Nevermore: After the Cataclysm, Force of Nature, Family Lore, When I'm Dead, To Conjure a Killer, This Time Tomorrow

 Reported by Kristin 

 

We had a small group on this very cold day, but it was nice to Zoom in and talk books!

 

First up, one reader discussed After the Cataclysm: Volume II: The Political Economy of Human Rights by Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman. Covering Western influenced political movements in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, Chomsky and Herman come together again to look at how the United States is involved in the political regimes of many other world countries. Our reader expressed her fraught emotions that so many lives have been lost, decades past and continuing to the present day.

 

Another more life affirming book was mentioned by the same reader: Force of Nature by Joan M. Griffin. The non-fiction work tells the tale of three women friends, all 50-somethings, who set off to walk the beautiful John Muir trail in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California. Our reader noted that alongside the description of the beauty and difficulty of the trail, the author included nitty-gritty details such as the relief of receiving food and clothing packages, including the delight of being able to put on clean underclothing after days of hiking. This comes highly recommended!

 

Another reader is just getting into another new book, Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo. Dominican American Flor has a special gift--she can predict when someone will die. When Flor announces to her family that she wants to have a living wake, their responses are generally along the line of "Oh no, is Flor going to die soon??"

 

When I'm Dead by Hannah Morrissey interested one of our book club members, with the main characters being a husband and wife team, a police detective and a medical examiner, respectively. When bodies of their teenage daughter's friends start showing up, and then their daughter goes missing, these parents must race against the clock as they investigate the murders of the young women.

 

Clea Simon's Witch Cats of Salem series returned to Nevermore with the fourth in series To Conjure a Killer. Main character Becca is part of a young coven based in Cambridge, all members working earnestly to cast spells. Little does she know that her mystical feline friends may be the ones who have more substantial power. When Becca's ex-boyfriend shows up (dead), guess who is a prime suspect? 

 

Another recent book read was This Time Tomorrow by Emma Straub. Our reader said this was another time travel or time slipping book which she keeps finding in her reading pile. Alice goes out to celebrate her 40th birthday with her lifelong best friend. Her life is okay, but somewhat mundane, and she is dealing with anticipatory grief for her hospitalized father. But when she wakes up the next morning in her childhood home with her father at the table, she realizes she has returned to her 16th birthday, and perhaps a chance to live her life a little differently. Again, and again, and again.

 

Also mentioned:

 

Sigrid Rides: The Story of an Extraordinary Friendship and an Adventure on Two Wheels by Travis Nelson

Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen

The Haunting on the Hill by Elizabeth Hand

The Fireman by Joe Hill

Weyward by Emilia Hart

Nevermore: Black Like Me, An Elderly Lady Is Up to No Good, Oona Out of Order

 Reported by Garry

Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin is a groundbreaking 1961 non-fiction book recounting the author’s journey through the Deep South of America during segregation.  Griffin, who was a white Texan, underwent medical treatment to darken his skin so he could pass as Black.  He then travelled through Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas and Georgia, documenting his experiences.  According to our reader, Griffin was treated better in New Orleans than elsewhere in the South, but event that is a relative term, as he was still routinely at the receiving end of “hate stares” from white people, and was not able to use restrooms, public transportation or be seated at restaurants.  Our reader was saddened and shocked by the lack of progress that our society has made since Griffin undertook his journey in 1959, but very highly recommends this book for its historical perspective.  CD

An Elderly Lady is Up To No Good by Helene Tursten is the first in her Elderly Lady series.  Maud is an 88 year old grump with no family, few friends, and even fewer qualms about offing those she deems need it.  Maud lives by herself (which is the way she likes it) in her family’s apartment in Gothenburg, spending her time traveling the world and surfing the net, and dabbling in murder, which she not only easily justifies, but gets away with – after all, who would suspect a little old lady of being a cold-blooded murderer?  Our reader loves this book for its quirky irascible leading lady, and her darkly humorous, matter-of-fact ways of deciding who should live and who should be disposed of.  SC

Oona Out of Order by Margarita Montimore.  New Year’s Eve, 1982 - Oona Lockhart will turn 19 at the stroke of midnight, and embark on her adult life.  As the clock counts down, Oona faints and wakes up 32 years in the future, in a now 51 year old body, in a house she is told that she owns, and to the news that every year on the strike of New Year she will jump at random to another time in her body.  Where in her life will she jump to next and who will she be?  Our reader really loved this book and noted that even though Oona may be “old” on the outside, she is still 19 in her mind, a state that many of the Nevermores echoed is the case for them right now.  MH

Other books mentioned:

Southwest Saga:  The Way It Really Was by William C. McGaw

The Lake Wobegon Virus by Garrison Keillor

Emily’s House by Amy Belding Brown

The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

Marmee by Sarah Miller

Mad at the World: A Life of John Steinbeck by William Souder

Three Visitors to Early Plymouth by Emmanuel Altham

They Knew: How a Culture of Conspiracy Keeps America Complacent by Sarah Kendzior

Plain Truth by Jodi Picoult

Theft of an Idol by Dana Stabenow

How it Went by Wendell Berry

Deliberate Cruelty:  Truman Capote, the Millionaire’s Wife, and the Murder of the Century by Roseanne Montillo

Defending Alice:  A Novel of Love and Race in the Roaring Twenties by Richard Stratton

War by Sebastian Junger