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At the end of each gathering, we decide when we’ll next meet, and what we’ll read. Sometimes, many books are mentioned and we have to choose. Other times, not so many ideas get shared. For those evenings, here’s a list of books we’ve considered reading, but got outvoted by something else that night. Hmmmm…. when will these move to our list of books which we’ve read?
Vaughn has annotated the list with number of print copies in the San Mateo County Libraries (SMCL) as of 10/24/22. Some are also in the SMCL in other formats as well. ** designates that the book is available as a Book Club in a Box.
Books
- All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr
- Barren Island by Carol Zoref (Long, sad, and tough but well worth it) SMCL 1
- Crossing Cairo, by Ruth Sohn SMCL 0 **\
- Fleishman Is in Trouble: A Novel by Taffy Brodesser-Akner SMLC 20, +7 ebooks, + 4 audiobooks
- Hitler in Los Angeles: How Jews Foiled Nazi Plots Against Hollywood and America, by Steven J. Ross SMCL 4
- Hollywood Spy, by Susan Elia MacNeal SMCL 13
- Hotel Cuba, by Aaron Hamburger SMLC 4
- Is This Anything? by Jerry Seinfeld SMCL 21 + other formats
- Letters to My Palestinian Neighbor, by Yossi Klein Halevi SMCL 6 **
- My Name Is Asher Lev, SMCL 3 or The Gift of Asher Lev SMCL 3 ** (2 different books), by Chaim Potok
- Once We Were Home, by Jennifer Rosner
- One Hundred Saturdays: Stella Levi and the Search for a Lost World, by Michael Frank
- Professor Schiff’s Guilt, by Auger Schiff SMLC 4
- Soutine’s Last Journey (The Swiss List), by Ralph Dutli (Author), Katharina Rout (Translator)
- Still Foolin’ ‘Em, by Billy Crystal SMCL 8 + other formats
- The Chosen Wars, by Steven R. Weisman SMCL 5
- The Color of Water, by James McBride SMCL 23 + other formats **
- The English Teacher, by Yiftach Reicher Atir SMCL 1
- The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, by Giorgio Bassani SMCL 3 **
- The Last Confessions of Sylvia P, by Lee Kravetz SMCL 19 + 31 on order + other formats
- The Last Train to London, by Meg Waite Clayton SMCL 12 + other formats
- The Rules Do Not Apply, by Ariel Levy SMCL 17 + other formats
- The Spinoza Problem, by Irvin D. Yalom SMCL 4 + 1 in Russian!
- When a Crocodile Eats the Sun, by Peter Godwin SMCL 4 **
- Women in Viet Nam: The Oral History, by Ron Steinman
Authors
- Jennifer Rosner: If A Tree Falls: A Family’s Quest to Hear and Be Heard (2010), The Yellow Bird Sings (2020), Once We Were Home (2023) SMCL Yellow Bird 6
- Ethan Canin- anything by this author SMCL 7 titles – which one?
- Meg Wolitzer
Suggestions from Rabbi Moshe
I had someone recently ask me about false messiahs, of which I recall there were at least a few well-known cases in Jewish history. One was Sabbetai Zevi and another was Jacob Frank. I then remembered that Jay Michaelson just finished writing a book on Jacob Frank and I bought it on Kindle. It’s excellent! Even though it’s a scholarly work, well-researched and notated, it reads like an historical novel because it’s so intriguing.
You can read or listen about it here:
By the way, the book by Gershom Scholem on Sabbetai Zevi is also fascinating. Scholem suggested that it was this failed messianic movement that led to the Reform movement. Interesting theories abound.
Book Club in a Box
A wonderful resource is Book Club in a Box, which we get through the generosity of the Jewish Community Library.
Recently added to Book Club in a Box:
- Signal Fires, by Dani Shapiro
- Shanda, by Letty Cottin Pogrebin
- Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, by Gabrielle Zevin
- The Tenth Muse, by Catherine Chung
- Shtum, by Jem Lester
- Atomic Anna, by Rachel Barenbaum
- Jacobo’s Rainbow, by David Hershberg
Coming this summer to Book Club in a Box::
- Kantika, by Elizabeth Graver
- One Hundred Saturdays, by Michael Frank
- The Oppermanns, by Lion Feuchtwanger
See the full list of Books available