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Discussion Books, Resources and Activities for 2024
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LAVA discussed (or will soon discuss) the following books during 2024. Click book names for reading resources, or browse month by month. Resources for books read in other years are also available.
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| January |
We met at church for a combined pot luck dinner and business meeting to exchange opinions on books on the 2024 voting list. Here are the voting results.
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| February |
River of the Gods: Genius, Courage, and Betrayal in the Search for the Source of the Nile
by Candice Millard. 282 pages, 2022.
This work of non-fiction tells the story of the 1854 British expedition to locate the source of the Nile River. New York Times: "River of the Gods is a lean, fast-paced account of the almost absurdly dangerous quest by those two friends turned enemies, Richard Burton and John Speke, to solve the geographic riddle of their era." Wall Street Journal: "The centerpiece of Ms. Millard's book goes beyond harrowing and into the ghastly." Washington Post: "Perhaps as a corrective to the Anglocentrism of earlier accounts, she brings a third figure into the foreground: Sidi Mubarak Bombay, a formerly enslaved African who acted as guide and interpreter for Burton, Speke and several other explorers over the years."
A forty-two-minute interview with the author about this book at the Library of Congress.
Several reviews of the book.
The Wikipedia articles on Richard Burton, John Speke, Sidi Mubarak Bombay, and Isabel Burton.
In 1865, Richard Burton published Wit and Wisdom from West Africa: Or, A Book of Proverbial Philosophy, Idioms, Enigmas, and Laconisms. In 1885, he published his translation of the controversial The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, more often called The Arabian Nights.
In 1876, Isabel Burton published The Inner Life of Syria, Palestine, and the Holy Land.
A three-minute video about the massive Nile River basin.
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| March |
An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us by Ed Yong, 355 pages, 2022
This book explores the world of creatures that experience the world in ways that humans can only imagine: sensing the earth's magnetic field; sensing vibrations in the ground or in plants; listening for the echo of sounds they emit; feeling the "shape" of faint currents in the water as they swim. The Times (London): "It prompts a radical rethink about the limits of what we know -- what the world is, even." New York Times: "Nature's true wonders aren't limited to a remote wilderness or other sublime landscape ... There is as much grandeur in the soil of a backyard garden as there is in the canyons of Zion." The author earlier won the Pulitzer Prize for journalism. This book was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award.
Reviews of the book.
The Wikipedia article about the author.
The author's website.
A forty-eight-minute video interview with the author about this book.
A thirteen-minute video of a TED talk by Daniel Kish, a blind person who navigates the world by listening for the echo he generates by clicking with his tongue.
A five-minute video about treehoppers, insects that communicate by vibrating the plants they are standing on.
A six-minute BBC video about echolocation.
On page 215, the author says that kangaroo rats hear so well they can detect a rattlesnake in the process of striking. Here is a two-minute video from National Geographic that shows the resulting escapes.
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| April |
The Cold Millions by Jess Walter, 337 pages, 2021.
This work of historical fiction centers on the 1909 free speech fight in Spokane, Washington as two orphaned brothers become involved with the radical Industrial Workers of the World. One brother is pressured to switch his loyalties to the local power broker in exchange for the other's release from prison. Many of the characters are based on real people.
The author's website features a must-see video of the author narrating "The Cold Millions - A Literary Tour". It explains a lot about old Spokane.
Several reviews of the novel.
The Wikipedia articles about the Spokane free speech fight, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn and the Industrial Workers of the World.
The National Endowment for the Arts made this novel part of their "Big Read" program. Their web page about the book includes a summary of its content, a biographical sketch of the author, and list of discussion questions.
A short interview with the author in the form of 21 questions ands answers.
A hour-long video of Jess Walter in discussion with Amor Towles, another author, about The Cold Millions.
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| May |
Joan is OK by Weike Wang, 224 pages, 2022.
Joan is a workaholic doctor who flies to Shanghai for her father's funeral and returns before the weekend is over so she won't miss any shifts. Her mother then travels to the U.S. just before the pandemic hits, despite the lack of a driver's license and a good command of English. New York Times: "Joan ... is solitary, literal-minded and extremely awkward - all of which contribute to the hilarity of this novel."
The Wikipedia article on the author.
The author's website.
Several reviews of the novel.
A one-hour video of an interview with the author. Fast forward to the five minute mark for the beginning of the interview.
Joan's brother had a huge home in Greenwich, Connecticut. Here is a collection of images of the mansions there.
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| June |
Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout, 288 pages, 2022.
As the covid lockdowns begin, Lucy Barton is taken by her ex-husband William, who is still her friend, from Manhattan to a little house in a little town in Maine, where they stay for several months and try to deal with their complex past lives. This is the fourth novel in which Strout features Lucy Barton. Irish Times: "If, like me, you find you're 'over Covid', to the extent that you've no interest in reading a fictional retelling, Lucy by the Sea will change your mind ... The strangeness of the pandemic is made fresh through the kind of considered detail and clarity of insight that is so often missing in the moment." The author won the Pulitzer Prize for a previous novel.
Several reviews of the book.
The Wikipedia article about the author.
The author's web site.
A forty-five minute video interview the author about this book. Fair warning: the sound fades in and out.
Toward the end of the book (page 277), Lucy and her two daughters meet at the duck pond in Central Park in Manhatten.
An article in the New Yorker called "Elizbeth Strout's Long Homecoming" that discusses her rural, small-town roots.
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