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Women's Circle Book Group

Women's Circle Bo0ok Group

 

Beth Am Women's Circle is excited to launch our very own Book group. We are a diverse bright group of women who want to get together in person to discuss great books. We will be meeting once a month to discuss the book of the month and hope to get a good discussion going where you can express your opinions, likes and even dislikes. The group will meet at a different house each month. If you would like to be a part of this group, or want to find out more, please contact Hillary Liber.


There are 3 roles in our Women's Circle Book Group, and we encourage you to spread your wings....

Participant: Get ready to read and make sure you finish before the next meeting.

Hostess: The group will meet in your home for the discussion, and you will provide beverages, and a light snack and/or dessert. Refreshments should be dairy or parve.

Facilitator: 1-Lead the discussion. 2- Present author information and background. 3- Prepare 5-10 questions for discussion (#2 & 3 can be found by googling the author's name and book title. The bookreviews, goodreads and the author's site are excellent resources.

If you have any interest in being a hostess or facilitator, please contact: Hillary Liber.


 

Thursday, January 12, 2023 | 7:00 pm

Once Upon A Wardrobe by Patti Callahan

Once Upon A Wardrobe
by Patti Callahan
Published: October 2021 | Pages: 320
Facilitator: TBD
Hostess: Jane Frank, Encinitas, CA

“Where did Narnia come from?” The answer will change everything. Megs Devonshire is brilliant with numbers and equations, on a scholarship at Oxford, and dreams of solving the greatest mysteries of physics. She prefers the dependability of facts—except for one: the younger brother she loves with all her heart doesn’t have long to live. When George becomes captivated by a copy of a brand-new book called The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and begs her to find out where Narnia came from, there’s no way she can refuse. Despite her timidity about approaching the famous author, Megs soon finds herself taking tea with the Oxford don and his own brother, imploring them for answers. What she receives instead are more stories . . . stories of Jack Lewis’s life, which she takes home to George. Why won’t Mr. Lewis just tell her plainly what George wants to know? The answer will reveal to Meg many truths that science and math cannot, and the gift she thought she was giving to her brother—the story behind Narnia—turns out to be his gift to her, instead: hope.

Thursday,February 9, 2023 | 7:00 pm

The Choice by Maggie Anton

The Choice: A Novel of Love, Faith and The Talmud
by Maggie Anton
Published: May 2022 | Pages: 400
Facilitator: TBD
Hostess: Britt Rubenstein, Carmel Valley,
CA
Click here to register A powerful love story with a purpose:to challenge Jewish customs concerning women, marriage, and equality. The award-winning author of "Rashi's Daughters," Maggie Anton, has written a wholly transformative novel that takes characters inspired by Chaim Potok and ages them into young adults in Brooklyn in the 1950s, a time of Elvis & Marilyn, communist scares & polio vaccines, Jewish migration & American integration. When Hannah Eisin, a successful journalist, interviews Rabbi Nathan Mandel, a controversial Talmud professor, she persuades him to teach her the mysteries of the text forbidden to women—even though it might cost him his job if discovered. Secret meetings and lively discussions bring the two to the edge of a line that neither dares to cross, as their relationships with each other and Judaism are tested.

Thursday, March 9, 2023 | 7:00 pm

Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng

Our Missing Hearts
by Celeste Ng
Published: October 2022 | Pages: 347
Facilitator: Laura Birns
Hostess: Laura Birns, Carmel Valley, CA

Click here to register for our upcoming Book Group Meeting Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet existence with his loving but broken father, a former linguist who now shelves books in a university library. Bird knows to not ask too many questions, stand out too much, or stray too far. For a decade, their lives have been governed by laws written to preserve “American culture” in the wake of years of economic instability and violence. To keep the peace and restore prosperity, the authorities are now allowed to relocate children of dissidents, especially those of Asian origin, and libraries have been forced to remove books seen as unpatriotic—including the work of Bird’s mother, Margaret, a Chinese American poet who left the family when he was nine years old.
Bird has grown up disavowing his mother and her poems; he doesn’t know her work or what happened to her, and he knows he shouldn’t wonder. But when he receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, he is pulled into a quest to find her. His journey will take him back to the many folktales she poured into his head as a child, through the ranks of an underground network of librarians, into the lives of the children who have been taken, and finally to New York City, where a new act of defiance may be the beginning of much-needed change. 
Our Missing Hearts is an old story made new, of the ways supposedly civilized communities can ignore the most searing injustice. It’s a story about the power—and limitations—of art to create change, the lessons and legacies we pass on to our children, and how any of us can survive a broken world with our hearts intact.

Thursday, April 13, 2023 | 7:00 pm

These Precious Days by Ann Patchett

These Precious Days: Essays
by Ann Patchett
Published: November 2022 | Pages: 331
Facilitator: TBD
Hostess: TBD

Click here to register for our upcoming Book Group Meeting “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 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.

Thursday, May 11, 2023 | 7:00 pm (Rescheduled - waiting on new date)

Horse by Geraldine Brooks

Horse
by Geraldine Brooks
Published: June 2022 | Pages: 413
Facilitator: TBD
Hostess: Ron Dosick, Carmel Valley,
CA
Click here to register for the upcoming book group meeting A discarded painting in a junk pile, a skeleton in an attic, and the greatest racehorse in American history: from these strands, a Pulitzer Prize winner braids a sweeping story of spirit, obsession, and injustice across American history
Kentucky, 1850. An enslaved groom named Jarret and a bay foal forge a bond of understanding that will carry the horse to record-setting victories across the South. When the nation erupts in civil war, an itinerant young artist who has made his name on paintings of the racehorse takes up arms for the Union. On a perilous night, he reunites with the stallion and his groom, very far from the glamour of any racetrack.
New York City, 1954. Martha Jackson, a gallery owner celebrated for taking risks on edgy contemporary painters, becomes obsessed with a nineteenth-century equestrian oil painting of mysterious provenance.
Washington, DC, 2019. Jess, a Smithsonian scientist from Australia, and Theo, a Nigerian-American art historian, find themselves unexpectedly connected through their shared interest in the horse--one studying the stallion's bones for clues to his power and endurance, the other uncovering the lost history of the unsung Black horsemen who were critical to his racing success.
Based on the remarkable true story of the record-breaking thoroughbred Lexington, Horse is a novel of art and science, love and obsession, and our unfinished reckoning with racism.

Thursday, June 8, 2023 | 7:00 pm

Lessons In Chemistry by Bonnie Gamus

Lessons in Chemistry
by Bonnie Gamus
Published: April 2022 | Pages: 394
(Once we have facilitator/hostess information, we will post registration)
Facilitator: TBD
Hostess: TBD

Click here to register for the upcoming book group meeting Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing as an average woman. But it’s the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute takes a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans; the lonely, brilliant, Nobel–prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with—of all things—her mind. True chemistry results.
But like science, life is unpredictable. Which is why a few years later Elizabeth Zott finds herself not only a single mother, but the reluctant star of America’s most beloved cooking show Supper at Six. Elizabeth’s unusual approach to cooking (“combine one tablespoon acetic acid with a pinch of sodium chloride”) proves revolutionary. But as her following grows, not everyone is happy. Because as it turns out, Elizabeth Zott isn’t just teaching women to cook. She’s daring them to change the status quo.
Laugh-out-loud funny, shrewdly observant, and studded with a dazzling cast of supporting characters, Lessons in Chemistry is as original and vibrant as its protagonist.

Thursday, July 13, 2023 | 7:00 pm

Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

Small Things Like These
by Claire Keegan
Published: November 2022
Facilitator: TBD
Hostess: TBD

It is 1985 in a small Irish town. During the weeks leading up to Christmas, Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and family man faces into his busiest season. Early one morning, while delivering an order to the local convent, Bill makes a discovery which forces him to confront both his past and the complicit silences of a town controlled by the church.

Mon, June 5 2023 16 Sivan 5783