Shows / Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Welcome to Middle Ground Books: After Hours. We’re Megan, Debra, and Lance from Middle Ground Books in Emporia, Kansas.
After a long day at the bookstore, this is where we sit down, grab a few drinks, and talk about whatever happens to be on our minds. Sometimes that means books, authors, and what we’re reading. Other times it takes us into movies, fandom, life, the shop, and whatever else comes up along the way.
We try to keep things family friendly, depending on how the drinks are treating…
Episodes
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Fifty-Two: What a Pretty Bird Am I
Megan, Debra, and Lance take on The Juniper Tree, a Brothers Grimm fairy tale with a long history of being retold, edited, and softened for younger audiences…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Fifty-One: Ash Arrows and Stealth Cheese
An ACOTAR Series Recap Megan, Debra, and Lance attempt the questionable task of explaining ACOTAR in one episode, with Megan doing most of the actual…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Fifty: Page Turners Pt. 7
Megan, Debra, and Lance get into the Halloween spirit with books that still unsettle them just talking about them. They break down what they like about each…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-Nine: Dental Floss and Vampire Teeth
Megan, Debra, and Lance look back on the October they grew up with and the one they now get to create at Middle Ground Books. Now those old Halloween memories…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-Eight: Snickers Bar or Fine Dining?
Some books are a Snickers bar. Others deserve the full fine-dining treatment. Megan, Debra, and Lance turn the focus from what we read to how we read, digging…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-Seven: Let Those Leaves Fall
📖 Question of the Chapter: When fall hits, what kind of book do you reach for first: something spooky, something cozy, a classic, or something completely…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-Six: The Book Was Better, Right?
Take a seat as Middle Ground Books After Hours tests the old line: “the book was better.” Megan, Debra, and Lance look at what books can hold that screen…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-Five: 37 Years Old With an Apartment in Paris
💬 Comment Question: What book would you defend even if everyone else calls it strange? Descend into madness with Middle Ground Books: After Hours as Chapter…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-Four: Reader's Theater
Middle Ground Books After Hours introduces Readers Theater, a new audio narrative format where the hosts read a selected portion of a story and the production…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-Three: We Didn’t Forget You
Middle Ground Books After Hours checks in with a short episode while “Cosmic” Ron, the show’s producer and audio engineer, works on something much bigger for…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-Two Fight With Your Head, Not Your Fists
Sammy Davis Jr. and H. P. Lovecraft make a strange pairing, but the conversation gets to the same question from two very different directions. Megan, Debra…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty-One: Podcast Like No One’s Listening
Middle Ground Books passed 1,000 subscribers, and the hosts are still figuring out what it means to talk like people are actually listening. Megan, Debra, and…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Forty: Class or Pass
Wine night comes to Middle Ground Books, and nobody is spitting. Megan, Debra, and Lance use Tom Gilby’s Thirsty as their guide through a tasting episode where…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-Nine: Don’t Panic, We’re Reading a Sequel
Douglas Adams built one of science fiction’s strangest comic universes, but what happens when someone else tries to hitch a ride? Megan, Debra, and Lance…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-Eight: Between the Sheets
>>>>Viewer discretion advised <<<< After promising to read a Harlequin romance if the channel reached 500 subscribers, Lance sits down with Hot Sheets by…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-Seven: Peter Rabbit and Some Pig
Megan, Debra, and Lance revisit the animal stories that shaped generations, from Peter Rabbit and Charlotte’s Web to Stuart Little, The Trumpet of the Swan…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-Six: Every Villain Is Lemons
After a round of villain laughs, Megan, Debra, and Lance try to decide what makes a villain when the obvious answer keeps falling apart. Some monsters are not…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-Five: Page Turners Pt. 6
Megan, Debra, and Lance bring Page Turners into the Fourth of July with summer reads, shop updates, July book clubs, listener shout outs, and the kind of…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-Four: AI Blues
Megan, Debra, and Lance talk Cory Doctorow’s The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI, the AI bubble, copyright, data centers, customer service dead ends…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-Three: Accidentally on Purpose
Megan, Debra, and Lance sit down for a casual get-to-know-us episode about the choices, accidents, and small acts of welcome that helped shape Middle Ground…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-Two: Page Turners Pt. 5
A dead author’s unfinished book. Children forced into someone else’s plan. An ancient soul weighing. A flock of sheep solving a murder. Megan, Debra, and Lance…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty-One: No-Mance Land
June is packed, and so is this episode. Megan, Debra, and Lance break down the biggest new releases hitting the shelves, including Ann Patchett’s quietly…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirty: School’s Out for Summer
Summer reads, childhood memories, and a whole lot of books. Megan, Debra, and Lance talk public pools, farm work, county fairs, and the stories they snuck in…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Science Fiction Show
Megan, Debra, and Lance celebrate crossing 100 YouTube subscribers with viewer shoutouts, comment responses, and a little appreciation for the people helping…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-Eight: From You, 142 Days Ago
An episode recorded near Christmas 2025, sent forward like a bookstore time capsule. Megan, Debra, and Lance have a conversation that somehow involves a naked…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-Seven: A Parade of Horribles
Lit RPG takes over the shop as Megan, Debra, and Lance dig into Dungeon Crawler Carl, A Parade of Horribles, and the strange pull of stories built around game…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-Six: Happy Little Accidents
Debra, Megan, and Lance settle in after a long week for a looser, after-hours recording. The conversation drifts through Emporia Kansas events, Comic Con…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-Five: Independent Bookstore Day Eve...Eve
Independent Bookstore Day is almost here, so the shop is in prep mode. There are plans for a costume event for kids, raffle prizes, local authors coming…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-Four: Poetry Slammed
Megan, Debra, and Lance open with a Comic-Con recap before moving into a National Poetry Month reading. They explore haiku from Basho, Buson, Issa, and Shiki…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-Three: Does This Costume Make Me Look Fictional?
Middle Ground Books After Hours steps onto the Comiccon floor. Along the way, you’ll meet Jeffrey Winkler, who founded Cate’s Concepts and works across both…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-Two: Abandon All Hope (And Finish Your Costumes)
The bookstore trio scrambles to finish Comicon costumes while celebrating their surprising connection to Wishbone, the beloved literary dog. Lance reads…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty-One: Book Club Picks and Character Twists
Megan and Debra bring in their latest book club picks while Lance reads from a Terry Pratchett story, all of it sitting in the same space at once while they…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twenty: St. Patrick’s Day
Irish mystery fiction, St. Patrick’s Day folklore, and a focus on Caimh McDonnell’s Bunny McGarry series and its mix of humor and crime. If any of these books…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Nineteen: Nine Goblins
Fantasy author T. Kingfisher has built a reputation for mixing humor, horror, and strange creatures in unforgettable ways. This chapter looks at Nine Goblins…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Eighteen: Strange Shelves
This chapter takes a look at the realities of running a small bookstore and the strange things that come through the door. From used book buybacks to…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Seventeen: Page Turners Pt. 4
When you come back to a series years later, how do you refresh yourself? Recaps, spoilers, rereads, or just jump in and hope for the best? This chapter returns…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Sixteen: Legends and Lattes
This chapter centers on Travis Baldree’s Legends and Lattes and Bookshops and Bone Dust as an entry point into cozy fantasy. The conversation moves from small…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Fifteen: Interlude I
This interlude steps away from a single theme and introduces unrestrained conversations between Megan, Deborah, and Lance about what has been taking up their…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Fourteen: Black History and Literature
Lance, Megan, and Deborah reflect on Black History Month, sharing personal experiences, reading insights, and the authors and stories that have shaped how they…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Thirteen: Page Turners Pt. 3
The Page Turners series continues as the group settles in to talk through what they’ve been reading lately. The conversation bounces between time travel…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Twelve : Book Talk at Tiffany’s
The group revisits a conversation with Tiffany Killoren, talking through her move from practicing law into writing fiction, what it cost to walk away from one…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Eleven: A Boy Who Loved His Bear
A January episode with a little something sweet in the air, offering a happy early birthday nod to A. A. Milne. The group spends the episode in the Hundred…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Ten: Now We’re Tolkien
A special tribute episode in celebration of the belated "Tolkien day" based on Tolkien’s January 3 birthday. The group talks about J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Nine: The 2025 Epilogue
Lance, Debra, and Megan look back at their favorite reads from 2025 and share what they’re excited to read in 2026. The episode touches on what’s ahead for the…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Eight: A Dungeon Crawler Carl Christmas
This is the final part in the Christmas Special trilogy, closing out the holiday season with a conversation about Dungeon Crawler Carl and how it can actually…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Seven: Tales for Tots
Part two of the three part Christmas special finds the group talking through children’s Christmas books and how those stories land differently now than they…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Six: A Hogmas to Die For
The crew opens their first Christmas special by settling in with The Hogfather, the holiday tale they all read to get into the spirit of the season. The…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Five: Page Turners Pt. 2
The crew settles in to talk through the books they just finished reading, sharing first impressions, lingering thoughts, and the pieces of each story that…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Four: Page Turners
The crew settles in with drinks and finally gets a moment to breathe after a long day. They share what they are reading now, what is waiting on their shelves…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Three: The Publishing Market? In This Economy!?
The hosts dig into the reality of today’s publishing market and how small bookstores are expected to compete with giant companies that control prices and…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter Two: This One Time at Banned Camp
From coming-of-age stories to provocative adult fiction, the crew unpacks what happens when books get banned and authors land on the cancel list. They dig into…
- Middle Ground Books: After Hours
Chapter One: Young Adult Things
Lance, Megan, and Debra introduce themselves, brainstorm the show’s name, and dive into the world of young adult fiction over drinks and laughter. Stay…