Introducing the BARPod Book Club. Plus, Personals are back, baby!

Let's get cozy.

We’ve got two exciting announcements for you today.

First: The BARPod Challenging Books Book Club is officially happening. Mark your calendars for Sunday, February 22, 2026, at 1 PM ET / 10 AM PT. We’ll be discussing Laura Delano’s Unshrunk: A Story of Psychiatric Treatment Resistance (links below to purchase).

The meeting will be on Substack Live, and you will be emailed a link to join shortly before we start. (Not getting our emails? Check your notification settings.) The author will be joining us to talk about the book and answer questions. (There will be a dedicated thread for questions/comments closer to the date, so please use this one to discuss Marty Supreme and/or Venezuela.)

Note: This is a pilot program. If it doesn’t work, the book club will join other failed experiments in the great podcast beyond. Probably right next to the merch store.

Second: Personals are back, baby! The Official BARPod Low-Effort Matchmaking Service is accepting personal ads through Tuesday, February 10, 2026, at 6 PM ET.

We are as shocked as anyone to report that our personals have actually resulted in at least one marriage (Hi Iangie!) and zero murders (so far). If you are looking for love (or whatever) and are not a psychopath, leave your ad (100 words or less, do not test me) in the form linked below. It may just change your life. (But probably won’t.)

Both the book club and the personals are perks for our Primos. If you want to support the show and get access to the premium episodes, the personals, the book club, the live chats, the comments section, our entire back catalog with hundreds of episodes, and more, please join us. This podcast does not, and will not, exist without your support. And yes that is a threat.