Shelf Indulgence
If you enjoy reading a diverse mix of literary fiction and nonfiction, then this book club is for you! We read one book each month, and meet on the third Thursday at 11:00am to discuss it. Past selections have come from popular genres such as Historical Fiction, Mysteries, Biographies and Memoirs, Travel Tales, Thrillers, Comedies, and Nonfiction. We welcome new members!
December Book:
The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich (Historical Fiction)
Thomas Wazhashk is the night watchman at the jewel bearing plant, the first factory located near the Turtle Mountain Reservation in rural North Dakota. He is also a Chippewa Council member who is trying to understand the consequences of a new “emancipation” bill on its way to the floor of the United States Congress. It is 1953 and he and the other council members know the bill isn’t about freedom; Congress is fed up with Indians. The bill is a “termination” that threatens the rights of Native Americans to their land and their very identity. How can the government abandon treaties made in good faith with Native Americans “for as long as the grasses shall grow, and the rivers run”? Since graduating high school, Pixie Paranteau has insisted that everyone call her Patrice. Unlike most of the girls on the reservation, Patrice, the class valedictorian, has no desire to wear herself down with a husband and kids. She makes jewel bearings at the plant, a job that barely pays her enough to support her mother and brother. Patrice’s shameful alcoholic father returns home sporadically to terrorize his wife and children and bully her for money. But Patrice needs every penny to follow her beloved older sister, Vera, who moved to the big city of Minneapolis. Vera may have disappeared; she hasn’t been in touch in months, and is rumored to have had a baby. Determined to find Vera and her child, Patrice makes a fateful trip to Minnesota that introduces her to unexpected forms of exploitation and violence, and endangers her life. Thomas and Patrice live in this impoverished reservation community along with young Chippewa boxer Wood Mountain and his mother Juggie Blue, her niece and Patrice’s best friend Valentine, and Stack Barnes, the white high school math teacher and boxing coach who is hopelessly in love with Patrice. – Amazon.com
January:
Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover (Memoir)
February:
The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman (Historical Fiction)
March:
Dovetail by Karen McQuestion (Mystery/Suspense)
April:
Beautiful Country by Qian Julie Wang (Memoir)
May:
The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit by Michael Finkel (Biography/Mystery)
June:
The Engineer’s Wife by Tracey Enerson Wood (Historical Fiction)
August:
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce (Humor/Adventure)
September:
Carnegie's Maid by Marie Benedict (Biography/Historical Fiction)
October:
The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri (Political)
November:
The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett (Mystery)
December:
The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich (Historical Fiction)
January:
The Revisioners by Margaret Wilkerson Sexton
February:
Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple
March:
Ask Again, Yes by Mary Beth Keane
April:
News of the World by Paulette Jiles
May:
Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate
June:
The Book of Two Ways by Jodi Picoult
July:
Long Bright River by Liz Moore
August:
The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro
September:
The Henna Artist by Alka Joshi
October:
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
November:
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
December:
Bring your Favorite Titles!
January:
A Star For Mrs. Blake by April Smith
February:
Shotgun Lovesongs by Nickolas Butler
March - September:
No Book Club due to COVID-19
October:
Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely
November:
Code Name Helene by Ariel Lawhorn
December:
All Adults Here by Emma Straub
January:
Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger
Britt Marie Was Here by Fredrik Backman
February:
The Lemon Tree: An Arab, A Jew, and The Heart of the Middle East by Sandy Tolan
In The Midst of Winter by Isabel Allende
March:
The Widow by Fiona Barton
April:
The Art Forger by B.A. Shapiro
May:
Old World Murders by Kathleen Ernst (Wisconsin Author)
June:
The Astronaut Wives Club by Lily Koppel
July:
The River by Peter Heller
August:
The Orchard: A Memoir by Theresa Weir
September:
The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein
October:
And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie
November:
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon
December:
The Indigo Girl by Natasha Boyd
January:
Gray Mountain by John Grisham
The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman
February:
Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance
Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil DeGrasse Tyson
March:
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold
April:
The Second Mrs. Hockaday by Susan Rivers
May:
Exit West by Mohsin Hamid
Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance
June:
Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
July:
Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway
August:
The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson
Caroline: Little House, Revisited by Sarah Miller
September:
The Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin
October:
A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
The German Girl by Armando Lucas Correa
November:
The Woman’s Hour by Elaine Weiss
December:
Montaigne in Barn Boots by Michael Perry
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley