Magpie Journals #3: Pages to Pods

Hi there! I’ve decided I’m switching the Journals to Fridays. It works better with The Monthly Magpie and honestly probably with my brain.

In Magpie Updates ...

My review for Scamanda is still doing shockingly well. Again, the uptick in hits I'm getting for Nobody Should Believe Me is a goal that I'm achieving that makes my little heart go pitter-patter. My subscriptions are pretty much the same, and my open rate was 75% for this month's Monthly Magpie. I'm looking at planning my reviews farther in advance, so maybe I'll even be able to do two to three reviews a week in the next year or so. These are dreams, and goals that I have.

Onto the Journal...

I love podcasts, but my first love was truly books. I was a voracious reader, to the point that taking the television or computer away from me in punishment for typical kid shenanigans didn’t work. I would just curl up with a book.

My parents never took my books away, though. To this day, I get more Barnes and Noble gift cards than anything. I’m here for it, but reading has just gotten harder and harder.

Lately, I’ve been blazing through easy-to-read romances. Books meant to sweep me away and scandalize me. Like many, A Court of Thornes and Roses  (ACOTAR) started me on this trek. I’m happy for it, not just because I enjoy these books written by Sarah J. Maas, but because there’s a community around them. Romance is seeing a social media heyday, and I am swept up in it.

As I revisited A Court of Thornes and Roses through Graphic Audio as a bit of a joke, I of course fell in love with the whole concept of Graphic Audio (no this isn’t an ad). I sat with this audiobook, absorbed for hours. Then, very suddenly, I realized how many hard-copy books I have sitting on my bedside table, my desk, and my bookshelf, that I haven’t touched. So I got to Chapter 55 in the sequel to ACOTAR and decided it was time to revisit the hard copies. First, I’m reading Hamnet a plague novel about the family of William Shakespeare, and then I’m probably heading into the fantasy world to escape the plague.

So how does all of this circle back to podcasts? Because of Graphic Audio? Nah. While I love that audiobook adaptation, it makes me think fondly of an idea when I first started this review website. Pages and Pods was a pairing, where I would take a podcast and pair it with a book series or book. The idea was if you like this book, maybe you’ll like this podcast, or if you like this podcast maybe you’ll like this book. They were supposed to compliment each other, to give depth to either piece. I want to keep this up, so as I travel through picking up my reading with more intention than “no thoughts, just vibes” I’m hoping to add pairings to my journals.

If you have a podcast that pairs with a book, let me know and maybe I’ll share it. Or maybe I’ll make Pages and Pods an actual newsletter with some collaboration. Who knows?

The impetus for this pairing was the book series An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir and Rabia O’Chaudry’s The Hidden Djinn. I read a lot of books inspired by South Asian mythology and culture and I realized as I read An Ember in the Ashes, (which is an inspirational combination of real-world to fantasy world-building someone could make a class on) that I was missing a big piece of understanding. So I went looking for a podcast to help me out. Here comes Rabia O’Chaudry and this great podcast that weaves tales of djinn in ways that are approachable for the unfamiliar.

Honestly, I want to keep doing things related to Pages and Pods. I love books, and I love podcasts. What more could I ask for?

Buy An Ember in the Ashes Here

Listen to The Hidden Djinn Here