It’s the perfect time to join a book club – from home. The Classics Made Modern book group meets on Zoom and connects together in a Facebook group!

If you haven’t ever read a classic that wasn’t assigned – we’re going to make this fun. If you love reading but are looking for something a bit different – try one of these titles!

Here are the basics:

• We meet on Wednesday afternoons from 2-3 pm in a Zoom video chat to discuss the book “face-to-face”!
• All of the books are available digitally from home — as ebooks or audiobooks through Hoopla.
• Follow along in the library’s Facebook group for this discussion as we share quotes, memes, historical context, modern takes, factoids about the author’s personal life, strong opinions about the movie versions, and trivia!
• Background information on each title and author is shared in advance via email.
• For help with Hoopla, Zoom, or any questions, email classicsmodern@tscpl.org.

Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook, then join the discussion on Zoom

The Keepers of the House by Shirley Ann Grau

• Wednesday March 15, 2023, 2-3 pm
• This 1965 Pulitzer Prize–winning classic is about the racial prejudice and long-buried secrets that threaten to destroy a distinguished Southern family.
• Read the ebook on Hoopla or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 300 pages or listen to 9 hours in audiobook.

The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder

• Wednesday April 12, 2023, 2-3 pm
• Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1928, The Bridge of San Luis Rey is the moving story of a tragic accident and its aftermath by American author Thornton Wilder. The novel tells the fictional story of the victims of a horrific collapse of an Incan rope bridge in Peru and how they came to be on the bridge on that fateful day.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 230 pages or listen to 4 hours in audiobook.

House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday

• Wednesday May 10, 2023, 2-3 pm
• House Made of Dawn remains a classic of contemporary literature. It was the first novel by a Native American writer to win the Pulitzer Prize, in 1969. The story depicts a young Native American man who is torn between his tribal heritage and the poisonous enticements of the white world.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 200 pages or listen to 7 hours in audiobook.

The Big Four by Agatha Christie

• Wednesday June 7, 2023, 2-3 pm
• Widely regarded as one of Christie’s most ambitious and complicated mysteries, the story takes place over a year as Poirot is determined to find out who is responsible for the death of a secretive and sickly man who mysteriously appears in the detective’s apartment one evening.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 280 pages or listen to 5.5 hours in audiobook.

  Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson

• Wednesday July 19, 2023, 2-3 pm
• At the center of this collection of stories stands George Willard, an earnest young reporter for the Winesburg Eagle who sets out to gather the town’s daily news. Bittersweet and richly insightful, it reveals Sherwood Anderson’s special talent for taking the small moments of life and transforming them into timeless folk tales-a talent that inspired a generation of writers.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 160 pages or listen to 7 hours in audiobook.

The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain

• Wednesday August 16, 2023, 2-3 pm
• Published in 1882, Twain’s tall tale about a bedraggled street urchin who becomes king for a day, and his twin, the pampered Prince of Wales left to fend for himself among his seedier subjects, showcases the author’s satirical wit and his acute sense of political irony.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 300 pages or listen to 9 hours in audiobook.

Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

• Wednesday September 13, 2023, 2-3 pm
• Imbued with the sensual details of Indian culture, these stories speak with passion and wisdom to everyone who has ever felt like a foreigner. Like the interpreter of the title story, Lahiri translates between the strict traditions of her ancestors and a baffling new world in this 2000 Pulitzer Prize winner.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 200 pages or listen to 6 hours in audiobook.

The Known World by Edward P. Jones

• Wednesday October 11, 2023, 2-3 pm
• Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, The Known World tells the story of Henry Townsend, a black farmer and former slave who falls under the tutelage of William Robbins, the most powerful man in Manchester County, Virginia. Making certain he never circumvents the law, Townsend runs his affairs with unusual discipline. But when death takes him unexpectedly, his widow, Caldonia, can’t uphold the estate’s order, and chaos ensues. Edward P. Jones has woven a footnote of history into an epic that takes an unflinching look at slavery in all its moral complexities.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 432 pages or listen to 14 hours in audiobook.

The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington

• Wednesday November 8, 2023, 2-3 pm
• Winner of the Pulitzer Prize when it was published in 1918, The Magnificent Ambersons chronicles the changing fortunes of three generations of an American dynasty. The family serves as a metaphor for the old society that crumbled after the Industrial Revolution while a middle-western town spread and darkened into a city.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the book from the library. Read approximately 227 pages or listen to 9 hours in audiobook.

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: The Illuminating Diary of a Professional Lady by Anita Loos

• Wednesday Dec 6, 2023, 2-3 pm
• One of the most popular novels released in the 1920s on the hedonistic Jazz Age, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is told from the point of view of a blonde flapper named Lorelei in the form of her diary. This novel follows her adventures around the world in search of a gentleman companion who can elevate her position within society.
• Read the ebook or listen to the audiobook on Hoopla or check out the movie from the library. Read approximately 85 pages or listen to 4 hours in audiobook.

Lissa Staley

Lissa Staley helps people use the library. She is a Book Evangelist, Trivia Emcee, Classics Made Modern book discussion leader, NaNoWriMo Municipal Liaison, and frequent library customer. She loves her kids, being a librarian, living in Topeka, and helping people form connections and community. (She's the Community Connections Librarian!) She reads a new book every few days, but is enjoying the audiobook of "Empress of Forever" by Max Gladstone, the ebook "When We Were Magic" by Sarah Gailey and is eagerly awaiting John Scalzi's "The Last Emperox" in April!