Book Club

Love to read? In the grand tradition of passing on a great book to a friend, we invite you to share and discuss your reading experience with fellow book lovers. Our Book Club meets on the third Thursday of each month at 10am in The Other Cup, September through May. Even if you haven’t read the book we’re discussing, you may still enjoy the conversation. You are welcome to arrive at 9:30am for fellowship; our discussion begins at 10am. All are invited to join our book club, a beloved group that has been part of life at Saint Barnabas for over 30 years. Read below for this month’s book reading. Questions? Contact the church office.

Please note: May 21 is our last session of this season. We will break for the summer and resume in September.

May 21 – Demon Copperhead, by Barbara Kingsolver

Demon Copperhead is set in the mountains of southern Appalachia. This is the story of a boy born to a teenage single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father’s good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit, and a fierce talent for survival. In a plot that never pauses for breath, relayed in his own unsparing voice, he braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing losses. Through all of it, he reckons with his own invisibility in a popular culture where even the superheroes have abandoned rural people in favor of cities.

Many generations ago, Charles Dickens wrote David Copperfield based on his experience as a survivor of institutional poverty and its effects on children in his society. Those problems have yet to be solved in ours. Dickens is not a prerequisite for readers of this novel, but he provided its inspiration. In transposing a Victorian epic novel to the contemporary American South, Barbara Kingsolver enlists Dickens’ anger and compassion, and above all, his faith in the transformative powers of a good story. Demon Copperhead speaks for a new generation of lost boys, and all those born into beautiful, cursed places they can’t imagine leaving behind.

 (Source: Goodreads.com)

Questions? Please email Karen Talus.