BookBrowse Highlights
Hello Readers!
This week, our book club members are talking about Reset by Kevin Charles, a fascinating philosophical novel set in a society where a person’s age reverses twenty-five years when they turn fifty.
Our Editor’s Choice pick is Marcia Chatelain’s illuminating How Bright the Path Grows, which revisits the historic March on Washington with a focus on the women behind it.
Bonnie Garmus’s much-anticipated new novel Peck & Peck revolves around a fictional poetry journal in 1980s New York City. In our “beyond the book” article, we explore literary magazines known for their poetry and look at which ones Garmus may have been inspired by.
Plus, vote on the Best Books of 2026! Scroll down to access the voting form, and see if you can solve our latest Wordplay while you’re at it.
Thanks for reading,
The BookBrowse Team
Book Club Discussions
Discussions are open to all! If you’d like to participate, you can do so by creating an account here. Please note that discussions can contain spoilers.
Reset by Kevin Charles
From the Jacket
Tom and Elena Miller built a beautiful life over nearly three decades of marriage. But as Tom approaches his fiftieth birthday, the crushing weight of his middle-aged responsibilities and a desperate desire for freedom drive a wedge between him and the people he loves most. He doesn't just want a break; he wants a second chance at his twenties.
In a society defined by "The Reset"—a global anomaly where anyone turning fifty wakes up in their original, twenty-five-year-old body—Tom's desire becomes a devastating reality.
From the Discussion
“I found the book fascinating and much more than I expected…issues raised when people reset to 25 included personal, societal, political and global…Not just impacting an individual’s own life but almost everyone around them. Presented an alternate reality that was very believable.” —Kay_D
“I think anyone who likes dystopian topics or likes a good philosophical debate would most certainly enjoy this. I can see it being great for a book club.” —Helen_B
See what people are saying in response to this question: Would you take more risks in your life before reaching 50, knowing you could Reset and any physical damage would be reversed? Would you fear the Reset stopping before your 50th birthday making any damage permanent?
For Members
This issue of The BookBrowse Review contains reviews and "beyond the book" articles for 14 titles, including American Hagwon by Min Jin Lee, Peck & Peck by Bonnie Garmus, and How Bright the Path Grows by Marcia Chatelain.
We also bring you previews of upcoming books, a giveaway, book award news, and more.
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Editor’s Choice
How Bright the Path Grows by Marcia Chatelain
In How Bright the Path Grows: The Untold Story of the Women Who Made the March on Washington, Chatelain revisits one of the most familiar events in American history but changes the people we look at. Instead of examining the 1963 March on Washington through Martin Luther King Jr. and the other famous male leaders who stood on the Lincoln Memorial steps, Chatelain asks us to look at the women who organized, planned, and sustained the Civil Rights Movement, but were treated as secondary figures at best.
The result is a group biography of these women—some famous, such as Rosa Parks and Josephine Baker, and others, like Eva Jessye and Gloria Richardson, less so. … continued
Review by Sofia Chatzistefanou
Beyond the Book
Famous Poetry Journals
Bonnie Garmus's Peck & Peck is about a fictional poetry quarterly that only publishes the top 0.5% of poems submitted and has somewhat arbitrary guidelines (e.g., no poems about rainbows, beaches, or cancer). In real life, there are hundreds of literary magazines that accept poetry submissions. The American Poetry Review, Poetry, The Atlantic, The Brooklyn Rail, The Kenyon Review, The New Yorker, Ploughshares, The Southern Review, Threepenny Review, and The Yale Review are some magazines known for featuring poetry. Below are a couple of additional well-known quarterlies that Garmus might have specifically had in mind as she was creating the world of Peck & Peck the magazine. … continued
Article by Rebecca Foster
Wordplay
Solve our Wordplay puzzle to reveal a well-known expression, and be entered to win a one-year membership to BookBrowse!
"It's M to M E"
Click for the answer to the last Wordplay (K was H), and a detailed breakdown of its meaning and history.
Want to play even more word games? Try our daily book trivia and see if you can get to the top of the leaderboard.
Vote for the Best Books of 2026
We’re excited to announce the voting for BookBrowse’s Best of Year is now open!
Best of Year titles are selected based on overall rating, not the total number of votes, and only our members and newsletter subscribers are eligible. Learn more about the process here.
To vote, please fill out the form at the link below. You do not need to rate all of the books, and only rate books that you’ve read.
Voting will be open until 11/5 and winners will be announced in December.
