What We've Read

We read an eclectic selection of books suggested by members.  Past themes have included: legal, Chicago, women authors.

2023
This is the Story of a Happy Marriage by Ann Patchett  Zoom
Pachinko by Min Jin Lee  Zoom
The Swift and the Harrier, Minette Walters  Astor Food Court, Lounge on 6 Floor
East of Eden, John Steinbeck, Astor Food Court, Lounge on 6 Floor
The Ultimate Betrayal, Kimberla Lawson RobyAstor Food Court, Lounge on 6 Floor
One of Us is Lying, Karen McManus, Astor Food Court, Lounge on 6 Floor
Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus, Marie's yard
The City of the Century, Donald Miller, Astor Food Court Lounge 6th Floor
Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry, Astor Food Court Lounge on 6th Floor
My Sister the Serial Killer, Oyinkan Braithwaite, Brehon Pub,731 N Wells

2022
Crooked House by Agatha Christie
Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara  
The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett  
As the Wicked Watch by Tamron Hall 
A Life in Code: pioneer cryptanalyst Elizebeth Smith Friedman 
The Loop by Patrick Reardon  
The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles
In a Dry Season, Peter Robinson  
The Sentence by Louise Erdrich  

2021
Next Year in Havana by Chanel Cleeton
The Coast of Chicago by Stuart Dybeck 
The Call, Peadar Ó Guilín
This is Happiness, Niall Williams
The Last Ragged Breath, Julia Keller
The Giver of Stars, JoJo Moyes
Chosen Ones, Veronica Roth
The Wife, Meg Wolitzer
All the King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren
Head Hunters, Jo Nesbo
 
2020
The Man Who Invented Christmas by Les Standiford
Where the Crawdad's Sing by Delia Owens
Snow Country by Yasunari Kawabata
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk by Kathleen Rooney
The Great Believers by Rebecca McRay 
You by Caroline Kepnes
An American Marriage by Tayari Jones
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
All the President's Men by Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward 
The Night Tiger by Yangsze Choo

2019
Faithful Place by Tana French
Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy
Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
The Alice Network by Kate Quinn
The Lake on Fire by Rosellen Brown
The Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
·      So You've Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson
·      The Reign of the Kingfisher by T.J. Martinson
·      Educated by Tara Westover
  ·    Beneath a Scarlet Sky by Mark T. Sullivan  

2018
The Color of Water by James McBride
Hot Milk by Deborah Levy
Autumn by Ali Smith
Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman
Brooklyn by Colm Toibin
Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward
Lincoln at the Bardo by George Saunders 
The Rooster Bar by John Grisham 
The Quiet American by Graham Greene
The Ludwig Conspiracy by Oliver Plotzsch
In the Woods by  Tana French 

2017
Among the Hidden by Margaret Peterson Haddix
The Road by Cormac McCarthy,  
The Painted Veil by Somerset Maugham   
Brighton by Michael Harvey     
Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
A Mixture of Frailties by Robertson Davies
Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty
The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly 
The Young Manhood of Studs Lonigan, by James Farrell 
The Grass Dancer, by Susan Power
Young Lonigan, by James T. Farrell

2016
The Death of the Detective, by Mark Smith
Presumed Innocent, by Scott Turow
The House on Mango Street, by Sandra Cisneros
Chicago: A Novel, by Brian Doyle
Life Itself, by Roger Ebert
So Big, by Edna Ferber
Paddy Whacked: The Untold Story of the Irish American Gangster by T. J. English
The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson 
The Lazarus Project by Aleksandar Hemon 
The Pit  by Frank Norris

2015
The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo
The Circle
Middlesex 
And the Mountains Echoed
The Girl on the Train
Secrets Under the Olive Tree
Wild
The Boston Girl
The Innocence Game
What the Lady Wants

2014
Unbroken
Our Final Invention
Atonement
Where'd you go, Bernadette?
Beautiful Ruins
The Namesake
Divergent
House on the Corner of Bitter & Sweet
The Third Coast
The Traitor's Wife
The Cuckoo's Calling

2013
My Germany
1916: A Novel of the Irish Revolution
Gone Girl
The Life of Pi
The Inventor & the Tycoon
The Great Gatsby

2012
Songs Without Words
The 19th Wife
House of Leaves
King Peggy
Shadow of the Wind

2011
The Mirage
The Great Chicago Fire and the Myth of Mrs. O'Leary's Cow
They All Fall Down: Richard Nickel's Struggle to Save America's Architecture