These are the books that we were supposed to discuss this spring.
We'll shift these to next year.

Go Tell It on the Mountain
Driving Miss Norma
The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry
Thunder Dog


These books have been suggested for reading next year:


FICTION:

The Leavers
Ko, Lisa
Eleven-year-old Deming Guo's undocumented immigrant mother, Polly,
heads off to work one day and disappears. With no other family to
care for him, he is adopted by white college professors who rename
him Daniel and shape him into an "All-American" boy. He struggles
in this new life. Contains strong language and some descriptions
of sex. Commercial audiobook. 2017.
14 hours, 55 minutes

The Tattooist of Auschwitz
Morris, Heather
1942. Lale Sokolov, a Slovakian Jew, has been transported to
Auschwitz. When the Nazis discover he can speak multiple
languages, he is put to work tattooing the incoming prisoners. He
does what he can to keep his fellow prisoners alive and falls in
love with Gita. Contains strong language, violence, and
descriptions of sex. Commercial audiobook. Bestseller. 2018.
7 hours, 28 minutes

Before the Fall
Hawley, Noah.
On a foggy summer night, eleven people--ten privileged, one a
down-on-his-luck painter--depart Martha's Vineyard on a private
jet for New York. The plane plunges into the ocean. The only
survivors are the painter and a four-year-old boy, who is now the
remaining member of an immensely wealthy media mogul's
family. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2016.
12 hours, 57 minutes

Be Frank With Me
Johnson, Julia Claiborne.
Alice Whitley works for a publisher who sends her to California to
help reclusive author Mimi Banning deliver her long-awaited second
novel. While Mimi locks herself in her office supposedly writing
every day, Alice takes care of Frank, Mimi's ferociously
intelligent but eccentric young son. 2016
9 hours, 45 minutes

The Last Days of Night
Moore, Graham.
Paul Cravath, fresh from Columbia Law School, has been hired by
electricity pioneer George Westinghouse as part of his legal team
fighting Thomas Edison. Cravath searches out Nikola Tesla in hopes
that Tesla will assist Westinghouse. However, these giants of
innovation lead Cravath on a merry dance. Unrated. Commercial
audiobook. 2016.
13 hours, 2 minutes

The Jump-Off Creek
Gloss, Molly.
Oregon, 1895. Recent widow Lydia Sanderson travels from
Pennsylvania to Oregon, where she homesteads on a sparse
mountain. The harshness and difficulty of pioneer life is further
complicated by squatters, loneliness, and isolation.
7 hours and 40 minutes

Lincoln in the Bardo
Saunders, George.
1862. One night, soon after the death of his eleven-year-old son,
Willie, President Abraham Lincoln goes to visit the recently
interred body in Georgetown. There, he encounters the ghosts of
the cemetery's residents, including Willie, who must escape the
limbo he is in. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2017.
7 hours, 27 minutes

Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk
Fountain, Ben.
Billy and the other soldiers of Bravo squad are home in the states
for a victory tour after an Iraqi firefight they were in was taped
and televised. As they experience a Dallas Cowboys game on
Thanksgiving Day, Billy reflects on fame, life, and war. Violence
and strong language. 2012.
11 hours, 3 minutes

Arcadia
Groff, Lauren.
A group of idealists forms a commune in 1970s New York State on
the grounds of the decaying Arcadia House mansion. The child known
as Bit grows up in the community and is an eyewitness to its
history. Some strong language and some explicit descriptions of
sex. 2012.
10 hours, 19 minutes

Pachinko
Lee, Min Jin.
Sunja, the beloved daughter of a prominent Korean family, finds
herself pregnant and abandoned by her lover. To save her family's
reputation, she marries a tubercular minister and moves to
Japan. She and her descendants deal with being separated from
their homeland and never quite accepted. Contains violence, strong
language, and descriptions of sex. Commercial audiobook. 2017.
18 hours, 18 minutes

Whatever Happened to Interracial Love?
Collins, Kathleen.
A collection of short stories exploring race, gender, family, and
sexuality in ordinary moments. A young girl discovers something
haunting about a couple she idolizes. A woman reminisces about her
daredevil lover. Some strong language and some descriptions of
sex. 2016.
3 hours, 42 minutes

The Sparrow.
Russell, Mary Doria.
It is the year 2059 when Jesuit priest Emilio Sandoz returns as the sole
survivor of a forty-year space voyage to Alpha Centauri. Broken in body and
spirit, Sandoz describes his horrific captivity by aliens and life in a depraved
civilization. Strong language, violence, and descriptions of sex.
17 hours, 35 minutes

A Thread of Grace
Russell, Mary Doria.
1943. As Italy makes peace with the Allies, fourteen-year-old Belgian Claudette,
her father Albert Blum, and other Jewish families prepare to march across the
Alps to seek sanctuary in northern Italy. But Germany now occupies that country,
and perils abound. Some strong language. Commercial audiobook. 2005.
19 hours, 52 minutes

An American Marriage
Jones, Tayari.
Newlyweds Celestial and Roy have their lives ripped apart when Roy is unjustly
arrested and sentenced to twelve years for rape. In her distress, Celestial
leans on her best friend, Andre, which causes complications when Roy is released
early. Strong language and some descriptions of sex. Commercial
audiobook. Bestseller. 2018. 
9 hours, 2 minutes

Asymmetry
Halliday, Lisa.
In New York City, young editor Alice begins an affair with an older
writer. Years later, economist Amar is on his way to visit his brother in
Kurdistan and is interviewed by immigration officials in Heathrow Airport. Alice
and Amar's stories slowly intertwine. Strong language and some descriptions of
sex. 2018. 
9 hours, 5 minutes

Circe
Miller, Madeline.
Circe grows up in the court of her father, the sun god Helios. Despised by her
parents and others, she falls in love with a mortal who shuns her. When she
takes revenge, she is banished. Those who wish her and others harm are
transformed into pigs. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018. 
12 hours, 11 minutes

Number One Chinese Restaurant
Li, Lillian.
The Beijing Duck House in Rockville, Maryland, is inhabited by waiters and
kitchen staff who have been fighting, loving, and aging within its walls for
decades. When disaster strikes, each member of this work family must confront
the conflicts that fast-paced restaurant life has kept at
bay. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018. 
11 hours, 55 minutes

Unsheltered
Kingsolver, Barbara.
One New Jersey house connects two families across time. In the present day, it
is home to the Knox family, who question why the success promised to them has
never materialized. In the 1800s, science teacher Thatcher Greenwood wonders why
utopia eludes him. Contains strong language and violence. Commercial
audiobook. 2018. 
16 hours, 40 minutes

Washington Black
Edugyan, Esi.
Barbados, 1830. Young Washington Black is enslaved on the Faith Plantation when
his first owner dies. When his new owner's brother, Christopher Wilde, chooses
Washington to be his manservant, Washington is wary, but is soon drawn into a
world of exploration. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018. 
12 hours, 21 minutes

A Gentleman in Moscow
Amor Towles
1922. Count Alexander Rostov has been judged by a Bolshevik tribunal and found
to be an unrepentant aristocrat. Sentenced to house arrest for life, he joins
the community in the luxurious Hotel Metropol. He tries to enjoy life and
befriends a young girl who wants to be a princess. Unrated. Commercial
audiobook. 2016. 
17 hours, 55 minutes

The Space Between Us
Thrity Umrigar
This novel set in modern-day India, is the story of two compelling and achingly
real women, one an upper-middle class housewife, the other a servant in her
household. It poignantly demonstrates how the lives of the rich and poor are
connected yet removed from each other, and how the strong bonds of womanhood are
opposed by the division of class and culture. Some strong language. 
11 hours, 57 minutes


NON-FICTION:

The Line Becomes a River; dispatches from the border
Cantu, Francisco
After being stationed at the remote crossroads of a drug route and
a smuggling corridor, the Mexican-American author, plagued by
nightmares, abandons the Border Patrol for civilian life. Then a
friend--a regular at the cafe where he now works--travels back to
Mexico to visit his dying mother and doesn't return. Contains
descriptions of violence and strong language. Commercial
audiobook. 2018.
6 hours, 33 minutes

The Stranger in the Woods; the extraordinary story of the last true hermit
Finkel, Michael.
In 1986, twenty-year-old Christopher Knight drove to Maine and
disappeared into the forest. He did not speak to another human
being until he was arrested for stealing food nearly thirty years
later. Discusses his survival in the wilderness in the intervening
decades. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2017.
6 hours, 21 minutes

Beyond Words; what animals think and feel
Safina, Carl.
Ecologist examines the boundary between humans and nonhuman
animals, using field observations as well as laboratory research
into brain activity. Highlights elephants in Amboseli National
Park in Kenya, wolves in Yellowstone National Park, and killer
whales off the Pacific Northwest coast. 2015.
18 hours, 11 minutes