Hi everyone, I don’t know how time flies as a fast as it does – but it certainly does!

January has flown, February has arrived and our next book club gathering is in just over a week, on Friday, February 10, 2023.

We’ll be meeting in the Conference Room at the library from 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. and copies of the February Read: Matrix by Lauren Groff, may be picked up at the Circulation Desk at any time.

And as the word “Matrix” sounds like science fiction – I’ll just note briefly, that the novel is historical fiction with a large dose of female empowerment. Set during the twelve century the novel relays the story of Marie de France; a young noble woman who was deemed by Queen Eleanor to be unsuitable for married or court life, and was thus sent away to an abbey, where she rose through the ranks and thrived.  

I hope to see everyone next Friday!

Linda

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Pasted below are the notes from our December 2022 and January 2023 gatherings where we read and discussed, respectively, Oh William! by Elizabeth Strout and The Secret Life of Bees by Eileen Garvin.

The book club attendees liked our December Read Oh William!

And the response to our January Read: The Secret Life of Bees was mixed. Some readers liked the lighter, feel good, intelligent-but-with-a-Hallmark-vibe to it novel and others felt it was more of a cozy read, with less in-depth character development than they desired.

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Our December 2023 Book Club for Adults Read was held on December 9, 2022

And our December Read was: Oh, William! By Elizabeth Strout

Oh, William! Is the third book in Strout’s Amgash series and relays the story of two main characters: the protagonist of the series: 64-year-old Lucy Barton and her philandering, semi-retired scientist ex-husband William. The novel features scenes both in the present and the past; basically, relaying basic information on the couple, including what their childhoods were like, how they met, married and divorce and are still connected in the present even though they both remarried after their divorce.

It transpires that Lucy had a very difficult, poverty-stricken childhood. Her parents were dysfunctional. Her father had PTSD and her mother was abusive. Lucy grew up with a limited view of the world and found that simply trying to get through each day in the emotional minefield that was her home was a difficult, cringe worthy challenge.

As a youth, Lucy was a good student and worked hard at her studies. She was awarded a scholarship at “that college right outside of Chicago.” Lucy was petrified of going to college because she couldn’t imagine a world other than the small one, she grew up in. She was greatly assisted in getting ready for college by her school counselor Mrs. Nash, who took her shopping for clothes and luggage to replace the few threadbare changes of clothes she took with her from home and carried in a paper bag. Mrs. Nash also drove her to college where Lucy did well as a student. And in her sophomore year she met a fellow student named William Gerhardt.

Turning to William, he too had a difficult childhood. His mother was a bit distant, and his father was a World War II era German soldier who was captured by the allies and wound up a prisoner of war working in the U.S. during the war.

After college, Lucy went on to become a writer and William a scientist in the field of parasitology. They married and had two daughters Becca and Chrissy. And when their daughters were in college, Lucy discovered William was having an affair with a family friend, and she first left him and then divorced him, though they remained in touch.

After her divorce from William, Lucy remarried a much different man a kind, faithful cellist named David. When the book opens readers discover David has died and Lucy is still grieving for him two years after his death.

Early in the book readers discover that William has married twice since his divorce from Lucy. First, he married Lucy’s former friend, Joanne, the woman he had an affair with which caused the breakup of his marriage to Lucy. And then he married a younger woman, Estelle, and had a daughter with her named Sophia. One night he came home from work and discovered Estelle had moved out, taking their daughter and much of their home furnishings with her and leaving him a note announcing the breakup of their marriage.

Readers additionally discover that Lucy has a nervous disposition. In fact, her counselor describes Lucy’s anxieties as being a part of post-traumatic stress disorder she obtained while growing up in a very dysfunctional household. Lucy’s PTSD may be one of the reasons why she stays connected to William as his presence offers her a feeling of safety since she knows what expect from him, most of the time, due to their many years of marriage.

Despite Lucy’s nervousness, it is William who is going through a mid-life crisis in the book. While Lucy is dealing with the death of her second husband David, William winds up dealing both with the breakup of his third marriage to Estelle and the discovery, ironically via a search inspired by the results of a DNA Ancestry kit Estelle gave him for Christmas and that he ignored for months, that his mother, Catherine, left her first husband, Clyde Trask, a Maine potato farmer and their toddler Lois to marry William’s father. William’s father, Wilhelm as a German World War II era POW was sent to Maine, to work on the same potato farm owned by Catherine’s first husband Clyde Trask.

Thus Lucy and William are dealing with the after effects of how they were raised. Lucy with an abusive mother and a father with PTSD; and William with a mother who kept her previous family a secret, and a father who had a haunted past due to things that happened during his service in the German Army. William’s father even admitted to him that the German Army did terrible, unconscionable things during the war and those things haunted him ever afterwards, and he inevitably, inadvertently passed that history and some of those haunted feelings on to William.

And it should also be noted that despite having been divorced for many years that Lucy and William are still connected to each other and still factor into each other’s lives; this is true to such a degree that when William wants to take a trip to Maine to track down his newly discovered half-sister Lois, he takes Lucy with him.

Perhaps needless to say, Oh William! Offers a character study of the two main characters – Lucy and William.

Oh William! Ends with Lucy preparing to take a vacation to the Cayman Islands with William.

Oh William! Is the third book in Elizabeth Strout’s Lucy Baron series; and the story of Lucy and William continues in the fourth book of the series, 2022’s Lucy By The Sea which follows Lucy and William as they take refuge from the COVID-19 pandemic in a secluded house by the sea.

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Books Recommended by Book Club Members: December 2022:

Brighter By The Day: Waking Up To New Hopes and Dreams by Robin Roberts

From the beloved host of Good Morning America and New York Times bestselling author Robin Roberts, a guide to instilling hope and optimism into readers’ lives, infusing their days with positivity and encouragement.

Over the last 16 years as the esteemed anchor of Good Morning America, Robin Roberts has helped millions of people across the country greet each new morning, gracing our screens with heart and humility. She has sought to bring a bit of positivity into each day, even in the most trying of times. Now, she shares with readers the guidance she’s received, her own hard-won wisdom, and eye-opening experiences that have helped her find the good in the world and usher in light—even on the darkest days.

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The Burgess Boys by Lucy Barton

Haunted by the freak accident that killed their father when they were children, Jim and Bob Burgess escaped from their Maine hometown of Shirley Falls for New York City as soon as they possibly could. Jim, a sleek, successful corporate lawyer, has belittled his bighearted brother their whole lives, and Bob, a Legal Aid attorney who idolizes Jim, has always taken it in stride. But their long-standing dynamic is upended when their sister, Susan—the Burgess sibling who stayed behind—urgently calls them home. Her lonely teenage son, Zach, has gotten himself into a world of trouble, and Susan desperately needs their help. And so the Burgess brothers return to the landscape of their childhood, where the long-buried tensions that have shaped and shadowed their relationship begin to surface in unexpected ways that will change them forever.

With a rare combination of brilliant storytelling, exquisite prose, and remarkable insight into character, Elizabeth Strout has brought to life two deeply human protagonists whose struggles and triumphs will resonate with readers long after they turn the final page. Tender, tough-minded, loving, and deeply illuminating about the ties that bind us to family and home, The Burgess Boys is perhaps Elizabeth Strout’s most astonishing work of literary art.

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Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover

Born to survivalists in the mountains of Idaho, Tara Westover was seventeen the first time she set foot in a classroom. Her family was so isolated from mainstream society that there was no one to ensure the children received an education, and no one to intervene when one of Tara’s older brothers became violent. When another brother got himself into college, Tara decided to try a new kind of life. Her quest for knowledge transformed her, taking her over oceans and across continents, to Harvard and to Cambridge University. Only then would she wonder if she’d traveled too far, if there was still a way home.

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Jane Austen’s Genius Guide to Life by Haley Stewart

Stewart draws fascinating connections between Austen’s novels and real life and introduces Austen as a capable life coach by how she guides her readers to understand virtue and vice through friendship, love, community, and God’s grace. Austen’s characters reveal how virtuous habits transform us and help us become who we were meant to be.

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Light To The Hills by Bonnie Blaylock: A richly rewarding novel about family bonds, the power of words, and the resilience of mothers and daughters in 1930s Appalachia.

The folks in the Kentucky Appalachians are scraping by. Coal mining and hardscrabble know-how are a way of life for these isolated people. But when Amanda Rye, a young widowed mother and traveling packhorse librarian, comes through a mountain community hit hard by the nation’s economic collapse, she brings with her hope, courage, and apple pie. Along the way, Amanda takes a shine to the MacInteer family, especially to the gentle Rai; her quick-study daughter, Sass; and Finn, the eldest son who’s easy to warm to. They remind Amanda of her childhood and her parents with whom she longs to be reconciled.

Her connection with the MacInteers deepens, and Amanda shares with them a dangerous secret from her past. When that secret catches up with Amanda in the present, she, Rai, Sass, and Finn find their lives intersecting—and threatened—in the most unexpected ways. Now they must come together as the truth lights a path toward survival, mountain justice, forgiveness, and hope.

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Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It by Richard Reeves: A positive vision for masculinity in a more equal world. Boys and men are struggling. Profound economic and social changes of recent decades have many losing ground in the classroom, the workplace, and in the family. While the lives of women have changed, the lives of many men have remained the same or even worsened.

Our attitudes, our institutions, and our laws have failed to keep up. Conservative and progressive politicians, mired in their own ideological warfare, fail to provide thoughtful solutions.

The father of three sons, a journalist, and a Brookings Institution scholar, Richard V. Reeves has spent twenty-five years worrying about boys both at home and work. His new book, Of Boys and Men, tackles the complex and urgent crisis of boyhood and manhood.

Reeves looks at the structural challenges that face boys and men and offers fresh and innovative solutions that turn the page on the corrosive narrative that plagues this issue. Of Boys and Men argues that helping the other half of society does not mean giving up on the ideal of gender equality.

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January 2023 Book Club for Adults:

The January Book Club for Adults gathering took place on Friday, January 8, 2023.

Our January Read was: The Secret Life of Bees by Eileen Garvin

There are four main characters in this intelligent general fiction cozy:  Alice Holtzman a middle aged widow and part-time beekeeper, Jake a paraplegic teenager and recent high school graduate, twenty five year old Harry Stokes who has a criminal record for going along with “friends” as a driver while they attempted and failed to steal electronics; and, of course, the bees.

Each chapter of the book begins with a short quote about the life of bees from written works by a man considered the father of modern bee keeping L. L. Langstroth.

And the bees are a counterpoint to the three human characters, who despite the differences in their ages and background are all trying to find themselves; in large part by trial and error while simultaneously trying to manage their emotional responses to difficulties they have experienced in their lives, and initially, by trying to remain unconnected to other people.  The bees, on the other hand, each have very specific roles and they all work together for the sustainability and health of their hive.

The trio of main characters Alice, Jake and Harry do eventually find themselves and wind up with their feet solidly on new and better paths in their lives. The trio learns something that the bees know instinctively, that if humans connect with others and help each other, as needed, then their lives are richer and run more smoothly than if they try and live their lives all by themselves.

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Books Recommended by Book Club Members (and the Eileen Garvin) : January 2023:

The Boston Girl by Anita Diamont

An unforgettable novel about a young Jewish woman growing up in Boston in the early twentieth century, told “with humor and optimism…through the eyes of an irresistible heroine” (People)—from the acclaimed author of The Red Tent.

Anita Diamant’s “vivid, affectionate portrait of American womanhood” (Los Angeles Times), follows the life of one woman, Addie Baum, through a period of dramatic change. Addie is The Boston Girl, the spirited daughter of an immigrant Jewish family, born in 1900 to parents who were unprepared for America and its effect on their three daughters. Growing up in the North End of Boston, then a teeming multicultural neighborhood, Addie’s intelligence and curiosity take her to a world her parents can’t imagine—a world of short skirts, movies, celebrity culture, and new opportunities for women. Addie wants to finish high school and dreams of going to college. She wants a career and to find true love. From the one-room tenement apartment she shared with her parents and two sisters, to the library group for girls she joins at a neighborhood settlement house, to her first, disastrous love affair, to finding the love of her life, eighty-five-year-old Addie recounts her adventures with humor and compassion for the naïve girl she once was.

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Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey-Bee, A Bee Keeper’s Manual by L. L. Langstroth

(This is the book that author Eileen Garvin quotes from at the beginning of each chapter of The Music of Bees)

This influential guide by the Reverend L. L. Langstroth, “the father of modern beekeeping,” revolutionized the practice of beekeeping. Originally published in 1853, his work constitutes the first descriptive treatise of modern bee management — its innovations allowed people to engage in actual beekeeping, rather than simply handling bee domiciles and extracting the honey. This book explains and illustrates techniques still employed 150 years later — including the author’s patented invention, a movable frame hive that quickly spread into common use around the world.

In his reader-friendly, nontechnical style, Langstroth addresses every aspect of beekeeping: bee physiology; diseases and enemies of bees; the life-cycles of the queen, drone, and worker; bee-hives; and the handling of bees. An infectious sense of wonder and enthusiasm suffuses Langstroth’s accounts of natural and artificial swarming, the production of honey and wax, and the best methods of feeding bees and maintaining an apiary. The manual abounds in practical and intriguing insights attained through the years of observation and experience, including “the kindness of bees to one another,” “their infatuation for liquid sweets,” and “the warning given by bees before stinging.”

This version of Langstroth’s ever-popular manual is the fourth and final edition; it incorporates the author’s own revisions and remains an unsurpassed resource for beekeepers.

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The Pale Blue Eye by Louis Bayard

At West Point Academy in 1830, the calm of an October evening is shattered by the discovery of a young cadet’s body swinging from a rope. The next morning, an even greater horror comes to light. Someone has removed the dead man’s heart.

Augustus Landor—who acquired some renown in his years as a New York City police detective—is called in to discreetly investigate. It’s a baffling case Landor must pursue in secret, for the scandal could do irreparable damage to the fledgling institution. But he finds help from an unexpected ally—a moody, young cadet with a penchant for drink, two volumes of poetry to his name, and a murky past that changes from telling to telling.

The strange and haunted Southern poet, for whom Landor develops a fatherly affection, is named Edgar Allan Poe.

The basis of the new Netflix series of the same name.

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Robert E. Lee and Me by Ty Seidule

Ty Seidule grew up revering Robert E. Lee. From his southern childhood to his service in the U.S. Army, every part of his life reinforced the Lost Cause myth: that Lee was the greatest man who ever lived, and that the Confederates were underdogs who lost the Civil War with honor. Now, as a retired brigadier general and Professor Emeritus of History at West Point, his view has radically changed. From a soldier, a scholar, and a southerner, Ty Seidule believes that American history demands a reckoning.

In a unique blend of history and reflection, Seidule deconstructs the truth about the Confederacy?that its undisputed primary goal was the subjugation and enslavement of Black Americans?and directly challenges the idea of honoring those who labored to preserve that system and committed treason in their failed attempt to achieve it. Through the arc of Seidule’s own life, as well as the culture that formed him, he seeks a path to understanding why the facts of the Civil War have remained buried beneath layers of myth and even outright lies, and how they embody a cultural gulf that separates millions of Americans to this day.

Part history lecture, part meditation on the Civil War and its fallout, and part memoir, Robert E. Lee and Me challenges the deeply-held legends and myths of the Confederacy, and provides a surprising interpretation of essential truths that our country still has a difficult time articulating and accepting.

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Podcasts: For The Ages, a variety of popular historians and historical figures are interviewed, published by the New York Historical Society; accessible online: https://www.nyhistory.org/for-the-ages-podcast