Strength in What Remins
by Tracy Kidder

Deo arrives in America from Burundi in search of a new life. Having survived a civil war and genocide, he lands at JFK airport with two hundred dollars, no English, and no contacts. He ekes out a precarious existence delivering groceries, living in Central Park, and learning English by reading dictionaries in bookstores. Then Deo begins to meet the strangers who will change his life, pointing him eventually in the direction of Columbia University, medical school, and a life devoted to healing. Kidder breaks new ground in telling this unforgettable story as he travels with Deo back over a turbulent life in search of meaning and forgiveness.

This meeting will be a joint pot-luck with the evening group. Contact the store for time, location, and directions. Maureen Gibbon will be meeting with us.

Thief
by Maureen Gibbon

Gibbon constructs a taut story of desire in the north woods of Minnesota. Against deep lakes, casinos, and a bar named the Royal, Gibbon's unconventional characters show us how to play the hands we're dealt and own the choices we make, in a tough and tender book about hard-won redemption from one of America's most original writers.

Ojibwe in Minnesota
by Anton Treuer

Ojibwe in Minnesota covers the fur trade, the Iroquois Wars, and Ojibwe-Dakota relations; the treaty process and creation of reservations; and the systematic push for assimilation as seen in missionary activity, movernment policy, and boarding schools.

Treuer also addresses today's controversial topics, covering them frankly and with sensitivity.

The Quickening
by Michelle Hoover

Michelle will be with us by telephone on Wednesday.

Enidina Current and Mary Morrow live on neighboring farms in the flat, hard country of Iowa during the early 1900s. Despite having little in common, Eddie and Mary need one another for survival and companionship. But as the Great Depression threatens, the delicate balance of their reliance on one another tips, pitting neighbor against neighbor, exposing the dark secrets they hide from one another, and triggering a series of disquieting events that threaten to unravel not only their friendship but their families as well.

Little Bee
by Chris Cleve

The publishers of this novel don't want to spoil the story by revealing too much about it. They will say this: It is extremely funny, but the African beach scene is horrific and braids the fates of a 16 year-old Nigerian orphan and a well-off British couple.

The story starts there, but the book doesn't.

And it's what happens afterward that is most important, and the magic is in how it unfolds.

Olive Kitteridge
by Elizabeth Strout

Crosby, Maine, may seem like nowhere, but in this novel it's in essence the whole world, and the lives that are lived there are filled with all of the grand human drama — desire, despair, jealousy, hope, and love.

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 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, mild and dire, 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.

The Kntting Circle
by Ann Hood

After the sudden loss of her only child, Mary Baxter joins a knitting circle in Providence, Rhode Island, as a way to fill the empty hours and lonely days, not knowing that it will change her life. Alice, Scarlet, Lulu, Beth, Harriet, and Ellen welcome Mary into their circle despite her reluctance to open her heart to them. Each woman teaches Mary a new knitting technique, and, as they do, they reveal to her their own personal stories of loss, love, and hope. Eventually, through the hours they spend knitting and talking together, Mary is finally able to tell her own story of grief, and in so doing reclaims her love for her husband, faces the hard truths about her relationship with her mother, and finds the spark of life again.

Cutting for Stone
by Abraham Verghese

Marion and Shiva Stone are twin brothers born of a secret union between a beautiful Indian nun and a brash British surgeon. Orphaned by their mother’s death and their father’s disappearance, bound together by a preternatural connection and a shared fascination with medicine, the twins come of age as Ethiopia hovers on the brink of revolution.

Moving from Addis Ababa to New York City and back again, Cutting for Stone is an unforgettable story of love and betrayal, medicine and ordinary miracles—and two brothers whose fates are forever intertwined.

Irreplaceable
by Stephen Lovely

Alex and Isabel Voormann had a pleasant life in Iowa until Isabel was struck and killed while riding her bicycle. Alex reluctantly complied with her wish to be an organ donor, which saved the life of Janet Corcoran, a 34-year-old Chicago art teacher and mother of two. Lovely thoughtfully weaves the tales of these two families together, tracing the realities of love and loss of all kinds.

Wolf At Twilight
by Kent Nerburn

A note left on a car windshield, the death of an old dog, and the author finds himself back on the Lakota reservation where he traveled more than a decade before with the elder, Dan. The touching, funny, and unforgettable journey that ensues takes the reader deep into reservation boarding school mysteries, the dark confines of sweat lodges, and lonely Native homesteads far back in the Dakota hills. Nerburn's engrossing narrative evokes the Native American way of teaching and learning with a depth that few outsiders ever experience. The Wolf at Twilight offers a touching story that will change the way readers look at our country, our history, and the people who first inhabited this land.

This meeting will be a joint pot-luck with the morning group. Contact the store for time, location, and directions. Maureen Gibbon will be meeting with us.

Thief
by Maureen Gibbon

Gibbon constructs a taut story of desire in the north woods of Minnesota. Against deep lakes, casinos, and a bar named the Royal, Gibbon's unconventional characters show us how to play the hands we're dealt and own the choices we make, in a tough and tender book about hard-won redemption from one of America's most original writers.

Breakfast with Buddha
by Roland Merullo

When Otto's sister tricks him into taking her guru on a trip to their childhood home, Otto is not amused. In Merullo's masterful hands, Otto tells his story with all the wonder and wry humor of a man who unwittingly finds what he's missing in the most unexpected place. And guess what—they go through Park Rapids on their trip!

Seeking Peace:
Chronicles of the World Buddhist in the World
by Mary Pipher

As a wife, mother, and therapist, Pipher sought to learn about the world and help others. But after the surprising success of Reviving Ophelia, she found herself overwhelmed by the demands on her time and attention. In 2002, she suffered a breakdown. Pipher realized that success and fame were harming her, and she needed a quieter, more meditative life that would carry her toward self-acceptance and joy. In Seeking Peace, she tells her own remarkable story, and in the process reveals truths about everyone's search for happiness and love.

Valeria's Last Stand
by Marc Fitten

The Hungarian village of Zivatar may be isolated, but it is not completely immune to the changes sweeping the country. The Soviets have left, and the villagers are warming to the blessings of capitalism—expensive cars, cheap women, and California fruit. It's all too much for Valeria, the village grouch. And yet, she isn't immune to change, either. A routine trip to the market leads to unexpected love, and sets off a chain reaction through the entire village. Valeria's Last Stand contemplates love, lust, tradition, and transition with wisdom and warmth.

That Old Cape Magic
Richard Russo

For Griffin, all paths and memories, converge at Cape Cod. The Cape is where he took his childhood summer vacations, where he and his wife, Joy, honeymooned, where they decided he’d leave his LA screenwriting job to become a college professor, and where they celebrated the marriage of their daughter Laura’s best friend. But when their beloved Laura’s wedding takes place a year later, Griffin is caught between chauffeuring his mother’s and father’s ashes in two urns and contending with Joy and her large, unruly family. Both he and she have also brought dates along. How in the world could this have happened?

Cutting for Stone
by Abraham Verghese

Marion and Shiva Stone are twin brothers born of a secret union between a beautiful Indian nun and a brash British surgeon. Orphaned by their mother’s death and their father’s disappearance, bound together by a preternatural connection and a shared fascination with medicine, the twins come of age as Ethiopia hovers on the brink of revolution.

Moving from Addis Ababa to New York City and back again, Cutting for Stone is an unforgettable story of love and betrayal, medicine and ordinary miracles—and two brothers whose fates are forever intertwined.