BookTok Thoughts, Julia Turshen on Cookbooks and Romance, and Pride Picks

Radio 831: A Romance Podcast · Jun 18, 2026 · 32m · transcript

Let’s dive into the BookTok discourse, shall we? Specifically, how algorithms work and why dismissing the community tends to say more about the dismisser than the community. Then debut romance novelist (and longtime cookbook author) Julia Turshen joins to talk about her 831 Stories novella Down to Earth, why food is the fastest way to put a reader in a room, the formula that cookbooks and romance novels quietly share, and what it means to write competency porn about a lesbian farmer without realizing that's what you're doing. And: Sanjana and Tyler each pitch a queer romance…