Book Club I
All Book Club I articles are collected here.
Book Club I in DecemberEvent Date:Planning meeting for 2025. More... |
Book Club I October: Should We Stay or Should We GoEvent Date:Should We Stay or Should We Go by Lionel Shriver. More... |
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Book Club I September: 'Half-Life of a Secret'Event Date:Judy Helgen will lead the discussion of Half-Life of a Secret by Emily Strasser, the story of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, when the UMRA Book Club meets at 2 p.m. on Friday, September 20, via Zoom. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘The Bookbinder’ by Pip WilliamsEvent Date: The story takes place in Oxford, England, between 1914 and 1920. As men are sent to the continent to fight in the Great War, women in England work to keep the nation going. Peggy and Maude are twin sisters who work together binding books for the Oxford University Press. More... |
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How Stella Learned to TalkEvent Date:Laura Ericksen will lead the discussion of How Stella Learned to Talk by Christina Hunger, a true story by a speech-language pathologist who taught her dog, Stella, to communicate using buttons associated with different words. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘Scoop’ by Evelyn WaughEvent Date: Named “one of the 1,000 novels everyone should read” by the Guardian newspaper, Evelyn Waugh’s satirical portrayal of foreign correspondents and British journalism in the 19th century drew mixed reviews from members of UMRA’s Book Club I. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law’Event Date: Author Mary Roach has gone around the world to collect stories of animal behavior that has come into conflict with humans and to describe the measures that humans have taken to reach compromises to allow the animals and humans to live in harmony. She is a superb researcher and has a witty way of writing. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘The Scarlet Letter’Event Date: Set in the 1600s in a small town in Puritan New England, 'The Scarlet Letter' by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a story of sin, cowardice, and survival. Members of the UMRA Book Club found the writing to be laborious, riddled with many words no longer in use, and wondered why the novel was on high school reading lists. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘The Other Einstein’Event Date: In 'The Other Einstein,' an historical novel about the life of Albert Einstein’s first wife, Mileva Marić, author Marie Benedict speculates that Marić contributed significantly to the papers and relativity theory that are attributed to Einstein. The book raises several questions. More... |
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Book Club I to discuss E. M. Forster's masterpiece 'Howards End'Event Date:Pat Tollefson will lead the discussion of E. M. Forster’s classic work Howard’s End when the UMRA Book Club meets on Friday, February 16. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘Fox Creek’Event Date: Set in the Northwoods of Minnesota, 'Fox Creek,' the 19th book in the Cork O’Connor mystery series by William Kent Krueger, is about the conflict between Native and white people in the use of natural resources in both the U.S. and Canada. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘Strongmen from Mussolini to the Present’Event Date: The topic covered by this well-researched and carefully documented history is depressing but very important as the battle between democracy and autocracy continues around the world today. More... |
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'The Dictionary of Lost Words'Event Date:Mary Jane Towle will lead the discussion of The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘Lessons in Chemistry’Event Date: The UMRA Book Club discussion of Elizabeth Zott’s novel brought to light several real-life examples of discrimination against women close to home, including their exclusion from full participation in the University of Minnesota Marching Band until 1972 and the landmark Rajender v. University of Minnesota sex discrimination lawsuit filed in 1973. More... |
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Book Notes | ‘The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane’Event Date: Although it represents exhaustive research and is engrossing, Lisa See’s novel about a young woman who becomes a tea entrepreneur in China and the daughter she gives up for adoption by a family in Southern California drew mixed reactions from members of UMRA’s Book Club I. More... |
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