Welcome to the Book Review Book Club! Every month we select a book to discuss with our readers. Last month we read “Transcription,” by Ben Lerner. (You can also find past book club discussions in the Book Review podcast feed.)
“Yesteryear,” by Caro Claire Burke, is one of the buzziest books of 2026, and with a premise this juicy, how could it not be. Here’s the set up:
Natalie Heller Mills is a ultrasuccessful tradwife influencer. She posts about her life on Yesteryear Ranch, a homestead where she grows her own food, tends to cows and chickens, raises her six children and models a particular brand of conservative Christian womanhood. But not all is as it seems. Behind the cameras, nannies care for the children, Natalie shops for the types of groceries she decries online, she detests her husband who is being seduced by the manosphere, and she’s on the cusp of being exposed by a rogue video producer.
One day she wakes up and discovers she has been transported to 1855, forced to live the pioneer persona she has been performing online. How did she get there? How can she escape? And what does her misery mean about the lifestyle she has embraced for profit?
Everyone, it seems, is talking about “Yesteryear.” But does it live up to the hype? One way to find out: Read it with us.
In June, the Book Review Book Club will read and discuss “Yesteryear,” by Caro Claire Burke. We’ll be chatting about it on the Book Review podcast that airs on June 26, and we’d love for you to join the conversation. Share your thoughts about the novel in the comments section of this article by June 18, and we may mention your observations in the episode.
Here’s some related reading to get you started.
Our review of “Yesteryear”: “In Burke’s biting prose, Natalie is an electric antiheroine. … Her bitterness burns like the lye soap on her fingers as she scrubs laundry the old-fashioned way, but ‘Yesteryear’ doesn’t revel in her downfall or dunk on tradwives at large. The meatiest, most revelatory swath of the novel is the origin story of how Natalie went from Harvard freshman to @YesteryearRanch, her identity flattened into an Instagram handle.” Read the full review here.
The Times’s profile of Burke, where she discusses how the novel approaches various types of womanhood: “We were all sold a bill of false goods, and that’s true for conservative women and it’s true for liberal women. … The point of the book is not that one wins.” Read our full profile here.
Burke’s interview with The New York Times’s religion newsletter, Believing, where she discusses faith in the novel: “This book is really a critique of America, and America as a Christian nationalist country right now. I had no interest in either condemning or defending any specific religion. But it was important to me to show that there are people who can find their way out of a regressive ideology and stay in church.” Read the full newsletter here.
We can’t wait to discuss the novel with you. In the meantime, happy reading!
MJ Franklin
Editor for the Book Review
Thank you for reading with us this month!To get the conversation started:—What did you think of the novel overall? Love it, hate it, feel mixed? And why? Please share your top level thoughts about the book.—What did you think of Natalie as a protagonist? She’s many things: intense, harsh, judgmental, vulnerable, lost, ambitious and more. How did you feel about her, both as a character and as the vehicle/anchor for this story?—“Yesteryear” examines a plethora of ideas: internet culture, surveillance and performance, religion, the social and cultural pressures women face, the manosphere, and more. Was there a theme or idea that resonated the most with you? Did the book make you think any differently about any of those ideas?—Is there a character, a quote, a writing element, etc that stood out to you?—What will you takeaway from this novel?Thanks, and looking forward to hearing what everyone thinks of “Yesteryear.”
