Arlington Common Book Club 

 

Book Club Coordinator

 

Robert “Rheo” Aieta retired to “quality of life” Vermont after a 40-year career as a vocational rehabilitation consultant on the West Coast.   During his youth, Robert asked for many conversations to be repeated and he progressed from one to two hearing aids at the same time the record industry went from hi-fi to stereo, so he was given the nickname “Stereo” which has evolved to “Rheo”.  He enjoys living in Arlington but misses being part of a local book club.  Rheo can be reached at rheo@comcast.com or (360) 529-1450.

 

Format

 

Initial book for discussion will be The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe.  The first meetings will  be to discuss the book club format.

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participants will be invited to recommend three books by email. At our next meeting, we can discuss the recommendations and explain our suggestions. Everyone can also research book reviews online.  All selections will be then tabulated for voting to choose the books for the next six to twelve months.  Picking several books months in advance will allow for more flexibility with purchasing and reading the books than month-to-month selection.

 

This will be a multi-genre book club, including fiction, non-fiction, biographical, and educational books. The next page includes a sampling of books selected by the voting process when Rheo participated in a previous book club.

 

When

 

Second Thursday of the month, at noon, beginning on May 12th.

If there is sufficient interest, an evening alternate time will be considered for the same book titles.

Mask wearing will be optional

 

Potential Book Titles

Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens

The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towle

The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World       

By The Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, and Douglas Carlton Abrams.

All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie                                   Barrows

Final Gifts by Maggie Callahan and Patricia Kelley

Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson

The Postmistress by Sarah Blake

Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell

Dear Life by Alice Munro

Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline.

The Japanese Lover by Isabel Allende

Sighing Woman Tea by Mark Seiler

In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom by Yeonmi Park

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich

The Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett by Annie Lyons

Breathe: A Letter to My Sons by Imani Perry

Clock Dance by Anne Tyler

The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Street

A Pilgrimage to Eternity by Timothy Egan

The Girl Who Wrote in Silk by Kelli Estes

The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng. 

The Overstory by Richard Powers

Strangers in Their Own Land by Arlie Russell Hochschild

The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker

The Library Book by Susan Orlean

To the Bright Edge of the World by Eowyn Ivey

Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan

A Woman of No Importance:  The Untold Story of the Spy Who           

Helped Win WW ll by Sonia Purnell

Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson

Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders

The Sea Runners by Ivan Doig

Educated by Tara Westover

Found: A Life in Mountain Rescue by Bree Loewen

Any Human Heart by William Boyd

The Woman Who Smashed Codes by Jason Fagone

Last Bus to Wisdom by Ivan Doig

Clementine by Sonia Purnell

My Notorious life: A Novel by Kate Manning.

Journey of Souls: Case Studies of Lives Between Lives by Michael Newton, Ph.D.