#book club pick

[cassiesbookishcorner]

•July 16, 2023•

What is your favorite trope?

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My favorite is enemies to lovers. Put the characters that hate each other into situations where they have to live/work together, and I will devour it.

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I also like the grumpy/sunshine trope. Which this book has!

It was such a cute read.

Beckett is 🥰 Evie is ☀️

It does have the miscommunication trope, which I cringe at, but I still very much enjoyed this book.

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If you haven't read this book yet but really want to and have someone to talk with after, you are more than welcome to join We're All Booked hosted by @laceydbellbooks & @thelibrarylane & myself.

There is a discord to chat about it and a live show at the end of the month.

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•

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#in the weeds #romance #grumpy sunshine #miscommunication #bookish #bibliophile #bookworm #read #books #tbr #bookaddict #currentlyreading #book club pick

[nkeshyy]

People are messy, and love can be ugly. I’m inclined to always err on the side of compassion.

—Taylor Jenkins Reid, from "The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo."

#literary fiction books #what are you reading? #the seven husbands of evelyn hugo #literature #bookish quotes #lgbtq community #writers of tumblr #readers on tumblr #bookish community #bookstagram #book recommendations #book club pick #book club #tbr #old gay icons #green dress #books and lovers #book lovers #writerscommunity #currently reading #book quotes #bisexual awareness #bisexual icons #literary conventions #interviews

[rockislandadultreads]

Book Recommendations: More Nonfiction Book Club Picks

Midnight in Chernobyl by Adam Higginbotham

April 25, 1986, in Chernobyl, was a turning point in world history. The disaster not only changed the world’s perception of nuclear power and the science that spawned it, but also our understanding of the planet’s delicate ecology. With the images of the abandoned homes and playgrounds beyond the barbed wire of the 30-kilometer Exclusion Zone, the rusting graveyards of contaminated trucks and helicopters, the farmland lashed with black rain, the event fixed for all time the notion of radiation as an invisible killer.

Chernobyl was also a key event in the destruction of the Soviet Union, and, with it, the United States’ victory in the Cold War. For Moscow, it was a political and financial catastrophe as much as an environmental and scientific one. With a total cost of 18 billion rubles - at the time equivalent to $18 billion - Chernobyl bankrupted an already teetering economy and revealed to its population a state built upon a pillar of lies.

The full story of the events that started that night in the control room of Reactor No.4 of the V.I. Lenin Nuclear Power Plant has never been told - until now. Through two decades of reporting, new archival information, and firsthand interviews with witnesses, journalist Adam Higginbotham tells the full dramatic story, including Alexander Akimov and Anatoli Dyatlov, who represented the best and worst of Soviet life; denizens of a vanished world of secret policemen, internal passports, food lines, and heroic self-sacrifice for the Motherland. Midnight in Chernobyl, award-worthy nonfiction that reads like sci-fi, shows not only the final epic struggle of a dying empire but also the story of individual heroism and desperate, ingenious technical improvisation joining forces against a new kind of enemy.

Last Call by Elon Green

The Townhouse Bar, midtown, July 1992: The piano player seems to know every song ever written, the crowd belts out the lyrics to their favorites, and a man standing nearby is drinking a Scotch and water. The man strikes the piano player as forgettable.

He looks bland and inconspicuous. Not at all what you think a serial killer looks like. But that’s what he is, and tonight, he has his sights set on a gray haired man. He will not be his first victim. Nor will he be his last.

The Last Call Killer preyed upon gay men in New York in the ‘80s and ‘90s and had all the hallmarks of the most notorious serial killers. Yet because of the sexuality of his victims, the skyhigh murder rates, and the AIDS epidemic, his murders have been almost entirely forgotten.

This gripping true-crime narrative tells the story of the Last Call Killer and the decades-long chase to find him. And at the same time, it paints a portrait of his victims and a vibrant community navigating threat and resilience.

Yellow Bird by Sierra Crane Murdoch 

When Lissa Yellow Bird was released from prison in 2009, she found her home, the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation in North Dakota, transformed by the Bakken oil boom. In her absence, the landscape had been altered beyond recognition, her tribal government swayed by corporate interests, and her community burdened by a surge in violence and addiction. Three years later, when Lissa learned that a young white oil worker, Kristopher "KC" Clarke, had disappeared from his reservation worksite, she became particularly concerned. No one knew where Clarke had gone, and few people were actively looking for him.

Yellow Bird traces Lissa's steps as she obsessively hunts for clues to Clarke's disappearance. She navigates two worlds - that of her own tribe, changed by its newfound wealth, and that of the non-Native oilmen, down on their luck, who have come to find work on the heels of the economic recession. Her pursuit of Clarke is also a pursuit of redemption, as Lissa atones for her own crimes and reckons with generations of trauma.

Lost & Found by Kathryn Schulz

Eighteen months before Kathryn Schulz's father died, she met the woman she would marry. In Lost & Found, she weaves the story of those relationships into a brilliant exploration of the role that loss and discovery play in all of our lives. The resulting book is part memoir, part guidebook to living in a world that is simultaneously full of wonder and joy and wretchedness and suffering - a world that always demands both our gratitude and our grief. A staff writer at The New Yorker and winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Schulz writes with curiosity, tenderness, erudition, and wit about our finite yet infinitely complicated lives. Lost & Found is an enduring account of love in all its many forms from one of the great writers of our time.

#book club books #book club #book club pick #nonfiction #nonfiction reads #nonfiction books #Nonfiction Reading #library books #book recommendations #book recs #reading recommendations #reading recs #TBR pile #tbr #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog

[readinglitty]

May's Book Club Pick: Writers & Lovers by Lily King

📣 Book Club Pick Announcement! We are excited to announce our next book club pick: Writers & Lovers by Lily King. This novel follows the story of Casey, a struggling writer who is grappling with the loss of her mother and a series of failed relationships. She finds solace in her writing and in a new romance, but must confront the challenges and sacrifices of pursuing her passion. Writers &…

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#american literature #Book Club #book club pick #books #Emma roberts #featured #lily king #may reading #romance novel #writers & lovers

[ijustkindalikebooks]

Currently Reading.

#tower #bae myung hoon #books #booklr #bookblr #book cover #book club #book club pick #book club reads #fiction #korean lit #korean literature

[taylorfennersbookishworld]

First Chapter, First Paragraph, Tuesday Intros: Vampires of El Norte

First Chapter, First Paragraph, Tuesday Intros is a weekly meme hosted by Socrates Book Reviews where you share the first paragraph of one of the books that you are currently reading. Each week bloggers will choose a book or books of the week (which will be one of the books that you are currently reading) and that book will take part in this book blog meme. This week I’m participating with:…

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#Blog Memes #Book Blog #Book Blogger #Book Club Pick #Bookish #Bookish Memes #First Chapter #First Paragraph #Horror #Tuesday Intros #Vampires

[communistkenobi]

I’m reflecting on cesaire’s work again and one of the little flourishes he does in discourse on colonialism is that he says the west will have to answer for its crimes against the human community. and I especially love this line because he’s using the same bourgeois universalising language that the imperial core so often does (“human rights” “freedom and justice for all” “spreading democracy across the globe”) but as a cudgel against the west, to reframe the human community as all those who lay outside of it. anyway I think everyone should read discourse on colonialism

#I need to brush up on my post colonial reading I’m not as well read as I’d like to be #once I finish my coursework I’ll have more time for reading shit I actually want to read lol #like I’m reading so much stupid bullshit that does not matter for class #genuinely useless theory that I will never pick up again #I want to finish orientalism in particular. one of the most didactic books I’ve ever read #like said’s writing is like every sentence restates his central argument. It’s an unrelenting book in a really compelling way #Interspersed with him talking fine grain shit about a bunch of European intellectuals I’ve never heard of lol #book club

[intersexbookclub]

January Pick: Envisioning African Intersex

Continuing our trend of alternating between fiction and non-fiction, our pick for January is Envisioning African Intersex: Challenging Colonial and Racist Legacies in South African Medicine, by Amanda Lock Swarr.

This is an academic text, so we won't be reading the whole thing! To make it manageable, we will be reading the first three chapters:

The Introduction: Pathologizing Gender Binaries

Chapter 1: Colonial Observations and Fallacies

Chapter 2: Intersex in Four South African Racial Groups in Durban

To ensure everybody has access to the book, a pdf copy is available through the discord.

Content notice: this book will be talking about the history of intersexism, colonialism, and racism.

When we're meeting We will be meeting to discuss the four chapters on Fri Jan 26, at: - 12:30-14:00 Pacific (Vancouver, San Francisco, etc) - 15:30-17:00 Eastern (Toronto, New York, etc) - 21:30-23:00 Central European (Berlin, Paris, etc) for more time zones see here

To join the discord: https://discord.gg/U8ZucKwGPK Also see: our code of conduct

How much of the book do you need to read? You don’t need to finish it participate! You are welcome to skim and/or skip chapters as desired. Current & future book picks If this isn’t in the cards for you, we’re reading YA portal fantasy Across the Green Grass Fields this month (December), and in February we will be reading the sci-fi short story collection Power To Yield.

We'll be reading another non-fiction selection in March, but it is not yet decided, so let us know in the Discord what would interest you!

#intersex book club #book picks #intersex books #queer theory #intersex studies #intersex #colonialism #post-colonial studies

[stone-stars]

Transcript:

Murph: (reading) "Sonic adds it to his vital statistics, and sl--" uhh… "-- and slips the card into the door slot. It swallows the card and opens… obediently." (disgusted) Oh. [Caldwell laughs.] Emily: Oh, I think we did make a big deal about that last time. Murph: Yeah? That sounds like us. Caldwell: (robot voice) Oh. Murph: (reading) "The h-- the hedgehog--" (laughs) Caldwell: (robot voice) I am your favorite door. Emily: Ew! [Murph laughs harder.] Caldwell: (robot voice) Come inside me daddy. [Murph cackles.] Emily: Ew! [Caldwell laughs.] Murph: (reading) "The headhog wal-- jogs off down the corridor. It ends in another door that automatically opens as he gets close, and s--" Caldwell: (robot voice) Don't listen to that door I am your favorite door now. Murph: (reading) "And, uh, slams shut as he steps into the next room." Caldwell: (robot voice) Enter me forcefully. Emily: Ewww! Murph: (laughs, then starts reading) "This room is about the same size as the last one, but there's only one computer in the middle of the room."

#8 bit book club #naddpod #8bbc #brian murphy #caldwell tanner #emily axford #been a minute since i posted an #8bbclip #so of course i had to pick a deeply cursed one

[sonofenki]

hello THOR????

#the HAIR???? #and he's so pretty???? #i swear tdr is the only book i'm torn between lis #i picked adil and im very happy with my choice #but GOD do i love mustafa #i'll definitely replay to be on his route someday #romance club #the desert rose #rc mustafa

[swordsmans]

one of the best feelings in the world is waking up to, like, a sudden burst of kudos and knowing someone, somewhere recommended one of my fics to their friends. whoever you are i love youuuuuu

#waaaaaaaaaaaaaa #always happy to be picked for a book club lmao #gyro.txt

[cassie-thorne]

#Some thorns need to be picked #And that lawyer bff #playchoices #choices stories you play #crimes of passion #Crimes of passion 2 #Trystan thorne #Cameron rose #Laws of attraction #choices loa #Laws of attraction mc #Max-what-now #Choices book club

[rockislandadultreads]

Book Recommendations: National Reading Group Month

In honor of National Reading Group Month, here are some titles featured in our book club kits that you can check out to share with your own reading group! 

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

Trevor Noah’s unlikely path from apartheid South Africa to the desk of The Daily Show began with a criminal act: his birth. Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle. Born a Crime is the story of a mischievous young boy who grows into a restless young man as he struggles to find himself in a world where he was never supposed to exist. It is also the story of that young man’s relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother—his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life.

The Unreal and the Real by Ursula K. Le Quin

In this two-volume selection of Ursula K. Le Guin's best short stories - as selected by the National Book Award winning author herself - the reader will be delighted, provoked, amused, and faced with the sharp, satirical voice of one of the best short story writers of the present day.

Where on Earth explores Le Guin's earthbound stories which range around the world from small town Oregon to middle Europe in the middle of revolution to summer camp. Companion volume Outer Space, Inner Lands includes Le Guin's best known nonrealistic stories. Both volumes include new introductions by the author.

My Sunshine Away by M.O. Walsh

In the summer of 1989, a Baton Rouge neighborhood best known for cookouts on sweltering summer afternoons, cauldrons of spicy crawfish, and passionate football fandom is rocked by a violent crime when fifteen-year-old Lindy Simpson - free spirit, track star, and belle of the block - is attacked late one evening near her home. As the dark side of this idyllic stretch of Southern suburbia is revealed, the close-knit neighborhood is irreversibly transformed.

In My Sunshine Away, M.O. Walsh brilliantly juxtaposes the enchantment of a charmed childhood with the gripping story of a violent crime, unraveling families, and consuming adolescent love. Acutely wise and deeply honest, it is an astonishing and page-turning debut about the meaning of family, the power of memory, and our ability to forgive.

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng

In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned - from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules. Enter Mia Warren - an enigmatic artist and single mother - who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community. When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town - and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia’s past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs.

#fiction #book club books #book club pick #national reading group month #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #tbr #to read #TBR pile #library books #booklr #book tumblr

[moghedien]

Can’t wait for the Wicked movie to come out because they’re gonna reprint the book with the movie cover on it and some innocent middle schooler is gonna pick up the book so they can be the cool person who read the book first and they’re gonna read it and not know what the fuck to do about what they’re reading

#i was said middle schooler #and I think ‘read Wicked way too young and got really into it’ is the defining moment of my personality tbh #and also why I never got into YA #*picks up a book for teenagers* ‘where is all the multi species orgies in sex clubs??’ #kids got Sarah J Maas now I guess #anyway there’s gonna be a whole generation of kids being bamboozled by not knowing the book is nothing like the musical #and I cannot wait

[uwmspeccoll]

Staff Pick of the Week

First serialized in Pearson’s (UK) and Cosmopolitan (US) in 1897, H.G. Wells’s War of the Worlds wasn’t the very first alien story ever told, but it is probably the most enduring and culturally significant of those early tales. Wells wasn’t just drawing on the nascent genre of science fiction but also the (earthly) invasion literature that was first popularized by George Tomkyns Chesney’s The Battle of Dorking ( Blackwood's Magazine, 1871). Wells later wrote that War of the Worlds was inspired by the genocidal treatment of Aboriginal Tasmanians by British colonizers.

The Limited Edition’s Club edition of H.G. Well’s War of the Worlds was published in 1964. It is illustrated with ten color lithographs, drawn directly on the plates by Joeseph Mugnaini, as well as a number of smaller line drawings by the artist. We posted a few years ago about the Limited Editions Club edition of The Time Machine, also illustrated by Mugnaini. These two books were originally issued together in an ochre-yellow slipcase that matches the end papers; the linen-weave book-cloth bindings are dyed in an opposite color scheme (black with a red spine label for The Time Machine and red with a black spine label for War of the Worlds). The boxed set was designed by Peter Oldenburg and printed on white wove paper from Curtis Paper Company by Abraham Colish at his press in Mt. Vernon, NY. The lithographs were pulled by master printer George C. Miller. 

I love how Mugnaini’s colorful illustrations manifest a sense of unease: the yellow and red skies backing the alien invaders, the extreme heat of blue streaked flames, the kaleidoscopic ruins of a building. Mugnaini was best known for his many collaborations with another Science Fiction heavyweight: Ray Bradbury, including cover art for the first paperback and hardback editions of Fahrenheit 451. A previous Staff Pick featured Mugnaini’s illustrations for the Limited Editions Club of Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles.

You can find more posts on the work of H. G. Wells here.

Check out more from illustrator Joe Mugnaini here.

And here you can find more from Limited Editions Club.

For more Staff Picks here. 

-Olivia, Special Collections Graduate Intern

#Staff Pick of the Week #The War of the Worlds #H. G. Wells #Joe Mugnaini #Joseph Mugnaini #Limited Editions Club #Fine Press Books #Fine Press #Invasion Literature #SF #SFF #Science Fiction #Ray Bradbury #lithographs #color lithographs #color lithography #Peter Oldenburg #Curtis Paper Company #Curtis Paper Mill #Abraham Colish #Press of A. Colish #olivia

[taylorfennersbookishworld]

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? - 28 August 2023

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? - 28 August 2023

#IMWAYR is a weekly meme started on J Kaye’s blog and then was hosted by Sheila from Book Journey. Sheila then passed it on to Kathryn at The Book Date. Hey Bookdragons! It was another slow reading week. I set aside the book I was reading last Monday and started and set aside two other books before coming back to the original book. Do you ever have a week where nothing you’re reading is…

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#IMWAYR #Blog Memes #Book Blog #Book Blogger #Book Club Pick #Bookish #Bookish Memes #Contemporary #Currently Reading. #Dark Romance #Horror #It&039;s Monday What Are You Reading #Last week I read #Last Week in Books #Mythology #next read #Retelling #Romance