Books for Book Clubs

Instead of seeking revenge or sinking into hatred, in this personal account of his life, Gaza doctor Izzeldin Abuelaish is calling for the people of the Middle East to start talking to each other.

(15 copies)     Reserve

Thornton Blackburn is hardly a household name, but he was an important figure in the history of American slavery. In “I’ve Got a Home in Glory Land,” the historian and archaeologist Karolyn Smardz Frost rescues him from obscurity and shows how he helped make Canada a safe haven for fugitive slaves.

(15 copies)     Reserve

Henrietta Lacks was not a famous woman, but her cells are known to scientists as "HeLa". She was a poor black woman whose cells - taken without her knowledge in the 1950s - became critically important to medical research due to their unique properties. HeLa was used to aid in developing some vaccines, cloning, and for in vitro fertilization. The book tells a true story of medical ethics, law, poverty and race.

(15 copies)     Reserve

A half-Indian, half-English boy raised in the wealthy family, is cast out in the streets when the truth is reveled of his real parentage. Accustomed to the living in the lap of luxury and unqualified to care for himself, Pran is forced to reinvent himself in his struggle to survive.

(15 copies)     Reserve

Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks is assigned to work on a case that the Yorkshire police department considers to be somewhat of a joke. The skeleton of a woman wrapped in World War II blackout curtains has been found in a dried-out reservoir. This man-made watering hole was a village--Hobbs End--that had been flooded many years earlier. Through the journal of a major player we realize early on who the dead woman is, but a large part of the fun is watching Banks and an edgy, attractive female cop put the pieces of the puzzle together.

(12 copies)     Reserve

True crime story about how two released convicts made their way to western Kansas and changed the town of Holcomb forever.

(10 copies)     Reserve

An East Indian and his sister living in Kenya spend their lives caught between the English rulers and the African locals who seek independence

(15 copies)     Reserve

This is an account of the life of the Somali-born Ali and her struggle with her Muslim faith. In it she discusses how her experiences in the poitical chaos of Somalia shaped her views. She was born into a family of desert nomads, subjected to circumcision and educated by radical imams. Later she was forced into marriage in Canada. On her way there, in the transit hall of Schiphol, she decided to ask for asylum in the Netherlands.

(13 copies)     Reserve

A young man leaves a comfortable life with an education and well to do parents and just wander into the wild.

(10 copies)     Reserve

Barry Laverty, a recent graduate, is uncertain about what type of medicine he should practice when he answers an ad for a physician assistant in a small town in Northern Ireland populated by eccentrics.

(20 copies)     Reserve