You’ve probably heard of the Millenium series by Stieg Larssen (“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”); Larssen had planned more novels but died after the third one, and the series was picked up by the publisher’s and family’s choice, David Lagercrantz. There’s an upcoming film starring Claire Foy, so it’s an opportunity to compare the book and movie. It’s also a chance to dig back into the series.
We’ll meet at the Harrisburg East Mall Regal Cinema at the show closest to noon. Be sure to check the event page on facebook for updates or theater website for times; there’ll be confirmation for those who RSVP in time. Then we’ll meet briefly after the movie and head to the back room of the Midtown Scholar. That discussion should start around 3.
Please RSVP and send questions to Joe Foner at joefoner1@gmail.com. Please state in RSVP whether it’s for the movie, the discussion, or both. See you there, and happy reading!
October means Halloween, so we’re reading the latest from the spook-master himself, Stephen King. In the “Outsider,” a young boy’s corpse is found in a town park. The suspect is a popular little league coach and father of two girls. The case seems ironclad, but the suspect has an alibi. What’s going on here? As the investigation evolves, there are some surprising – and horrifying – answers… We meet in the back room (behind the children’s section) of the Midtown Scholar. Please RSVP and/or send questions to Joe Foner at joefoner1@gmail.com. See you there, and happy reading!
One thing we can say for sure at the HYP Book Club is that we’ve never read an African-American female sci-fi author. Since we like to take the road less traveled, we’re going to remedy that this month, with “Kindred” by the renowned Octavia Butler. It’s about a young African-American writer, who somehow travels back and forth between her present-day LA home and a pre-Civil War Maryland plantation, meeting her ancestors, and becoming more and more involved in their lives the more she goes back. Although it’s categorized as sci-fi, Butler herself has talked about how “Kindred” crosses boundaries, calling it a “kind of grim fantasy.”
We meet in the back room (behind the children’s section) of the Midtown Scholar. Please RSVP and/or send questions to Joe Foner at joefoner1@gmail.com. See you there, and happy reading!
In honor of the recent passing of Philip Roth, we’re reading one of his lesser-known works, “The Plot Against America.” Imagine an America where famed aviator Charles Lindbergh becomes president and America stays out of WWII, and a cordial “understanding” is negotiated with Nazi Germany. But Roth goes beyond typical dystopia in playing out the impact on his teenage self and his family in his trademark intensely autobiographical style. Although the book is a good companion piece for fans of Phillip K. Dick’s “The Man in the High Castle” and the lesser-known “Focus” by Arthur Miller, it has some eerie parallels to the present. We meet in the back room (behind the children’s section) of the Midtown Scholar. Please RSVP and/or send questions to Joe Foner at joefoner1@gmail.com. See you there, and happy reading!
On its surface, “Heart of Darkness” is a tale about a river journey to hunt down the chief of an inner station of a trading company deep in the jungle. But the novella that inspired the movie “Apocalypse Now” is much deeper, a foray into a meditation on the good and evil of mankind, with characters who are clearly not one or the other. Join us to discuss Joseph Conrad’s classic story of morality that sits right alongside “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” “The Picture of Dorian Gray,” and “The Turn of the Screw.”
We meet in the back room (behind the children’s section) of the Midtown Scholar. Please RSVP and/or send questions to Joe Foner at joefoner1@gmail.com. See you there, and happy reading!