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DISCUSSION GUIDES
- 1.The Library of Lost Dollhouses: Enchanting Fiction with a Historical Twist
"This beautiful page-turner kept me reading all night.” —Janet Skeslien Charles, New York Times bestselling author of The Paris Library
"This one’s an absolute gem.” —Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author of The Stolen Queen
When a young librarian discovers hidden historic dollhouses in her library, she embarks on an unexpected journey that reveals surprising secrets about the lost miniatures.
Tildy Barrows, Head Curator of a beautiful archival library in San Francisco, is meticulously dedicated to the century’s worth of inventory housed in her beloved Beaux Art building. She loves the calm and order in the shelves of books and walls of art. But Tildy’s life takes an unexpected turn when she, first, learns the library is on the verge of bankruptcy and, second, discovers two exquisite never-before-seen dollhouses.
After finding clues hidden within these remarkable miniatures, Tildy sets out to decipher the secret history of the dollhouses, aiming to salvage her cherished library in the process. Her journey introduces her to a world of ambitious and gifted women in Belle Époque Paris, a group of scarred World War I veterans in the English countryside, and Walt Disney’s bustling Burbank studio in the 1950s. As Tildy unravels the mystery, she finds not only inspiring, hidden history, but also a future for herself—and an astonishing familial revelation.
Spanning the course of a century, The Library of Lost Dollhouses is a warm, bright, and captivating story of secrets and love that embraces the importance of illuminating overlooked women.
- 2.Wait for Me: A Novel
A READ WITH JENNA TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB PICK
“Wait for Me left me speechless...An absolutely gorgeous exploration of friendship, authenticity, and the power that a few strings and a well-written lyric can wield.” ―Shelby Van Pelt, author of Remarkably Bright Creatures
From the author of Mercury and Shiner comes a novel about the bond between two female folk singers, the love stories that haunt them, and the music that brings them together to burn bright.
Young folk singer Elle Harlow reaches the height of her prowess in 1973, with two wildly beloved albums to her name and a hidden history of impossible heartbreak. When she sets foot on the famed Grand Ole Opry stage, a far cry from the mountain that raised her, Elle gives the biggest performance of her life. Then, to the dismay of shocked fans, her producer, and the man who still loves her, she vanishes.
Almost two decades later, eighteen-year-old Marijohn Shaw is spending her summer pumping gas, writing songs on her broken mandolin, and longing for a mother. Her father, Abe, has always sworn he was the last person to see Elle Harlow alive, but when a meteor strikes the woods of their sleepy Pennsylvania town and a piece of Elle’s past emerges from the wreckage, the truth of her disappearance sets fire to everything Marijohn believes about herself, her music, and her ability to love with abandon.
Wait for Me exalts the lush hills of Appalachia and the bright lights of Nashville as it reveals the legacy of Elle Harlow, the bold voice that defined her, the intimate betrayal that undid her, and the unexpected faith of another young woman determined to resurrect her. - 3.A House in the Sky: A Memoir“Exquisitely told…A young woman’s harrowing coming-of-age story and an extraordinary narrative of forgiveness and spiritual triumph.” —The New York Times Book Review
Amanda Lindhout’s unforgettable hostage memoir recounts her fifteen-month abduction in Somalia and her extraordinary journey toward hope and redemption in this powerful true story of survival, resilience, and forgiveness.
As a child, Amanda Lindhout escaped a violent household by paging through issues of National Geographic and imagining herself visiting its exotic locales. At the age of nineteen, working as a cocktail waitress, she began saving her tips so she could travel the globe. Aspiring to understand the world and live a significant life, she backpacked through Latin America, Laos, Bangladesh, and India, and emboldened by each adventure, went on to Sudan, Syria, and Pakistan. In war-ridden Afghanistan and Iraq she carved out a fledgling career as a television reporter. And then, in August 2008, she traveled to Somalia—“the most dangerous place on earth.” On her fourth day, she was abducted by a group of masked men along a dusty road.
Held hostage for 460 days, Amanda survives on memory—every lush detail of the world she experienced in her life before captivity—and on strategy, fortitude, and hope. When she is most desperate, she visits a house in the sky, high above the woman kept in chains, in the dark.
Vivid and suspenseful, this gripping survival memoir is “a searingly unsentimental account. Ultimately it is compassion—for her naïve younger self, for her kidnappers—that becomes the key to Lindhout’s survival” (O, The Oprah Magazine). - 4.Home Again: A NovelNATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the author The Women, a moving, powerful novel about the fragile threads that bind together our lives and the astonishing potential of second chances
“A tender, beautifully told story of emotional growth, forgiveness [and] the possibility of miracles.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
Madelaine Hillyard is a world-famous heart surgeon at the top of her game. Her personal life is far less successful. A loving but overworked single mom, she is constantly at odds with her teenage daughter. At sixteen, Lina is confused, angry, and fast becoming a stranger to her mother—a rebel desperate to find the father who walked away before she was born. Complicating matters for Madelaine are the vastly different DeMarco brothers: While priest Francis DeMarco is always ready to lend a helping hand, his brother, Angel, long ago took on the role of bad boy. Years earlier Angel abandoned Madelaine—and fatherhood—to go in search of fame and fortune. His departure left Madelaine devastated, but now he reappears and seeks help from the very people he betrayed—as a patient in dire need. - 5.Unaccustomed Earth (Vintage Contemporaries)#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the bestselling, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Interpreter of Maladies: These eight stories take us from Cambridge and Seattle to India and Thailand, as they explore the secrets at the heart of family life.
“Glorious.... Showcases a considerable talent in full bloom.” —San Francisco Chronicle
In the stunning title story, Ruma, a young mother in a new city, is visited by her father who carefully tends her garden–where she later unearths evidence of a love affair he is keeping to himself. In “A Choice of Accommodations,” a couple’s romantic getaway weekend takes a dark turn at a party that lasts deep into the night. In “Only Goodness,” a woman eager to give her younger brother the perfect childhood she never had is overwhelmed by guilt, anguish and anger when his alcoholism threatens her family. And in “Hema and Kaushik,” a trio of linked stories–a luminous, intensely compelling elegy of life, death, love and fate–we follow the lives of a girl and boy who, one fateful winter, share a house in Massachusetts. They travel from innocence to experience on separate, sometimes painful paths, until destiny brings them together again years later in Rome.
Unaccustomed Earth is rich with the author’s signature gifts: exquisite prose, emotional wisdom, and subtle renderings of the most intricate workings of the heart and mind. It is the work of a writer at the peak of her powers. - 6.Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham LincolnOne of the most influential books of the past fifty years, Team of Rivals is Pulitzer Prize–winning author and esteemed presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin’s modern classic about the political genius of Abraham Lincoln, his unlikely presidency, and his cabinet of former political foes.
Winner of the prestigious Lincoln Prize and the inspiration for the Oscar Award winning–film Lincoln, starring Daniel Day-Lewis, directed by Steven Spielberg, and written by Tony Kushner.
On May 18, 1860, William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, Edward Bates, and Abraham Lincoln waited in their hometowns for the results from the Republican National Convention in Chicago. When Lincoln emerged as the victor, his rivals were dismayed and angry.
Throughout the turbulent 1850s, each had energetically sought the presidency as the conflict over slavery was leading inexorably to secession and civil war. That Lincoln succeeded, Goodwin demonstrates, was the result of a character that had been forged by experiences that raised him above his more privileged and accomplished rivals. He won because he possessed an extraordinary ability to put himself in the place of other men, to experience what they were feeling, to understand their motives and desires.
It was this capacity that enabled Lincoln as president to bring his disgruntled opponents together, create the most unusual cabinet in history, and marshal their talents to the task of preserving the Union and winning the war.
We view the long, horrifying struggle from the vantage of the White House as Lincoln copes with incompetent generals, hostile congressmen, and his raucous cabinet. He overcomes these obstacles by winning the respect of his former competitors, and in the case of Seward, finds a loyal and crucial friend to see him through.
This brilliant multiple biography is centered on Lincoln's mastery of men and how it shaped the most significant presidency in the nation's history. - 7.Flight of Dreams: A NovelFrom the New York Times bestselling author of The Frozen River, this “enthralling nail-biter” (People) of a novel brings the fateful voyage of the Hindenburg to life.
“At every page a guilty secret bobs up; at every page Lawhon keeps us guessing. Who will bring down the Hindenburg? And how?”—New York Times Book Review
On the evening of May 3, 1937, ninety-seven people board the Hindenburg for its final, doomed flight. Among them are a frightened stewardess who is not what she seems; the steadfast navigator determined to win her heart; a naive cabin boy eager to earn a permanent position; an impetuous journalist who has been blacklisted in her native Germany; and an enigmatic American businessman with a score to settle.
Over the course of three champagne-soaked days, their lies, fears, agendas, and hopes for the future will be revealed—and one will set in motion a plot with devastating consequences for them all. - 8.Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the UniverseNow a major motion picture starring Max Pelayo, Reese Gonzales, and Eva Longoria!
A Time Best YA Book of All Time (2021)
The award-winning, internationally renowned book that is a “tender, honest exploration of identity” (Publishers Weekly) and distills lyrical truths about family and friendship through the unlikely connection between two teens.
Aristotle is an angry teen with a brother in prison. Dante is a know-it-all who has an unusual way of looking at the world. When the two meet at the swimming pool, they seem to have nothing in common. But as the loners start spending time together, they discover that they share a special friendship—the kind that changes lives and lasts a lifetime.
And it is through this friendship that Ari and Dante will learn the most important truths about themselves and the kind of people they want to be. - 9.Crime and Punishment (Penguin Classics)The classic novel of guilt and redemption from one of Russia's greatest novelists
Raskolnikov, a destitute and desperate former student, wanders through the slums of St Petersburg and commits a random murder without remorse or regret. He imagines himself to be a great man, a Napoleon: acting for a higher purpose beyond conventional moral law. But as he embarks on a dangerous game of cat and mouse with a suspicious police investigator, Raskolnikov is pursued by the growing voice of his conscience and finds the noose of his own guilt tightening around his neck. Only Sonya, a downtrodden prostitute, can offer the chance of redemption.
This vivid translation by David McDuff has been acclaimed as the most accessible version of Dostoyevsky’s great novel, rendering its dialogue with a unique force and naturalism. This edition also includes a chronology of Dostoyevsky’s life and work. - 10.John of John (Oprah's Book Club): A Novel
NAMED A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2026 BY THE NEW YORK TIMES, WASHINGTON POST, LOS ANGELES TIMES, TIME, OPRAH DAILY, AND VOGUE
"So immersive, so all-encompassing, that I felt like I was living in it."--Ann Patchett
From the Booker Prize-winning and New York Times bestselling author of Shuggie Bain and Young Mungo comes a vivid, moving novel following a young man returning to his Hebridean island home, a portrait of a father's expectations and a son's desires
Out of money and with little to show for his art school education, John-Calum Macleod takes the ferry back home to the Isle of Harris in the Outer Hebrides to find that little has changed except for him. He returns to the windswept croft and the two pillars of his childhood: his father John, a sheep farmer, tweed weaver, and lay preacher in the local Presbyterian church, and his maternal grandmother Ella, a profanity-loving Glaswegian whose steady warmth helped Cal weather the sudden departure of his mother.
Cal privately wonders if any lonely men might be found on the barren hillsides of home, while John is dismayed by his son's long hair, strange clothes, and seeming unwillingness to be Saved. But Cal isn't the only one in the croft house who is keeping secrets. As lambing season turns to shearing season, the threads holding together the community together become increasingly frayed, and nothing will remain as it was before.
John of John is a singular novel about duty, passion, and the transformative power of the truth. It is a magnificent literary work that cements Douglas Stuart's reputation as one of our greatest novelists working today.