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Here is our current booklist at a glance. Click the
novel's picture, the book name, or choose either the PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF
link to access a detailed summary of both the novel and the details
offered by BOOKCLUB-IN-A-BOX.
In each guide you will receive a wealth of information that cannot be found anywhere else!
Special Offer
The discussion guide to
The Known World (Edward P. Jones),
Middlesex (Jeffrey Eugenides),
Small Island (Andrea Levy) and
Bel Canto (Ann Patchett) are now offered at a special introductory price: printed guide is $16.80 and the PDF downloadable file is $6.80.
Shipping is free until August 31, 2008
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF version. Click on the
title for more information.
Discussion Guides and PDF's
Anil’s Ghost
(Michael Ondaatje)
In Anil’s Ghost, Michael Ondaatje presents an intimate and detailed picture of the costs and pain of the civil war in Sri Lanka, as uncovered through the novel’s main character, Anil, a Sri-Lankan-born, American-trained forensic anthropologist.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The Ash Garden (Dennis Bock)
The Ash Garden
tells the story of Emiko, a child victim of the bombing of
Hiroshima; Sophie, a child survivor of the Holocaust; and Anton, a
German national who joined the effort in the West to develop and use
the atom bomb for the purpose of ending the war. These three people
are joined together by a shared history, a shared loss and a shared
grief.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Atonement (Ian McEwan)
Thirteen-year-old Briony makes up stories and plays and is mesmerized by the potential of the imaginary world and by the power of words. McEwan looks closely at the impact that words have on one’s consciousness and behavior.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Bel Canto (Ann Patchett)
Ann Patchett’s novel Bel Canto
is a fictional account of the actual 1996 siege of the Japanese
Embassy in Peru. What should be narrated as a tense and terse
action-filled tragedy, turns out to be a human story told with
warmth and sardonic humor.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
A Complicated Kindness (Miriam Toews)
Miriam Toews describes a community where individual skills and emotions are held in strict check by the Mennonite leadership of the town.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The Corrections (Jonathan Franzen)
In this fast-paced and funny novel, Jonathan Franzen tells the story of Enid and Alfred Lambert, and their three grown children, Gary, Chip and Denise. It is Enid’s goal to bring her family back together for a Christmas celebration; a last chance to have everyone together before something serious happens to Alfred, a fast-failing Parkinson’s disease victim. This is the novel that Oprah Winfrey ‘de-listed’ from her television book club.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
the curious incident of the dog in the night-time (Mark Haddon)
Mark Haddon takes you inside the exceptional mind of Christopher Boone, a young man who suffers from Asperger’s
Syndrome, a condition associated with autism.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Deafening (Frances Itani)
As the surviving number of WWI veterans dwindle in number and become forever silent, Frances Itani seeks to recreate the words and thoughts of the participants of this war. Itani
highlights the soundless world of the deaf against the constant
noise of battle.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Disgrace (J. M. Coetzee)
This
Booker Prize winner by J.M. Coetzee is well named. From the
disgraceful affair of a middle-aged professor with a student, to the
disgrace of an entire country reeling from the after-effects of
Apartheid, this novel will leave you breathless.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Elizabeth and After (Matt Cohen)
The story of Elizabeth and After begins dramatically with Elizabeth’s death. The narrative thread follows the tormented and broken Carl, who had driven the car the night his mother was killed. Cohen offers choices to his emotionally damaged characters in order to see if these choices might make a difference to their futures.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions.
A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
It is 1975 and Indira Gandhi has declared a State of Emergency in India. Rohinton Mistry vividly portrays the tragedy of human suffering and the dignity of the human spirit during this time. His four main characters manage to sew together the scraps of their individual lives to create a strong, supportive family.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Fugitive Pieces (Anne Michaels)
Anne Michaels explores how the chance and circumstance of life is measured against the power of love. The novel is set during and after WWII and links the stories of two men – Jakob and Ben – both of whom are lost and found through love.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The
Girls (Lori Lansens)
Lori
Lansens’ fantastic novel, The Girls, brings us the
extraordinary story of Rose and Ruby Darlen, conjoined twins. They
are physically connected at the head and because of that they have
never looked into each other’s eyes.
Available in an ACROBAT PDF
Novel Notes version
The Hours (Michael Cunningham)
Michael Cunningham seamlessly weaves together the stories of three women, set in three locations during three different time periods. One of the characters is a fictional Virginia Woolf, while the other two, despite being wholly distinct personalities, portray other aspects of the real Virginia Woolf.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The Human Stain (Philip Roth)
Nathan Zuckerman, Philip Roth's favorite narrator, is at it again, discussing the human condition and the human characteristics that stain that existence.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
In
his first novel, The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini
uses the story of two boys, Amir and Hassan, to show the human faces
behind the historic events in Afghanistan, during three turbulent
decades in the country’s history.
Available in
PRINTED or
ACROBAT PDF versions
Novel Notes: Mini-guides
Deconstructing Herzog
Novel Notes is the Bookclub-in-a-Box mini-guide to Saul Bellow’s novel, Herzog. Saul Bellow uses his character, Moses Herzog, to discuss and discover the meaning of being one human being among others. This novel is Bellow’s most autobiographical. Bookclub-in-a-Box looks at Bellow’s philosophy of writing, his values and ethical perspective, as well as his views on interpersonal relationships.
Available only in ACROBAT PDF version.
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New Guides
The guides to The Memory Keeper’s Daughter (Kim Edwards) and The Shadow of the Wind (Carlos Ruiz Zafon) will be published shortly. Watch the
What’s New section for announcements.
The Known World (Edward P. Jones)
This Pulitzer prize-winning novel highlights a little known fact of American history: black slaves belonging to black slave owners. Henry Townsend, a black slave owner, dies as the novel opens. Everyone wonders what will happen next.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
We
join Pi on his life's journey – from his childhood in Pondicherry,
through his oceanic struggle alone in a lifeboat with only a Bengal
tiger for a companion, to his rescue and afterlife in Canada.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
In
Alice Sebold’s story, fourteen-year-old Susie Salmon is murdered.
Many readers might stop reading right there, but that would mean
missing Sebold’s unique perspective on life and death, and it would
mean not getting to know her unusual narrator, Susie, who tells her
story from heaven.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The Mark of the Angel (Nancy Huston)
In her novel, Nancy Huston sets the story of a love triangle between Raphael, a Parisian flautist, Andras, a Holocaust survivor, and the enigmatic young Saffie, a German national, against the backdrop of the French-Algerian conflict of the 1960s.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions.
Middlesex (Jeffrey Eugenides)
Transformation, identity, fate, destiny, crime and punishment are just some of the themes that are unraveled for readers in the Bookclub-in-a-Box discussion guide for this Pulitzer prize-winning novel.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Moonlight on the Avenue of Faith (Gina B. Nahai)
Gina Nahai tells the lovely story of Roxanna the Angel, who disappears one night when her daughter is five years old. Her story is set in the Iranian-Jewish community, first in the years prior to the fall of the Shah in 1979, and later, in California, where many of these Jews emigrated.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The Namesake (Jhumpa Lahiri)
American-born
Gogol Ganguli is linked to the Bengali culture through his parents.
However, his name, Gogol, connects him to the immensely talented but
psychologically wounded Russian author, Nikolai Gogol. Jumpha
Lahiri’s Gogol has a big problem with identity.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Never Let Me Go
(Kazuo Ishiguro)
The future is now and it is quite frightening as Ishiguro tells it. Listen to Kathy H., a cloned human being, as she tells her incredible story.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Oryx and Crake (Margaret Atwood)
Oryx
and Crake, by Margaret Atwood is a classic futuristic story
about life as we may soon know it. The story follows Snowman (Jimmy)
back through his memories to unravel how a technologically driven
world spiraled out of control. Oryx and Crake was first
released in 2003, but it is scarily relevant to our world today.
Available in
PRINTED or
ACROBAT PDF versions
The Plot Against America (Philip Roth)
Philip
Roth imagines that American hero, Charles Lindbergh, has won the
presidency of the United States away from the other grand American
hero of the time, Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
Into
the Belgian Congo’s jungle comes a narrow-minded American missionary
from America’s deep South, along with his wife and four daughters.
These five women tell the tale of the family's unexpected
relationship with the Congo against the backdrop of America's
relationship with Africa.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
The River Midnight (Lilian Nattel)
The River Midnight tells a story of the friendship of four women who were born and raised in a small village (the shtetl, Blaszka). The place is Poland and the date is the late 1800s, a time in history that is nestled between tragic events. The novel is a day-to-day diary of a slice of Jewish life not overshadowed by the Holocaust.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Small Island (Andrea Levy)
Small Island is a delightfully entertaining and probing book about Jamaican immigration to Britain in the days after World War II.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions.
A Student of Weather (Elizabeth Hay)
The
student of the title, Maurice Dove, arrives from lush Ontario to
study weather patterns in the bleak Canadian prairies. He becomes
the object of fascination for the two sisters, Lucinda and Norma
Joyce.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Suite Française (Irène Némirovsky)
Irène
Némirovsky’s novel is extraordinary as a fiction, as a witness to an
ongoing history, and as its own mystery. Written in 1942 and
published in 2004, this novel has taken quite a journey.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
A Thousand Splendid Suns (Khaled Hosseini)
A
Thousand Splendid Suns, the new novel by Khaled Hosseini
brings us the female perspective of how hard life is in Afghanistan,
a story which he began in his first novel, The
Kite Runner.
Available in
PRINTED or
ACROBAT PDF versions
The Time Traveler's Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)
The Time Traveler’s Wife is the romantic and tender story of an unusual love affair. Clare meets Henry when she is 6 and he is 36 years of age; Henry meets Clare when he is 28 and she is 20. Niffenegger frees their relationship from the traditional definitions of time and love.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
To The Lighthouse (Virginia Woolf)
Come along with Bookclub-in-a-Box and the Ramsay family on a journey To The Lighthouse.
This novel is Virginia Woolf’s favorite and most autobiographical
book. Find out about Virginia Woolf, the woman, the wife, and the
writer.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
True History of the Kelly Gang (Peter Carey)
True History of the Kelly Gang
is the story of Australian outlaw-turned-hero Ned Kelly. In this
novel, Peter Carey has captured the essence of a character, who has
risen to mythical proportions in Australia. As Carey explores Ned’s
story, he also explores the mythology of Australia, the country.
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
Water For Elephants (Sara Gruen)
Come
along with Bookclub-in-a-Box as we run away to the circus. Sara
Gruen’s fantastic novel presents Jacob Jankowski as a
ninety-something senior looking back on the exciting, romantic,
difficult, and often tragic days of circus life during the Great
Depression era.
Available in
PRINTED or
ACROBAT PDF versions
The Way The Crow Flies (Ann-Marie Macdonald)
Ann-Marie Macdonald tells a graphic tale of murder, false accusation, cruelty and slavery, based on true history. The novel is her vehicle for exploring the following questions: How often do we make irreversible decisions based on assumptions instead of fact? On convenience instead of truth?
Available in PRINTED or ACROBAT PDF versions
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