Book Club Corner: November Recommendations

At Cedars of Lebanon Hospital, doctors have noticed a marked uptick in Alzheimer’s patients. People who seemed perfectly lucid just a day earlier suddenly show signs of advanced dementia. Is it just normal aging, or an epidemic? Is it a coincidence, or a secret terrorist plot? In the looking-glass world of Half the Kingdom—where terrorist paranoia and end-of-the-world hysteria mask deeper fears of mortality; where parents’ and their grown children’s feelings vacillate between frustration and tenderness; and where the broken medical system leads one character to quip, “Kafka wrote slice-of-life fiction”—all is familiar and yet slightly askew. Lore Segal masterfully interweaves her characters’ lives—lives that, for good or for ill, all converge in Cedar’s ER—into a funny, tragic, and tender portrait of how we live today. You’ll discuss medicine, redemption, family, and life in our modern world.

“I always feel in her work such a sense of toughness and humor…. Her writing is sad and funny, and that makes it more of both.” —Jennifer Egan, author of A Visit from the Goon Squad

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Still Life With Bread Crumbs by Anna Quindlen

Still Life with Bread Crumbs begins with an imagined gunshot and ends with a new tin roof. Between the two is a wry and knowing portrait of Rebecca Winter, a photographer whose work made her an unlikely heroine for many women. Her career is now descendent, her bank balance shaky, and she has fled the city for the middle of nowhere. There she discovers, in a tree stand with a roofer named Jim Bates, that what she sees through a camera lens is not all there is to life.Brilliantly written, powerfully observed, Still Life with Bread Crumbs is a deeply moving and often very funny story of unexpected love, and a stunningly crafted journey into the life of a woman, her heart, her mind, her days, as she discovers that life is a story with many levels, a story that is longer and more exciting than she ever imagined. You’ll discuss issues of art, domestic life, love, and second chances.

  The Martian by Andy Weir

Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars. Now, he’s sure he’ll be the first person to die there. After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive—and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive. Chances are, though, he won’t have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old “human error” are much more likely to kill him first. But Mark isn’t ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills—and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit—he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him? You’ll discuss space exploration, survival, tenacity, and humanity.

Raul recommends this book: “This book should serve as a manual for survival on Mars for any future missions to the Red Planet. It should be required reading for all crew members, administrators and staff of NASA. Weir creates not only a gripping man v. Mars survival story, but he includes all the associated minutiae that comes with space exploration: innovation, intelligence, courage, and administrative obfuscation and deniability. For a first novel, this work is relevant to the problems associated with space travel and creates a wonderfully entertaining and sarcastic character in Mark Watney.”

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Featured Whiskey of the Month: 

Heather Greene, whiskey sommelier and author of the book Whisk(e)y Distilled, will be visiting BookPeople on Monday, November 3 at 7pm. In an interview with Bon Appetit, Heather suggests taking a look at bourbons made outside of Kentucky. A crop of new bourbon distilleries have popped up across Texas. Why not try a Texas bourbon such as this one from Austin’s own Treaty Oak Distillery?

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Featured Book Club Event:

Garth Stein
A Sudden Light (fiction; hardcover)
Wednesday, November 12 at 7pm
Event Info

BookPeople is pleased to welcome Garth Stein, the bestselling author of the beloved book The Art of Racing in the Rain, to Austin to share his new novel, A Sudden Light, about a boy who uncovers a vast legacy of family secrets as he tries to save his parents’ marriage.

The bestselling author of The Art of Racing in the Rain presents a long-awaited new novel in which a boy trying to save his parents’ marriage uncovers a vast legacy of family secrets. Spellbinding and atmospheric, A Sudden Light is rich with unconventional characters, scenes of transcendent natural beauty, and unforgettable moments of emotional truth that reflect Garth Stein’s outsized capacity for empathy and keen understanding of human motivation–a triumphant work of a master storyteller at the height of his power.

Join us this evening as Garth Stein speaks and signs. A perfect evening out for book clubs!