The Third Wednesday of the Month
Book Club
2026-2027 Schedule
|
Date |
Book Title |
Description |
Suggested By |
|---|---|---|---|
| September 16 |
Olive, Again |
by Elizabeth Strout (2019) 320 Pages “Olive, Again", the acclaimed 2019 sequel to "Olive Kitteridge", mirrors the original's structure, consisting of 13 interconnected short stories set in Crosby, Maine, tracking Olive as she navigates her seventies into her eighties. The book explores the physical and emotional realities of late-life aging. Olive enters an unexpected second marriage with fellow widower Jack Kennison and continues to navigate a strained, distant relationship with her son Christopher. She drifts in and out of her neighbors' lives, offering her signature blunt, yet profoundly empathetic, perspective on their struggles with grief, secrets, and loneliness. |
Cheryl |
| October 21 |
The Correspondent |
by Virginia Evans (2025) 304 Pages Sybil has throughout her life used letters to make sense of the world and her place in it. Most mornings, Sybil sits down to write letters—to her brother, to her best friend, to the president of the university who will not allow her to audit a class she wants to take, to Joan Didion and Larry McMurtry to tell them what she thinks of their latest books, and to one person to whom she writes often yet never sends the letter. As a mother, grandmother, wife, divorcee, and a distinguished lawyer, Sybil has lived a very full life. But when letters from someone in her past force her to examine one of the most painful periods of her life, she realizes she cannot move forward until she finds it in her heart to offer forgiveness. |
Jennifer & Maxine |
| November 18 |
The Thursday |
by Richard Osman (2020) 382 Pages Crime mystery. In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet up once a week to investigate unsolved murders. But when a brutal killing takes place on their very doorstep, the Thursday Murder Club find themselves in the middle of their first live case. Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim and Ron might be pushing eighty, but they still have a few tricks up their sleeves. This is the first book of a five-book series (as of now). |
Cathy |
| December 16 |
Theo of Golden |
by Allen Levi (2023) 399 Pages One morning, a stranger (Theo) arrives in the small Southern city of Golden. He doesn't explain much about where he came from or why he's there—but when he visits the local coffeehouse, where pencil portraits of the people of Golden hang on the walls, he begins purchasing them, one at a time, and giving each portrait to the person depicted. In exchange, he asks only for the person's story. And so, portrait by portrait, person by person, secrets are revealed, regrets are shared, and ordinary lives are profoundly altered. A story of giving and receiving, of seeing and being seen, Theo of Golden is an unforgettable novel about the power of generosity, the importance of connection, and the quiet miracles that happen when we choose kindness and wonder. |
Maxine |
| January 20 |
Remains of the Day |
by Kazuo Ishiguro (2010) 258 Pages The Remains of the Day is a quiet, deeply emotional novel about a lifelong English butler named Stevens who has devoted himself completely to duty, dignity, and service. The story takes place after World War II. Stevens goes on a road trip through the English countryside to visit Miss Kenton, a former housekeeper he once worked closely with at a grand estate. As he travels, he reflects on his life, his choices, and the emotional sacrifices he made in the name of professionalism and loyalty. On the surface, not much happens. The power of the novel is in what is not said directly. Despite its sadness, it’s also a beautiful meditation on grace and human worth. The ending is especially powerful because Stevens slowly realizes that a meaningful life is not measured only by perfection or sacrifice. |
Trish |
| February 17 |
The Woman |
by Sulari Gentill (2022) 290 Pages A murder mystery that starts off in a crowded library full of book lovers. The tranquility is shattered by a woman's terrified scream. Security guards take charge immediately, instructing everyone inside to stay put until the threat is identified and contained. While they wait for the all-clear, four strangers, who'd happened to sit at the same table, pass the time in conversation and friendships are struck. Each has his or her own reasons for being in the reading room that morning—it just happens that one is a murderer. |
Charlotte |
| March 17 |
The Little Paris Bookshop |
by Nina George (2015) 398 Pages Monsieur Perdu runs a floating bookstore in a barge on the Seine. He prescribes novels for the hardships of life. Using his intuitive feel for the exact book a reader needs, Perdu mends broken hearts and souls. However, he can't seem to heal himself; he's still haunted by heartbreak after his great love disappeared. She left him with only a letter, which he has never opened. After Perdu is finally tempted to read the letter, he hauls anchor and departs on a mission to the south of France, hoping to make peace with his loss and discover the end of the story. Joined by a bestselling but blocked author and a lovelorn Italian chef, Perdu travels along the country’s rivers, dispensing his wisdom and his books, showing that the literary world can take the human soul on a journey to heal itself. |
Maxine |
| April 21 |
Yesteryear |
by Caro Claire Burke (2026) 400 Pages Psychological thriller, dark satire, speculative fiction. A traditional American woman, a beautiful wife and mother who sells her pioneer lifestyle of raw milk and farm-fresh eggs to her millions of social media followers, suddenly awakens cold, filthy, and terrified in the brutal reality of 1805—where she must unravel whether this living nightmare is an elaborate hoax, a twisted reality show, or something far more sinister in this sensational debut novel. |
Cathy |
| May 19 |
The Elegance of the Hedgehog |
by Muriel Barbery (2008) 323 Pages In a bourgeois apartment building in Paris, Renée, the concierge, is all but invisible. She is an intelligent, philosophical, and cultured woman who masks herself as the stereotypical uneducated “super” to avoid suspicion from the building’s pretentious inhabitants. Paloma is a twelve-year-old who lives on the fifth floor. Talented and precocious, she's come to terms with life's seeming futility and decided to end her own on her thirteenth birthday. Until then, she will continue hiding her extraordinary intelligence behind a mask of mediocrity. A wealthy Japanese man named Ozu arrives in the building and Paloma and Renee begin to recognize each other as kindred souls. |
Maxine |
| June 16 |
The Four Winds |
by Kristin Hannah (2021) 464 Pages The Four Winds is a rich, sweeping novel that stunningly brings to life the Great Depression and the people who lived through it—the harsh realities that divided us as a nation and the enduring battle between the haves and the have-nots. A testament to hope, resilience, and the strength of the human spirit to survive adversity, The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation. |
Pat |
| July 21 |
Whistler |
by Ann Patchett (2026) 304 Pages Daphne, a 53-year-old English teacher, unexpectedly encounters Eddie, her former stepfather, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She has not seen him since she was nine years old, when a car crash seemingly shattered his marriage to her mother. After they meet, Daphne feels she “stepped into an open crack in time and fell backwards”. This is a story about bravery, memory, the often small yet consequential moments that define our lives, and the endless stream of loss that in time comes for us all. |
Trish |