Book Recs: The Good Sources, The Bad Phrases, and Our Hot Takes

Where do you get your book recs? This week on Chapter One Scene One, we covered our favorites along with some hot takes. Spoiler: TikTok is overrated, "best of" lists are fake, and indie bookstore staff picks hit different than Barnes & Noble ones. And some of our most hated phrases in recs? "This book destroyed me" and "it broke my brain." But where do we actually find trusted sources?

We broke it down by category.

People You Know

• Friends, family, coworkers, group chats

Online & Social

• Podcasts
• Substacks and book blogs
• Social media (with a grain of salt)
• Author newsletters

Websites & Apps

• Goodreads
• BookBrowse
• NetGalley
• Libby / Hoopla

In Person

• Indie bookstore staff picks
• Magic City Books
• Marigold's Books
• Bookstore tables and displays

We also got into the phrases that make us want to immediately put a book down, whether early reader hype actually shapes how a book lands, and a round of books we'd always recommend versus ones we absolutely wouldn't.

Listen to the full episode wherever you get your podcasts. Find all our links at linktr.ee/chapteronesceneone.