and other content I'll be posting soon. If you're participating in 2026 Latine Book Bingo, then I recommend this 2-part series (video 1, video 2) detailing 50 books you can read for different parts of the bingo card. In addition, I posted 15 Latine books releasing in 2026 I'm looking forward to. Beginning in February, I'll slow down production. My goal is to post at least 2 YouTube videos a month.

Finally, before I bring you this week's Latine releases, I'm contemplating some changes to your benefits and wanted to run something by you--I was thinking that instead of a weekly newsletter of Latine releases for Lectores and Libritos members, I'd instead make available to you my spreadsheet of Latine releases, both past and future. That way, you'd have something to reference when you're looking for your next Latine read. You'd still get the Tuesday New Latine Releases spreadsheet, but wouldn't receive the duplicate exclusive newsletter like this one. Let me know what you think. I'm still ruminating on this change, but if you have any feedback on your benefits as members...

And now, on to this week's releases...

ROMANCE

The Lust Crusade by Jo Segura (Audiobook) Contemporary romance following a plucky librarian and an archaeologist on the run who fake an engagement to save their lives all while catching feelings for one another.

The Magic of Untamed Hearts by Raquel Vasquez Guililand (Audiobook) Paranormal romance that centers the third Flores sister, Sage, who was trapped in an oak by the gods for 8 years. It's been 2 years since she was released and she's trying to find her way in life, dealing with a town that disparages her circumstances and her relationship with animals. Enter Adam Noemi, grandson of her elderly neighbor she cares for William, who's down on his luck, but also beloved by the town. In a scheme to reveal to the town what happened to her, Sage agrees to have Adam, a reporter, interview her. But her revelations also brings wall crashing down between them and something more grows between them. I'm almost done with this one and it's my favorite of the series so far. Full review to come soon...

TRANSLATED FICTION

Pedro the Vast by Simon Lopez Trujillo and translated by Robin Myers (Audiobook) A translated work of literary fiction that beckons Jeff Vandermeer where in a fire-prone landscape, humanity has encroached on nature enough and a deadly fungus mounts resistance.

DARK ROMANTASY

A Vow In Vengeance by Jaclyn Rodriguez (Audiobook) A Latine release with a limited edition first print run? WHAT A RARITY! The first book in the Immortal Desires series, this dark fantasy features enemies to lovers, dark academia, fake fated mates, forced proximity, touch her and die, and tarot tropes.

PICTURE BOOK

Apapacho Love: A Story About Hugs From The Heart by Cynthia Harmony and illustrated by Erika Meza

xoxo,

Carmen

PS--this is a reminder that this list is CURATED by me and not intended to be a comprehensive list of ALL Latine releases. Part of that curation is not promoting problematic Latine authors.

Hello Friends!

Happy New Year! You may think I'm late, but the French say Happy New Year for the entire month of January and I like this tradition! So HAPPY NEW YEAR!

I spent the New Year in the Redwoods (The North Coast is my favorite part of California)!

Publishing Updates

I am so thankful for all of you and your support of What Feeds Below. One of my immediate goals was to get 1,000 adds on Goodreads and because of you, in just over two weeks we are at 927! That is so incredible! You may have heard me say it before, but supporting indie and marginalized authors on Goodreads is so important! Adding books to your Want to Read shelf helps these books get noticed, gets them on media lists, gets book box attention and signals to publishers that the book is going to do well. This can help author's land future contracts. I know many of my supporters have migrated to author platforms, but if you want to support marginalized author's, I strongly urge you to consider using both. If you haven't added What Feeds Below to your Goodreads shelves yet, please do so here.

PREORDERS: I've been pretty blunt (surprise, surprise lol) about my very ambitious preorder goal for What Feeds Below. I want to hit 1,000 preorders early, like by tomorrow haha! There are 2 BIG reasons why:

1. I am absolutely obsessed with this book. I think it has the potential to be such a huge hit (I'm thinking big: movies! I'm already preparing my red carpet dress. PLEASE! Dare I say...TRILOGY?) I think this is the best book Tatiana has written so far. I think most people will read it in one sitting. I think there are so many cosplay opportunities! I think you're going to sleep with the lights on! I want this book to compete with trad pub releases this year. I want book box options. I want to hit a best seller list.

2. I want to publish more books. I want the books I publish to be in conversation with some of the hottest books of the year. (I have great taste, so they should be LOL). After WFB, we have Cracks in an Ocean of Glass, an incredible literary horror coming out in Spring 2027. I want ensure a book for Fall 27. (I've already received a pitch for an Indigenous sci-fi fantasy that I'm pretty sure the world needs). The way to make sure we get there is to hit these preorders early!

There are over 2,000 of you here now! That's 2,000 readers who believe in this mission, who believe traditional publishing has failed us, who believe women in horror deserve equal conversation time to their male counterparts and Indigenous authors need more books on the shelves at your local bookstore. If all 2,000 of you pre-ordered this book today, you would not only change my life, but the lives of our current and future authors. The book is $16.73 on bookshop right now. GRAB IT HERE. If you can spare the $16.73 this month, investing in marginalized authors, investing in indie publishing, investing in this change we want to see in the world is a great way to spend it.

READING UPDATES

I've read 3 books so far this year:

• Not Quite Dead Yet by Holly Jackson, this is an adult mystery where the main character has 7 days to live and needs to solve her murder before she dies. I did enjoy this one, but I'm going to recommend that you read a physical copy or E reader version.

• The Sky Was Once A Dark Blanket:Poems by Kinsale Drake, beautiful Indigenous poetry collection. I am going to read more poetry this year!

• The Last Witch by CJ Cookie, holy crap! My first book by CJ Cooke and I'm hooked. I need to read all of their books right now! 15th century Innsbruck, women accused of witchcraft, historical horror at its finest!

Current reads:

• This is Not A Test by Courtney Summers, a Bindery spring release! and Women in Horror Book Club February pick (and yes Courtney will be joining us for a bookclub meeting!) I'm reading the audio as a Libro ALC and this is a zombie book full of feelings! You're going to have them! Wow!

• Rebecca by Daphne DuMaurier, this was supposed to be a 2025 reread but I started in 2025 and now I read multiple books at the same time apparently. A mood reading queen! Loving every minute of this reread. And annotating! YES!

• Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado, Women in Horror Book Club read for January! Oh, I'm loving this collection of short horror stories. I need Machado to put out another book like this year please.

On deck:

• To The Moon and Back by Eliana Ramage, this is Good Day to Read Indigenous book club selection for January!

JOIN THE COMMUNITY

To join the Women in Horror book club and Good Day To Read Indigenous Book Club, connect to our community Discord on the main page.

Journal CLUB!

We are starting a 100 day project tomorrow using the prompts in The Book of Alchemy: A Creative Practice For An Inspired Life by Suleika Jaouad. You don't have to start tomorrow to join, just have a love for journaling (or wanting to try!)

Upcoming for Paid Members:

Paid members get publishing news first. They get to see the cover process in action. They get to hear about all the publishing meeting that happen and provided input! If you're interested in how the book all comes together, consider upgrading to $5.

$5 members will get e*arcs of all Boozhoo Books.

$12 members will get physical arcs of all Boozhoo Books AND their name on the thank you page.

Your paid membership makes this community run. Part of the funds go into the production of the books and I'm using the rest to host giveaways (and sometimes buy a latte!)

Letter Club: you heard it here first. I'm starting a penpal club for paid members (still working on the name? IDEAS??? Will keep you posted in the upcoming weeks!

Traveling Arc Club: more details to come, but I've wanted to start a traveling arc club for a long time! Books chosen will have permission from the publisher or author. (If you are an author reading this and want to participate, DM me!)

Traveling Journal Club: the idea here is that everyone has their own journal to start off, and we rotate, adding things to the journal, the journal gets circulated to all members until it's full and then mailed back to the original owner as a keepsake. Details to come!

Upcoming Content:

• more On Your Radar lists are coming!

• Get A Rec responses (If you didn't notice the button at the top of the page, you can now request a rec! I have a few to work through and give responses so will be working on them this week!)

• Recommendations for books to read for the Read More Indigenous Non Fiction Storygraph Challenge

Reminder that our book club meeting for Broken Country will take place Wednesday, January 28th at 8pm EST! Link will be posted closer to meeting time ☺️

I haven't yet started reading, but I did a little digging, and there are a few content warnings I want to mention.

• Child death

• Animal death

• Infidelity

• Gun violence

• Suicidal thoughts

If you've already finished or just have more to add, feel free to leave in the comments! And please keep these in mind when choosing whether or not to read it. You are always more than welcome to hang out in the chat, whether or not you read the book!

Synopsis:

“The farmer is dead. He is dead, and all anyone wants to know is who killed him.”

Beth and her gentle, kind husband Frank are happily married, but their relationship relies on the past staying buried. But when Beth’s brother-in-law shoots a dog going after their sheep, Beth doesn’t realize that the gunshot will alter the course of their lives. For the dog belonged to none other than Gabriel Wolfe, the man Beth loved as a teenager—the man who broke her heart years ago. Gabriel has returned to the village with his young son Leo, a boy who reminds Beth very much of her own son, who died in a tragic accident.

As Beth is pulled back into Gabriel’s life, tensions around the village rise and dangerous secrets and jealousies from the past resurface, this time with deadly consequences. Beth is forced to make a choice between the woman she once was, and the woman she has become.

Enter the preorder raffle here!

It’s voting time! We’ve narrowed it down to 𝗦𝗜𝗫 𝗮𝗺𝗮𝘇𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀, and we need your help deciding what we’ll read together next month. Drop your vote in the in the comments👇

✨𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝟭: 𝑨 𝑪𝒂𝒍𝒂𝒎𝒊𝒕𝒚 𝒐𝒇 𝑺𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒔 𝒃𝒚 𝑫𝒂𝒗𝒊𝒅 𝑩𝒂𝒍𝒅𝒂𝒄𝒄𝒊

A powerful courtroom drama tackling justice, race, and moral reckoning in the Jim Crow–era South.

🌴𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝟮: 𝑫𝒂𝒚 𝑫𝒓𝒊𝒏𝒌𝒆𝒓𝒔 𝒃𝒚 𝑲𝒊𝒕𝒕𝒚 𝑻𝒖𝒓𝒏𝒆𝒓

A sun-soaked, darkly thrilling adventure full of corrupt elites, danger at sea, and island secrets.

💕𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝟯: 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑲𝒏𝒐𝒄𝒌𝒆𝒎𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝑺𝒆𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒃𝒚 𝑳𝒖𝒄𝒚 𝑺𝒄𝒐𝒓𝒆 

Small-town charm, swoony romance, grumpy heroes, and found-family chaos classic comfort reads with spice.

📍If you choose The three books in The Knockemout Series by Lucy Score then we still need 𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸!

❄️𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝟰: 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑾𝒊𝒕𝒄𝒉 𝑾𝒂𝒍𝒌𝒆𝒓 𝑺𝒆𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒃𝒚 𝑪𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒊𝒔𝒔𝒂 𝑾𝒆𝒂𝒌𝒔

Epic romantasy with ancient gods, icy magic, slow-burn tension, and a morally gray hero.

📍If you choose The two books in the The Witch Walker Series we will need 𝘁𝘄𝗼 𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸𝘀!

🔥𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝟱: 𝑩𝒍𝒐𝒐𝒅 𝒐𝒇 𝑯𝒆𝒓𝒄𝒖𝒍𝒆𝒔 𝒃𝒚 𝑱𝒂𝒔𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒆 𝑴𝒂𝒔

Dark academia meets Greek mythology, deadly trials, brutal training, gods, monsters, and survival at all costs.

🎧 𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝟲: 𝑨 𝑺𝒉𝒂𝒅𝒐𝒘 𝒊𝒏 𝑴𝒐𝒔𝒄𝒐𝒘 𝒃𝒚 𝑲𝒂𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓𝒊𝒏𝒆 𝑹𝒆𝒂𝒚

A gripping Cold War spy novel following two brave women navigating secrets, betrayal, and survival inside Soviet Moscow.

🗳️Vote in the comments the FOUR books you would like us to read in February!

Hi everyone!

Sunday marks the end of the first week in our reading challenge, and you should be halfway into your time audits. If you didn't start yet, or missed a few days, that's ok! Even doing only a week of this will give you some good insights.

Hopefully at this point you are starting to notice some patterns, or places where you are spending more/less time than you thought. Remember, as we go forward just keep living and reading like you normally would. For the next post regarding this reading challenge, we will talk about how to analyze your results, and how to come up with a plan to fit in some consistent reading.

For week three, when we are done your time audits, we can analyze your results, and pick out a book for you to read to start working on a daily reading habit. We'll also come up with a plan for when and how much you'll plan on reading, and then week 4 we will implement that plan and check in.

As I mentioned before, for each month of these reading challenges, one person gets a $25 bookshop.org gift card. To be eligible for January, you'll need to prove that you did the time audit, so if you haven't started and want to participate, the is still time! If you go to my last post on the topic, all the info, including the Google Doc for the time audit, can be found there.

So, how is it going? Have you learned anything new? Anything surprised you yet? Any Struggles? Any questions? Let me know down in the comments or head over to Discord and we can chat!

Over the holidays, I took a road trip to the nordics and visited a beautifully-curated bookstore in Copenhagen, Politikens Boghal. Here's a little look at all of the books I was tempted to pick up and what I ended up bringing home.

📚Request a Custom Book Club Kit

Planning your next book club read and wishing you had everything ready to go in one place? Are you an author and looking for a book club kit for your book?

💥We’ve got you covered!

If there’s a specific title you’d love to see turned into a themed book club kit complete with discussion questions, a themed menu, activities, and door prize ideas you can request one directly from us!

How to Request a Kit

📧Email us at: thepageladies6@gmail.com

In your message, please include:

📚The book title

🗓The date you need the kit by

❗️Important: Please allow at least two weeks’ notice so we have enough time to thoughtfully create your kit.

Whether your group loves suspense, literary fiction, romance, or courtroom drama, we’re happy to help make your next book club meeting feel special, immersive, and stress-free!

We can’t wait to see what you’re reading next! 📖✨