October 28, 2024

Watch Book Talks on These 10 YouTube Channels

When a book is released from a major book publisher, it is still quite common for the author to go on tour, talking about their book at literary events. The author will often give a talk on their book at bookstores, libraries, or other venues and do a book signing. The author may also go on TV shows, radio shows, or podcasts to promote their book. These book talks can be in the form of readings, lectures, or interviews and often include a Q&A from the audience at the end of the talk.

Since the ascent of YouTube for easily distributing long-form videos, these book talks have become increasingly popular on many YouTube channels in the past 15 years. When a new book comes out that may interest you, watching or listening to a book talk on YouTube is a great way to learn about the book and see if it’s something you might want to purchase as a full book or audiobook. With the best authors, these book talks are well-prepared and can provide a lot of the main ideas from a book.

On LearnOutLoud.com, we’ve been featuring these book talks for over 15 years now, as they are such a great way to learn. We’re subscribed to dozens of YouTube channels that regularly feature book talks and we’ve added and reviewed hundreds of these book talks on our site with authors talking about their most popular books. In this blog post, we’ll highlight 10 of the best YouTube channels for watching book talks. If we’ve added these channels as publishers on our website, we’ll link to those as well.

1. Talks at Google YouTube Channel – Since Google owns YouTube, it is no surprise that they were pioneers in featuring talks from authors delivered at their many Google offices around the world. Since 2006 their speaker series has been going on with authors and leading thinkers giving talks on all sorts of topics. To date, they feature over 5,000 talks on their YouTube channel, which has over 2 million subscribers. On LearnOutLoud.com, we’ve tried to pick out some of their most popular talks to feature on our site and we currently showcase about 600 Google Talks on our site, many with reviews of the talk:

600 of the Best Talks at Google on LearnOutLoud.com

2. Politics and Prose YouTube Channel – Politics and Prose is one of the top independent bookstores in the country located in Washington, D.C. For the past 12 years, they’ve featured high-quality video recordings of talks by authors about their books recorded at their bookstore. Because of where they’re located and their name, you might have guessed that a lot of the authors that speak there talk about books related to politics. But their talks cover a whole lot more than that. With over 3,000 videos on their YouTube channel and over 200K subscribers, they’re one of the top destinations on YouTube for book talks. We’ve added about 100 of these book talks to our site covering many of their most popular talks:

100 Politics and Prose Bookstore Events Videos on LearnOutLoud.com

3. University of California Television (UCTV) YouTube Channel – The University of California Television channel on YouTube is vast with over 10,000 videos and 1 million subscribers. They’ve been broadcasting on YouTube since 2007, with talks delivered at many University of California campuses. Many of these talks are from UC faculty covering research in the areas of science, tech, and health. But they also feature talks from authors often talking about books they’ve written. We’ve added over 250 of their best videos to our site which you can browse here:

Over 250 of the Best University of California Television Talks on LearnOutLoud.com

4. The 92nd Street Y YouTube Channel – The 92nd Street Y in New York City has been a cultural and community center for 150 years! They’ve been recording their talks there even long before YouTube existed. Their YouTube channel features over 3,500 videos with over 350K subscribers. Their talks are often done in conversation format, and for their book talks sometimes feature readings from the books. Some of their historic talks go back decades and feature audio recordings of authors. We’ve gone through their whole channel and featured over 100 of their best talks on LearnOutLoud:

Over 100 92nd Street Y Talks on LearnOutLoud.com

5. GBH Forum Network YouTube Channel – WGBH is Boston’s primary PBS television station. They’ve been recording book talks around the Boston area for over a decade now and posting them to their YouTube channel. Their channel has over 4,000 videos with over 100K subscribers. Learn from authors of all sorts of books on their YouTube channel. We feature over 200 of their best talks on our website:

Over 200 of the Best WGBH Forum Network Talks on LearnOutLoud.com

6. The Commonwealth Club of California YouTube Channel – This public affairs forum features many authors discussing their books on their YouTube channel. Their YouTube channel has over 2,500 videos with over 200K subscribers. Many of their talks are politically related, but they cover other categories including science, religion, technology, and much more. We feature over 50 of their best talks on our site:

Over 50 of The Commonwealth Club of California’s Best Videos on LearnOutLoud.com

7. Library of Congress YouTube Channel – The Library of Congress has a ton of videos on their YouTube channel from historical films to musical performances to talks of all kinds. Many of their talks are authors talking about their books. A lot to explore here!

8. Author Events from the Free Library of Philadelphia – The Free Library of Philadelphia has offered over 900 book talks on its YouTube channel over the past 6 years. These public events are often done in the form of interviews.

9. Barnes & Noble YouTube Channel – The Barnes & Noble YouTube Channel features a lot of content, but more recently a lot of book talks. Many of these are interviews conducted on Zoom which isn’t ideal, but some of them are book talks delivered at one of Barnes & Noble’s 600 bookstores nationwide.

10. BookTV YouTube Channel – And we must mention C-SPAN’s BookTV. They feature a YouTube channel with over 5,000 clips of their book talks dating back decades since C-SPAN has been around for a long time. Unfortunately, they don’t post full book talks on their YouTube channel. To watch their full book talks, you’ll need to go to their website at www.c-span.org/bookTv. On the website, they have an astounding 21,000 book talks to choose from dating back to the 1990s. We feature over 300 of the best Book TV Interviews on our site:

Over 300 of the Best Book TV Interviews on LearnOutLoud.com

And these channels are just scratching the surface of the book talks that are on YouTube. Search about any major book from the past 15 years and you’re likely to find a book talk about it on YouTube from some channel. A great way to learn!