Hopkinton Town Library Book Group: Audio CD available

Showing posts with label Audio CD available. Show all posts

July title

Fahrenheit 451

by Ray Bradbury

Wednesday July 26th at 1pm

Copies available at the library. Also available as a hoopla audiobook.

First published in 1953, Ray Bradbury's internationally acclaimed novel Fahrenheit 451 is a masterwork of twentieth-century literature set in a bleak, dystopian future.

Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden.

Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television "family." But then he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn't live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television.

When Mildred attempts suicide and Clarisse suddenly disappears, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known. He starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is
discovered, the fireman has to run for his life.

June title

Remarkably Bright Creatures

by Shelby Van Pelt

Wednesday June 28th at 1pm

Available editions:

Print copies (available soon!)

After Tova Sullivan’s husband died, she began working the night shift at the Sowell Bay Aquarium, mopping floors and tidying up. Keeping busy has always helped her cope, which she’s been doing since her eighteen-year-old son, Erik, mysteriously vanished on a boat in Puget Sound over thirty years ago. Tova becomes acquainted with curmudgeonly Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus living at the aquarium. Marcellus knows more than anyone can imagine but wouldn’t dream of lifting one of his eight arms for his human captors—until he forms a remarkable friendship with Tova. Ever the detective, Marcellus deduces what happened the night Tova’s son disappeared. And now Marcellus must use every trick his old invertebrate body can muster to unearth the truth for her before it’s too late.

April title

Afterlife
by Julia Alvarez

Wednesday April 26th at 1pm
at the library and on zoom

Copies of the book are available now!
Large print and audio CD available too.

Digital copies:

Overdrive/Libby ebook
Overdrive/Libby audiobook

hoopla ebook
hoopla audiobook

The first adult novel in almost fifteen years by the internationally bestselling author of In the Time of the Butterflies and How the García Girls Lost Their Accents

“A stunning work of art that reminds readers Alvarez is, and always has been, in a class of her own.” —Elizabeth Acevedo, National Book Award-winning author of the New York Times bestseller The Poet X

Antonia Vega, the immigrant writer at the center of Afterlife, has had the rug pulled out from under her. She has just retired from the college where she taught English when her beloved husband, Sam, suddenly dies. And then more jolts: her bighearted but unstable sister disappears, and Antonia returns home one evening to find a pregnant, undocumented teenager on her doorstep. Antonia has always sought direction in the literature she loves—lines from her favorite authors play in her head like a soundtrack—but now she finds that the world demands more of her than words.

Afterlife is a compact, nimble, and sharply droll novel. Set in this political moment of tribalism and distrust, it asks: What do we owe those in crisis in our families, including—maybe especially—members of our human family? How do we live in a broken world without losing faith in one another or ourselves? And how do we stay true to those glorious souls we have lost?

February title

These Precious Days

by Ann Patchett

Wednesday February 22nd

at 1pm

At the library and on zoom

Copies are available at the library including large print and audio cd editions. Also available as a Hoopla ebook and Hoopla audiobook, as well as a Libby ebook.

The beloved New York Times bestselling author reflects on home, family, friendships and writing in this deeply personal collection of essays.

"The elegance of Patchett's prose is seductive and inviting: with Patchett as a guide, readers will really get to grips with the power of struggles, failures, and triumphs alike." --Publisher's Weekly

"Any story that starts will also end." As a writer, Ann Patchett knows what the outcome of her fiction will be. Life, however, often takes turns we do not see coming. Patchett ponders this truth in these wise essays that afford a fresh and intimate look into her mind and heart.

At the center of These Precious Days is the title essay, a surprising and moving meditation on an unexpected friendship that explores "what it means to be seen, to find someone with whom you can be your best and most complete self." When Patchett chose an early galley of actor and producer Tom Hanks' short story collection to read one night before bed, she had no idea that this single choice would be life changing. It would introduce her to a remarkable woman--Tom's brilliant assistant Sooki--with whom she would form a profound bond that held monumental consequences for them both.

A literary alchemist, Patchett plumbs the depths of her experiences to create gold: engaging and moving pieces that are both self-portrait and landscape, each vibrant with emotion and rich in insight. Turning her writer's eye on her own experiences, she transforms the private into the universal, providing us all a way to look at our own worlds anew, and reminds how fleeting and enigmatic life can be.
From the enchantments of Kate DiCamillo's children's books (author of The Beatryce Prophecy) to youthful memories of Paris; the cherished life gifts given by her three fathers to the unexpected influence of Charles Schultz's Snoopy; the expansive vision of Eudora Welty to the importance of knitting, Patchett connects life and art as she illuminates what matters most. Infused with the author's grace, wit, and warmth, the pieces in These Precious Days resonate deep in the soul, leaving an indelible mark--and demonstrate why Ann Patchett is one of the most celebrated writers of our time.

November/December title

The library's next book discussion will be held on

Wednesday December 14th at 1pm.

The meeting will be held in the Local History Room

and via zoom.

Copies of the book (regular print and large print) and audiobook are available at the desk at the library.

In addition the audiobook is available to download via Overdrive/Libby.

"An extraordinary story set in the first century about a woman who finds her voice and her destiny, from the celebrated number one New York Times bestselling author of The Secret Life of Bees and The Invention of Wings

In her mesmerizing fourth work of fiction, Sue Monk Kidd takes an audacious approach to history and brings her acclaimed narrative gifts to imagine the story of a young woman named Ana. Raised in a wealthy family with ties to the ruler of Galilee, she is rebellious and ambitious, with a brilliant mind and a daring spirit. She engages in furtive scholarly pursuits and writes narratives about neglected and silenced women. Ana is expected to marry an older widower, a prospect that horrifies her. An encounter with eighteen-year-old Jesus changes everything.

Their marriage evolves with love and conflict, humor and pathos in Nazareth, where Ana makes a home with Jesus, his brothers, and their mother, Mary. Ana’s pent-up longings intensify amid the turbulent resistance to Rome’s occupation of Israel, partially led by her brother, Judas. She is sustained by her fearless aunt Yaltha, who harbors a compelling secret. When Ana commits a brazen act that puts her in peril, she flees to Alexandria, where startling revelations and greater dangers unfold, and she finds refuge in unexpected surroundings. Ana determines her fate during a stunning convergence of events considered among the most impactful in human history.

Grounded in meticulous research and written with a reverential approach to Jesus’s life that focuses on his humanity, The Book of Longings is an inspiring, unforgettable account of one woman’s bold struggle to realize the passion and potential inside her, while living in a time, place and culture devised to silence her. It is a triumph of storytelling both timely and timeless, from a masterful writer at the height of her powers". --from the author's website

October title

Book Group Meeting

Wednesday October 26

at 1pm

Print copies will be available at the library starting October 5th.

Overdrive/Libby ebook

Overdrive/Libby audiobook

September book

Book group meeting

Wednesday September 28th at 1pm

Finding Chika by Mitch Albom

Print and audio cd copies available at the library

Digital editions:

Hoopla ebook

Hoopla audiobook

Overdrive/Libby audiobook

Check out our latest Gallery exhibit A Celebration of Haitian Art (through the end of October). Also on Thursday September 29th at 7pm Judith Kumin will present
A Panorama of Haitian Art in the Library Community Room. Join us!

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Tuesdays With Morrie comes Mitch Albom’s most personal story to date: an intimate and heartwarming memoir about what it means to be a family and the young Haitian orphan whose short life would forever change his heart.
Chika Jeune was born three days before the devastating earthquake that decimated Haiti in 2010. She spent her infancy in a landscape of extreme poverty, and when her mother died giving birth to a baby brother, Chika was brought to The Have Faith Haiti Orphanage that Albom operates in Port Au Prince.

With no children of their own, the forty-plus children who live, play, and go to school at the orphanage have become family to Mitch and his wife, Janine. Chika’s arrival makes a quick impression. Brave and self-assured, even as a three-year-old, she delights the other kids and teachers. But at age five, Chika is suddenly diagnosed with something a doctor there says, “No one in Haiti can help you with.”

Mitch and Janine bring Chika to Detroit, hopeful that American medical care can soon return her to her homeland. Instead, Chika becomes a permanent part of their household, and their lives, as they embark on a two-year, around-the-world journey to find a cure. As Chika’s boundless optimism and humor teach Mitch the joys of caring for a child, he learns that a relationship built on love, no matter what blows it takes, can never be lost.

Told in hindsight, and through illuminating conversations with Chika herself, this is Albom at his most poignant and vulnerable. Finding Chika is a celebration of a girl, her adoptive guardians, and the incredible bond they formed—a devastatingly beautiful portrait of what it means to be a family, regardless of how it is made.

https://www.mitchalbom.com/books/chika/

August title

August Book Group Meeting

In person and via zoom

August 31st at 1pm

(Please email the library at
info@hopkintontownlibrary.org
if you would like the zoom link)

Still Life

by Sarah Winman

Print books are available for check out
at the library and the book is also available on
Overdrive/Libby (ebook and audiobook).

Tuscany, 1944: As Allied troops advance and bombs fall around deserted villages, a young English soldier, Ulysses Temper, finds himself in the wine cellar of a deserted villa. There, he has a chance encounter with Evelyn Skinner, a middle-aged art historian who has come to Italy to salvage paintings from the ruins and recall long-forgotten memories of her own youth. In each other, Ulysses and Evelyn find a kindred spirit amongst the rubble of war-torn Italy, and set off on a course of events that will shape Ulysses's life for the next four decades.

As Ulysses returns home to London, reimmersing himself in his crew at The Stoat and Parrot -- a motley mix of pub crawlers and eccentrics -- he carries his time in Italy with him. And when an unexpected inheritance brings him back to where it all began, Ulysses knows better than to tempt fate, and returns to the Tuscan hills.

With beautiful prose, extraordinary tenderness, and bursts of humor and light, Still Life is a sweeping portrait of unforgettable individuals who come together to make a family, and a richly drawn celebration of beauty and love in all its forms.

--Goodreads.com

July title

July Book Group Meeting

In person and via zoom

July 27th at 1pm

The Secret Keeper of Jaipur

by Alka Joshi

Books are available for check out
at the library and on hoopla and Overdrive/Libby.

This follow-up to The Henna Artist picks up the story 12 years later, and is told alternatingly in the voices of henna artist Lakshmi; her protégé Malik; and Nimmi, Malik's beloved. It's 1969, and Malik is studying the building trade under the tutelage of the Singh family and apprenticing at the Facilities Office of the Jaipur Royal Palace. When a section of their largest project, the Royal Jewel Cinema, collapses on opening night, blame is quickly assigned. Meanwhile, Lakshmi is running the Lady Reading Healing Garden, while her husband, Dr. Jay Kumar, heads up the Community Clinic. They invite Nimmi to coordinate the healing garden, creating opportunities for the facets of Malik's life—personal/professional and traditional/modern—to intersect. As Malik tries to clear the person blamed for the cinema collapse, he uncovers nefarious connections between his mentors and his life back in Shimla, which may put Nimmi in danger. It's only after Malik employs the help of Lakshmi, and her connections at the Royal Palace, that justice may be served. With lush details, a return to favorite characters, and emotional complexity, this story satisfies on every level. --Library Journal

June title

Our next book is A Thousand Ships: A Novel by Natalie Haynes; the Trojan War from the point of view of the silenced women! Lots of options for accessing this title: we will have print copies (here by Wednesday 6/1), an audio CD edition, hoopla audiobook, Overdrive/Libby audiobook and ebook. We'll meet in person and via zoom on Wednesday June 29th at 1pm.

Broadcaster and classicist Natalie Haynes amplifies the muted voices of women in her all-female retelling of the Trojan War. From slaves to queens to muses to deities, she takes the scraps of women Homer offers us in THE ILIAD and THE ODYSSEY and patches them into full characters with powerful stories.

In A THOUSAND SHIPS, Homer is writing yet another epic. Desperate for inspiration, he beseeches Calliope, the muse of epic poetry and the novel’s sporadic narrator, to lend him her song once more. She obliges, albeit reluctantly, intent on two objectives: teaching Homer the true meaning of war and memorializing the women left unsung.

"[T]he novel draws cohesion from the fragmented voices of women. In presenting her audience with so many voices, Haynes could have written a cacophony. Instead, she has conducted a choir."

What follows is a series of primarily self-contained chapters tackling not only the Trojan War but also its long and drawn-out aftermath. For the most part, each chapter is its own entity and does not follow a linear timeline. Creusa runs through a smoke-choked city in search of her husband. Briseis is enslaved by her family’s murderer. Laodamia laments the death of her king. A rejected Oenone raises her son as a single mother atop Mount Ida.

While these stories give A THOUSAND SHIPS the feel of a series of thematically connected vignettes, the book is lent narrative scaffolding by the Trojan women and Penelope's letters to her husband, Odysseus, transforming it into something between a collection and a novel.

Nestled between stories of goddesses arguing over golden apples and wives offering prophetic warnings to their husbands, the Trojan women are living in the direct aftermath of the war. Their stories converge in these chapters as they huddle together on a beach at the outskirts of the Greek encampment. Their fates hang in a precarious balance. They are held captive by the Greeks and are waiting to be divided as spoils of war among the men who have slaughtered their loved ones and laid waste to their homes. Still, they continue to hope --- for those who made it out of Troy and for one another --- and, in doing so, exhibit bravery even in the depths of loss and despair.

Penelope’s letters, on the other hand, offer a witty respite from the traumatic stories of other women as she awaits her husband’s return in a quiet rage. She listens as the bard sings songs of his exploits across the seas and grows more cross by the year as she imagines Odysseus getting sidetracked from his destination (her) by an endless parade of monsters, cannibals and enchantresses.

Even as the tone of the chapters sways from daunted to desperate to downright ruthless, the novel draws cohesion from the fragmented voices of women. In presenting her audience with so many voices, Haynes could have written a cacophony. Instead, she has conducted a choir.

If THE ILIAD is an ode to the actors, then A THOUSAND SHIPS commemorates those acted upon: “victims of men, slaves of men, survivors of men.” With the wisdom of Athena and a pinch of humor, Haynes considers the many ways in which women exhibit strength, even in situations of relative powerlessness.

Reviewed by Kayla Provencher on January 29, 2021

From BookReporter.com

May title

Our May title is The Seed Keeper by Diane Wilson. The group will meet on Wednesday May 25th at 1pm at the library in the Local History Room and on zoom. There are copies of the book to check out here at the library as well as a hoopla ebook edition and audiobook edition (if you have any questions about using hoopla just let us know!). We'll also have a CD audiobook available if you would like that format.

Rosalie Iron Wing has grown up in the woods with her father, Ray, a former science teacher who tells her stories of plants, of the stars, of the origins of the Dakota people. Until, one morning, Ray doesn’t return from checking his traps. Told she has no family, Rosalie is sent to live with a foster family in nearby Mankato—where the reserved, bookish teenager meets rebellious Gaby Makespeace, in a friendship that transcends the damaged legacies they’ve inherited.

On a winter’s day many years later, Rosalie returns to her childhood home. A widow and mother, she has spent the previous two decades on her white husband’s farm, finding solace in her garden even as the farm is threatened first by drought and then by a predatory chemical company. Now, grieving, Rosalie begins to confront the past, on a search for family, identity, and a community where she can finally belong. In the process, she learns what it means to be descended from women with souls of iron—women who have protected their families, their traditions, and a precious cache of seeds through generations of hardship and loss, through war and the insidious trauma of boarding schools.

Weaving together the voices of four indelible women, The Seed Keeper is a beautifully told story of reawakening, of remembering our original relationship to the seeds and, through them, to our ancestors. ---https://milkweed.org/book/the-seed-keeper

April title

Our title for April is The Woman They Could Not Silence; One Woman, Her Incredible Fight for Freedom, and the Men Who Tried to Make Her Disappear by Kate Moore. Pick up a print copy (starting on March 30th) or access online via hoopla (ebook) or Overdrive/Libby (audiobook) (ebook). We will also have this title available in Large Print and audio CD format. The book group will meet in the Local History Room at the library on Wednesday April 27th at 1pm. There will also be a zoom option.

From the New York Times, USA Today and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of The Radium Girls comes another dark and dramatic but ultimately uplifting tale of a forgotten woman whose inspirational journey sparked lasting change for women’s rights and exposed injustices that still resonate today.

1860: As the clash between the states rolls slowly to a boil, Elizabeth Packard, housewife and mother of six, is facing her own battle. The enemy sits across the table and sleeps in the next room. Her husband of twenty-one years is plotting against her because he feels increasingly threatened – by Elizabeth’s intellect, independence, and unwillingness to stifle her own thoughts. So Theophilus makes a plan to put his wife back in her place. One summer morning, he has her committed to an insane asylum.

The horrific conditions inside the Illinois State Hospital in Jacksonville, Illinois, are overseen by Dr. Andrew McFarland, a man who will prove to be even more dangerous to Elizabeth than her traitorous husband. But most disturbing is that Elizabeth is not the only sane woman confined to the institution. There are many rational women on her ward who tell the same story: they've been committed not because they need medical treatment, but to keep them in line – conveniently labeled “crazy” so their voices are ignored.

No one is willing to fight for their freedom and, disenfranchised both by gender and the stigma of their supposed madness, they cannot possibly fight for themselves. But Elizabeth is about to discover that the merit of losing everything is that you then have nothing to lose...

Bestselling author Kate Moore brings her sparkling narrative voice to The Woman They Could Not Silence, an unputdownable story of the forgotten woman who courageously fought for her own freedom – and in so doing freed millions more.

Elizabeth’s refusal to be silenced and her ceaseless quest for justice not only challenged the medical science of the day, and led to a giant leap forward in human rights, it also showcased the most salutary lesson: sometimes, the greatest heroes we have are those inside ourselves. --from the author's website

March title

You probably read this one in high school so it's time to revisit it! Our title for March (which happens to be Women's History Month) is The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank. Pick up a copy at the library or access online (see below). We will meet at the the library and via zoom on Wednesday March 23rd at 1pm.

There are several editions of both the ebook and the audiobook in hoopla. It's also available in Overdrive/Libby. The print copy we are reading is called the "definitive" edition.

Hope to see you there!

February title

Our February book title is The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett. We'll meet in person and on zoom on Wednesday February 23rd at 1pm.

Copies of the book are available at the library. Regular print, large print, cd audiobook and Overdrive/Libby ebook and audiobook editions are available for this title.

The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it’s not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it’s everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Many years later, one sister lives with her black daughter in the same southern town she once tried to escape. The other secretly passes for white, and her white husband knows nothing of her past. Still, even separated by so many miles and just as many lies, the fates of the twins remain intertwined. What will happen to the next generation, when their own daughters’ storylines intersect?

Weaving together multiple strands and generations of this family, from the Deep South to California, from the 1950s to the 1990s, Brit Bennett produces a story that is at once a riveting, emotional family story and a brilliant exploration of the American history of passing. Looking well beyond issues of race, The Vanishing Half considers the lasting influence of the past as it shapes a person’s decisions, desires, and expectations, and explores some of the multiple reasons and realms in which people sometimes feel pulled to live as something other than their origins.

As with her New York Times-bestselling debut The Mothers, Brit Bennett offers an engrossing page-turner about family and relationships that is immersive and provocative, compassionate and wise. ---www.penguinrandomhouse.com

January title

January book discussion

American Dirt

by Jeanine Cummins

Wednesday January 26th at 1pm

Type of meeting to be determined
(in-person, zoom or a hybrid)

Copies of the book (including regular and large print editions and audiobook on CD) are available for checkout at the library.

Also available as a hoopla audiobook, Overdrive/Libby ebook and Overdrive/Libby audiobook.

Let us know if you have any questions about accessing our online versions!

Lydia Quixano Pérez lives in the Mexican city of Acapulco. She runs a bookstore. She has a son, Luca, the love of her life, and a wonderful husband who is a journalist. And while there are cracks beginning to show in Acapulco because of the drug cartels, her life is, by and large, fairly comfortable.
Even though she knows they'll never sell, Lydia stocks some of her all-time favorite books in her store. And then one day a man enters the shop to browse and comes up to the register with a few books he would like to buy—two of them her favorites. Javier is erudite. He is charming. And, unbeknownst to Lydia, he is the jefe of the newest drug cartel that has gruesomely taken over the city. When Lydia's husband's tell-all profile of Javier is published, none of their lives will ever be the same.
Forced to flee, Lydia and eight-year-old Luca soon find themselves miles and worlds away from their comfortable middle-class existence. Instantly transformed into migrants, Lydia and Luca ride la bestia—trains that make their way north toward the United States, which is the only place Javier's reach doesn't extend. As they join the countless people trying to reach el norte, Lydia soon sees that everyone is running from something. But what exactly are they running to?
American Dirt will leave readers utterly changed. It is a literary achievement filled with poignancy, drama, and humanity on every page. It is one of the most important books for our times.
Already being hailed as "a Grapes of Wrath for our times" and "a new American classic," Jeanine Cummins's American Dirt is a rare exploration into the inner hearts of people willing to sacrifice everything for a glimmer of hope. ----Publisher's website

November/December title

Perestroika in Paris

by Jane Smiley

Wednesday December 1st at 1pm

Copies of the book, including large print and audio editions, are available at the library.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning and best-selling author: a captivating, brilliantly imaginative story of three extraordinary animals—and a young boy—whose lives intersect in Paris in this “feel-good escape” (The New York Times).

Paras, short for “Perestroika,” is a spirited racehorse at a racetrack west of Paris. One afternoon at dusk, she finds the door of her stall open and—she’s a curious filly—wanders all the way to the City of Light. She’s dazzled and often mystified by the sights, sounds, and smells around her, but she isn’t afraid.

Soon she meets an elegant dog, a German shorthaired pointer named Frida, who knows how to get by without attracting the attention of suspicious Parisians. Paras and Frida coexist for a time in the city’s lush green spaces, nourished by Frida’s strategic trips to the vegetable market. They keep company with two irrepressible ducks and an opinionated raven. But then Paras meets a human boy, Etienne, and discovers a new, otherworldly part of Paris: the ivy-walled house where the boy and his nearly-one-hundred-year-old great-grandmother live in seclusion.

As the cold weather nears, the unlikeliest of friendships bloom. But how long can a runaway horse stay undiscovered in Paris? How long can a boy keep her hidden and all to himself? Jane Smiley’s beguiling new novel is itself an adventure that celebrates curiosity, ingenuity, and the desire of all creatures for true love and freedom. --penguinrandomhouse.com

July title

July book discussion

Wednesday July 28th at 1pm

at the library

A Long Petal of the Sea

by Isabel Allende

Copies of the book are available at the library. Also available in Large Print and audio formats and as an Overdrive ebook and audiobook.

In the late 1930s, civil war grips Spain. When General Franco and his Fascists succeed in overthrowing the government, hundreds of thousands are forced to flee in a treacherous journey over the mountains to the French border. Among them is Roser, a pregnant young widow, who finds her life intertwined with that of Victor Dalmau, an army doctor and the brother of her deceased love. In order to survive, the two must unite in a marriage neither of them desires.

Together with two thousand other refugees, Roser and Victor embark for Chile "the long petal of sea and wine and snow" on the SS Winnipeg, a ship chartered by the poet Pablo Neruda. As unlikely partners, the couple embraces exile as the rest of Europe erupts in world war. Starting over on a new continent, they face trial after trial, but they will also find joy as they patiently await the day when they might go home. Through it all, their hope of returning to Spain keeps them going. Destined to witness the battle between freedom and repression as it plays out across the world, Roser and Victor will find that home might have been closer than they thought all along.

A masterful work of historical fiction about hope, exile, and belonging, A Long Petal of the Sea shows Isabel Allende at the height of her powers.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * From the author of The House of the Spirits, this epic novel spanning decades and crossing continents follows two young people as they flee the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War in search of a place to call home.

"One of the most richly imagined portrayals of the Spanish Civil War to date, and one of the strongest and most affecting works in [Isabel Allende's] long career."--The New York Times Book Review

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Esquire * Good Housekeeping * Parade

January title

This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger

Wednesday January 27th at 1pm via zoom

Print copies will be available for pickup starting on Tuesday December 29th. There will be large print and audio CD copies too.

Other options for access:

hoopla audiobook

Overdrive/Libby ebook

Ovedrive/Libby audiobook

(Hint: make sure you are logged in to Overdrive to see copies available to you)

"For fans of Before We Were Yours and Where the Crawdads Sing, a magnificent novel about four orphans on a life-changing odyssey during the Great Depression.
1932, Minnesota—the Lincoln School is a pitiless place where hundreds of Native American children, forcibly separated from their parents, are sent to be educated. It is also home to an orphan named Odie O’Banion, a lively boy whose exploits earn him the superintendent’s wrath. Forced to flee, he and his brother Albert, their best friend Mose, and a brokenhearted little girl named Emmy steal away in a canoe, heading for the mighty Mississippi and a place to call their own.
Over the course of one unforgettable summer, these four orphans will journey into the unknown and cross paths with others who are adrift, from struggling farmers and traveling faith healers to displaced families and lost souls of all kinds. With the feel of a modern classic, This Tender Land is an enthralling, big-hearted epic that shows how the magnificent American landscape connects us all, haunts our dreams, and makes us whole". ...https://williamkentkrueger.com/standalone/this-tender-land/#about

Email kdixon@hopkintontownlibrary for more information or the zoom login info.

November/December title

Our next title is Apeirogon by Colum McCann, author of Let the Great World Spin and TransAtlantic.

As in previous years, we are combining our November/December book group meeting. We'll meet (via zoom) on December 9th at 1pm.

We will have copies of the hardcover book (as well as a large print edition and audio CD edition) to borrow from the library - just email or call if you'd like to reserve one.

Or use the links below to access the online versions.

Overdrive/Libby audiobook

Overdrive/Libby ebook

September title

September Book Group

The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek

by Kim Michele Richardson

Wednesday

September 23rd at 1pm

via zoom

Available formats include 1 hardcover, 1 CD audiobook, ebook and eaudiobook.

Reserve the hardcover or audio CD version in our catalog. Click on the links below to access the digital versions.

hoopla ebook

hoopla audiobook

Overdrive/Libby ebook

Overdrive/Libby audiobook

Please let us know if you need help with any of our online resources!

Author information, discussion questions, videos, reviews and more can be found here!

The hardscrabble folks of Troublesome Creek have to scrap for everything—everything except books, that is. Thanks to Roosevelt’s Kentucky Pack Horse Library Project, Troublesome’s got its very own traveling librarian, Cussy Mary Carter.

Cussy’s not only a book woman, however, she’s also the last of her kind, her skin a shade of blue unlike most anyone else. Not everyone is keen on Cussy’s family or the Library Project, and a Blue is often blamed for any whiff of trouble. If Cussy wants to bring the joy of books to the hill folks, she’s going to have to confront prejudice as old as the Appalachias and suspicion as deep as the holler.

Inspired by the true blue-skinned people of Kentucky and the brave and dedicated Kentucky Pack Horse library service of the 1930s, The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek is a story of raw courage, fierce strength, and one woman’s belief that books can carry us anywhere—even back home.

About The Thursday Murder Club

About Apeirogon: A Novel

September Book Group