Friday Night Knitting Club

Synopsis

Juggling the demands of her yarn shop and single-handedly raising a teenage daughter has made Georgia Walker grateful for her Friday Night Knitting Club. Her friends are happy to escape their lives too, even for just a few hours. But when Georgia's ex suddenly reappears, demanding a role in their daughter's life, her whole world is shattered.

Luckily, Georgia's friends are there, sharing their own tales of intimacy, heartbreak, and miracle making. And when the unthinkable happens, these women will discover that what they've created isn't just a knitting club: it's a sisterhood.

Condi: The Life of a Steel Magnolia

Synopsis

An in-depth look at the life, faith, and achievements of one of America's most fascinating women.

Condoleezza Rice rose from humble beginnings in racially segregated Alabama to become an accomplished classical pianist, Stanford University professor and provost, US national security advisor, and secretary of state. In this gripping and inspiring book, Mary Beth Brown artfully explores the roles played in Condi's life by her parents, mentors, faith, and key events and how those things have prepared her for her present position of power and global influence.

In 2005, Condi topped Forbes' list of the world's most powerful women. In 2007, she topped GQ's ranking of Washington's most powerful players. Not only does she appeal to moderates and Republicans, she draws women, African Americans, and Hispanic voters from the Democratic Party. Additionally, Condi may emerge as a strong vice presidential candidate, a possibility the book explores.

Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict

Synopsis

In this Jane Austen–inspired comedy, love story, and exploration of identity and destiny, a modern LA girl wakes up as an Englishwoman in Austen’s time.

The Other Boleyn Girl

Synopsis

Two sisters competing for the greatest prize: the love of a king

When Mary Boleyn comes to court as an innocent girl of fourteen, she catches the eye of Henry VIII. Dazzled by the king, Mary falls in love with both her golden prince and her growing role as unofficial queen. However, she soon realizes just how much she is a pawn in her familys ambitious plots as the kings interest begins to wane and she is forced to step aside for her best friend and rival: her sister, Anne. Then Mary knows that she must defy her family and her king, and take her fate into her own hands.

A rich and compelling tale of love, sex, ambition, and intrigue, The Other Boleyn Girl introduces a woman of extraordinary determination and desire who lived at the heart of the most exciting and glamorous court in Europe and survived by following her own heart.

My Sister's Keeper

Synopsis

Anna is not sick, but she might as well be. By age thirteen, she has undergone countless surgeries, transfusions, and shots so that her older sister, Kate, can somehow fight the leukemia that has plagued her since childhood. The product of preimplantation genetic diagnosis, Anna was conceived as a bone marrow match for Kate — a life and a role that she has never challenged...until now. Like most teenagers, Anna is beginning to question who she truly is. But unlike most teenagers, she has always been defined in terms of her sister — and so Anna makes a decision that for most would be unthinkable, a decision that will tear her family apart and have perhaps fatal consequences for the sister she loves.

My Sister's Keeper examines what it means to be a good parent, a good sister, a good person. Is it morally correct to do whatever it takes to save a child's life, even if that means infringing upon the rights of another? Is it worth trying to discover who you really are, if that quest makes you like yourself less? Should you follow your own heart, or let others lead you? Once again, in My Sister's Keeper,Jodi Picoult tackles a controversial real-life subject with grace, wisdom, and sensitivity.

Earthly Pleasures

Synopsis

When Skye Sebring, a hospitality greeter inside the pearly gates of Heaven, meets lawyer Ryan Blaine during his brush with death after a motorcycle accident, she falls so deeply in love that she follows him back to Earth, a world with strange customs she knows nothing about — until she discovers that all of life's lessons can be learned from the lyrics of five Beatles songs.

Loving Frank

Synopsis

I have been standing on the side of life, watching it float by. I want to

swim in the river. I want to feel the current.

So writes Mamah Borthwick Cheney in her diary as she struggles to justify her clandestine love affair with Frank Lloyd Wright. Four years earlier, in 1903, Mamah and her husband, Edwin, had commissioned the renowned architect to design a new home for them. During the construction of the house, a powerful attraction developed between Mamah and Frank, and in time the lovers, each married with children, embarked on a course that would shock Chicago society and forever change their lives.

In this groundbreaking historical novel, fact and fiction blend together brilliantly. While scholars have largely relegated Mamah to a footnote in the life of America’s greatest architect, author Nancy Horan gives full weight to their dramatic love story and illuminates Mamah’s profound influence on Wright.

Drawing on years of research, Horan weaves little-known facts into a compelling narrative, vividly portraying the conflicts and struggles of a woman forced to choose between the roles of mother, wife, lover, and intellectual. Horan’s Mamah is a woman seeking to find her own place, her own creative calling in the world, and her unforgettable journey, marked by choices that reshape her notions of love and responsibility, leads inexorably to this novel’s stunning conclusion.

The First Book

The first book we chose to read was Echo Park by Michael Connelly

Synopsis

In 1995, Marie Gesto disappeared after walking out of a supermarket in Hollywood. Harry Bosch worked the case but couldn't crack it, and the 22-year-old woman never turned up, dead or alive. Now Bosch is in the Open-Unsolved Unit, where he still keeps the Gesto file on his desk, when he gets a call from the DA. A man accused of two heinous killings is willing to come clean about several other murders, including the killing of Marie Gesto. Bosch must now take Raynard Waits's confession and get close to the man he has sought - and hated - for eleven years. But when Bosch learns that he and his partner missed a clue back in 1995 that could have led them to Gesto's killer - and that would have stopped nine murders that followed - he begins to crack.