The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

Tuesday, March 22, 7:00 pm

Joan Didion's memoir The Year of Magical Thinking is about grieving for her husband, fellow writer John Gregory Dunne. The couple had been married since 1964 when Dunne died of a heart attack at the end of 2003. His death came suddenly, just as the couple was sitting down to dinner after visiting their gravely ill daughter in the hospital. In her memoir, Didion contemplates how the rituals of daily life are fundamentally altered when her life's companion is taken from her. Her impressions, both sharply observed and utterly reasonable, form a picture of an intelligent woman grappling with her past and future.

Meetings are the 3rd Tuesday of the month at 7:00 pm

Please pre-register by calling 419-586-4442 or emailing Connie Gray at grayco@oplin.org

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Stout

Tuesday, February 22, 7:00 pm

Olive Kitteridge, the 2008 “novel in stories” by Elizabeth Strout won the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. The title character appears in all thirteen stories in the book in a variety of ways following the flow of her life from middle age into old age. At times stern, at other times patient, at times perceptive, at other times in sad denial, Olive Kitteridge, a retired schoolteacher, deplores the changes in her little town of Crosby, Maine, and in the world at large, but she doesn’t always recognize the changes in those around her. As the townspeople grapple with their problems: a lounge musician haunted by a past romance; a former student who has lost the will to live; Olive’s own adult child, who feels tyrannized by her irrational sensitivities; and her husband, Henry, who finds his loyalty to his marriage both a blessing and a curse, Olive is brought to a deeper understanding of herself and her life–sometimes painfully, but always with ruthless honesty. Olive Kitteridge offers profound insights into the human condition–its conflicts, its tragedies and joys, and the endurance it requires. 

Meetings are the 3rd Tuesday of the month at 7:00 pm

Please pre-register by calling 419-586-4442 or emailing Connie Gray at grayco@oplin.org

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

Tuesday, January 18th, 7:00 pm

The Corrections is a 2001 novel of social criticism by American author Jonathan Franzen. The satirical family drama drew widespread critical acclaim, earned Franzen a National Book Award, and was a finalist for the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. The book revolves around the troubles of the Lambert family, an elderly Midwestern couple and their three adult children and their attempts to get together for one last Christmas.

Meetings are the 3rd Tuesday of the month at 7:00 pm

Please pre-register by calling 419-586-4442 or emailing Connie Gray at grayco@oplin.org

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer

Tuesday, November 16th, 7:00 pm

Drawn together by their love of books and affection for each other, the unforgettable characters of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society collectively tell a moving tale of endurance and friendship. Through the chorus of voices they have created, Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows have composed a rich tale that celebrates the power of hope and human connection in the shadows of war. 

Meetings are the 3rd Tuesday of the month at 7:00 pm

Please pre-register by calling 419-586-4442 or emailing Connie Gray at grayco@oplin.org

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

Tuesday, October 19th, 7:00 pm

Born a generation apart and with very different ideas about love and family, Mariam and Laila are two women brought jarringly together by war, by loss and by fate. As they endure the ever escalating dangers around them-in their home as well as in the streets of Kabul-they come to form a bond that makes them both sisters and mother-daughter to each other, and that will ultimately alter the course not just of their own lives but of the next generation. With heart-wrenching power and suspense, Hosseini shows how a woman's love for her family can move her to shocking and heroic acts of self-sacrifice, and that in the end it is love, or even the memory of love, that is often the key to survival.A stunning accomplishment, A Thousand Splendid Suns is a haunting, heartbreaking, compelling story of an unforgiving time, an unlikely friendship, and an indestructible love.  (From an Amazon Online Review) Meetings are the 3rd Tuesday of the month at 7:00 pm Please pre-register by calling 419-586-4442 or emailing Connie Gray at grayco@oplin.org