Brown Baggers book club met Thursday, December 21 to celebrate the end of 2023 with a potluck. As is our December tradition, instead of discussing one book title, we shared lots of book suggestions for our upcoming reading season, which will kick off this June. After profiling almost 40 books, the group voted on their favorites, and 10 books were selected to be read June 2024 – May 2025. While we won’t know what we’ll be reading in March 2025 until next year, we are excited to have recently found out the Same Page Community Read title for this March, Florence Adler Swims Forever. 

We’ll soon kick off our next cycle of reading with historical fiction mystery/thriller/wartime tales. Then we’ll switch gears to discuss historical and contemporary life and issues in the (sometimes wild) West. Come January, we’ll discuss a long, literary title, to give our readers plenty of time to read and digest (as there is no book discussion in December). For February, we’ve chosen a short Russian love story in translation. Finally, this next batch of books will end with more mystery/detective/spy reading. 

Mark your calendars for another great year of reading and riveting discussion: 

June 20, 2024: Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane 

July 18, 2024: The Plot Against America by Philip Roth

August 15, 2024: The Quiet American by Graham Greene 

September 19, 2024: Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann

October 17, 2024: The Light in the Forest by Conrad Richter 

November 21, 2024: The Ox-Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilburg Clark 

December 19, 2024: Potluck Party! (and selection meeting)

January 16, 2025: The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese 

February 20, 2025: Jamila by Chinghiz Aitmatov

March 20, 2025: Same Page Community Read (TBD)

April 17, 2025: Lie Down with Lions by Ken Follett 

May 15, 2025: The Madness of Crowds by Louise Penny

Other titles suggested this year, listed alphabetically by author: 

• The Wind Knows my Name by Isabel Allende
• The 6:20 Man by David Baldacci 
• Nostalgia by Mircea Cartarescu (not owned)
• The Manchurian Candidate by Richard Condon (we only own the DVD)
• The Stranger in the Woods by Michael Finkel
• The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
• Until the End of Time by Brian Greene
• Untamed by Will Harlan 
• Five Decembers by James Kestrel
• Elevation by Stephen King
• The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey
• Apeirogon by Colum McCann 
• The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes
• Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano 
• Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng
• The Library Book by Susan Orlean 
• Animal Farm by George Orwell
• Commonwealth by Ann Patchett
• The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
• English by Sanaz Toossi
• Blackouts by Justin Torres
• A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
• Honor by Thrity Umrigar
• The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
• Caste by Isabel Wilkerson 
• Fear by Bob Woodward
• The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski
• The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin 

What will we be reading January-May, 2024?

January 18: And There was Light by Jon Meacham

February 15: My People: five decades of writing about black lives by Charlayne Hunter-Gault

March 21: Florence Adler Swims Forever by Rachel Beanland (just announced!)

April 18: Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck

May 16: Sapphira and the Slave Girl by Willa Cather

Hope to see you at Brown Baggers soon! We meet on the third Thursday of every month at noon. For more information, email Krista at kfarrell@jmrl.org.