Some of you guessed our clue correctly: For International Men's Day (19 November), we will be release the most laddish book we've ever read on the show: William Golding's 1954 anti-colonialist schoolboy castaway narrative, 'Lord of the Flies'. No girls allowed, and 'Sucks to your Auntie!'

Happy Halloween, Shelfers! We receive the ultimate honour (and Abby has been able to scratch this off her bucket list): a listener went as not one, but BOTH hosts for Halloween this year. Posted here with permission. Apologies that we don't have their socials--please tag yourself if this is you!

It's time to guess the clue to our next episode, which will be released on International Men's Day (19 November). For this episode, we don't want to hear a woman in our text. We don't even want to SEE a woman. And turns out, neither do any of the male characters. What are we reading?

When you're going through hell, just keep going. Or so says The Divine Comedy! Join us (and medieval heresy expert Justine) to discuss Dante (Caesar fanboy, civil engineering girlie, cringe bisxeual), and to hear Daniel's increasing anger over Abby's chosen circle. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

For our spoooooky Halloween text, we will recap Dante's Divine Comedy (major focus on the 'Inferno' section). And to help us do this, we will be joined by medieval heresy historian (and Abby's best friend/Daniel's enemy), Justine! Tune in 15 Oct. for Dante's embarrassing self-insert Bible fanfic.

We've had a lot of guesses about our clue to the next episode (a text that's both hotter than 'Fahrenheit 451' and also ice cold), but no one has come close to getting it right. Another clue: After a long hiatus, the hosts will be joined by Abby's best friend, and MEDIEVAL SCHOLAR, Justine.

Time to guess the clue to our next episode! This summer, we did a mini-season of texts that were 'Hot' (Streetcar), 'Hotter' (Fanny Hill), and 'Hottest' (Fahrenheit 451). But can we find a text that is *even hotter* than Fahrenheit 451? Or maybe it's not hot at all. Maybe it's ice cold.

'I really miss seeing racists and misogynists on TV' - verified Abby quote in Bookends 23, out today! ALSO: outtakes from the 'Catcher in the Rye' episode, erotic imaginings of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and a massive upset involving Henry Fielding. podcasts.apple.com/za/podcast/s...

Daniel Jenkin-Smith, one half of @smfmspodcast.bsky.social, is a guest on @utopiaanddystopia.bsky.social. Bigger than the 1968 crossover Thanksgiving episode of The Beverly Hillbillies. Can't wait to listen! open.spotify.com/episode/3mD0... @dcjenkin-smith.bsky.social @drabigailboucher.bsky.social

I should add, if you like what you hear from our guest in this episode you can follow him @dcjenkin-smith.bsky.social and his podcast is the brilliant @smfmspodcast.bsky.social.

Hey, ya phonies! Enjoying back-to-school? Well, our (anti)hero sure isn't! Join us for JD Salinger's 1951 ode to teen angst, 'Catcher in the Rye'. Let's all have Buckfast at Tiffany's, put on weird hats, and argue about who has it worse in winter: ducks or fish. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

If you've been saving up your urine for a rainy day, tune in to our 'Catcher in the Rye' (1951) episode, which includes an investigation into the famous 'Hughes principle': the proposed overlap between aviation and bra technology. Taking flight this Wednesday!

A week today we'll be putting out our next episode and you can listen to me chatting about bureaucratic dystopias (and utopias) with @dcjenkin-smith.bsky.social of @smfmspodcast.bsky.social 'fame'!... I use fame in scare quotes because I know he'd want me to!

Actually, Frankenstein is a doctor success at the Venice film festival

You guessed correctly! For the start of the autumn term, we're ... accidentally doing a Christmas book (look, neither of us had read this before). Join us 17 September for J.D. Salinger's surprisingly funny masterpiece of teenage ennui, ducks, and hostile cab drivers: 'The Catcher in the Rye' (1951)

Will do, and thank you! I am also a fan of @smfmspodcast.bsky.social and listened to their episode on Fahrenheit 451. My novel is (sadly) a little too relevant these days. Here's an essay I wrote about it last year before the 2024 elections. www.zocalopublicsquare.org/real-monster...

Your hosts are in the throes of prepping for a new school year, so we're going to guess the clue to our next episode a little early this time. This is another pretty obvious clue, but what better way to celebrate the new school term than with someone deciding to play hookey? What are we reading?

Join us during this heatwave for our hottest text yet: Ray Bradbury's dystopian 'Fahrenheit 451' (1953). Today we get one step closer to EGOT-ing, see more of Abby's French-Vermonter roots, and discuss some scholastic terms: fridging, Bowlderisation, and Futurismo. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

The excellent people over at @smfmspodcast.bsky.social are doing Fahrenheit 451 this month, so if you want to hear their entertaining take, you can listen to it here: open.spotify.com/episode/7npQ...

Recorded, and released, during a heatwave, we discover in this episode that high temperatures can yield provocative new visions about literature and culture. Ray Bradbury's 'Fahrenheit 451' (1953) - out tomorrow!

Just finished recording an interview with the super smart @dcjenkin-smith.bsky.social of @smfmspodcast.bsky.social fame on the relationship between bureaucracy and utopia/dystopia! Lots of great insight and a really fun chat. Looking forward to the episode making its appearance.

Loads of people guessed correctly! Our next very banned (and, ironically, often burned) book is Ray Bradbury's 1953 dystopia about the perils of anti-intellectualism, 'Fahrenheit 451'. Tune in on 13 August for a lot of histrionics about technology!

It's time to guess the clue to our next episode in our season on banned books--and this might be the most obvious clue we've ever given. Our summer texts have been getting increasingly hot. But what could possibly be hotter than our last episode, 'Fanny Hill'?

Today's episode of SMFMS Bookends is a wild ride. We reveal the podcast's best-kept secret (three years and we said nothing!), in addition to our plans to destroy every other podcast that might vie with us for your affections. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/s...

ATTENTION ALL PERVS: our 69th episode, covering John Cleland's 1749 erotic novel 'Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure' (AKA 'Fanny Hill'), is out now! Expect strapping footmen, polite applause during orgies, and plenty of red-hot turtlebilling! podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/e...

Join us on Wednesday for our episode on John Cleland's seminal (heh) erotic work, 'Fanny Hill' (1748). In addition to lots of strange euphemisms for body parts, be prepared to learn about some bizarre sex acts, like (the maybe less dirty than originally thought) 'turtlebilling'.

What texts would you like us to cover in Season 7 (a lighter season on fan favourites)? Give your answer in our thread of polls below! And don't worry if you don't see the text you really want: we have a handful that have been requested so many times that they're already on the official S7 list!

We've had some feverish guessing of our next text and only one person got it right! For our 69th episode (nice), we'll recap what is debatably the very first pornographic work to use the novel as its form: John Cleland's 'Fanny Hill, or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure' (1748). Genitals at the ready!

Time to guess the clue to our next episode! We're labelling our run of summer episodes: 'Hot, Hotter, and Hottest'. Our next episode (Hotter) covers an erotic text that is also a literary classic and a very, very banned book. What are we reading? (it is NOT 'Dennis Reynolds: An Erotic Life')

Join us today for our Bookends episode on 'A Streetcar Named Desire'. We've gotten a request to show Daniel's famous boots (the ones by which he was diddled by a dodgy cobbler), so here you go. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/s...

We need your reccs! After this season on banned books, in S7 we are only covering fan favs--the (hopefully) fun, campy works of classic lit that you've been asking for. Tournament bracket poll coming later; let us know now what you want to see on it! (YES Lysistrata & Wilkie Collins are on the list)

Happy Pride, everyone! Today we look at Tennessee Williams's slutty 1947 play, 'A Streetcar Named Desire'. We talk po'boys, suffer through a massive recording equipment failure, and Daniel reveals himself to be both the podcast's Brando AND a thriving gay man. 🌈 podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

TOMORROW: We cover the first installment in Tennessee Williams' highly popular Historic Tramways of New Orleans Extended Theatrical Universe™: 'A Streetcar Named Desire' (1947). FEAT: the bleeping out of the word 'tosser'. Tune in!

Ah yes this is why I got into education: so I can watch 2 robots shitting into each others’ mouths

Several of you guessed our clue correctly! We have labelled our run of summer episodes 'hot', 'hotter', and 'hottest'. Join us on Wednesday 18 June for our first text, 'hot', as we go down to New Orleans and jump into the familial and delusional boiling pot that is 'A Streetcar Named Desire' (1947).

We know the bigger podcasts could hit this number in a single day, but Save Me From My Shelf is pretty chuffed to have reached 100,000 downloads. 900,000 more and maybe a local deli will name a sandwich after us. We can but dream!

It's time to guess the clue to our next episode! Summer is around the corner, so our next three texts will be labelled hot, hotter, and hottest. Our first one is ‘hot’. Let’s go someplace sultry, with a lot of boiling over tensions. And, because it’s Pride Month, this text has a queer connection.

SMFMS Bookends out today: it was a mistake to record it during the 'Ulysses' session... FEAT: - Listener letters; - Outtakes/extra close readings of Joyce's masterwork; - More 'bad sex award' readings; - Book/film recommendations: don't start reading a new book halfway through 'Oxen of the Sun'.

YESTERDAY: Ulysses Part 2 just dropped! Tune in for the shocking, explosion-laden, hostage situation-ridden conclusion to the 16 June 1904 with yet more of our coverage of James Joyce's magnum opus. Yes you said yes you will yes. Pprrpffrrppffff: podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/e...

Gird your loins, everyone! Today we cover the first half of James Joyce's 800-page Modernist Irish masterpiece and light retelling of 'The Odyssey' (with far more poop and possibly more sex, if you can believe it): 'Ulysses' (1922). Will we go mad in the process? podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

Tune into part one of James Joyce's 'Ulysses' (1922) on Wednesday, a work that inspired all manner of discussions philosophical, psychological, linguistic, theological, cinematographical... and scatological.

So many people guessed our next episode that we don't need to tease it: We two 'lunatics', as we've been rightly called, will be doing James Joyce's 800-page incomprehensible Modernist masterpiece, 'Ulysses' next month. Why not in June? Because Abby thought Bloomsday was in May, like a numpty.

Not since our episodes on 'Pamela' and 'Ivanhoe' have the hosts of this show been so annoyed! Tune in today for the emotionally manipulative banned book, 'The Kite Runner' (2003). podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

While we weren't *especially* fond of Khaled Hosseini's 'The Kite Runner' (2003), one of us at least was willing to succumb to its emotional manipulation. Tune in for a right royal roasting on Wednesday!

A few people guessed correctly! The next banned book we'll be covering is the 2003 sentimental war/redemption/brotherhood extravaganza, 'The Kite Runner'. Hoooo boy, we had a lot of thoughts and feelings about this one! Find out what those thoughts and feelings are on 16 April.

We haven't had any correct guesses for our next text (the original clue was that it VERY prominently features a spring or summertime activity). Here's an additional clue: It's a modern 'classic', published sometime between 2000-2025.

It's time to guess the clue to our next episode! We have previously asked you to guess texts which include a classic wintertime activity in a major scene. Our next text much, MUCH more prominently features a classic spring/summertime activity. What are we reading?

For our season on banned books and for International Women's Day, we've picked an EXTREMELY banned book--Margaret Atwood's 'The Handmaid's Tale' (1985). Atwood predicts the Men's Loneliness Epidemic™, recalls Orwell, and gives some beautiful meditations on an egg. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

Tune in on Wednesday to hear us explore the legacy of George Orwell in Margaret Atwood's 'The Handmaid's Tale' (1985). Pigs, men - I can't tell the difference!

Several people guessed correctly! For International Women's Day, we're covering Margaret Atwood's chauvinistic dystopia, 'The Handmaid's Tale' (1985)! We'll have plenty of Orwellian klaxons and bizarre prose-poems about eggs when the episodes releases on Wednesday 12 March.