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Book Club Kits 2 Go: List of Titles with Annotations

	The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton In 1870s New York, Newland Archer and his fiancée seem the perfect match. But when the alluring Countess Ellen Olenska returns home from Europe, Newland must make the most important decision of his life.
	The Amateur Marriage by Anne Tyler Michael and Pauline seem like the perfect couple until their 17-year-old daughter disappears and they are forced to rescue her little boy, named Pagan, from drug-infested San Francisco. Tyler captures the nuances of everyday life through the decades of this mismatched marriage and its consequences.
	Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner Angle of Repose, winner of the 1972 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, can be appreciated as America's story as well. Based on the correspondence of the little-known 19th century writer, Mary Hallock Foote, the novel's heroes represent opposing but equally strong strains of the American ideal.
	Ava’s Man by Rick Bragg Rick Bragg brings his astonishing gift for storytelling to the tale of his grandfather, a man who kept his family one step ahead of poverty and starvation in Depression-era Appalachia. Charlie Bundrum was a man who took giant steps in rundown boots, a true hero whom history would otherwise have overlooked.
	Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie In 1971, as Mao's Cultural Revolution swept over China, shutting down universities and banishing "reactionary intellectuals" to the countryside, two teenage boys are sent to live on the remote and unforgiving mountain known as Phoenix in the Sky. Even though the knowledge the narrator and his best friend Luo had acquired in middle school was "precisely nil," they are nevertheless considered dangerous intellectuals and forced to spend their days carrying buckets of excrement up and down the mountain to fertilize the fields.
	Bel Canto by Ann Patchett Somewhere in South America, at the home of the county’s vice president, a lavish birthday party is being held in honor of a powerful Japanese businessman. A famous American opera diva entertains the international guests. It’s an enchanting night, until a band of terrorists breaks in and takes the entire party hostage. But what begins as a panicked, life-threatening scenario turns into something quite different. Terrorists and hostages forge unexpected bonds, people from different countries become friends and passionate, doomed love blooms.
	The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad An international phenomenon translated into 17 languages, "The Bookseller of Kabul" has become not only the bestselling nonfiction book ever published in the author's native Norway, but also a tremendous success throughout Europe and around the world.
	Blink : the Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell Draws on a range of case studies to explore the process by which people make decisions, explaining how the difference between good and bad decision making is directly related to the details on which people focus, and counseling readers on how to become better decision makers in every aspect of life.
	The Color of Water by James McBride James McBride grew up one of twelve siblings in the all-black housing projects of Red Hook, Brooklyn, the son of a black minister and a woman who would not admit she was white. The object of McBride's constant embarrassment, and his continuous fear for her safety, his mother was an inspiring figure, who through sheer force of will saw her dozen children through college, and many through graduate school.
	Corelli's Mandolin by Louis de Bernières The idyllic world of the Greek island of Cephallonia is forever changed by the inexorable changes of World War II, as the inhabitants struggle to cope with the Axis invasion and occupation
	The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon Christopher John Francis Boone knows all the countries of the world and their capitals and every prime number up to 7,057. He relates well to animals but has no understanding of human emotions. He cannot stand to be touched. And he detests the color yellow. This improbable story of Christopher's quest to investigate the suspicious death of a neighborhood dog makes for one of the most captivating, unusual, and widely heralded novels in recent years.
	Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende Raised in the British colony of Valparaiso, Chile, after being abandoned as a baby, a pregnant Eliza follows her lover, Joaquin Andieta, to California at the height of the Gold Rush and finds adventure and adversity on her road to independence and love.
	The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson In The Devil in the White City, Erik Larson takes readers into a richly complex moment in American history, a moment that would draw together the best and worst of the Gilded Age, the grandeur and triumph of the human imagination, and the poverty, violence, and depravity that surrounded it.
	The Distant Land of My Father by Bo Caldwell Experiencing a seemingly idyllic childhood in pre-World War II Shanghai, Anna flees to California with her mother when the Japanese occupation begins, believing her charismatic millionaire father's connections will keep him safe. Funded by a donation from Book Expo.
	The Eighth Promise: An American Son's Tribute to his Toisanese Mother by William Poy Lee A memoir of the Chinese American immigrant experience and the relationship between a mother and son, in which the mother makes eight promises to her mother before she leaves China, and instills the final one, to live with compassion toward all, into her son.
	Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card A veteran of years of simulated war games, Ender believes he is engaged in one more computer war game when in truth he is commanding the last fleet of Earth against an alien race seeking the complete destruction of Earth.
	Enemy Women by Paulette Jiles The Civil War Era was one of the most divisive and heart-rending in our nation's history. For 18-year-old Adair Colley it brought about intense personal change as well. Although the Colley family was neutral on the issues of secession and slavery, many men from their area in Missouri Ozarks had joined the Confederate army. One day in November 1864 the Union Militia swept in on their mission to rout Confederate sympathizers.
	Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury In one of literature's most haunting denunciations of censorship, Ray Bradbury uses the materials of science fiction to tell the story of Guy Montag, a fireman forced to burn books.
	Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry The setting is Bombay, mid-1990s. Nariman Vakeel, suffering from Parkinson's disease, is the elderly patriarch of a small, discordant family. He and his two middle-aged stepchildren—Coomy, bitter and domineering, and her brother Jal, mild-mannered and acquiescent, occupy a once-elegant apartment whose ruin progresses as rapidly as Nariman's disease. When his illness is compounded by a broken ankle, Coomy plots to turn his round-the-clock care over to her younger, sweet-tempered half sister—living with her husband and two sons in an already over-crowded apartment—knowing that Roxana will not refuse. What ensues is a great unraveling, and repair, of the family, and a revelation of its love-torn past.
	Gardens in the Dunes by Leslie Marmon Silko A sweeping, multifaceted tale of a young Native American pulled between the cherished traditions of a heritage on the brink of extinction and an encroaching white culture, Gardens in the Dunes is the powerful story of one woman's quest to reconcile two worlds that are diametrically opposed. At the center of this struggle is Indigo, who is ripped from her tribe, the Sand Lizard people, by white soldiers who destroy her home and family.
	The Golden Notebook by Doris May Lessing The experiences of two women provide the framework for an intense literary study of liberated womanhood, in a new edition, which includes an author biography and publication history, of a novel originally published in 1962.
	The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood Offred, a Handmaid, describes life in what was once the United States, now the Republic of Gilead, a shockingly repressive and intolerant monotheocracy, in a satirical tour de force set in the near future.
	Horse Heaven by Jane Smiley "It's not true," says a character in Jane Smiley's funny, passionate, and brilliant new novel of horse racing, "that anything can happen at the racetrack," but many astonishing and affecting things do -- and in Horse Heaven, we find them woven into a marvelous tapestry of joy and love, chicanery, folly, greed, and derring-do.
	The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler "Real people are really complicated," says Jocelyn, the founder of the "Central Valley/River City all-Jane-Austen-all-the-time book club." And the members of her newly founded book club certainly prove this to be true. Each has a story to tell, and much like an Austen novel, the intricate plots that are their own lives are slowly revealed.
	The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan In sixteen interwoven stories, Amy Tan's characters—four Chinese immigrant mothers and their American-raised daughters—struggle to connect despite the ghosts and secrets of the past.
	Justine by Lawrence Durrell On the eve of World War II in the Egyptian city of Alexandria, an exiled Irish schoolteacher becomes involved with Justine, the Jewish wife of a Coptic Christian.
	The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini The unforgettable, heartbreaking story of the unlikely friendship between a wealthy boy and the son of his father's servant, The Kite Runner is a beautifully crafted novel set in a country that is in the process of being destroyed. It is about the power of reading, the price of betrayal, and the possibility of redemption, and it is also about the power of fathers over sons-their love, their sacrifices, their lies.
	The Known World by Edward P. Jones Henry Townsend, a black farmer, bootmaker, and former slave, has a fondness for Paradise Lost and an unusual mentor -- William Robbins, perhaps the most powerful man in antebellum Virginia's Manchester County. Under Robbins's tutelage, Henry becomes proprietor of his own plantation -- as well as of his own slaves.
	The Life of Pi by Yann Martel Life of Pi is at once a realistic, rousing adventure and a meta-tale of survival that explores the redemptive power of storytelling and the transformative nature of fiction.
	Lolita by Vladimir Nabakov A novel that studies the moral disintegration of a man whose obsessive desire to possess his step-daughter destroys the lives of those around him.
	The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett Detective Sam Spade becomes embroiled with a mysterious client, avenges the death of his partner, and chases a priceless treasure, in this classic American private-eye novel.
	Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides Spanning eight decades, Eugenides's long-awaited second novel is a grand, utterly original fable of crossed bloodlines, the intricacies of gender, and the deep, untidy promptings of desire.
	My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult “My Sister's Keeper examines what it means to be a good parent, a good sister, a good person. Is it morally correct to do whatever it takes to save a child's life, even if that means infringing upon the rights of another?”
	Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America by Barbara Ehrenreich "Nickel and Dimed" reveals low-wage America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity. Instantly acclaimed for its insight, humor, and passion, this book is changing the way the nation perceives its working poor.
	Night by Elie Wiesel In eloquent, unflinching scenes, Night recalls Wiesel's survival as a teenager in Nazi death camps. Each chapter raises questions that have haunted the world since Hitler's rise: How could such a staggering number of innocents have lost their lives at the command of one regime? What does it take to survive when body, mind, and spirit are brutalized for months, even years?
	The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks A man picks up a faded, well-worn notebook and begins reading to a frail elderly woman, his voice recalling the heartbreaking story of two star-crossed lovers and their poignant, bittersweet journey to happiness. So begins this touching novel that is a dual tale of love lost and found, and of a man's gentle battle to reach an aging woman who cannot remember the most cherished moments of her life.
	A Northern Light by Jennifer Donnelly While working at the local hotel, the drowned body of a young woman washes onto the shore and gets Mattie thinking again of the loss of her mother, her family's struggles, and her unhappy life in her small community, but when she reads the girl's letters, Mattie is inspired and becomes determined to follow her dream of moving to New York City to become a writer.
	Not a Genuine Black Man: My Life as an Outsider by Brian Copeland Based on the longest running one-man show in San Francisco history--now coming to Off-Broadway--"Not a Genuine Black Man" is a hilarious, poignant, and disarming memoir of growing up black in an all-white suburb.
	The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver The family of a fierce evangelical Baptist missionary--Nathan Price, his wife, and his four daughters--begins to unravel after they embark on a 1959 mission to the Belgian Congo, where they find their lives transformed over the course of three decades.
	Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi Every Thursday morning for two years in the Islamic Republic of Iran, a bold and inspired teacher named Azar Nafisi secretly gathered seven of her most committed female students to read forbidden Western classics. As Islamic morality squads staged arbitrary raids in Tehran, the girls in Azar Nafisi’s living room risked removing their veils and immersed themselves in the worlds of Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitgerald, Henry James and Vladimir Nabokov. This is a remarkable exploration of resilience in the face of tyranny.
	The Red Tent by Anita Diamant The Red Tent tells the little-known Biblical story of Dinah, daughter of the patriarch Jacob and his wife, Leah. In Chapter 34 of the Book of Genesis, Dinah’s tale is a short, horrific detour in the familiar narrative of Jacob and Joseph.
	The Samurai's Garden by Gail Tsukiyama On the eve of the Second World War, a young Chinese man is sent to his family's summer home in Japan to recover from tuberculosis. He will rest, swim in the salubrious sea, and paint in the brilliant shoreside light. It will be quiet and solitary. But he meets four local residents - a lovely young Japanese girl and three older people. What then ensues is a tale that readers will find at once classical yet utterly unique.
	The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd Set in the American South in 1964, the year of the Civil Rights Act and intensifying racial unrest, Sue Monk Kidd's The Secret Life of Bees is a powerful story of coming-of-age, of the ability of love to transform our lives, and the often unacknowledged longing for the universal feminine divine. Addressing the wounds of loss, betrayal, and the scarcity of love, Kidd demonstrates the power of women coming together to heal those wounds, to mother each other and themselves, and to create a sanctuary of true family and home.
	Sleeping at the Starlite Motel: and other Adventures on the Way Back Home by Bailey White Anyone who has read her bestseller Mama Makes Up Her Mind--or who has heard her on National Public Radio--knows that Bailey White is one of the keenest observers of Southern eccentricity since Mark Twain. Sleeping at the Starlite Motel revives White's reputation as a master storyteller, Southern division, as it catalogs the oddities of the Georgia town she knows so well.
	Smilla's Sense of Snow by Peter Høeg She thinks more highly of snow and ice than she does of love. She lives in a world of numbers, science and memories--a dark, exotic stranger in a strange land. And now Smilla Jaspersen is convinced she has uncovered a shattering crime...
	The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell “Jesuit priest and linguist, Emilio Sandoz, leads a twenty-first-century scientific mission to a newly discovered extraterrestrial culture. Sandoz and his companions are prepared to endure isolation, hardship and death, but nothing can prepare them for the civilization they encounter, or for the tragic misunderstanding that brings the mission to a catastrophic end.”
	The Sunflower by Simon Wiesenthal “ Put yourself in the position of a prisoner in a concentration camp. A dying Nazi soldier asks for your forgiveness.”
	Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table by Ruth Reichl The candid and comical memoir by the renowned "New York Times" restaurant critic whose high-spirited life has always been defined and enriched by food. Reichl's childhood and young-adult life provide a smorgasbord of wit and wisdom, sprinkled with recipes that perfectly capture her endlessly entertaining world.
	Their Eyes were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston Zora Neale Hurston's vibrant novel presents Janie Mae Crawford's growth from a voiceless teenage girl into a woman who takes charge of her own destiny.
	To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee As Harper Lee's narrator, Scout Finch, tries to draw out a reclusive neighbor, she finds herself involved in a racially charged trial that decides the fate of a man in her Alabama community.
	The Tortilla Curtain by T. C. Boyle From the author of The Road to Wellville comes his most controversial novel yet--a deeply moving story of the men and women who risk everything to cross the Mexican border and invade the American dream.
	The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger The Time Traveler's Wife is the story of Clare, a beautiful art student, and Henry, an adventuresome librarian, who have known each other since Clare was six and Henry was thirty-six, and were married when Clare was twenty-three and Henry thirty-one. Impossible but true, because Henry is one of the first people diagnosed with Chrono-Displacement Disorder: periodically his genetic clock resets and he finds himself misplaced in time, pulled to moments of emotional gravity in his life, past and future.
	A Walk in the Woods By Bill Bryson Returning to the U.S. after 20 years in England, Iowa native Bryson decided to reconnect with his mother country by hiking the length of the 2100-mile Appalachian Trail. Awed by merely the camping section of his local sporting goods store, he nevertheless plunges into the wilderness and emerges with a consistently comical account of a neophyte woodsman learning hard lessons about self-reliance.
	Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks Young Anna Frith, a vicar's maid, is faced with the loss of her family, the disintegration of her local community, and a passionate, illicit love as she and her village confront the horrors of the plague, in a historical novel based on real-life events in seventeenth-century England.
	Under the Banner of Heaven: a Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer Krakauer shifts his focus from extremes of physical adventure to extremes of religious belief in this true story of an appalling double murder committed by two Mormon Fundamentalist brothers who insist God commanded them to kill.

Book Club Kits 2 Go: List of Titles with Annotations