Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Annie Condon is reading Remember Me like This by Bret Anthony Johnston

Bret Anthony Johnston is a professor of Creative Writing in the USA and his writing is seamless and engaging. This novel begins where many crime novels end – in the triumphant return of a kidnap victim to his family who have been searching for him for four years.

Justin’s return after his disappearance at eleven years old is deemed amazing, but brings new stresses to his parents and younger brother (the novel is told from the point of view of each parent and the younger brother). They are advised not to talk to Justin about his experience at the hands of his captor, and the not knowing what he endured is difficult. His family have also developed their own coping strategies in the ensuing period – some healthy, some not – and these are brought into a new light once he returns.

I couldn’t put this book down even though I was loathe to finish such a superb and empathic work.

Elke Power is reading The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P. by Adelle Waldman

In order to participate in society again, I’ve accepted that I must read Gone Girl and see the film as soon as possible. As such, it is necessary I tear myself away from The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P. . It will be quite a wrench because I have loved every deftly crafted line of Waldman’s book so far – I fell straight in and have hardly stopped laughing. Reluctant though I am to put Waldman aside, the great thing about books is that they wait for you where you left them.

Or rather, they wait unless they have been relocated by the dog. Mine keeps taking Gone Girl to his secret stash and attempting to hide it under Julian Barnes’s The Sense of an Ending. (Anyone familiar with these works will spot the major flaws in his strategy.)

Love Affairs is not the only threat to my planned return to humanity. I also gave in to temptation this week and read the introduction to Annabel Crabb’s The Wife Drought after the author visited the Carlton shop. My worst fears were confirmed: it is fantastic, somehow simultaneously hilarious and sobering. I have had to foster the book out temporarily in order to resist it.

Bronte Coates is reading The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta

If you’ve ever been to a dinner party with me you’ll know that I can’t resist a good ‘what if’ and Tom Perrotta’s The Leftovers definitely falls into this category. The premise of the novel hinges on a single question: What if a large percentage of the world’s population vanished in an instant, and the rest were left behind?

Perrotta’s imagined answer to the ‘what if’ he’s used as a catalyst is believable and interesting. Through the novel we follow several characters as they react to what appears to be a Rapture-like phenomenon (though not necessarily the Rapture) and these interconnected narratives are balanced and well-paced. Grief is a permanent feature of this new world. A man who believes he can absorb the pain of others through hugs proclaims, ‘There’s not some finite amount of pain inside us. Our bodies and minds just keep manufacturing more of it.’ A woman who has lost her husband and children muses that, ‘Apparently even the most awful tragedies, and the people they’d ruined, got a little stale after a while.’

The constant tension in the book is a desire to return to normality and move past the tragedy, and a desire to not forget or deny the tragedy. I’d definitely recommend The Leftovers as a thoughtful and thought-provoking read.

Nina Kenwood is listening to the podcast series Serial

Before I get to books, I want to recommend an amazing podcast series I am listening to, called Serial. It’s a new podcast from the creators of This American Life, and is hosted by Sarah Koenig. Serial follows one story – a true story – over the course of a whole season, and each week’s podcast fills out another piece of the puzzle. This first season is looking at a murder case from 1999. A high-school girl was murdered and her ex-boyfriend was quickly convicted of the crime. Fifteen years later, many people believe he is innocent. Sarak Koenig tracks down missing witnesses, pours over transcripts and talks to everyone involved (including the ex-boyfriend in prison), trying to decide what she herself believes. It’s utterly gripping and fascinating and after listening to episode three this morning, I can hardly wait another week for episode four.

Now, to books. I very much enjoyed Lena Dunham’s Not That Kind of Girl. She’s a talented writer, and very good at looking inwards and examining her complicated sense of self. Some of the essays are better than others (as is always the case with essay collections) but overall, it’s a solid, entertaining read. I’ve just started The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters, which looks to be a big, juicy, involving novel. I can’t wait.