We are lovers of books and lovers of wine. And so we've come together to meet once a month. We talk, we laugh, we eat and we drink. Our meetings are an opportunity to connect with like-minded people who concurrently stretch our views of the world.
Becky has picked 'Where'd You Go, Bernadette' by Maria Semple for us to read in August. We're meeting early this month, so you might want to start reading it soon.
ABOUT THE BOOK Bernadette Fox is notorious. To her Microsoft-guru husband, she's a
fearlessly opinionated partner; to fellow private-school mothers in
Seattle, she's a disgrace; to design mavens, she's a revolutionary
architect, and to 15-year-old Bee, she is a best friend and, simply,
Mom.
Then Bernadette disappears. It began when Bee aced her
report card and claimed her promised reward: a family trip to
Antarctica. But Bernadette's intensifying allergy to Seattle--and people
in general--has made her so agoraphobic that a virtual assistant in
India now runs her most basic errands. A trip to the end of the earth is
problematic.
To find her mother, Bee compiles email messages,
official documents, secret correspondence--creating a compulsively
readable and touching novel about misplaced genius and a mother and
daughter's role in an absurd world.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Maria Semple wrote for the television shows Arrested Development, Ellen
and Mad About You. Her writing has appeared in The New Yorker and The
Los Angeles Times. She lives in Seattle.
Amy has selected "Life After Life" by Kate Atkinson for our reading pleasure in July.
ABOUT THE BOOK
What if you could live again and again, until you got it right?
On
a cold and snowy night in 1910, Ursula Todd is born, the third child of
a wealthy English banker and his wife. She dies before she can draw her
first breath. On that same cold and snowy night, Ursula Todd is born,
lets out a lusty wail, and embarks upon a life that will be, to say the
least, unusual. For as she grows, she also dies, repeatedly, in any
number of ways. Ursula's world is in turmoil, facing the unspeakable
evil of the two greatest wars in history. What power and force can one
woman exert over the fate of civilization -- if only she has the chance?
Wildly inventive, darkly comic, startlingly poignant -- this is Kate Atkinson at her absolute best.
"One of the best novels I've read this century. Kate Atkinson is
a marvel. There aren't enough breathless adjectives to describe LIFE
AFTER LIFE: Dazzling, witty, moving, joyful, mournful,
profound."--Gillian Flynn, author of Gone Girl
In a radical departure from her Jackson Brodie
mystery series, Atkinson delivers a wildly inventive novel about Ursula
Todd, born in 1910 and doomed to die and be reborn over and over again.
She drowns, falls off a roof, and is beaten to death by an abusive
husband but is always reborn back into the same loving family, sometimes
with the knowledge that allows her to escape past poor decisions,
sometimes not. As Atkinson subtly delineates all the pathways a life or a
country might take, she also delivers a harrowing set piece on the
Blitz as Ursula, working as a warden on a rescue team, encounters
horrifying tableaux encompassing mangled bodies and whole families
covered in ash, preserved just like the victims of Pompeii. Alternately
mournful and celebratory, deeply empathic and scathingly funny, Atkinson
shows what it is like to face the horrors of war and yet still find the
determination to go on, with her wholly British characters often
reducing the Third Reich to “a fuss.” From her deeply human characters
to her comical dialogue to her meticulous plotting, Atkinson is working
at the very top of her game. An audacious, thought-provoking novel from
one of our most talented writers.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kate Atkinson’s first novel, Behind the Scenes at the Museum, won the
Whitbread (now Costa) Book of the Year Award. She has been a critically
acclaimed, bestselling author ever since, with over one million copies
of her books in print in the United States.
She is the author of
a collection of short stories, Not the End of the World, and of the
novels Human Croquet, Emotionally Weird, Case Histories, One Good Turn,
When Will There Be Good News?, and Started Early, Took My Dog. Case
Histories, which introduced her readers to Jackson Brodie, former police
inspector turned private investigator, was made into a television
series starring Jason Isaacs.
I've picked "George Washington's Secret Six: The Spy Ring that Saved the American Revolution" by Brian Kilmeade and Don Yaeger for our June 2016 book. It comes with a glowing recommendation from my dad.
ABOUT THE BOOK When George Washington beat a hasty retreat from New York City in
August 1776, many thought the American Revolution might soon be over.
Instead, Washington rallied—thanks in large part to a little-known,
top-secret group called the Culper Spy Ring. He realized that he
couldn’t defeat the British with military might, so he recruited a
sophisticated and deeply secretive intelligence network to infiltrate
New York.
Drawing on extensive research, Brian Kilmeade and Don
Yaeger have offered fascinating portraits of these spies: a reserved
Quaker merchant, a tavern keeper, a brash young longshoreman, a
curmudgeonly Long Island bachelor, a coffeehouse owner, and a mysterious
woman. Long unrecognized, the secret six are finally receiving their
due among the pantheon of American heroes.
*Now with a new afterword containing never-before-seen research on the identity of the spy ring’s most secret member, Agent 355
“This is my kind of history book. Get ready. Here’s the action.” —BRAD MELTZER, bestselling author of The Fifth Assassin and host of Decoded
ABOUT THE AUTHORS Brian Kilmeade cohosts Fox News Channel’s morning show “Fox &
Friends” and also hosts the nationally syndicated radio show “Kilmeade
& Friends.” He lives on Long Island.
Don Yaeger has written or co-written twenty-three books, and lives in Tallahassee, Florida.
*UPDATED* Julie's pick for April is "The Atonement Child" by Francine Rivers.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Dynah Carey knew where her life was headed. Engaged to a wonderful man,
the daughter of doting parents, a faithful child of God, she has it all.
Then the unthinkable happens: Dynah’s perfect life is irrevocably
changed by a rape that results in an unwanted pregnancy.
Her family is
torn apart and her seemingly rock-solid faith is pushed to the limits as
she faces the most momentous choice of her life: to embrace or to end
the life within her. This is ultimately a tale of three women, as
Dynah’s plight forces both her mother and her grandmother to face the
choices they made. Written with balance and compassion, The Atonement Child brings a new perspective to the most controversial topic of our times.
*****
The Atonement Child
faces the tough and divisive issues of abortion through the story of
three women in the same family. In preparation for this book, Francine
Rivers spoke with numerous women of all points of view on abortion,
painstakingly bringing the experiences, pains, and hearts of the women
to this book. The Atonement Child looks at the medical and social
dilemma of abortion and the consequences that are shared by society. The
theme is that abortion is not just a woman's problem. The Christian
community must have more compassion and take a less confrontational
approach to women who have experienced an abortion.
The Atonement
Child centers around three women, Dynah Carey, a rape victim faced with a
momentous decision, and her mother, Hannah Carey, and grandmother, Eve
Daniels, both of whom have had abortions.
As horrible as the rape
experience is, it is minimal compared to the trauma everyone experiences
when it is discovered that Dynah is pregnant from the assault. A
student on a Christian campus, she faces the Dean and the rigid rules of
the college. Engaged to a pastoral student with a brilliant scholastic
record, she comes face to face with his dreams for their future.
Abandoned, she seeks solace from her family and learns love is not
always unconditional even from those who espouse the Christian faith.
Standing on her own, she comes face to face with God and learns what
true love means.
The story addresses the tremendous inner
struggles of those who have had abortions and those who are facing them.
It is a story of how victims are often victimized and those who need
love the most are often forgotten in the fight to save the child. It is a
story of women in crisis andthe realities of what it means to face
abortion.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Francine Rivers began her literary career at the University of
Nevada, Reno, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in
English and Journalism. From 1976 to 1985, she had a successful writing
career in the general market and her books were awarded or nominated for
numerous awards and prizes. Although raised in a religious home,
Francine did not truly encounter Christ until later in life, when she
was already a wife, mother of three, and an established romance
novelist. Shortly after becoming a born-again Christian in 1986,
Francine wrote Redeeming Love as her statement of faith. First
published by Bantam Books, and then re-released by Multnomah Publishers
in the mid- 1990s, this retelling of the biblical story of Gomer and
Hosea set during the time of the California Gold Rush is now considered a
classic work of Christian fiction and continues to be one of the
Christian Booksellers Association’s top-selling titles; it has held a
spot on the Christian bestseller list for nearly a decade.
Since Redeeming Love, Francine has published more than 20
novels with Christian themes – all bestsellers- and she has continued to
win both industry acclaim and reader loyalty around the globe. Her
Christian novels have been awarded or nominated for numerous awards
including the RITA Award, the Christy Award, the ECPA Gold Medallion,
and the Holt Medallion in Honor of Outstanding Literary Talent. In
1997, after winning her third RITA award for Inspirational Fiction,
Francine was inducted into the Romance Writers’ of America Hall of Fame.
In 2007, the feature-length film version of her novel The Last Sin Eater was released in theaters by Fox Faith. In March 2010, Francine officially became a New York Times bestselling author, when Her Mother’s Hope debuted at #12 on the hardcover fiction bestsellers lists. The sequel, Her Daughter’s Dream,
debuted at #12 on the same list just 6 months later, in September,
2010. Francine’s novels have been translated into nearly thirty
different languages and she enjoys best-seller status in many foreign
countries including Germany, The Netherlands, and South Africa.
Francine’s dog, Sarge
Francine and her husband Rick live in Northern California and enjoy
the time spent with their three grown children and every opportunity to
spoil their five grandchildren. She uses her writing to draw closer to
the Lord, and that through her work she might worship and praise Jesus
for all He has done and is doing in her life.
Liz has announced her first book pick! In May 2016, we'll be reading: Grandma Gatewood's Walk by Ben Montgomery.
She explained: My current favorite book is so popular the library is ordering seventeen
(17!) more copies to fill the wait list. Wow! So that will have to wait
until my next round pick. I ultimately decided to decline my third
choice in favor of my fourth choice because I haven't read this one:
Grandma Gatewood's Walk by Ben Montgomery. Unfortunately, as I mentioned, it still has a small wait list.
PS, this was hard for a first timer!
ABOUT THE BOOK
Winner of the 2014 National Outdoor Book Awards for History/Biography
Emma Gatewood told her family she was going on a walk and left her
small Ohio hometown with a change of clothes and less than two hundred
dollars. The next anybody heard from her, this genteel, farm-reared,
67-year-old great-grandmother had walked 800 miles along the 2,050-mile
Appalachian Trail. And in September 1955, having survived a rattlesnake
strike, two hurricanes, and a run-in with gangsters from Harlem, she
stood atop Maine’s Mount Katahdin. There she sang the first verse of
“America, the Beautiful” and proclaimed, “I said I’ll do it, and I’ve
done it.”
Grandma
Gatewood, as the reporters called her, became the first woman to hike
the entire Appalachian Trail alone, as well as the first person—man or
woman—to walk it twice and three times. Gatewood became a hiking
celebrity and appeared on TV and in the pages of Sports Illustrated. The
public attention she brought to the little-known footpath was
unprecedented. Her vocal criticism of the lousy, difficult stretches led
to bolstered maintenance, and very likely saved the trail from
extinction.
Author
Ben Montgomery was given unprecedented access to Gatewood’s own
diaries, trail journals, and correspondence, and interviewed surviving
family members and those she met along her hike, all to answer the
question so many asked: Why did she do it? The story of Grandma
Gatewood will inspire readers of all ages by illustrating the full power
of human spirit and determination. Even those who know of Gatewood
don’t know the full story—a story of triumph from pain, rebellion from
brutality, hope from suffering.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ben Montgomery is an enterprise reporter for the Tampa Bay Times and founder of the narrative journalism website Gangrey.com.
Montgomery
grew up in Oklahoma and studied journalism at Arkansas Tech University,
where he played defensive back for the football team, the Wonder Boys.
He worked for the Courier in Russellville, Ark., the Standard-Times in
San Angelo, Texas, the Times Herald-Record in New York's Hudson River
Valley and the Tampa Tribune before joining the Times in 2006.
In
2010, he was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in local reporting and
won the Dart Award and Casey Medal for a series called "For Their Own
Good," about abuse at Florida's oldest reform school. He lives in Tampa
with his wife, Jennifer, and three children.
Andrea has picked The Ice Twins by S.K. Tremayne for us to read in March. She doublechecked and there are plenty of copies at the library!
ABOUT THE BOOK
In the tradition of The Girl on the Train comes the UK bestseller THE ICE TWINS, a terrifying psychological thriller with a twisting plot worthy of Gillian Flynn.
One of Sarah's daughters died. But can she be sure which one?
A
year after one of their identical twin daughters, Lydia, dies in an
accident, Angus and Sarah Moorcroft move to the tiny Scottish island
Angus inherited from his grandmother, hoping to put together the pieces
of their shattered lives.
But when their surviving
daughter, Kirstie, claims they have mistaken her identity--that she, in
fact, is Lydia--their world comes crashing down once again.
As
winter encroaches, Angus is forced to travel away from the island for
work, Sarah is feeling isolated, and Kirstie (or is it Lydia?) is
growing more disturbed. When a violent storm leaves Sarah and her
daughter stranded, they are forced to confront what really happened on
that fateful day.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Tom Knox is the pseudonym of British writer and journalist Sean Thomas. Born in Devon, England in 1963, he studied Philosophy at University College London.
As a journalist he has written for the Times, the Daily Mail, the
Sunday Times, and the Guardian. In 2013 he became a blogger and
commentator for the Daily Telegraph in the UK.
When he writes under the name of Tom Knox, he specialises in
archaeological and religious thrillers. More recently he has written
novels under the pseudonym S K Tremayne.
Sean Thomas lives in Camden, north London. His ancestry is Cornish; his father is the author D. M. Thomas. He has written three novels under his own name, the second, Kissing England, won the Literary Review's "Bad Sex" award in 2000. Thomas's fourth book Millions Of Women Are Waiting To Meet You,
was a memoir of his lovelife; it was a best-seller, translated into
eight languages, and was the Guardian newspaper's "paperback of the
week" in May, 2007.
