Host An Unforgettable Book Club Party

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

The Night Circus is the tale of two young magicians, Marco and Celia, who are bound to a game in which neither has chosen to participate and in which neither fully understands the rules.

The Outside Boy by Jeanine Cummins

Christy is an eleven year old Irish traveller, a Pavee, in the 1950′s. He travels with his dad, his grandda and granny, Uncle Finty and Aunt Bridget and his cousins. This is his family. Wherever they “camp” is his home. He never knew his mam. He only shared seven minutes of breath with her.

The Paris Wife by Paula McLain

The Paris Wife by Paula McLain, set in the 1920′s, is the partly fictional/partly factual account of Ernest Hemingway and his first wife Elizabeth Hadley Richardson and their life together in Paris among other British and American expatriates. The bohemian lifestyle of these expats led Gertrude Stein to dub them the “Lost Generation.”

The Paris Wife is movingly told in Hadley’s voice from her first meeting of Ernest, their courtship and wedding, life abroad, the birth of their son, and the painful unraveling of their marriage.

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

The tyrannical Nathan Price, a World War II veteran and evangelical Baptist missionary, takes his family into the Belgian Congo in 1959 to run a mission in the small village of Kilanga. Nathan and his family are ill-prepared for dealing with the indigenous culture, and are caught in the political firestorm of an African nation seeking independence from white rule.

The Sandcastle Girls by Chris Bohjalian

Elizabeth Endicotte, a 21-year old missionary from “one of Boston’s most priggish families” arrives in Aleppo, Syria during World War I with her father to assist the women and children refugees of 1915 Armenian Genocide by the Turkish Ottomon Empire.

Armen Petrosian is an Armenian engineer working with the Germans in Aleppo. Armen has escaped the genocide and is desperately trying to find out the fate of his wife Karine and his infant daughter.

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

With her father’s maid, motherless fourteen year old Lily Owens sets out on a quest in 1964 South Carolina to learn more about her mother and the mysterious circumstances of her death. The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd is a story about motherhood, sisterhood, prejudices, love, and coming of age.

The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

Tony Webster and his clique first met Adrian Finn at school. Maybe Adrian was a little more serious than the others, certainly more intelligent, but they swore to stay friends forever. Until Adrian’s life took a turn into tragedy.

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Books are hidden away in The Cemetery of Forgotten Books and protected in this mysterious place until their rediscovery. Young Daniel is drawn to a particular book. “The Shadow of the Wind’ by Julian Carax.

Daniel chooses this book, or does this book choose Daniel?

The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey

Alaska in 1920: a brutal place to homestead, and especially tough for recent arrivals Jack and Mabel. Childless, they are drifting apart. In a moment of levity during the season’s first snowfall, they build a child out of snow. The next morning the snow child is gone–but they glimpse a young, blonde-haired girl running through the trees.

The Snowman by Jo Nesbo

On the night of the first snowfall, a mysterious snowman is seen on the front lawn staring at the house where the mother has been reported missing. Harry Hole will put everything on the line to hunt down this serial killer.

The Spiritualist by Megan Chance

Young Evie,who has married far above her station, is accused of murdering her husband Peter. Her husband’s family and her society friends have abandoned her. Evie knows she must find the means to exonerate herself, even if she must call on the dead for help.

The Story of Beautiful Girl by Rachel Simon

Lynnie, a young white woman with a developmental disability, and Homan, an African American deaf man, escape an institution and show up at a widow’s home. But the couple is not alone – Lynnie has just given birth to a baby girl. When the authorities catch up to them that same night, Homan escapes into the darkness, and Lynnie is caught. But before she is forced back into the institution, she whispers two words to Martha: “Hide her.”

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski

The Story of Edgar Sawtelleby David Wroblewski is set in Northern Wisconsin in The Chequamegon National Forest and surrounding area. Remote and heavily wooded, teeming with wildlife and lakes, The Chequamegon National Forest is the ideal wilderness hideaway for a boy not wanting to be found.

The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult

Sage Singer is a baker. She works through the night, preparing the day’s breads and pastries, trying to escape a reality of loneliness, bad memories, and the shadow of her mother’s death. When Josef Weber, an elderly man in Sage’s grief support group, begins stopping by the bakery, they strike up an unlikely friendship.

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

The Thirteenth Tale is the story of Vida Winter, a prolific writer with a mysterious past. She commissions a young writer named Margaret to pen her story, the “Thirteenth Tale”. Mrs. Winter tells the story of Angelfield, an avoided house that was home to spooky twin girls that terrorized the village. The manor was run by their father, a recluse that never got over the unconventional love he had for his sister. Mrs. Winter’s tale, along with Diane Setterfield’s intriguing writing, will draw you in as you are told the stories of Angelfield and its inhabitants.

The Time Keeper by Mitch Albom

In Mitch Albom’s newest work of fiction, The Time Keeper, the inventor of the world’s first clock is punished for trying to measure God’s greatest gift. He is banished to a cave for centuries and forced to listen to the voices of all who come after him seeking more days, more years.

The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

The Time Traveler’s Wife is a classic love story. Clare and Henry are separated by time but bound by love. In an instant Henry, a librarian, is transported through time leaving Clare anxiously waiting and wondering when and where she will see him again.

The Uninvited Guests by Sadie Jones

While Emerald, her brother Clovis, her beautiful and haughty mother Charlotte, and youngest sister Imogene prepare for Emerald’s 20th birthday party, step-father Edward Swift leaves early that morning in an attempt to save his wife’s house. The invited guests, brother and sister Ernest and Patience Sutton, and wealthy neighbor and bachelor John Buchcanan, soon arrive at Sterne. However, things take an interesting and unexpected turn when the Torrington’s are charged with taking in the survivors of a horrible train wreck until the railroad can make arrangements for their displaced passengers.

The Wedding Officer by Anthony Capella

“The trouble with eating Italian food is that 5 or 6 days later you’re hungry again.” ~ George Miller, British writer

The Wedding Officer by Anthony Capella is an affirmation of life, love, and good food. The setting is WWII occupied Italy. The British Army is in Naples and James Gould, a young naive British officer, is assigned to prevent weddings between the lonely British soldiers and the young Italian women desperately trying to survive the war. James’ very proper and restrained existence is set upside down by the fiery young woman, Livia Pertini, he hires as the British personnel’s cook.

The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown

The Weird Sisters is about three sisters who were each named after famous Shakespearean women by their fanatical dad. They reunite at their parent’s home after their mother is diagnosed with cancer.

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga tells the story of the extreme measures Balram Halwai must undertake to escape the poverty trap he calls the rooster coop and become an entrepreneur.

The Widower’s Tale by Julia Glass

The Widower’s Tale is the story of Percival Darling. He still lives in the house where his daughters grew up – “the house of her mother’s heart” according to Clover, Percy’s eldest daughter. Percy is a 70 year old who runs everyday to get in shape to die and who fantasizes of a quasi-Luddite retirement – “Cursed be the cursors; farewell to iEverything and its pertly nicknamed apps.”

The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley

Carrie McClelland, a historical fiction author, is having difficulty with her current novel until she travels to the Scottish coast and begins to write profusely. She finds out everything she has written actually occurred 300 years ago.

The Woman in Black by Susan Hill

The Woman in Black: A Ghost Story by Susan Hill, set during the early 1900′s, is a Gothic haunting whose ghost is driven by fury and bent on vengeance.

The Worst Hard Time by Timothy Egan

The dust storms that terrorized the High Plains in the darkest years of the Depression were like nothing ever seen before or since.
Following a dozen families and their communities through the rise and fall of the region, Timothy Egan tells of their desperate attempts to carry on through blinding black dust blizzards, crop failure, and the death of loved ones.

The Year of the Gadfly by Jennifer Miller

Young Iris and her parents have moved to a new town to help Iris recover from the tragic loss of her best friend. But Iris is struggling and finds comfort in her ruminations with her imaginary friend and mentor Edward R. Murrow, the famed broadcast journalist.

On the first day of school at Mariana Academy, Iris and the other new students, receive a blank copy of The Devil’s Advocate, the paper distributed by the secretive Prisom’s Party, and a threatening message.

Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum

For fifty years, Anna Schlemmer has refused to talk about her life in Germany during World War II. Her daughter Trudy, now a professor of German history, begins investigating the past and finally unearths the dramatic and heartbreaking truth of her mother’s life.

Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin

Three Cups of Tea is about one man’s determination to bring schools to the forgotten areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Greg Mortenson’s life work is to provide a balanced education to the children in these regions so they have an alternative to the extremist madrasas (schools) and to teach them skills to build their communities. This book is about his journey – from sleeping in his car and being kidnapped to the triumphs of seeing children become educated.

Tina Cocolina Queen of the Cupcakes

Tina Cocolina by Pablo Cartaya and Martin Howard is about a cupcake girl trying to find her topping so she can enter the Cream of the Top Cupcake contest. The book includes cupcake and icing recipes by award-winning pastry chef Martin Howard.

Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand

“Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption” is a biographical narrative written by Laura Hillenbrand about the indomitable Louie Zamperini. The novel begins with Louie’s troubled youth, his discovery of distance running, and subsequent participation in Hitler’s 1936 Berlin Olympics. There he roomed with Jesse Owens, shook Hitler’s hand, and stole a Nazi flag. Although Nineteen-year old Louie didn’t medal, he was the top American finisher and set his sites on the 1940 Tokyo Olympics. However, World War II would bring the cancellation of those games, and thrust young Louie into a harrowing and disturbing fight for “survival, resilience and redemption.”

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

Ladies and Gentlemen! Step right up for the amazing, the unbelievable, the marvelous wonders we have gathered for this book club party inspired by Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen. The main character, Jacob Jankowski, jumps on the circus train after suffering a tragedy in his life. He encounters “the most dazzling collection” of people and animals “gathered from all four corners of the earth”.

We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver

In a series of compelling and introspective letters to her estranged husband, Franklin, Eva Khatchadourian dissects her married life and her mothering of her son Kevin and daughter Celia in the aftermath of Kevin’s Columbine-like school slaying of seven classmates, a cafeteria worker, and a teacher.