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Join the Club: Shelter in a Good Book!
Book clubs you can do from home
Tea With Anna Karenina
Tea with Anna Karenina
Project Gutenberg eBook Link: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1399
Read-Aloud Group (Monday-Thursday at 3 p.m.): https://facebook.com/groups/SDPLtea
Activities: Tune in Monday-Thursday at 3 p.m. to stream a read-aloud from Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. The videos will be also be available for later viewing. Drinking tea while listening to this romantic classic is encouraged but not required.
Book Description: Leo Tolstoy published Anna Karenina in installments between 1875 and 1877, and it is widely acclaimed as a classic of world literature. Weaving together narratives about several families, the story centers on an adulterous affair between Anna and dashing cavalry officer Count Vronsky that scandalizes the social circles of Saint Petersburg.
Author Bio: Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) was a Russian writer who is regarded as one of the greatest authors of all time. He received nominations for the Nobel Prize in Literature every year from 1902 to 1906 and for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1901, 1902, and 1909, without ever winning either prize. Born to an aristocratic Russian family, Tolstoy is best known for the novels War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1878), often cited as pinnacles of realist fiction. He also wrote plays and numerous philosophical essays. Tolstoy's writings on nonviolent resistance had a profound impact on such pivotal 20th-century figures as Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.
Previous Readings: Check out the Library's YouTube channel to watch previous readings by clicking on the different playlists below.
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Emma by Jane Austen
- Roughing It by Mark Twain
- Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
- Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
- Little Women by Loisa May Alcott (Available on Facebook)
Adventure and Mystery Book Club
The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
Project Gutenberg eBook
Read-Aloud Book Group (Monday, Wednesdays and Fridays at 4 p.m.): https://facebook.com/groups/SDPLadventure
Here’s the Deal: Tune in to Facebook Live on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 4pm to hear chapters of a great classic adventure or mystery book read aloud. Our current selection is: The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins.
Author Bio: William Wilkie Collins (Jan. 8, 1824 – Sept. 23, 1889) was an English novelist and playwright known for The Woman in White (1859) and The Moonstone (1868). The last has been called the first modern English detective novel. On publishing his first novel, Antonina, in 1850, Collins met Charles Dickens, who became a friend and mentor. Some Collins works appeared first in Dickens's journals Household Words and All the Year Round. The two also collaborated on drama and fiction.
Book Description: Colonel Herncastle, an unpleasant former soldier, brings the Moonstone back with him from India where he acquired it by theft and murder during the Siege of Seringapatam. Angry at his family, who shun him, he leaves it in his will as a birthday gift to his niece Rachel, thus exposing her to attack by the stone's hereditary guardians, who will stop at nothing to retrieve it.
Previous Readings: Visit the Library's YouTube channel to watch previous readings by clicking on the different playlists below.
The Bucketlist Book Club
Welcome to the Bucketlist Book Club! This is a virtual forum to discuss longer/harder books or books that many of us have wished to read, but just never got around to it!
Title: Anna Karenina | Author: Leo Tolstoy
Available via Gutenberg Project: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1399
Discussion Group: https://facebook.com/groups/SDPLbucketlist
Author Bio: Leo Tolstoy was a Russian writer who is regarded as one of the greatest authors of all time.[ He received nominations for the Nobel Prize in Literature every year from 1902 to 1906 and for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1901, 1902, and 1909.
Book Description: A complex novel in eight parts, with more than a dozen major characters, it is spread over more than 800 pages (depending on the translation and publisher), typically contained in two volumes. It deals with themes of betrayal, faith, family, marriage, Imperial Russian society, desire, and rural vs. city life.
Discussion questions forthcoming! Join the Bucketlist Book Club and be a part of the conversation!
Short Classics Book Club
Welcome to the Short Classics Book Club! This is a live discussion group held each month on Zoom to discuss the shortest of the greatest books of all time.
Current Selection
Title: The Death of Ivan Ilyich | Author: Leo Tolstoy
Project Gutenberg eBook | Librivox Audio Book
Short Classics Book Club Facebook Group
Tuesday, November 29th at 4:30 p.m. | Link to Zoom Discussion Group
Author Bio: Leo Tolstoy, also spelled Tolstoi, Russian in full Lev Nikolayevich, Graf (count) Tolstoy, born September 9, 1828, died November 20, 1910, was a Russian author, master of realistic fiction and one of the world’s greatest novelists. Tolstoy is best known for his two longest works, War and Peace (1865–69) and Anna Karenina (1875–77), which are commonly regarded as among the finest novels ever written.
Book Description: Hailed as one of the world's supreme masterpieces on the subject of death and dying, The Death of Ivan Ilyich is the story of a worldly careerist, a high court judge who has never given the inevitability of his death so much as a passing thought. But one day death announces itself to him, and to his shocked surprise he is brought face to face with his own mortality. How, Tolstoy asks, does an unreflective man confront his one and only moment of truth?
Study/Discussion Questions:
- How does Ivan treat those with whom he comes in contact in his career as a judge?
- Why does Tolstoy begin the story with Ivan's death and work backward rather than writing the story chronologically?
- What are the attitudes of Peter Ivanovich, Praskoyva Fedorovna, Schwartz, and Gerasim toward Ivan's illness and death? What is the significance of these minor characters?
- Why does Ivan Ilych have such a difficult time accepting his illness and death?
- What stages does Ivan pass through on his journey to acceptance? Identify where these seem to appear in the text.
Click the link below to enjoy a short video introduction to The Death of Ivan Ilyich and learn more about our virtual discussion group on Zoom.
Modern Classics Book Club
Welcome to our virtual book club! We will be discussing a wide variety of books ranging from classic selections to modern literature.
Current Selection
Title: Poisonwood Bible | Author: Barbara Kingsolver
eBook available via cloudLibrary
Printed books and CD audiobook via our catalog
Discussion Group: https://facebook.com/groups/CMRbookclub
Schedule: Chapters posted Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 10:00 a.m.
Next meeting: November 5th at 11:00 a.m. via Zoom.
Author Bio: Barbara Kingsolver (1955-) grew up in rural Kentucky. She was named by Writer’s Digest as one of the most important writers of the 20th century. She has received numerous awards including the National Humanities Medal in 2000 for her service to the arts. The Poisonwood Bible was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the Orange Prize. It won the national book award for South Africa and was an Oprah Book Club selection. Her other novels have won numerous awards including the prestigious Orange Prize in 2010 for Lacuna. In 2011, Kingsolver won the Daytona Peace Prize for her complete works.
Book Description: Poisonwood Bible is told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a Baptist evangelical minister who takes his family on a mission to the Congo in 1959. This suspenseful tale is set over the course of 3 decades as it highlights the family’s tragic undoing and reconstruction. It is set in the dramatic backdrop of the Congo’s fight for independence from Belgium, highlighting the difficulties of the fledgling African nation. It is told in alternating voices of the wife, Orleanna Price and her four daughters: Rachel, Leah, Adah and Ruth May. Having been uprooted from their home in Georgia, the group arrives with 1950s ideals. Each character handles this move and the events that happen to them in different ways. The story intertwines dark humor with the possibilities of human hope. This novel, with it’s lush prose, promises to captivate the imagination.
The Jane Austen Book Club
Welcome to the Jane Austen Book Club! Our book club will be an open forum conversation in which group members will be discussing the literary works of Jane Austen. Many Janeite advocates consider Jane Austen England's most popular author.
April Selection
Title: Pride and Prejudice | Author: Jane Austen
Project Gutenberg eBook Link: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1342
Librivox Audiobook Link: https://librivox.org/pride-and-prejudice-by-jane-austen
Discussion Group: https://facebook.com/groups/RBlibrarybookclub
Author bio: Jane Austen, (born December 16, 1775, Steventon, Hampshire, England—died July 18, 1817, Winchester, Hampshire), English writer who first gave the novel its distinctly modern character through her treatment of ordinary people in everyday life. She published four novels during her lifetime: Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814), and Emma (1815). In these and in Persuasion and Northanger Abbey (published together posthumously, 1817), she vividly depicted English middle-class life during the early 19th century. Her novels defined the era’s novel of manners, but they also became timeless classics that remained critical and popular successes two centuries after her death.
Book Description: The story revolves are the Bennet girls and the search for a successful marriage contract. Primary story plot revolves around our proud aristocratic, Mr. Darcy and his evolving feelings toward Elizabeth Bennet, The couple's relationship must overcome many social and cultural challenges to find true love. Any Janeite will tell you the story is worth reading due to the wit and charm of Jane Austen's characters.
Discussion questions:
Our questions will added once per week on every Friday throughout the month of April 2020.