Monthly Book Clubs

CIVIL RIGHTS AND EQUALITY

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Let's Talk About It Book Club

Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the Jazz Age by Kevin Boyle

In 1925, Detroit was a city of jazz, speakeasies, and rising tensions. Ossian Sweet, a proud Negro doctor and grandson of a slave, had worked his way out of the ghetto to buy a home in a white neighborhood. But when a mob gathered outside his house, shots were fired, and Sweet, or one of his defenders, accidentally killed a white man.

This sparked a high-profile trial, with renowned attorney Clarence Darrow defending Sweet, who became a symbol of racial equality. Kevin Boyle weaves together the police investigation, courtroom drama, and Sweet’s journey from slavery to the middle class, capturing the volatile America of the 1920s and the battle for civil rights.

 

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Thursday, April 17 @ 6:00 PM

ADULT BOOK CLUBS

91W2jvKMTQL

Romance Book Club

The Love of My Afterlife by Kirsty Greenwood
If she wasn’t dead already, Delphie would be dying of embarrassment. Not only did she just die by choking on a microwaveable burger, but now she’s standing in her ‘shine like a star’ nightie in front of the hottest man she’s ever seen. And he’s smiling at her.
As they start to chat, everything else becomes background noise. That is until someone comes running out of a door, yelling something about a huge mistake, and sends the dreamy stranger back down to earth. And here Delphie was thinking her luck might be different in the afterlife.
When Delphie is offered a deal in which she can return to earth and reconnect with the mysterious man, she jumps at the opportunity to find her possible soulmate and a fresh start. But in a city of millions, Delphie is going to have to listen to her heart, learn to ask for help, and perhaps even see the magic in the life she’s leaving behind…

 

 

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Tuesday, April 8 @ 5:30 PM

9781250275035

Sci-Fi/Fantasy Book Club

Mickey7 by Edward Ashton
Mickey Barnes is an Expendable, a human clone created for dangerous space exploration missions. Now on his seventh iteration, Mickey lives and dies on the ice world of Niflheim, where he's been deployed for hazardous assignments and subjected to experiments. 
After being left for dead on a mission, Mickey7 is saved by Niflheim’s native species, thought to be insentient. Upon returning, he meets his next clone, Mickey8, and the two must keep their existence a secret to avoid execution. With memories of his past deaths and doubts about the colony’s mission, Mickey7 is forced to question his moral and mortal existence... again and again.
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Tuesday, April 15 @ 5:00 PM

91kDLqQKJEL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_

4th Tuesday Book Club Book Club

The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine
Amber Patterson is fed up. She’s tired of being a nobody: a plain, invisible woman who blends into the background. She deserves a life of money and power like the one blond-haired, blue-eyed goddess Daphne Parrish takes for granted.

To everyone in the exclusive town of Bishops Harbor, Connecticut, Daphne, a socialite and philanthropist, and her real-estate mogul husband, Jackson, are a couple straight out of a fairy tale.

Amber’s envy could eat her alive . . . if she didn't have a plan. Amber uses Daphne’s compassion and caring to insinuate herself into the family’s life, the first step in a meticulous scheme to undermine her. Before long, Amber is Daphne’s closest confidante, traveling to Europe with the Parrishes and their lovely young daughters, and growing closer to Jackson. But a skeleton from her past may undermine everything that Amber has worked towards, and if it is discovered, her well-laid plan may fall to pieces.

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Tuesday, April 22 @ 5:00 PM

91P80kXFyLL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_

Banned or Challenged Book Club

Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi

In this deeply researched and fast-moving narrative, Kendi chronicles the entire story of anti-Black racist ideas and their staggering power over the course of American history.

Stamped from the Beginning uses the lives of five major American intellectuals to offer a window into the contentious debates between assimilationists and segregationists and between racists and anti-racists.

From Puritan minister Cotton Mather to Thomas Jefferson, from fiery abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison to brilliant scholar W. E. B. Du Bois to legendary anti-prison activist Angela Davis, Kendi shows how and why some of our leading pro-slavery and pro–civil rights thinkers have challenged or helped cement racist ideas in America.

 

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Tuesday, May 6 @ 5:00 PM

CHILDREN'S BOOK CLUB

9781840228175

Elementary Book Club & Movie

Black Beauty by Anna Sewell

Spends his youth in a loving home, surrounded by friends and cared for by his owners. But when circumstances change, he learns that not all humans are so kind.

Passed from hand to hand, Black Beauty witnesses love and cruelty, wealth and poverty, friendship and hardship . . .
Will the handsome horse ever find a happy and lasting home? Carefully retold in clear contemporary language, and presented with delightful illustrations, these favorite classic stories capture the heart and imagination of young readers.
Check Availability

Tuesday, April 8 @ 4:00 PM

CIVIL RIGHTS AND EQUALITY

81LNtCl7J-L

Let's Talk About It Book Club

Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the Jazz Age by Kevin Boyle

In 1925, Detroit was a city of jazz, speakeasies, and rising tensions. Ossian Sweet, a proud Negro doctor and grandson of a slave, had worked his way out of the ghetto to buy a home in a white neighborhood. But when a mob gathered outside his house, shots were fired, and Sweet, or one of his defenders, accidentally killed a white man.

This sparked a high-profile trial, with renowned attorney Clarence Darrow defending Sweet, who became a symbol of racial equality. Kevin Boyle weaves together the police investigation, courtroom drama, and Sweet’s journey from slavery to the middle class, capturing the volatile America of the 1920s and the battle for civil rights.

Thursday, April 17 @ 6:00 PM

Check Availability

ADULT BOOK CLUBS

91W2jvKMTQL

Romance Book Club

The Love of My Afterlife by Kirsty Greenwood
If she wasn’t dead already, Delphie would be dying of embarrassment. Not only did she just die by choking on a microwaveable burger, but now she’s standing in her ‘shine like a star’ nightie in front of the hottest man she’s ever seen. And he’s smiling at her.
As they start to chat, everything else becomes background noise. That is until someone comes running out of a door, yelling something about a huge mistake, and sends the dreamy stranger back down to earth. And here Delphie was thinking her luck might be different in the afterlife.
When Delphie is offered a deal in which she can return to earth and reconnect with the mysterious man, she jumps at the opportunity to find her possible soulmate and a fresh start. But in a city of millions, Delphie is going to have to listen to her heart, learn to ask for help, and perhaps even see the magic in the life she’s leaving behind…

Tuesday, April 8 @ 5:30 PM

Check Availability
9781250275035

Sci-Fi/Fantasy Book Club

Mickey7 by Edward Ashton
Mickey Barnes is an Expendable, a human clone created for dangerous space exploration missions. Now on his seventh iteration, Mickey lives and dies on the ice world of Niflheim, where he's been deployed for hazardous assignments and subjected to experiments.
After being left for dead on a mission, Mickey7 is saved by Niflheim’s native species, thought to be insentient. Upon returning, he meets his next clone, Mickey8, and the two must keep their existence a secret to avoid execution. With memories of his past deaths and doubts about the colony’s mission, Mickey7 is forced to question his moral and mortal existence... again and again.

Tuesday, April 15 @ 5:30 PM

Check Availability
91kDLqQKJEL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_

4th Tuesday Book Club Book Club

The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine
Amber Patterson is fed up. She’s tired of being a nobody: a plain, invisible woman who blends into the background. She deserves a life of money and power like the one blond-haired, blue-eyed goddess Daphne Parrish takes for granted.
To everyone in the exclusive town of Bishops Harbor, Connecticut, Daphne, a socialite and philanthropist, and her real-estate mogul husband, Jackson, are a couple straight out of a fairy tale.
Amber’s envy could eat her alive . . . if she didn't have a plan. Amber uses Daphne’s compassion and caring to insinuate herself into the family’s life, the first step in a meticulous scheme to undermine her. Before long, Amber is Daphne’s closest confidante, traveling to Europe with the Parrishes and their lovely young daughters, and growing closer to Jackson. But a skeleton from her past may undermine everything that Amber has worked towards, and if it is discovered, her well-laid plan may fall to pieces.

Tuesday, April 22 @ 5:00 PM

Check Availability
91P80kXFyLL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_

Banned or Challenged Book Club

Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi

In this deeply researched and fast-moving narrative, Kendi chronicles the entire story of anti-Black racist ideas and their staggering power over the course of American history.

Stamped from the Beginning uses the lives of five major American intellectuals to offer a window into the contentious debates between assimilationists and segregationists and between racists and anti-racists.

From Puritan minister Cotton Mather to Thomas Jefferson, from fiery abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison to brilliant scholar W. E. B. Du Bois to legendary anti-prison activist Angela Davis, Kendi shows how and why some of our leading pro-slavery and pro–civil rights thinkers have challenged or helped cement racist ideas in America.

Tuesday, May 6 @ 5:00 PM

Check Availability

CHILDREN'S BOOK CLUB

9781840228175

Elementary Book Club & Movie

Black Beauty by Anna Sewell

Spends his youth in a loving home, surrounded by friends and cared for by his owners. But when circumstances change, he learns that not all humans are so kind.

Passed from hand to hand, Black Beauty witnesses love and cruelty, wealth and poverty, friendship and hardship ...

Will the handsome horse ever find a happy and lasting home? Carefully retold in clear contemporary language, and presented with delightful illustrations, these favorite classic stories capture the heart and imagination of young readers.

Tuesday, April 8 @ 4:00 PM

Check Availability