AAUW Book Group Reading Selections for 2025-2026
The Book Group meets on the second Monday of each month, unless otherwise announced, for lively discussions led by the various members of the group.
Bleak House by Charles Dickens, 789 pages.
Widely regarded as Dickens’s masterpiece, Bleak House centers on the generations-long lawsuit Jarndyce and Jarndyce. Focusing on Esther Summerson, a ward of John Jarndyce, the novel traces Esther’s romantic coming-of-age and, in classic Dickensian style, the gradual revelation of long-buried secrets,
Other possibilities: Watch Masterpiece Theater of Bleak House 2005; Read any Dickens.
Date: September 15, 2025, 1:30 pm Discussion Leader: Lin Tollefsen, Host: Kendal. In-person
We Solve Murders by Richard Osman, 400 pages.
Steve Wheeler is enjoying retired life. He still does the odd bit of investigation work, but he prefers his familiar routines. His days of adventure are over. Adrenaline is daughter-in-law Amy’s job now. She’s currently on a remote island protecting mega-bestselling author Rosie D’Antonio, until a dead body and a bag of money mean trouble in paradise. So she sends an SOS to the only person she trusts . . .
Date: October 20, 2025, 1:30 pm Discussion Leader: Kathy Earnest-Koons, Host: Phyllis Pappaport. In-person
The Thanksgiving Play by Larissa FastHorse (2015).
This brutally relevant satire from Lakota playwright FastHorse follows four white teaching artists attempting to write a “politically correct” play that straddles the line between honoring the first Thanksgiving and Native American Heritage Month.
Date: November 10, 2025, 7 pm Discussion Leader: Mary-Carol Lindbloom. On Zoom
Miss Austen by Gill Hornby, 288 pages.
England, 1840. Two decades after the death of her beloved sister, Jane, Cassandra Austen returns to the village of Kintbury and the home of her family friends, the Fowles. In a dusty corner of the vicarage, there is a cache of Jane’s secret letters, secrets not only about Jane but about Cassandra herself. Will Cassandra bare the most private details of her life to the world, or commit her sister’s legacy to the flames?
Date: December 8, 2025, 7pm Discussion Leader: Kathy Earnest-Koons. On Zoom
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, 162 pages.
Extravagant rumors abound of a man named Jay Gatsby who has newly arrived to the coastline of a section of Long Island known colloquially as West Egg. The greatest story to encapsulate the roaring twenties, The Great Gatsby follows the eventful lives of the denizens from East and West Egg in this timeless classic of American literature.
Date: January 12, 2026, 7 pm Discussion Leader: Jeanette Knapp. On Zoom
James by Percival Everett, 320 pages.
PULITZER PRIZE WINNER 2023, #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
A brilliant, action-packed reimagining of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
When Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he runs away. Meanwhile, Huck has faked his own death to escape his violent father.This brilliant, humorous and tender novel radically illuminates Jim’s agency, intelligence, and compassion as never before.
You might also read or re-read Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
Date: February 16, 2026, 7 pm Discussion Leader: Margaret Nichols. On Zoom
The Three Mothers by Anna Malaika Tubbs, 288 pages.
New York Times Bestseller
Celebrating Black motherhood, “The Three Mothers” focuses on the women who raised some of the most influential figures in history: Malcolm X, James Baldwin and Martin Luther King, Jr. It addresses the discrimination and prejudice faced by these Black women.
Date: March 9, 2026, 7 pm Discussion Leader: Lin Tollefsen. On Zoom
Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell, 224 pages.
George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London was written as a novel, though in reality it’s autobiographical. Before Animal Farm; before 1984, George Orwell’s primary research was on class struggles and the realities of blue-collar work and poverty. When Orwell found himself penniless after the theft of his savings, rather than turning to his family for aid, he embraced the life of poverty, falling in with criminals, smugglers, drug dealers, and cooks. This book is short, easy to read, and packed with firsthand insight.
Date: April 13, 2026, 1:30 pm Discussion Leader and Host: Norma Goldberg. In-person
The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan, 320 pages.
Tracking the natural beauty that surrounds us, The Backyard Bird Chronicles maps the passage of time through daily entries, thoughtful questions, and beautiful original sketches. With boundless charm and wit, author Amy Tan charts her foray into birding and the natural wonders of the world.
Date: May 11, 2026, 1:30 pm Discussion Leader: Diane Doyle, Host: Margaret Nichols. In-person
Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Windspear, 336 pages.
Maisie Dobbs got her start as a maid in an aristocratic London household when she was thirteen. Her employer, suffragette Lady Rowan Compton soon became her patron. Lady Rowan’s friend, Maurice Blanche, an investigator for London’s elite, recognized Maisie’s intuitive gifts. The outbreak of war changed everything. In the spring of 1929, Maisie sets out on her own as a private investigator, one who has learned that coincidences are meaningful, and truth elusive.
Date: June 8, 2026, 6 pm Discussion Leader: Betta Hedlund, Host: Jeanette. In-person