December Not Fiction Book Discussions

The Library Book by Susan Orlean is classic Orlean. As with The Orchid Thief and Rin Tin Tin, she starts with a complicated individual, Harry Peak, the young man accused of starting the devastating 1986 fire that destroyed or damaged more than a million books at Los Angeles' Central Library, and ends with a sprawling exploration of a larger topic, libraries and their place in our culture and society. Orlean told Writer's Digest, "When I heard about the fire, I was so fascinated. The two categories of story that I cannot resist are, one, the examination of something that seems very familiar but that I realize I don't really know anything about. And that was definitely present in this story. And secondly, the discovery of a big story or subculture that I never knew existed, and that was true of the fire. So this combined the two genres of story that I find almost irresistible. The so familiar that you don't notice it, and so hidden that it's a discovery."

And as with a The Feather Thief by Kirk Wallace Johnson, which we read earlier this year, Orlean does not definitively solve the mystery she set out to investigate. In the end, to Orlean, whether Peak started the fire or not is less important than his desire to be remembered, which to her is the essence of why we write, read, and create libraries. In fact, what led Orlean to this story were her memories of visiting the library with her mother when she was a child and her present-day visits to the library with her own son. She told Writer's Digest that her biggest challenge in writing The Library Book was structure: "In this case, I realized I was essentially working on four storylines. And the challenge was, how do I make these live together naturally and happily within a book? I had the history of the library. I had the story of the fire, which was a totally different time period. I had the day-to-day life of the library, which I very much wanted to write about. And I had this more meditative storyline of what do libraries mean, what is their importance, what has been their importance? So how do you put those together?"

What do you think? Is Orlean successful in integrating these four storylines and bringing the seemingly familiar, the public library, to life in a new way? What has your relationship with libraries been throughout your life? What are some of your favorite library memories? As Orlean vividly portrays, libraries are so much more that just warehouses of books. How have libraries changed in your lifetime and in your community? How do you feel about these changes? Andrew Carnegie is the most famous benefactor of libraries, and other benefactors have similarly supported museums or parks or other community spaces. Do you think it is more important to have wealthy benefactors or overall community support? Are libraries indicative of the vitality and mindset of a community or culture? Do they have a role and responsibility in creating this vitality and mindset? In Chapter 30, Orlean discusses a variety of initiatives undertaken by libraries and librarians around the world. Are there any that you would like to see replicated at your public library?

We hope you will join the conversation: Tuesday, December 3, at 6:30 p.m. at Main Library; Thursday, December 19, at 11:00 a.m. at West Ashley Branch Library; and here on the blog.

Readalikes: If you enjoyed November's selection . . .

If you enjoyed Old in Art School: A Memoir of Starting Over by Nell Painter, then you might also enjoy these books and films suggested by our discussion group members:

Books

• Broad Strokes: 15 Women Who Made Art and Made History (In That Order) by Bridget Quinn
• If You Can Doodle, You Can Paint: Transforming Simple Drawings Into Works of Art by Diane Culhane

Films

• Art documentaries on Netflix

Book recommended by Nell Painter in an interview with her publisher, Counterpoint

• Art and Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking by David Bayles and Ted Orland

November Not Fiction Book Discussions

We continue our theme of education with Old in Art School: A Memoir of Starting Over by Nell Painter. Following her retirement from her career as a historian at Princeton University, Dr. Nell Painter surprised everyone in her life by returning to school in her sixties to earn a BFA and MFA in painting. An interviewer with her publisher, Counterpoint, asked Painter, “How did you come to write this book? What’s the story of this story?” She replied, “The notion of writing about my experience(s) in art school came very early on, even before I enrolled at Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University, for my friends voiced curiosity as soon as they discovered my musings. At first it was the novelty of a chaired professor at Princeton climbing down from what seemed like the pinnacle of scholarly achievement—the strangeness of that turning away intrigued people. Then it was asking about what was new. In either case, people I knew wanted me to send back reports from my new life. Old in Art School is that report. Old in Art School speaks a tiny bit about the leaving, but mainly it’s about what the title says: being old in a world obsessed with youth, with what one of my teachers called right-nowness. That’s a challenge when you’re starting out at sixty-four with twentieth-century eyes.” Painter's story asks us to consider how artists, and women artists in particular, are seen and judged by their age, looks, and race. 

What do you think? Have you "started over" or dreamed of "starting over" in your career or general life path? Have you experienced any discouragement, either stated or implied? How did that affect you? What influence did Painter's mother's example have on her own decision to leave her academic career at its pinnacle and start over in art school? Painter titles Chapter 11 "A Bad Decision." Why did Painter decide to leave Mason Gross School of the Arts before completing a full four years there? Why does she think going to graduate school at Rhode Island School of Design before completing her time at Mason and maybe even taking a few years off was a bad decision? Do you think it was a bad decision, or did it perversely have a positive effect on Painter's trajectory as an artist? Of the various "-isms" Painter experienced, which do you think were the most damaging to her confidence in her own vision and execution of her art? How did her own cohort's opinion of her art contrast with that of her art teachers and peers? How did Painter's summer alone with her work in the Adirondacks influence her work and sense of herself as an artist? What is art? Who is an artist? Who gets to decide? 

We hope you will join the discussion: Tuesday, November 5, at 6:30 p.m. at Main Library or Thursday, November 21, at 11:00 a.m. at West Ashley Branch Library.

Readalikes: If you enjoyed October's selection . . .

If you enjoyed Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover, then you might also enjoy these books and television series suggested by our discussion group members:

Books:
Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder by Laura Fraser
Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World by Tracy Kidder
Old in Art School: A Memoir of Starting Over by Nell Painter
Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth by Sarah Smarsh
Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed
Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis by J.D. Vance
The Glass Castle: A Memoir by Jeannette Walls

Television Series:
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt created by Tina Fey and Robert Carlock
Country Music: A Film by Ken Burns

October Not Fiction Book Discussions

Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover, one of the most read and discussed books of the year, asks us to consider what it means to be educated.

Born to a family of Mormons who embrace a survivalist worldview and distrust, among other things, public schools, Westover had little formal education of any kind as a child. She worked for her mother's herbal supplement and midwifing businesses and her father's scrapping business until a brother who had left home for college encouraged her to study for the ACT. Westover passed and was accepted to Brigham Young University at the age of 16. Westover performed brilliantly academically, and ultimately earned graduate degrees from Cambridge and a fellowship at Harvard. Yet Westover's steepest learning curve was less academic than social, cultural, and emotional as she outgrew her family's world on Buck's Peak in rural Idaho.

What do you think? Have you ever outgrown a world or worldview? What sparked that learning curve? Did you have to make difficult choices? In pursuit of her academic and personal education, Westover endured active opposition from her father, demeaning abuse from her brother, mixed messages from her mother, a limiting view of women's place in the world from her religion, and, initially, suffered from limited cultural intelligence. Why do you think she was able to persevere? What personal qualities contributed to her success? Ironically, did those same qualities also limit her in some ways? Crucial to most people's education are the mentors and guides we meet along the way. Who do you think was important to Westover's education? In addition to books and lectures, we also learn from experiences. Which life experiences had the most impact on Westover? At Cambridge, Westover attends a lecture about Isaiah Berlin's concept of negative versus positive liberty, a concept reiterated to her in the lyrics of a Bob Marley song. How did these two very different texts help Westover to understand her education? Westover wrote her memoir at a relatively young age, close in time and emotion to the experiences depicted. Why do you think she chose to write it at this time of her life? Do you think it would differ if she wrote it at a later point in her life? How?

We hope you will join the discussion: Tuesday, October 1, at 6:30 p.m. at Main Library; Thursday, October 17, at 11:00 a.m. at West Ashley Branch Library; and here on the blog.

Readalikes: If you enjoyed September's selection . . .

If you enjoyed Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and The Drug Company that Addicted America by Beth Macy, then you might also enjoy these books recommended by Macy:

• In Pain: A Bioethicist's Personal Struggle with Opioids by Travis N. Rieder
• Drug Dealer, MD: How Doctors Were Duped, Patients Got Hooked, and Why It's So Hard to Stop by Anna Lembke, MD
• The Big Fix: Hope After Heroin by Tracey Helton Mitchell
• The Recovering: Intoxication and Its Aftermath by Leslie Jamison
• If You Love Me: A Mother's Journey Through Her Daughter's Opioid Addiction by Maureen Cavanagh
• American Overdose: The Opioid Tragedy in Three Acts by Chris McGreal
• Glass House: The 1% Economy and the Shattering of the All-American Town by Brian Alexander
• What You Are Getting Wrong About Appalachia by Elizabeth Catte
• Trampoline and Weedeater, illustrated novels by Robert Gipe
• Ohio, a novel by Stephen Markley
• Cherry, a novel by Nico Walker
• I Know Your Kind, poems by William Brewer

Macy's follow-up to Dopesick:

• Audible Original Finding Tess:A Mother's Search for Answers in a Dopesick America

And these articles and videos suggested by our discussion group members:

• Wall Street Journal article Schism in the House of Sackler by Jared S. Hopkins July 13, 2019 print edition
• Opioids and Opioids II segments from Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, available on YouTube

September Not Fiction Book Discussions

Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America by Beth Macy is a perfect example of how narrative nonfiction can help us to better understand current events by providing the in-depth stories necessary for us to identify with the people behind the headlines.

Just this week, Purdue Pharma filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in an effort to shield itself and its owners, the Sackler family, one of the richest families in America, from over 2,600 federal and state lawsuits concerning their role in America's opioid addiction epidemic. It is estimated that at its peak, over 100 people died every day of opioid drug overdoses, and Macy describes the devastating effects of addiction on these individuals, their families, and their communities. In fact, Beth Macy's clear-eyed and compassionate reporting may be in part responsible for a growing awareness of the extent and causes of the crisis. Although it is a sobering, infuriating, and heartbreaking read, Dopesick is also inspiring because Macy profiles individuals who have devoted their lives to raising awareness about and combating the epidemic, and she provides an overview of the different treatment protocols and of different models of community response.

What do you think? Before reading Dopesick, were you aware of the extent to which the opioid addiction epidemic had spread in America? Do you know someone actively experiencing or recovering from addiction? How does Dopesick help you to understand what they and their families are going through? To what degree do you think Purdue Pharma, Johnson & Johnson, and other pharmaceutical companies should be held responsible for the opioid addiction epidemic? To what degree should the Sackler family be held responsible? Within the addiction treatment community, there are two very different approaches to treatment, abstinence and medicine-assisted therapy, and, in general, effective and affordable treatment is difficult to find. What were your thoughts about the nature of addiction and its treatment before reading Dopesick? Have they changed? What strategies--legal, medical, cultural--would you suggest? Macy profiles a large number of people touched either personally or professionally by the opioid addiction epidemic. Which stories of loss and grief, of personal and professional responsibility or irresponsibility, of self-sacrifice or greed most moved you? Why? Macy both profiles specific individuals and provides an overview of the crisis. Does she manage to integrate both the intimate and the broad view successfully? Does Dopesick end on a note of hope or of despair? Are you optimistic or pessimistic about our collective will to find solutions?

We hope you will join the discussion: Thursday, September 19 at 11:00 a.m. and here on the blog.