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Book ClubBook ClubBook ClubBook Club Fiction List of Titles

2010

Monica ALI, Brick Lane - Monica Ali's gorgeous first novel

is the deeply moving story of one woman, Nazneen, born in

a Bangladeshi village and transported to London at age

eighteen to enter into an arranged marriage. Gradually she is

transformed by her experience, and begins to question

whether fate controls her or whether she has a hand in her

own destiny.

Isabel ALLENDE, Ines of My Soul - This magisterial work

of historical fiction recounts the astonishing life of Ines

Suarez, a daring Spanish conquistadora who toiled to build

the nation of Chile--and whose vital role has too often been

neglected by history.

Niccolao AMMANITI, I’m not Scared - When Michele Ami-

trano stumbles onto a boy held prisoner in a hole deep in the

Italian countryside, he begins a journey that will lead him to a

series of startling discoveries. I'm Not Scared is a powerful

tale of how one boy finds the courage to overcome his fear,

risk his life, and make wrenchingly difficult moral choices.

Margaret ATWOOD, The Blind Assassin – This is an award

winning novel which opens with these simple, resonant words:

"Ten days after the war ended, my sister Laura drove a car off

a bridge." They are spoken by Iris, whose terse account of her

sister's death in 1945 is followed by an inquest report pro-

claiming the death accidental. But just as the reader expects

to settle into Laura's story, Atwood introduces a novel-within-a

-novel.

Jane AUSTEN, Persuasion - How far should one yield to

persuasion from older, wiser, loving people? When is advice

interference? In Jane Austen’s last completed work her

characteristic incisiveness gains an autumnal tone.

Murray BAIL, Eucalyptus - A fable-like novel from prize-

winning Australian writer Bail poses an age-old question:

How do you win a woman's heart?

Muriel BARBERY, The Elegance of the Hedgehog - The book

follows events in the life of a concierge, Renée Michel, whose

deliberately concealed intelligence is uncovered by an unstable

but intellectually precocious girl named Paloma. Paloma and

Renee hide their true talents and their finest qualities from a

world they suspect cannot or will not appreciate them. But every-

thing changes when a new tenant arrives, a wealthy Japanese

man named Ozu.

Mary Ann SHAFFER and Annie BARROWS, The Guernsey

Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - January 1946: London

is emerging from the shadow of the Second World War, and

writer Juliet Ashton is looking for her next book subject. Who

could imagine that she would find it in a letter from a man she’s

never met, a native of the island of Guernsey, who has come

across her name written inside a book by Charles Lamb….

Alan BENNETT, The Uncommon Reader - By turns cheeky

and charming, the novella features the Queen herself as its

protagonist. When her yapping corgis lead her to a mobile li-

brary, Her Majesty develops a new obsession with reading.

John BOYNE, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas - A story of

innocence existing within the most terrible evil, this is the fic-

tional tale of two young boys caught up in events entirely be-

yond their control.

Charlotte BRONTE, Jane Eyre - A novel of intense power

and intrigue, Jane Eyre (1847) dazzled and shocked read-

ers with its passionate depiction of a woman's search for

equality and freedom.

Olive Ann BURNS, Cold Sassy Tree - Cold Sassy Tree is

a 1984 novel by Olive Ann Burns. Set in a fictional Georgia

town called Cold Sassy during 1905-1906, it follows the life

of young Will Tweedy, and explores themes such as relig-

ion, death, and social taboos. It is light, funny and tender.

Liz BYRSKI, Gang of Four - Gang of Four is a very differ-

ent coming-of-age story in that the protagonists are all in

their fifties. Author Liz Byrski does a superb job of crafting

four very different stories which overlap, diverge and merge

again throughout the book.

Truman CAPOTE, In Cold Blood – In Cold Blood weaves a

complicated psychological story of two parolees who together

commit a mass murder of a family in Kansas, an act they

were not capable of individually. Capote's book also details

the lives of the victims and the effect the crime had on the

community where they lived. A pioneering book of True

Crime.

Anthony CAPELLA, The Various Flavours of Coffee – A

passionate adventure set against the backdrop of the coffee

trade. Stretching from London to Africa at the turn of the last

century, The Various Flavours of Coffee is a sweeping saga of

forbidden love, trade secrets, and the playfully delicious story

of a young man’s coming-of-age.

Peter CAREY, His Illegal Self - His Illegal Self is the story of

Che. Raised in isolated privilege by his New York grandmother,

he is the precocious son of radical student activists at Harvard in

the late sixties. An achingly beautiful story of the love between a

young woman and a little boy.

Chris CLEAVE, The Other Hand - It is extremely funny, but

the African beach scene is horrific. The story starts there, but

the book doesn't. And it's what happens afterward that is

most important.

Paul COELHO, The Alchemist - The Alchemist is an alle-

gorical novel first published in 1988. It follows Santiago, a

young boy Spanish shepherd, on a journey to fulfill his Per-

sonal Legend. It has been hailed as a modern classic. The

plot is inspired by Jorge Luis Borges' short story: Tale of two

dreamers.

J.M. COETZEE, Disgrace – The Booker Prize winner in

1999, Disgrace is the story of a South African professor of

English descent who loses everything: his reputation, his

job, his peace of mind, his good looks, his dreams of artistic

success, and finally even his ability to protect his cherished

daughter.

Joseph CONRAD, Heart of Darkness - Recounts Mar-

low's physical and psychological journey deep into the

heart of the Belgian Congo in search of the mysterious

trader Kurtz.

Anita DIAMANT, The Red Tent - The Red Tent tells the story

of Dinah from the Bible, daughter of Jacob and sister of Jo-

seph, a talented midwife and proto-feminist. The book's title re-

fers to the tent in which women of Jacob's tribe must, according

to the ancient law, take refuge while menstruating or giving

birth, and in which they find mutual support and encourage-

ment from their mothers, sisters and aunts.

Charles DICKENS, Great Expectations - On Christmas Eve,

young Pip, an orphan being raised by his sister and her hus-

band, encounters a convict in the village churchyard. The man,

who has escaped from a prison ship, scares Pip into stealing

him some food and a file to grind away his leg shackle. This

incident is crucial: firstly, it gives Pip, who must steal the goods

from his sister's house, his first taste of true guilt, and sec-

ondly, Pip's kindness warms the convict's heart. The convict,

however, waits many years to truly show his gratitude.

Robert DREWE, The Shark Net - Aged six, Robert Drewe

moved with his family from Melbourne to Perth, the world's most

isolated city - and proud of it. This sun-baked coast was inno-

cently proud, too, of its tranquillity and friendliness. Then a man

he knew murdered a boy he also knew…

Kim EDWARDS, The Memory Keeper’s Daughter - A doctor

delivers his own twins, and upon seeing that the daughter has

Down's syndrome, tells his nurse to take the baby to an institu-

tion and never reveal the secret. The nurse disappears into an-

other city to raise the child herself in this tale of redemptive love

and long-buried secrets that unfolds over a quarter of a century.

James ELLROY, The Black Dahlia - The murder of a beau-

tiful young woman in 1947 Los Angeles sparks a great in-

vestigation in which Bucky Bleichert, Lee Blanchard,

L.A.P.D. Warrants Squad cops, ex-boxers, friends, and ad-

versaries become obsessed by the case.

Laura ESQUIVEL, Like Water for Chocolate - Earthy,

magical, and utterly charming, this tale of family life in tum-

of-the-century Mexico became a best-selling phenomenon

with its winning blend of poignant romance and bittersweet

wit.

Jeffery EUGENIDES, Middlesex - The story of Calliope

Stephanides, who discovers at the age of fourteen that she is

really a he. Cal traces the story of his transformation and the

genetic condition that caused it back to his paternal grandpar-

ents, who happen also to be brother and sister, and the

Greek village of Bithynios in Asia Minor.

F. Scott FITZGERALD, The Great Gatsby - Jay Gatsby is

the man who has everything. But one thing will always be out

of his reach. Set in 1920’s America.

Richard FLANAGAN, The Unknown Terrorist - The Un-

known Terrorist makes use of the post-911 worldwide fear

of terror attacks as the driving force behind this savagely

relevant novel. We are taken on a nightmare ride through a

city that has been whipped up into an "alarmed, not alert"

frenzy.

Helen GARNER, The Spare Room - Helen prepares her

spare room for her friend Nicola, who is flying down from

Sydney for a three-week visit. But this is no ordinary visit -

Nicola has advanced cancer. She is coming to Melbourne to

receive treatment she believes will cure her.

Robert GOOLRICK, A Reliable Wife - He placed a notice in a

Chicago paper, an advertisement for "a reliable wife." She re-

sponded, saying that she was "a simple, honest woman." She

was, of course, anything but honest, and the only simple thing

about her was her single-minded determination to marry this

man and then kill him, slowly and carefully, leaving her a

wealthy widow, able to take care of the one she truly loved.

Philippa GREGORY, The Other Boleyn Girl - 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....

Kate GRENVILLE, The Idea of Perfection - The Idea of

Perfection is a romance between two people who have

given up love. Set in rural New South Wales, Douglas

Cheeseman and Harley Savage first clash over the conser-

vation of the old bridge, but eventually a closer relationship

develops.

Sara GRUEN, Water for Elephants - Though he may not

speak of them, the memories still dwell inside Jacob

Jankowski's ninety-something-year-old mind, memories of

himself as a young man, tossed by fate onto a rickety train

that was home to the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular

Show on Earth.

David GUTERSON, Snow Falling on Cedars - San Piedro

Island, north of Puget Sound, is a place so isolated that no

one who lives there can afford to make enemies. But in

1954 a local fisherman is found suspiciously drowned, and

a Japanese American named Kabuo Miyamoto is charged

with his murder.

Mark HADDON, The Curious Incident of the dog in the

night-time - Christopher John Francis Boone knows all the

countries of the world and their capitals and every prime

number up to 7,057. He relates well to animals but has no

understanding of human emotions. He cannot stand to be

touched. And he detests the color yellow. This improbable

story of Christopher's quest to investigate the suspicious

death of a neighborhood dog makes for one of the most

captivating, unusual, and widely heralded novels in recent

years.

Rosalie HAM, The Dressmaker - Peopled with exotic char-

acters, this is a story of love, hate and haute couture, set in

a country town that's disconcerting to visit but a bitingly co-

medic and heart-breaking place to live.

Thomas HARDY, Tess of the D’Urbervilles - When Tess

Durbeyfield is driven by family poverty to claim kinship with

the wealthy D'Urbervilles and seek a portion of their family

fortune, meeting her 'cousin' Alec proves to be her downfall.

Joseph HELLER, Catch 22 - Set in the closing months of

World War II, in an American bomber squadron on a small

island off Italy. Its hero is a bombardier named Yossarian,

who is frantic and furious because thousands of people he

hasn't even met keep trying to kill him. (He has decided to

live forever even if he has to die in the attempt.)

Victoria HISLOP, The Island - A richly enchanting novel of

lives and loves unfolding against the backdrop of the Medi-

terranean during World War II, The Island is an enthralling

story of dreams and desires, of secrets desperately hidden,

and of leprosy's touch on an unforgettable family.

Kazuo ISHIGURO, Never Let Me Go - As a child, Kathy–

now thirty-one years old–lived at Hailsham, a private school

in the scenic English countryside where the children were

sheltered from the outside world, brought up to believe that

they were special and that their well-being was crucial not

only for themselves but for the society they would eventually

enter. Kathy had long ago put this idyllic past behind her,

but when two of her Hailsham friends come back into her

life, she stops resisting the pull of memory.

Lloyd JONES, Mr Pip - Matilda lives on an island some-

where in the Pacific-but this is no paradise. Civil war is a fact

of life, though at first the village is largely left alone by the

soldiers and the rebel fighters. The school is closed but then

Mr Watts, the only white man on the island, steps forward to

do what he can to help. He begins by reading Great Expec-

tations aloud to his students…

Adib KHAN, Spiral Road - Masud Alam has lived in Austra-

lia for the past 30 of his 53 years. Now his father, Abba, is

dying, drifting in a haze of Alzheimer′s, and Masud has re-

turned to Bangladesh to say goodbye and to reconnect with

his family.

Sue Monk KIDD, The Secret Life of Bees - The Secret

Life of Bees is the story of Lily, a fourteen-year-old girl who

runs away from her unloving father to search for the secrets

of her dead mother's past.

Barbara KINGSOLVER, Poisonwood Bible – The story is

told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce,

evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the

Belgian Congo in 1959. What follows is a suspenseful epic of

one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction

over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa.

Harper LEE, To Kill a Mockingbird - To Kill a Mockingbird

was Lee's first novel. The book is set in Maycomb, Alabama,

in the 1930s. Atticus Finch, a lawyer and a father, defends a

black man, Tom Robinson, who is accused of raping a poor

white girl, Mayella Ewell

Marina LEWYCKA, A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian -

In this comedic debut novel, two feuding sisters team to save

their father, an elderly Ukrainian widower (and author of a book

on tractors) living just outside of London, from the very young,

voluptuous Valentina, who is attempting to seduce him (and his

money).

Alexander MCCALL SMITH, No.1 Ladies Detective Agency -

This first novel in Alexander McCall Smith's widely acclaimed The

No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series tells the story of the delight-

fully cunning and enormously engaging Precious Ramotswe. Im-

mediately upon setting up shop in a small storefront in Gaborone,

she is hired to track down a missing husband, uncover a con man,

and follow a wayward daughter.

Cormac MCCARTHY, All the Pretty Horses – The tale of

John Grady Cole, who at sixteen finds himself at the end of a

long line of Texas ranchers, cut off from the only life he has

ever imagined for himself. With two companions, he sets off

for Mexico on a sometimes idyllic, sometimes comic journey

Ian MCEWAN, On Chesil Beach - Ian McEwan's novel

about a disastrous wedding night brings the grand narrative

of history to bear on the small picture of individual lives.

Monica MCINERNEY, A Taste for it - Laura Carmody's off

on the trip of a lifetime. A talented chef, she's traveling

around Ireland for a month to promote Australian food and

wine.

Hugh MACKAY, Winter Close - Winter Close, a small cul-

de-sac, is home to an eclectic group of people, including

Tom. Tom is pleasant but conscious not to pry. So it comes

as a shock to discover that his reserved, introverted manner

may have isolated him from the rest of the residents. In fact

he might not know them as well as he thinks…

Gabriel Garcia MARQUEZ, Love in the Time of Cholera -

Florentino Ariza has never forgotten his first love. He has waited

nearly a lifetime in silence since his beloved Fermina married

another man. No woman can replace her in his heart. But now

her husband is dead…

Yann MARTEL, The Life of Pi - The only survivor from the wreck of a cargo ship on the Pacific, 16 year old Pi spends 221 days on a lifeboat with a hyena, a zebra (with a broken leg), a female orang-utan and a 450-pound Royal Bengal Tiger called Richard Parker ...

Alex MILLER, Journey to the Stone Country - Betrayed by

her husband, Annabelle Beck retreats from Melbourne to her

old family home in tropical North Queensland where she meets

Bo Rennie, one of the Jangga tribe. Intrigued by Bo's claim that

he holds the key to her future, Annabelle sets out with him on a

path of recovery that leads back to her childhood and into the

Jangga's ancient heartland.

Roffey MONIQUE, The White Woman on the Green Bicycle -

When George and Sabine Harwood arrive in Trinidad from Eng-

land. George instantly takes to their new life, but Sabine feels

isolated, heat-fatigued, and ill at ease with the racial segregation

and the imminent dawning of a new era.

Kate MORTON, The Forgotten Garden - On the night of

her twenty-first birthday, Nell O'Connor learns a secret that

will change her life forever. Decades later, she embarks

upon a search for the truth that leads her to the windswept

Cornish coast and the strange and beautiful Blackhurst

Manor, once owned by the aristocratic Mountrachet family.

Haruki MURAKAMI, Norwegian Wood - A poignant story

of one college student's romantic coming-of-age, Norwe-

gian Wood takes us to that distant place of a young man's

first, hopeless, and heroic love.

Irene NEMIROVSKY, Fire in the Blood - The novel is nar-

rated by Silvio, a solitary old man looking back at his life,

the passions of his youth, and the folly still being commit-

ted because of the madness of love.

Audrey NIFFENEGGER, The Time Traveller’s Wife -

The Time Traveler's Wife depicts the effects of time travel

on Henry and Clare's marriage and their passionate love

for each other as the story unfolds from both points of

view.

Jodi PICOULT, My Sister’s Keeper – An emotionally riveting

story of a family torn apart by conflicting needs and a passion-

ate love that triumphs over human weakness.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.

Ann PATCHETT, Bel Canto - Somewhere in South America, at

the home of the country's vice president, a lavish birthday party

is being held in honor of Mr. Hosokawa, a powerful Japanese

businessman. Roxanne Coss, opera's most revered soprano,

has mesmerized the international guests with her singing. It is a

perfect evening -- until a band of gun-wielding terrorists breaks in

through the air-conditioning vents and takes the entire party hos-

tage….

Annie PROULX, The Shipping News - When Quoyle's two-

timing wife meets her just desserts, he retreats with his two

daughters to his ancestral home on the starkly beautiful New-

foundland coast, where a rich cast of local characters and family

members all play a part in Quoyle's struggle to reclaim his life.

Ian RANKIN, Exit Music - (Inspector Rebus novel) It's late au-

tumn in Edinburgh and late autumn in the career of Detective In-

spector John Rebus. As he tries to tie up some loose ends before

retirement, a murder case intrudes…

Matthew REILLY, Temple - Deep in the jungles of Peru, the

race of the century is underway. A race to locate a legen-

dary Incan idol an idol carved out of a strange kind of stone.

Arundhati ROY, The God of Small Things - Tells the story

of one very fractured family from the southernmost tip of In-

dia. Here is an unhappy family unhappy in its own way, and

through flashbacks and flashforwards The God of Small

Things unfolds the secrets of these characters' unhappiness.

Bernhard SCHLINK, Homecoming - When young, father-

less Peter Debauer discovers an incomplete story in a vol-

ume of fiction, he becomes obsessed with the tale of a sol-

dier, presumed dead, who returns home after the war.

Alice SEBOLD, The Lovely Bones - Our narrator Susie

Salmon is already in heaven. Murdered by a neighbour

when she was only fourteen years old, Susie tells us what it

is like to be in her new place.

Lisa SEE, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan - A language

kept a secret for a thousand years forms the backdrop for

an unforgettable novel of two Chinese women whose friend-

ship and love sustains them through their lives.

Lionel SHRIVER, We Need to Talk About Kevin- Kevin

Katchadourian killed seven of his fellow high-school stu-

dents, a cafeteria worker and a teacher, shortly before his

sixteenth birthday. He is visited in prison by his mother, Eva,

who narrates in a series of letters to her estranged husband

Franklin, the story of Kevin’s upbringing.

Craig SILVEY, Jasper Jones - A riveting tale, set in 1960s small

-town Australia, about a young, bookish adolescent who is drawn

into events surrounding the grim disappearance of a local girl

when the solitary Jasper Jones, a rebellious mixed-race older

boy comes asking for his help.

Nicholas SPARKS, The Notebook - A man with a faded, well-

worn notebook open in his lap. A woman experiencing a morn-

ing ritual she doesn't understand. Until he begins to read to her.

...is an achingly tender story about the enduring power of love, a

story of miracles that will stay with you forever.

John STEINBECK, Of Mice and Men - Drifters in search of

work, George and his simple-minded friend Lennie, have

nothing in the world except each other and a dream – a dream

that one day they will have some land of their own.

Patrick SUSKIND, Perfume - Patrick Suskind's classic novel

provokes a terrifying examination of what happens when one

man's indulgence in his greatest passion—his sense of

smell—leads to murder.

Donna TARTT, The Secret History - Under the influence of

their charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccen-

tric misfits at an elite New England college discover a way of

thinking and living that is a world away from the humdrum ex-

istence of their contemporaries. But when they go beyond the

boundaries of normal morality their lives are changed pro-

foundly and forever, and they discover how hard it can be to

truly live and how easy it is to kill.

John Kennedy TOOLE, A Confederacy of Dunces - wildly

inventive comic masterpiece that features one of the most

unforgettable characters in modern fiction: Ignatius Reilly, a

mammoth misfit Medievalist hilariously at odds with the 20th-

century world.

Christos TSIOLKAS, The slap - At a suburban barbecue, a

man slaps a child who is not his own. This event has a

shocking ricochet effect on a group of people, mostly friends,

who are directly or indirectly influenced by the event.

Mark TWAIN, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Climb

aboard the raft with Huck and Jim and drift away from the

"sivilized" life and into a world of adventure, excitement, dan-

ger, and self-discovery.

Oscar WILDE, The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde's story

of a fashionable young man who sells his soul for eternal youth

and beauty is one of his most popular works.

Tara June WINCH, Swallow the Air - When May's mother dies

suddenly, she and her brother Billy are taken in by an aunt.

However their loss leaves them both searching for their place in

a world that doesn't want them. May sets off to find her father

and her Aboriginal identity.

Tim WINTON, Dirt Music - Georgie Jutland is a mess. At

forty, with her career in ruins, she finds herself stranded in

White Point with a fisherman she doesn't love and two kids

whose dead mother she can never replace.

Charlotte WOOD, Submerged Cathedral - Spanning many

years, travelling across Australia’s vast continent and

through some of Europe’s great cities, The Submerged Ca-

thedral is a beguiling, heartbreaking story of paradise and

the fall, of sacrifice and atonement, and of sisterly love and

rivalry.

Richard YATES, Revolutionary Road – Frank and April

Wheeler are a bright young couple who are bored by the ba-

nalities of suburban life and long to be extraordinary.

Carlos Ruis ZAFON, The Shadow of the Wind - It is

1945 and Barcelona is enduring the long aftermath of civil

war when Daniel Sempere’s bookseller father decides he

is old enough to visit the fabulous secret library, the

‘Cemetery of Forgotten Books’. There, Daniel must ‘adopt’

a single book, promising to care for it and keep it alive al-

ways.

Markus ZUSAK, The Book Thief - It is 1939. Nazi-Germany.

The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier

and will become busier still. Liesel and her younger brother are

being taken by their mother to live with a foster family outside

Munich.