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The Downtowners book group at Kansas City Public Library is the fastest growing book group at Central. The group members do a great job of talking up the group among coworkers and friends, and they are very welcoming to new readers. They are an eclectic group of readers and have always been open to anything as long as it’s discussable. Here’s what lies in store for the coming year.

January: In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia  Alvarez–This book has been so popular there are no copies left for the facilitator to read! And it’s not available as an ebook, either. I see this as a good thing. Everyone is eager to read this book and they’ll be talking so much, no one will notice I didn’t get to read the book.

February: City of Thieves by David Benioff–An official selection of the KCPL Adult Winter Reading Program Destination: Anywhere! I’ve discussed this book before and it has great appeal for men and teens. I wrote about it for BGB here.

March: The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon–Another suggested title off the Destination: Anywhere! list. It has also been a book group favorite nationwide.

April: Destiny of the Republic by Candice Millard–A great nonfiction choice with appeal to readers of all ages from a Kansas City author. I discussed this book in December with the Kansas City Star/KCPL FYI book group.

May: The Paris Wife by Paula McLain–One of the Downtowners’ suggested this title. This group likes to read historical fiction in the warm months. They enjoyed Loving Frank by Nancy Horan and this novel is a good readalike.

June: Why Read Moby-Dick? by Nathaniel Philbrick–I will be encouraging some group members to listen to Philbrick read his own homage to an American classic.

July: A Novel Bookstore by Laurence Cosse–This is the title that made the list because I want to read it.

August: Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward–Downtowners will be the last of my book groups to read this year’s National Book Award winner.

September: Just Kids by Patti Smith–Another suggestion from a member of Downtowners. We like memoirs and this one is stellar.

October: The Turn of the Screw by Henry James–Just in time for Halloween, we’ll be reading this classic novella and watching the film version for a Read It/Watch It.

November: Tinkers by Paul Harding–Award winners are a favorite of this book group and one of the members campaigned for this indie fave novel.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 2nd, 2012 at 9:55 am and is filed under Adult Books, Fiction, Good Books for Book Clubs, Nonfiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.