Book Discussion Groups
The following books are available free to any book discussion group in the area on a first-come first-served basis. To reserve a set of books simply call the Traverse Area District Library at 932-8500 ext. 204. Indicate which set you wish and the date of your discussion. The books will be available six weeks before your discussion at the Library's Circulation Desk. Please return them to the Circulation desk as soon as possible after your group meets. New titles and additional copies of available sets will be added periodically.
|
AUTHOR |
TITLE |
Description |
|
Baxter, Charles |
Shadow Play |
Michigan short story writer and novelist takes on 80’s ethics and its impact on families in a small community with a chemical plant. 399 pages |
|
Bloom, Amy |
Come to Me |
Short Stories. 174 pages |
|
Brooks, Geraldine |
March |
2006 Pulitzer Prize winning novel of Civil War time. 280 pages |
| Bryson, Bill | The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid | Bryson's memoir of his childhood. 268 pp. |
|
Chabon, Michael |
The Amazing
Adventures of Kavalier and Clay |
2001 Pulitzer Prize Winner. 654 pp. |
|
Cisneros, Sandra |
Caramelo. |
Mexican/American history, family love. 439 pages |
|
Coelho, Paulo |
Eleven Minutes |
Best selling Brazilian novelist |
|
Coetzee, J.M. |
Disgrace |
Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature. 220 pages. |
|
Conway, Jill Ker |
The Road from Coorain |
Memoir of Conway’s journey from an Australian sheep farm to America. She eventually became the first woman president of Smith College. 238 pages |
|
Cunningham, Michael. |
The Hours |
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, 1998. 226 pages. Good to read along with Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. |
|
Danticat, Edwidge. |
Breath, Eyes, Memory |
The wonder, terror and heartache of Danticat’s native Haiti and its women. 234 pages |
|
Driscoll, Jack |
Wanting Only to be
Heard |
Poignant stories about hard men by Interlochen writer. 191 pages |
|
Fleischman, Lisa Huang |
Dream of the Walled City |
Inspired by the author's early feminist Chinese grandmother. |
|
Foer, Franklin |
How Soccer Explains the World |
Soccer and the global economy |
|
Frayn, Michael |
Headlong |
English playwright, novelist and journalist. Shortlisted for 1999 Booker Prize. 342 pages |
|
Gibbons, Kay |
Ellen Foster |
11 year old orphan in American South. Oprah selection |
|
Gruen, Sara |
Water for Elephants |
Story of a man's life in the circus in Depression era America. 335 pages |
|
Hemingway, Ernest |
Nick Adams Stories |
Memorable character grows from child to adolescent to soldier, veteran, writer and parent. 268 pages |
| Horan, Nancy | Loving Frank | Novel about Frank Lloyd Wright's scandalous life. |
|
Hosseini, Khaled |
Kite Runner |
Kabul in the 1970s from fall of the monarchy to The Taliban. ALA Notable Book. 371 pages |
|
Houston, Pam |
Cowboys Are My
Weakness |
Strong shrewd and funny. 171 pages |
| Hunt, Linda Lawrence | Bold Spirit | Helga Estby's forgotten walk across victorian America. |
|
Hurston, Zora Neale |
Their Eyes Were Watching God |
An independent black woman in the 30's. 205 pages |
|
Jamerson, William |
Big Shoulders |
Looking for his dad, a boy finds his father. 325 pages |
|
Kingsolver, Barbara |
Animal Dreams |
Early Kingsolver |
|
Kingsolver, Barbara |
Prodigal Summer |
Weaves together three stories of human love within a larger tapestry of lives amid the mountains and farms of southern Appalachia. 444 pages |
|
Langer, Adam |
Crossing California |
Chicago's West Rogers Park neighborhood in 1979 |
|
Larson, Erik |
The Devil in the
White City |
Murder, magic, and madness at the World's Fair (non-fiction) |
|
Lynch, Jim |
Highest Tide |
A 13-yr old boy develops a consuming passion for tidal flats one summer. 272 pages |
|
Maxwell, William |
All the Days and
Nights |
21 stories spanning 50 years of William Maxwell’s eloquence, grace and wit. 415 pages |
|
McCraken, Elizabeth |
The Giant's House |
Unlikely love story between a lonely spinster librarian and a monstrous-sized younger man |
| Mengestu, Dinaw | The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears | Debut novel about what it means to lose a family and a country through African immigrant's eyes. |
|
Morrison, Toni |
The Bluest Eye |
1970 first Morrison novel. Oprah selection. 206 pages |
|
Morrison, Toni |
Beloved |
Chosen by NYT Book Review fiction writers and reviewers as best American fiction in last 25 years. |
|
Mortenson, Greg |
Three Cups of Tea |
One man's quest to build schools in the wildest parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan. |
|
Oates, Joyce Carol |
We Were the Mulvaneys |
Dissolution of the American family—and an American way of life. Oprah selection. 454 pages |
|
O'Faolain, Nuala |
Are You Somebody? |
The accidental memoirs of a Dublin woman. 215 pages |
|
Raban, Jonathan |
Passage To Juneau: a
sea and its meanings. |
Raban sails a 35 foot sailboat the thousand miles from Seattle to Juneau. The journey becomes a personal journey as well, as events in his own life impact his trip. 435 pages |
|
Robinson, Marilynne |
Gilead |
Fathers and sons and the spiritual battles that still rage in America's heart. 247 pages |
|
Robinson, Marilynne |
Housekeeping |
A book to read slowly and savor each word. Coming of age of a young orphan. 187 pages |
|
Rubenstein, Julian |
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber |
True story of bank heists, ice hockey, Transylvanian pelt smuggling, moonlighting, detectives, and broken hearts. 319 pages |
|
Rushdie, Salman |
Midnight’s Children |
Allegory
for
events in India before and after its
1947 independence and partition. Won
Booker of Bookers in 1993. 533
pages |
|
Seierstad, Asne |
The Bookseller of Kabul |
Reportage of Afghan after the Taliban |
|
Stander, Aaron |
Summer People |
Murder on the Leelanau Peninsula. Local author. 258 pages |
|
Taylor, Peter |
Summons to Memphis |
Pulitzer Prize |
|
Tey, Josephine |
The Franchise Affair |
Inspector Grant has a cameo role in this classic in the detective field. 300 pages |
| Toobin, Jeffrey | The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court | . |
|
Trevor, William |
After Rain |
Short stories by the author of Felicia’s Journey. 213 pages |
|
Unsworth, Barry |
Morality Play |
Medieval murder mystery. 206 pages |
| Wakefield, Larry | The Way it Was: Stories from the Grand Traverse Area | . |
|
Walters, Minette |
The Sculptress |
|
|
Wharton, Edith |
The Age of Innocence |
Won the 1921 Pulitzer Prize. A story of desire and betrayal in Old New York. 362 pages |
|
Wiesel, Elie |
Night |
Autobiographical account of Nazi death camp. Nobel Peace Prize. 109 pages |
(Revised September 2008)