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Sep 9 • 4:30 – 5:30pm
Virtual
The fall is going to get busy, so plan now to join the UC Book Club when we next meet on Wednesday, September 9, at 4:30 via Google Meet to discuss Good People by Patmeena Sabit. This is the Wednesday after Labor Day, so perhaps a long weekend is just what you need to get the book read. The novel addresses the current (constant?) human tendency to only believe the facts that fit one's own opinion. The Sharaf family seem to be living the life every immigrant dreams of upon coming to America. Then a tragedy happens, and everybody weighs in. The novel has multiple narrators, what New York Times guest reviewer Tommy Orange calls a "polyphony of outsiders" in a format reminiscent of a movie, a documentary, or even social media. The Amazon blurb meant to get us to buy the book says, "Good People compels the reader to reconsider what might have happened even on the previous page." Orange concludes his New York Times review with this: "They say reading is dying, and maybe it is. But works like this one will ensure there will always be a place for what novels alone can achieve." The novel has already appeared on The New Yorker's Best Books of 2026 list.
And on Wednesday, October 7, the Book Club will discuss Kaveh Akbar's Martyrs! A young man born in Persia but who was brought to the United States as a very young child now struggles with a lot of internal baggage including a drinking problem. His solution is to fixate on martyrs and to explore past mysteries via an uncle who was also an Iranian soldier and via his long dead mother connected to a painting in a Brooklyn art gallery. The book was shortlisted for the National Book Award and has appeared on multiple "bests" lists including one from The New York Times. Guest reviewer Junot Diaz writes, "There is a life force coursing through the work, implacably curious, devoted to the small human things, and a recognition that even if we shattered ones don’t always put ourselves back together, there is dignity in our brokenness — sympathies and wisdoms that help transform a tale about a grieving young man and a senseless tragedy into a paean of life, of hope."
As always, email Kathy Fish at Kathy.fish [at] ucumberlands.edu (Kathy[dot]fish[at]ucumberlands[dot]edu) if you're not already on the Google Meet invitation list.
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