Waltham Public Library 2010 Book Club Thursday Evenings from 7:30 to 8:45 PM In the Trustees Room, 2nd Floor.
Books are available at the Main Circulation Desk during the month before the meeting. For more information, contact Kate Tranquada, 781-314-3432, ktranquada@minlib.net. Click here to see a list of books read at past meetings. Click here to view a printable version of the 2010 list.
Be sure to check out our Book Club Blog where you can learn more about the books and authors on our list!
January 21
Ann Patchett, Run “As the former mayor of Boston, Bernard Doyle wants to see his sons in politics, a dream the boys have never shared. But when an argument in a blinding New England snowstorm inadvertently causes an accident that involves a stranger and her child, all Bernard cares about is his ability to keep his children—all his children—safe.” Amazon.com	2007, 295 pp.
Februrary 18
Philip Roth, American Pastoral "Seymour "the Swede" Levov,a WWII-era high school sports hero and all-around Great Guy wants nothing more than to live in tranquility. But as the Swede grows older and America crazier, history sweeps his family inexorably into its grip." Amazon.com	1997, 423 pp.
March 18
Alexandra Fuller, Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight "The British-born Fuller grew up in Rhodesia(now Zinmbabwe),losing three siblings to disease as her father fought in the Rhodesian civil war and her mother managed the farm." Library Journal	2001, 301 pp.
April 15
Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin "Iris at age 18 is literally sold into marriage to a ruthless 35-year-old industrialist by her father, a woolly-minded idealist who thinks more about saving the family name and protecting the workers in his button factories than his daughter's happiness." Pblishers Weekly	2000, 521 pp.
May 20
Asne Seierstad, Bookseller of Kabul [tr. Ingrid Christophersen] "A female journalist from Norway moved in with the Khan family in Afganistan after the fall of the Taliban. Disguised as she was behind the bulky shapeless burka and escorted always by a man and even in Western dress, she was somehow anonymous and accepted readily into the bookseller's large extended family. " School Library Journal	2003, 287 pp.
June 17
Louise Erdrich, Master Butcher's Singing Club "A German soldier straggles home from World War I, marries his best friend's pregnant widow, then picks up a set of butcher knives and heads for North Dakota, where he founds a singing clib and encounters the passionate Delphine Watzka." Library Journal	2003, 389 pp.
July 15
Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows, Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie society was no ordinary book club. Rather, it was formed as a ruse and became a way for people to get together without raising the suspicions of Guernsey's Nazi occupiers." Booklist	2008, 277 pp.
August 19
Michael Chabon, The Yiddish Policemen's Union "What if, as Franklin Roosevelt proposed on the eve of World War II, a temporary Jewish settlement had been established on the Alaska panhandle?" Publishers Weekly	2007, 414 pp.
September 16
Don Delillo, White Noise "Nice-guy narrator Jack Gladney teaches Hitler Studies at a small college. His wife may be taking a drug that removes fear, and one day a nearby chemical plant accidentally releases a cloud of gas that may be poisonous." Amazon.com	1985, 326 pp.
October 21
Elizabeth Strout, Olive Kitteridge "A retired schoolteacher, Olive deplores the changes in her little town and in the world at large, but she doesn't always recognize the changes in those around her." from the publisher	2008, 270 pp.
November 18
Junot Diaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao "Things have never been easy for Oscar, a sweet but disastrously overweight, lovesick Dominican ghetto nerd. Oscar dreams of becoming the Dominican J. R. R. Tolkien and finding love. But he may never get what he wants, thanks to the curse that has haunted the Oscar's family for generations." from book jacket	2007, 339 pp.

The Waltham Public Library Book Club has been meeting for over 25 years. Everyone is welcome to attend meetings, which are held one evening a month. People have come and gone over the years, with some being active members for 10 years or more. All are welcome to come for one discussion or many. The lists are based on member suggestions and the library borrows extra copies from other libraries in our network.

After reading the book, we meet to have a lively discussion. The discussions are informal and based on personal reactions rather than an academic approach. The Book Club members are all ages and from varied backgrounds. they have in common an enjoyment of reading and the desire to share ideas about what they have read. Generally between 10 and 20 people attend a meeting. We especially like to read books by authors we might miss without the encouragement of the club - American and foreign - historical and contemporary - famous and lesser known. We have discovered many satisfying books and new authors together.