Book Clubs
Share your reading experiences and gain insight while getting to know other readers from all across the state. Wolfner Library proudly offers three book clubs for your reading pleasure! Each book club will feature a different type of reading experience.
- Novel Reads is the general fiction book club.
- Big Ideas is a non-fiction book club.
- Good Books is a mild reads book club. The Good Books club will read fiction and non-fiction books that feature little-to-no sex, violence, or strong language.
- Patron Led is a focused book club. The first one will be focused on African-American literature.
All clubs will meet via conference call line.
How the club works:
Call Wolfner Library to register for the club or clubs you are interested in. Your books will be sent to you. We recommend registering at least two weeks in advance of your club meeting date.
1. Read the book for your club(s).
2. On the appointed day and time, call the toll-free number which will be provided at the time of registration.
3. Once everyone is on the line, we will discuss the book we have read!
Schedule:
June:
June 11 at 2 p.m. Novel Reads: Faded Coat of Blue by Owen Parry DB 50818
Washington, D.C.; 1861. Captain Abel Jones--a Welshman late of Queen Victoria’s service--is assigned by General George McClellan to investigate the murder of a young abolitionist officer. While probing the crime, Jones uncovers corruption, graft, drugs, and illicit sex, and he is eventually ordered off the case. Some strong language. 1999.
June 18 at 2 p.m. Good Books (mild reads): Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie DB 39507; LP002441; BR002922
Hercule Poirot has been called back to England and is traveling home by way of the Orient Express. While the train is stranded by a snowstorm, a murder occurs. Investigation shows that the dead man, Mr. Ratchett, was traveling under a false name and was the person responsible for a terrible kidnapping that had taken place several years earlier. Poirot’s first interviews with all passengers yield nothing--then he questions them again.
June 25 at 2 p.m. Big Ideas: The Ghost Ship of Brooklyn: An Untold Story of the American Revolution by Robert P. Watson DB 89068
Moored off the coast of Brooklyn during the Revolutionary War, the HMS Jersey housed thousands of Americans being kept prisoner. Conditions were horrific, and many died on board. The author pulls accounts from newspapers, diaries, military reports, and more. Violence and some strong language. 2017.
July:
June 16 at 2 p.m. Novel Reads: The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain DB 59303; LP000645; BR 09695
The future Edward VI of England and a young pauper agree to trade places for a few days. The pauper becomes king, and he finds it quite insufferable. Meanwhile, the prince is roaming the street in tatters. People and circumstances almost make the role reversal permanent. For junior and senior high and older readers.
July 23 at 2 p.m. Good Books: Victoria the Queen: An Intimate Biography of the Woman Who Ruled an Empire by Julia Baird DB 87924
A journalist draws on sources that include revelations about the queen’s relationship with Scottish servant John Brown and examines the story of a woman who struggled with many of the same things as modern individuals: work-life balance, raising children, marital troubles, family death, anxiety, and more. 2016.
July 30 at 2 p.m. Big Ideas: Catherine the Great by Simon Dixon DB 69496
Biography of Catherine II (1729-1796), a minor German princess who married Russia’s future Peter III in 1744. Uses primary sources to chronicle Catherine’s thirty-four years on the throne after her husband was deposed in 1762--including her love affairs, court culture, and politics in the age of Enlightenment. 2009.
August:
August 13 at 2 p.m. Novel Reads: My Brother Sam is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier DB 38902; LP000359; BR052050
As the Revolutionary War tragically divides the Meeker family, Tim finds himself caught between his father’s loyalty to the king and his brother’s fierce support of the rebel cause. For grades 6-9.
August 20 at 2 p.m. Good Books: The Cruelest Mile: The Heroic Story of Dogs and Men in a Race Against an Epidemic by Gay and Laney Salisbury DB 58310
Chronicles the valiant efforts of a dogsled relay to bring serum to ice-bound Nome, Alaska, when a deadly diphtheria outbreak put Eskimo natives and especially their children at risk in 1925. Blends Alaska’s early history with portraits of courageous team leaders and their dogs--including the famous Balto--who trekked 674 miles across frozen terrain. 2003.
August 27 at 2 p.m. Big Ideas: The Woman Who Ran for President: The Many Lives of Victoria Woodhull by Lois Beachy Underhill DB 42766
From an early age, Victoria Claflin Woodhull defied tradition. She and her sister, Tennessee, were 1850s spiritualists. They went to New York City, established themselves as fortune-tellers, received the backing of Cornelius Vanderbilt, and founded the first brokerage firm run by women. They also established a newspaper, where in the 1870s, Victoria began a fight for women’s rights that led her to bid for the presidency.
September:
September 2 at 2 p.m. Wolfner Library is proud to announce a new quarterly patron-led book club featuring African American literature. The first meeting will discuss Becoming by Michelle Obama (DB 92627; LP033366; BR 22497; DB 93194 para español).
September 10 at 2 p.m. Novel Reads: Memoirs of a Geisha by DB 45008; LP000359; BR052050: A fictionalized account of the life of a typical geisha in 1930s and 1940s Japan. Sayuri recalls being nine years old when she and her sister are sold to a geisha house as their mother lies dying. From then on Sayuri learns the traditional exotic art of pleasing men. Bestseller. 1997.
September 17 at 2 p.m. Good Books: Code Talker: A Novel about the Navajo Marines of World War Two by Joseph Bruchac DB 60312: At the white man's school, Ned Begay is taught that Navajo is a useless language. But when the United States enters World War II, the Marines recruit Ned and other Navajo as code talkers sending messages based on their native language and unknown to the enemy. For grades 6-9.
September 24 at 2 p.m. Big Ideas: Kangaroo Squadron: American Courage in the Darkest Days of World War II by Bruce Gamble DB 93601: An account of the US Army's Australia-based Kangaroo Squadron, which carried out armed reconnaissance missions and even rescued General MacArthur and his staff from the Philippines in 1942. Draws from eyewitness accounts in diaries, letters, interviews, and memoirs, as well as Japanese sources. Some violence and some strong language. 2018.
October:
To be announced.