Moke Hill READS Book Club

Sep 20, 2017 by contributor

Moke Hill READS

 NEXT MEETING:  Tuesday October 3 — 7 PM, Moke Hill Library/Archives

October 3, 2017.  The Girl with Seven Names: Escape from North Korea, by Hyeonseo Lee. An autobiography that reads like a suspense novel, Lee provides extraordinary insight into life under one of the world’s most ruthless and secretive dictatorships.  At 17 she slipped over the border into China and spent the next decade living a secret life to avoid capture and repatriation. Life in the world outside of North Korea exposed the repression and poverty of what she had been told was the most successful country on the planet. It took over a decade before she obtained South Korean refugee citizenship and smuggled out her mother and brother.

 November 7, 2017.  The Nest, by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney.  A warm, funny and acutely perceptive debut novel about four adult siblings and the shared inheritance that has shaped their lives. Years of simmering tensions reach a breaking point as Melody, Beatrice, and Jack Plumb gather to confront their charismatic and reckless older brother, Leo, whose recent accident endangers the joint trust fund that they are mere months away from receiving. The author brings a remarkable cast of characters to life to illuminate what money does to relationships, what happens to our ambitions over the course of time, and the fraught yet unbreakable ties we share with those we love.

December 5, 2017.  The Chrysalids, by John Wyndham.  A classic Sci-Fi from 1955, David lives in a post-apocalyptic world after a devastating global nuclear war several thousand years before.  His homeland is dominated by genetic fundamentalists who purge all human, plant, and animal life that deviates from a pre-war standard. Born with unusual mental powers, David and his friends flee to the Fringes and beyond where alternative communities developed. The story resonates as much today with the rise of religious and scientific dogmatism as when it was written during the cold war.

Moke Hill Reads Book Club:  First Tuesday of every month. No commitment, No attendance taken, No restrictions, No membership, No dues. For everyone interested in good books and discussions about them. Sponsored by the Mokelumne Hill Friends of the Library. Send your email address or watch for announcements on mokehill.org and other news sources. Contact Janet Dock:  janetdock@me.com