New Releases and More for May 5, 2026

This week, Liberty and Vanessa discuss Moonlight Murder, Platform Decay, Verity Guild, and more great books!

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Books Discussed On the Show:

Birth Vibes by Jen Hamilton

Dissection of a Murder by Jo Murray

Moonlight Murder by Uzma Jalaluddin

The Fallen: The Lost Girls of Ireland's Magdalene Laundries and a Legacy of Silence by Louise Brangan

The Miseducation of Caroline Bingley by Lindz McLeod

Verity Guild by Mai Corland

Honey by Imani Thompson

Backtalker: An American Memoir by Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw

The Girl with a Thousand Faces by Sunyi Dean

Platform Decay (The Murderbot Diaries Book 8) by Martha Wells

Seek Immediate Shelter by Vincent Yu

True Crime: A Memoir by Patricia Cornwell

One Leg on Earth by 'Pemi Aguda

Mother Tongue: A Memoir by Sara Nović

What We Ask Google: A Surprisingly Hopeful History of Humankind by Simon Rogers

Earthly Playing Field by Radhika Singh

What We're Reading:

Little Bosses Everywhere: How the Pyramid Scheme Shaped America by Bridget Read

Before I Let Go by Kennedy Ryan

Brume, Volume 2: The Forest of Lost Souls by Jérôme Pélissier, Carine Hinder

A Real Animal by Emeline Atwood 

Taipei Story by R. F. Kuang

The Repairer of Reputations by Ed Park, Robert W. Chambers

Paperbacks:

Victorian Psycho by Virginia Feito

When the Earth Was Green: Plants, Animals, and Evolution's Greatest Romance by Riley Black

The Director by Daniel Kehlmann, Ross Benjamin (translator)

The Lilac People by Milo Todd

The Museum Detective by Maha Khan Phillips

How to Lose Your Mother: A Daughter's Memoir by Molly Jong-Fast

Gliff by Ali Smith

Spectacular Things by Beck Dorey-Stein

You Belong Here by Megan Miranda

My Name Is Emilia del Valle by Isabel Allende, Frances Riddle (translator)

Flashlight by Susan Choi

The Starving Saints by Caitlin Starling

August Lane by Regina Black

As I Dream of You by Jennifer Lee, LeUyen Pham

The Book of Lost Hours by Hayley Gelfuso

Don't Let Him In by Lisa Jewell

The Manor of Dreams by Christina Li

Not Quite Dead Yet by Holly Jackson

Links:

A new book from Chad Harbach

The NYT Best Books of the Year (So Far)

Bestsellers:

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir 

Theo of Golden by Allen Levi

Famesick: A Memoir by Lena Dunham  

Hope Rises by David Baldacci  

London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family’s Search for Truth by Patrick Radden Keefe 

Poisoned Ivies: The Inside Account of the Academic and Moral Rot at America’s Elite Universities by Elise Stefanik 

Kin by Tayari Jones

The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad

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