Past Book Discussions
Content
2023
- January Classic: Persuasion by Jane Austen
- January Fiction: The Mistletoe Murder and Other Stories by P.D. James
- January Nonfiction: Owls of the Eastern Ice by Johnathan Slaght
- January Specfic: All Systems Red by Martha Wells
- February Classic: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
- February Fiction: The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce
- February Nonfiction: In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado
- February Specfic: Galatea 2.2 by Richard Powers
- March Classic: The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
- March Fiction: The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey
- March Nonfiction: Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe
- March Specfic: The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper
- April Classic: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- April Fiction: Our Darkest Night by Jennifer Robson
- April Nonfiction: The Collected Schizophrenias by Esmé Weijun Wang
- April Specfic: The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa
- May Fiction: The Story Hour by Thrity Umrigar
- May Nonfiction: The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green
- May Specfic: Foundation by Isaac Asimov
- May & June Classic: Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
- June Fiction: Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate
- June Nonfiction: Before and After by Judy Christie & Lisa Wingate
- June Specfic: The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix Harrow
- July Classic: Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin
- July Fiction: The Life She Was Given by Ellen Marie Wiseman
- July Nonfiction: The Secret to Superhuman Strength by Alison Bechdel
- July Specfic: Hyperion by Dan Simmons
- August Classic: I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
2022
- January Classic: Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
- January Fiction: The Color of Air by Gail Tsukiyama
- January Specfic: The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune
- February Classic: Annie John by Jamaica Kincaid
- February Fiction (Nonfiction for Fiction): The Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett
- February Specfic: Dune by Frank Herbert
- March Classic: The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
- March Fiction: Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese
- March Specfic: Circe by Madeline Miller
- April Classic: Walden by Henry David Thoreau
- April Fiction: A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende
- April Specfic: How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe by Charles Yu
- May Classic: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
- May Fiction: A Window Opens by Elisabeth Egan
- May Specfic: In Other Lands by Sarah Rees Brennan
- June Classic: One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
- June Fiction: On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
- June Specfic: The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling
- July Classic: The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett
- July Fiction: Citizens Creek by Lalita Tademy
- July Specfic: Ammonite by Nicola Griffith
- August Classic: The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
- August Fiction: A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
- August Specfic: The Devourers by Indra Das
- September Classic: The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
- September Fiction: Ask Again, Yes by Mary Beth Keane
- September Nonfiction: The Boys of Summer by Roger Kahn
- September Specfic: Everfair by Nisi Shawl
- October Classic: My Antonia by Willa Cather
- October Fiction: The Henna Artist by Alka Joshi
- October Nonfic: Mill Town: Reckoning with What Remains by Kerri Arsenault
- October Specfic: Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
- November Classic: Hamlet by William Shakespeare
- November Fiction: Run by Ann Patchett
- November Nonfic: Wow, No Thank You by Samantha Irby
- November Specfic: Piranesi by Susanna Clarke
- December Classic: The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon
- December Fiction: The Story of Arthur Truluv by Elizabeth Berg
- December Nonfic: The Hare with Amber Eyes by Edmund de Waal
- December Specfic: Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse
2021
- January Classic: Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
- January Fiction: Pieces of Happiness: A Novel of Friendship, Hope and Chocolate by Anne Ostby
- January LGBTQ: Bingo Love by Tee Franklin
- January Specfic: Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James
- February Classic: The Odyssey translated by Emily Wilson
- February Fiction: Only Child by Rhiannon Navin
- February LGBTQ: Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe
- February Specfic: Seraphina by Rachel Hartman
- March Fiction: The Daring Ladies of Lowell by Kate Alcott
- March LGBTQ: On A Sunbeam by Tillie Walden
- March Specfic: Mr. Fox by Helen Oyeyemi
- April Classic: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
- April Fiction: Tears of the Giraffe by Alexander McCall-Smith
- April LGBTQ: Passing Strange by Ellen Klages
- April Specfic: This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone
- May Classic: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
- May Fiction: The Book of Unknown Americans by Christina Henriquez
- May LGBTQ: Maurice by E.M. Forster
- May Specfic: Foundryside by Robert Jackson Bennett
- June (every group): The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
- July Classic: All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot
- July Fiction (Nonfiction for Fiction):When Books Went to War by Molly Guptill Manning
- July LGBTQ: The Deep by Rivers Solomon
- July Specfic: Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
- August Classic: The Color Purple by Alice Walker
- August Fiction: The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
- August LGBTQ: Juliet Takes a Breath by Gabby Rivera
- August Specfic: The Psychology of Time Travel by Kate Mascarenhas
- September Classic: Beowulf translated by Maria Dahvana Headley
- September Fiction: Winter Sisters by Robin Oliveira
- September LGBTQ: George (Melissa’s Story) by Alex Gino
- September Specfic: Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie
- October Classic: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
- October Fiction: Allie and Bea by Catherine Ryan Hyde
- October LGBTQ: In Other Lands by Sarah Rees Brennan
- October Specfic: The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell
- November Classic: The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
- November Fiction: White Chrysanthemum by Mary Lynn Bracht
- November LGBTQ: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
- November Specfic: Lanny by Max Porter
- December Classic: A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
- December Fiction: The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Baumeister
- December Specfic: The Nutcracker and Mouse King and The Tale of the Nutcracker by E. T. A. Hoffmann & Alexandre Dumas
2020
- January Fiction: Seven Days of Us by Francesca Hornak
- January Nonfiction: Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters' First 100 Years by Sarah and A. Elizabeth Delany with Amy Hill Hearth
- January Specfic: The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers
- February Fiction: The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving by Jonathan Evison
- February Nonfiction: 1920: The Year That Made the Decade Roar by Eric Burns
- February Specfic: The Quick by Lauren Owen
- March Fiction: Idaho by Emily Ruskovich
- March Specfic: Titus Groan by Mervyn Peake
- April Fiction: The Women in the Castle by Jessica Shattuck
- April Specfic: The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison
- May Fiction: Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata
- May Specfic: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling
- June Classic: Emma by Jane Austen
- June Fiction: Good Riddance by Elinor Lipman
- June Specfic: The Princess Bride by William Goldman
- July Classic: Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
- July Fiction: Another Brooklyn by Jacqueline Woodson
- July Specfic: Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation by Octavia Butler
- August Classic: A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- August Fiction: The Boston Girl by Anita Diamant
- August Specfic: An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon
- September Classic: Howards End by E.M. Forster
- September Fiction: The One in A Million Boy by Monica Wood
- September LGBTQ: The Clancys of Queens by Tara Clancy
- September Specfic: The Salt Roads by Nalo Hopkinson
- October Fiction: There, There by Tommy Orange
- October Classic: Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
- October LGBTQ: Not My Father's Son by Alan Cumming
- November Fiction: Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward
- November LGBTQ: Sissy by Jacob Tobia
- November Specfic: Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand by Samuel Delany
- December Classic: Middlemarch by George Eliot
- December Fiction: The Life We Bury by Allen Eskens
- December LGBTQ: The Clancys of Queens by Tara Clancy
- December Specfic: Unnatural Magic by C.M. Waggoner
2019
- January Fiction: The New Year's Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini
- January Nonfiction: The Worst Hard Time by Timothy Egan
- January Specfic: Smoke by Dan Vyleta
- February Fiction: February 11 - Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi
- February Nonfiction: Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
- February Specfic: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
- March Fiction: The Stars are Fire by Anita Shreve
- March Nonfiction: The Death and Life of the Great Lakes by Dan Egan
- March Specfic: Long Division by Kiese Laymon
- April Fiction: The Rent Collector by Camron Wright
- April Nonfiction: Tell Me More by Kelly Corrigan
- April Specfic: Weave a Circle Round by Kari Maaren
- May Fiction: Midwives by Chris Bohjalian
- May Nonfiction: The Lemon Tree: An Arab, A Jew and The Heart of the Middle East by Sandy Tolan
- May Specfic: The Power by Naomi Alderman
- June Fiction: The Stargazer’s Sister by Carrie Brown
- June Nonfiction: 13.8 The Quest to Find the True Age of the Universe and Theory of Everything by John Gribbin
- June Specfic: Mirror Dance by Lois McMaster Bujold
- July Fiction: Something in the Water by Catherine Steadman
- July Nonfiction: How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming by Mike Brown
- July Specfic: The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin
- August Fiction: The Movement of Stars by Amy Brill
- August Nonfiction: The Interstellar Age: The Story of the NASA Men and Women Who Flew the Forty-Year Voyager Mission by Jim Bell
- August Specfic: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
- September Fiction: Five Carat Soul by James McBride
- September Specfic: The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell
- October Fiction: Saints for All Occasions by J. Courtney Sullivan
- October Nonfiction: Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out? By Bill McKibben
- October Specfic: Beloved by Toni Morrison
- November Fiction: In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez
- November Nonfiction: Ecology, Ethics, and Interdependence: The Dalai Lama in Conversation with Leading Thinkers on Climate Change
- November Specfic: An Accident of Stars by Foz Meadows
- December Fiction: Strong Poison by Dorothy Sayers
- December Nonfiction: Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming by Paul Hawken
- December Specfic: The Book of Joan by Lidia Yuknavitch
2018
- January Fiction: Andy Catlett: Early Travels by Wendell Berry
- January Nonfiction: The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell
- January Specfic: The Subtle Knife & The Amber Spyglass by Phillip Pullman
- January Cookbooks: Return to Healthy Eating
- February Fiction: Reflex by Dick Francis
- February Nonfiction: The Blue Zones by Dan Buettner
- February Specfic: Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
- March Fiction: My Wish List by Greg Delacourt
- March Nonfiction: Tribe by Sebastian Junger
- March Specfic: Contact by Carl Sagan
- March Cookbooks: Cooking for Special Diets
- April Fiction: La's Orchestra Saves the World by A. McCall-Smith
- April Nonfiction: Better Together by Robert Putnam
- April Specfic: Geek Love by Katherine Dunn
- May Fiction: The Red Thread by Ann Hood
- May Nonfiction: Being Mortal by Atul Gawande
- May Specfic: The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
- June Fiction: The Heart by Maylis De Kerangal
- June Nonfiction: America Walks Into a Bar by Christine Sismondo
- June Specfic: Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor
- July Fiction: News of the World by Paulette Jiles
- July Nonfiction: Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance
- July Specfic: The Once and Future King by T.H. White
- August Fiction: Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri
- August Nonfiction: Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari
- August Specfic: Doomsday Book by Connie Willis
- September Fiction: The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh
- September Nonfiction: Forward From Here: Leaving Middle Age by Reeve Lindbergh
- September Specfic: A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin
- October Fiction: The Daugher of Time by Josephine Tey
- October Nonfiction: The B Side by Ben Yagoda
- October Specfic: NOS4A2 by Joe Hill
- November Fiction: A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra
- November Nonfiction: The Flamingo's Smile by Stephen Jay Gould
- November Specfic: This Census-Taker by China Mieville
- December Fiction: Less by Andrew Sean Greer
- December Nonfiction: The Book That Changed America by Randall Fuller
- December Specfic: The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein
2017
- January Fiction: Department of Speculation by Jenny Offill
- January Nonfiction: Just Mercy by Brian Stevenson
- January Specfic: The Passage by Justin Cronin
- February Fiction: The Art Forger by B.A. Shapiro
- February Nonfiction: Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall
- February Specfic: Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
- March Fiction: Family Life by Akhil Sharma
- March Nonfiction: Tattoos on the Heart by Greg Boyle
- March Specfic: Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson
- April Fiction: The Blessingsby Elise Juska
- April Nonfiction: We should all be feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
- April Specfic: We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
- May Fiction: The Book of Aron by Jim Shepard
- May Nonfiction: Girl in the Dark by Anna Lyndsey
- May Specfic: Grass by Sherri Tepper
- June Fiction: The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio by Terry Ryan
- June Nonfiction: The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry
- June Specfic: Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
- July Fiction: At The Edge of the Orchard by Tracy Chevalier
- July Nonfiction: My Life in France by Julia Child
- July Specfic: Signal to Noise by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
- August Fiction: The Hunchback of Neiman Marcus by Sonya Sones
- August Nonfiction: Ecomind: changing the way we think to create the world we want by Frances Moore Lappé
- August Specfic: The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett
- September Fiction: The Same Sky by Amanda Eyre Ward
- September Nonfiction: The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester
- September Specfic: Hard-Boiled Wonderland & the End of the World by Haruki Murakami
- October Fiction: Beasts of No Nation by Uzodinma Iweala
- October Nonfiction: Salt: a World History by Mark Kurlansky
- October Specfic: The Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValle
- November Fiction: Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante
- November Nonfiction: Outliers: the Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell
- November Specfic: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle
- December Fiction: Euphoria by Lily King
- December Nonfiction:To the End of June by Chris Beam
- December Specfic:Tenth of December by George Saunders
2016
- January Fiction: Pomegranate Soup by Marsha Mehran
- January Nonfiction: A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle
- February Fiction: Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson
- February Nonfiction: Astronaut Wives Club by Lily Koppel
- February Specfic: The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
- March Fiction: Swallows of Kabul by Yasmina Khadra
- March Nonfiction: Rez Life by David Treuer
- March Specfic: The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
- April Fiction: Sisterland by Curtis Sittenfeld
- April Nonfiction: Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt & Stephen J. Dubner
- April Specfic: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
- May Fiction: Fever by Mary Beth Keane
- May Nonfiction: Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
- May Specfic: Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
- June Fiction: The First of July by Elizabeth Speller
- June Nonfiction: I'm a Stranger Here Myself by Bill Bryson
- June Specfic: Good Omens by Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman
- July Specfic: Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer
- August Nonfiction: Half the sky : turning oppression into opportunity for women worldwide by Nicholas Kristof
- August Specfic: Sabriel by Garth Nix
- September Fiction: While I’m Falling by Laura Moriarty
- September Nonfiction: Smoke gets in your eyes and other lessons from the crematory by Caitlin Doughty
- September Specfic: The Intuitionist by Colson Whitehead
- October Fiction: The Crane Wife by Patrick Ness
- October Nonfiction: Lest innocent blood be shed: the story of the village of Le Chambon, and how goodness happened there by Philip Paul Hallie
- October Specfic: Among Others by Jo Walton
- November Fiction: We are called to Rise by Laura McBride
- November Nonfiction: The immortal life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
- November Specfic: The Girl with the Ghost Eyes by M. H. Boroson
- December Fiction: Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf
2015
- January 12: The Long Walk Home by Will North
- February 9: The Girl Who Fell From The Sky by Heidi Durrow
- February 17: The Age of Wonder by Richard Holmes
- March 9: The Year We Left Home by Jean Thompson
- March 17: Out of Order by Sandra Day O'Connor
- April 13: Necessary Lies by Diane Chamberlain
- April 21: The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson
- May 11: Manuscript found in Accra by Paulo Coelho
- May 19: Choose Your Own Nonfiction Book! Topic: China
- June 8: The Wives of Los Alamos by Tarashea Nesbit
- June 16: The World's Strongest Librarian by Joshua Hanagarne
- July 21: An Invisible Thread by Laura Schroff and Alex Tresniowski AND/OR In a Heartbeat by Leigh Anne Tuohy and Sean Tuohy with Sally Jenkins
- August 18: How We Got to Now by Steven Johnson
- September 14: The Edge of the Earth by Christina Schwarz
- September 15: Portsmouth Women edited by Laura Pope
- October 9: The Girls by Lori Lansens
- October 20: The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe
- October 26: Vicious by V.E. Schwab
- November 9: Letters from Skye by Jessica Brockmole
- November 17: The Family by David Laskin
- November 30: Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
- December 15: Stuff Matters by Mark Miodownik
- December 28: The Magicians by Lev Grossman
2014
- January 8: Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer
- January 13: The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce
- February 5: In the Sanctuary of Outcasts by Neil White
- February 10: Last Runaway by Tracy Chevalier
- March 5: Passing Strange by Martha Sandweiss
- March 10: Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O’Farrell
- April 14: We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
- April 16: Animal, Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver
- May 12 - Daniel Isn't Talking by Marti Leimbach
- May 21: Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua
- June 9: Dream When You're Feeling Blue by Elizabeth Berg
- June 18: Five Days at Memorial Hospital by Sheri Fink
- August 5: Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick
- September 8: The Silver Star by Jeannette Walls
- September 17: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman
- October 15: Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand
- October 20: Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin
- November 10: A Long Long Wayby Sebastian Barry
- November 19: Black, White, Jewish by Rebecca Walker
- December 17: The Railway Man by Eric Lomax
2013
- January 28: The Good Braider by Terry Farish
- February 25: Home by Toni Morrison
- March 25: Left Neglected by Lisa Genova
- April 3: Quiet by Susan Cain
- April 15: Memory Won't Save Me by Mimi White
- May 1: Why be Happy When You Could Be Normal by Jeanette Winterson
- May 20: Say Nice Things About Detroit by Scott Lasser
- June 5: A Wedding in Haiti by Julia Alvarez
- June 17: The Train of Small Mercies by David Rowell
- September 4: A Queer and Pleasant Danger by Kate Bornstein
- September 16: Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones
- October 2: Wild by Cheryl Strayed
- October 21: Expats by Chris Pavone
- November 6: Happy by Alex Lemon
- November 18: Italian Shoes by Henning Mankell
- December 4: The Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown
2012
- January 23: Coffins of Little Hope by Timothy Schaffert
- February 13: The Well and the Mine by Gin Phillips
- March 12: Talk Funny Girl by Roland Merullo
- April 16: So Much Pretty by Cara Hoffman
- May 4: Oxygen written by Carol Cassella
- September 17: Girl in Translation by Jean Kwok
- October 15: Lifeboat by Charlotte Rogan
- November 19: You Know When the Men Are Gone by Siobhan Fallon
2010-2011
- Oct. 18: Broken Teaglass written by Emily Arsenault
- Nov. 15: Crow Lake written by Mary Lawson
- February 14: Two Rivers by T. Greenwood
- March 14: The Stone Gods by Jeanette Winterson
- April 11: Into the Beautiful North by Luis Alberto Urrea
- May 9: Haroun and the Sea Stories by Salman Rushdie
2009-2010
- September 14: All the Living by C.E. Morgan
- October 19: Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
- November 9: Telex from Cuba by Rachvel Kushner
- February 8: House on Sugar Beach by Helene Cooper
- March 15: Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein
- April 12: Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa
- May 10: Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway
- June 7: The Good Thief : A Novel by Hannah Tinti
2008-2009
- Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle
- End of the Alphabet by C.S. Richardson
- The Beautiful Things that Heaven Bears by Dinaw Mengestu
- Lost City Radio by Daniel Alarcon
- Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones
- The Cave by Jose Saramago
- Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
- Split Estate by Charlotte Bacon
2007-2008
- Brooklyn Follies by Paul Auster
- Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
- Talk, talk by T.C. Boyle
- March by Geraldine Brooks
- Girls by Lori Lansens
- Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson
- Secondhand World by Katherine Min
- Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut
- Zoli by Colum McCann
- Lost and Found by Carolyn Parkhurst
- Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid