The following book clubs will meet in September and are open to new members. Discover the joy of discussing a great book with others this month!
Club Read meets on Wednesday, September 26 at Lakeview Branch at 6:30 p.m. to discuss Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. The greatest coming-of-age story in English literature and a memorable depiction of its age, Great Expectations was published in 1860-61 and its story of ambition versus fidelity, youthful mistakes and education, and admirable ambition overcoming social limitations has made it Dickens’ most popular novel.
Book ‘Em Mystery Book Club will meet on Sunday, September 16 at 2:00 p.m. at Lakeview Branch to discuss John Sandford’s Bad Blood. Two bodies in two days. One is murder. The other is suicide. Virgil Flowers never imagined that discovering the connection would lead him into the perverse history of the Minnesota farm community, and almost unimaginable darkness.
The Sci-Fi/Fantasy Book Club meets on Monday, September 10 at Lakeview Branch at 6:30 p.m. to discuss They Shall Have Stars by James Blish. The West has devolved into a state with extreme censorship. Scientists, whose experiments are all classified, are not allowed to share and compete with one another, creating scientific stagnation. A senator, Bliss Wagoner, recognizes this and funds “crackpot” scientists in an effort to stimulate some radical new inventions. For more information call 309-497-2149.
A Little Romance Book Club will meet on September 9 at 2:00 p.m. at Lakeview Branch to discuss Black Ties and Lullabies by Jane Graves. When a fling with her boss – Texas’s most eligible bachelor – leaves her confused, intrigued and pregnant, bodyguard Bernadette Hogan wonders if self-made millionaire and notorious womanizer Jeremy Bridges will become a one-woman man and a dependable father.
The Evening Love to Read! Book Club will meet on Wednesday, September 12 at Lakeview Branch at 6:30 p.m. to discuss The Poker Bride: The First Chinese in the Wild West by Christopher Corbett. During the Gold Rush, a young Chinese concubine arrived by horse in Idaho gold country, where a white gambler soon won her in a poker game. She became Polly Bemis, the winner’s legal, beloved wife. Polly emerged into public view only in 1923, a tiny old woman on horseback, her identity and story known only to a few old-timers. For more information, call Carol May at (309) 692-1020 or email cmay1223@comcast.net
The Read On Book Club will meet on Tuesday, September 25 at 5:30 p.m. at Lincoln Branch to discuss Night Hawk by Beverly Jenkins. Outlaw. Preacher. Night Hawk. He’s had many names, but he can’t escape the past. Since Ian Vance’s beloved wife was murdered years ago, the hardened bounty hunter knows he’ll never feel love or tenderness again, so he’s made it his mission to ensure others get their justice. But when he’s charged with delivering a sharp-eyed beauty to the law, Ian can’t help but feel he may still have something left to lose. Orphaned at twelve, Maggie Freeman has always found her way out of trouble. But now there’s a vigilante mob at her back who would like nothing more than to see her hang for a crime she didn’t commit. Maggie may have to accept help for the first time in her life, even if it’s from the one man standing between her and freedom. As the past closes in, the sassy prisoner and toughened lawman may just find a passion between them that could bring blinding happiness, if they’ll let it. Register now for the Reaching for New Horizons Pajama Night Read on Saturday, September 29. It’s a full day of events and features author Beverly Jenkins. Call 309-497-2601 or visit www.peoriapubliclibrary for registration information.
The Biography and Non-Fiction Book Club will meet on Sunday, September 9, at 3:00 p.m. at North Branch to discuss Leningrad: The Epic Siege of World War II, 1941-1944 by Anna Reid. On September 8, 1941, eleven weeks after Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa, his brutal surprise attack on the Soviet Union, Leningrad was surrounded. The siege was not lifted for two and a half years, by which time some three quarters of a million Leningraders had died of starvation. Anna Reid’s Leningrad is a gripping, authoritative narrative history of this dramatic moment in the twentieth century, interwoven with indelible personal accounts of daily siege life drawn from diarists on both sides. They reveal the Nazis’ deliberate decision to starve Leningrad into surrender and Hitler’s messianic miscalculation, the incompetence and cruelty of the Soviet war leadership, the horrors experienced by soldiers on the front lines, and, above all, the terrible details of life in the blockaded city: the relentless search for food and water; the withering of emotions and family ties; looting, murder, and cannibalism- and at the same time, extraordinary bravery and self-sacrifice.
