Book Suggestions for Reading Groups

BHPL's own reference librarian, the one who leads our Friday morning and Tuesday evening book groups, has combed through piles of best books lists, bibliographies and readers' advisory resources to produce the following list, alphabetical by title.

14 Sisters of Emilio Montez O'Brien by Oscar Hijuelos
Adventure of English by Melvyn Bragg
Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund
All but the Waltz by Mary Clearman Blew
Almost Americans by Patricia Justiniani McReynolds
Among Schoolchildren by Tracy Kidder
Are You Mine? By Abby Frucht
At Play in the Fields of the Lord by Peter Matthiesen
Bastard Out of Carolina by Dorothy Allison
Beggars in Spain by Nancy Kress
Betsey Brown by Ntozake Shange
Bloodlines by Susan Conant
Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe
Broken Cord by Michael Dorris
Buffalo Tree by Adam Rapp
Cage by Audrey Schulman
Carmichael's Dog by R. M. Koster
Cave by Jose Saramago
Close to the Knives by David Wojnarowicz
Coming into the Country by John McPhee
Conscience and Courage by Eva Fogelman
Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett
Crick Crack Monkey by Merle Hodge
Dad by William Wharton
Dancing at the Rascal Fair by Ivan Doig
Deadwood by Pete Dexter
Defiance by Carole Maso
Disturbing the Universe by Freeman Dyson
Dollmaker by Harriette Arnow
Dream West by David Nevin
Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
Fair is Fair by Sharon Creeden
Family History by Dani Shapiro
First Lady of Dos Cacahuates by Harriet Rochlin, from the Desert Dwellers Trilogy
Floatplane Notebooks by Clyde Edgerton
Forgotten by Eli Wiesel
Front Runner by Patricia Nell Warren
Gastronomical Me by M. F. K. Fisher
George Eliot: Voice of a Century by Frederick R. Kari
Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen
Good Morning, Midnight by Jean Rhys
Gorillas in the Mist by Dian Fossey
Green Berets by Robin Moore
Hard Evidence by John Lescoat
Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
Hero's Walk by Anita Rau Badami
Hollywood by Gore Vidal
House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros
I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
Ida Mae Tutweiler and the Traveling Tea Party by Ginnie Siena Bivona
Immigrant's Daughter by Howard Fast
Indian Country by Philip Caputo
Intruder in the Dust by William Faulkner
It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis
Jazz by Toni Morrison
Joseph Andrews by Henry Fielding
Jump-off Creek by Molly Gloss
Kennedy for Defense by George Higgins
La Maravilla by Alfredo Vea Jr.
Language of Threads by Gail Tsukiyama
Law of Similars by Chris Bohjalian
Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin
Live at Five by David Hynes
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
Love Always by Ann Beattie
Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Madame Curie: A Biography by Eva Curie
Making History by Eric Marcus
Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sacks
Mary Barton, A Tale of Manchester Life by Elizabeth Gaskell
Memento Mori by Muriel Spark
Mirror by Lynn Freed
My Life as a Dog by Reidar Jonsson
Nick Adams Stories by Ernest Hemingway
Nightwood by Djuna Barnes
Norma Jean the Termite Queen by Sheila Ballantyne
Notches by Peter Bowen
October Suite by Maxine Clair
Old New York by Edith Wharton
Original Sins by Lisa Alther
Paint the Yellow Tiger by Dong Kingman
Patchwork Planet by Anne Tyler
Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men Against the Sea by Sebastian Junger
Physicists by Friedrich Durrenmatt
Pleading Guilty by Scott Turow
Praying for Base Hits by Bruce Clayton
Purple America by Rick Moody
Rain or Shine by Cyra McFadden
Rats by Robert Sullivan
Red-Tails in Love: A Wildlife Drama in Central Park by Marie Winn
Return to the Sea by Anne Johnson
Road from Coorain by Jill Ker Conway
Room With a View by E.M. Forster
Rumors of Peace by Ella Leffland
Seize the Day by Saul Bellow
Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Simple Truth by David Baldacci
Slaves in the Family by Edward Ball
Snow by Orhan Pamuk
Someone Not Really Her Mother by Harriet Scott Chessman
Souls Raised from the Dead by Doris Betts
Split by Lisa Michaels
Still Life by A. S. Byatt
Strange But True by John Searles
Summer Lightning by Olive Senior
Taipan by James Clavell
Tending to Virginia by Jill McCorkle
This House of Sky by Ivan Doig
Tiger in the Grass by Harriet Doerr
Tom: The Unknown Tennessee Williams by Lyle Leverich
Trash by Dorothy Allison
Tripmaster Monkey by Maxine Hong Kingston
Turtle Moon by Alice Hoffman
Under the Feet of Jesus by Helena Maria Viramontes
Unsettling of America by Wendell Berry
Venus in Copper by Lindsey Davis
Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee
Waiting for the End of the World by Madison Smartt Bell
War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells
Way to Cook by Julia Child
What the Heart Knows: Milford-Haven by Mara Purl
White Album by Joan Didion
Wildlife by Richard Ford
Winter in the Blood by James Welch
World's End by T. Coraghessan Boyle
You Can't Go Home Again by Thomas Wolfe

I just finished Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon which I highly recommend. My book discussion group all loved it. I thought Stones for Ibarra by Harriet Doerr, her first book written while in her seventies - that should give hope to all late-starting novelists) was terrific and inspired a good discussion in my book group. So her book of short stories, Tiger in the Grass, would be a good bet for a book discussion also, based on the reviews. The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, by renowned neurologist Oliver Sacks, describes several of his most intriguing medical cases. It is a fascinating and sympathetic glimpse into the minds of people who experience the world in very puzzling ways due to various neurological and psychiatric conditions.