Reader's Link - Book Kits (All)

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The Color of Water
by James McBride
A young African-American man describes growing up in an all-black Brooklyn housing project, one of twelve children of a white mother and black father, and discusses his mother's contributions to his life and coming to terms with his confusion over his own identity.
Approximate number of books in kit: 9

The Confessions of Max Tivoli
by Andrew Sean Greer
Born as an old man, Max Tivoli lives his life aging backwards, falling in love and living an odd, sometimes terrifying life in San Francisco at the turn of the nineteenth century.
Approximate number of books in kit: 11

A Conspiracy of Paper
by David Liss
An outsider in eighteenth-century London, Jewish pugilist and hired thug Benjamin Weaver prowls the city's mean streets in the service of England's gentry tracking down debtors and thieves.
Approximate number of books in kit: 6

The Cookbook Collector
by Allegra Goodman
While executive Emily questions her choices about her career and a long-distance relationship with a successful man, her environmental activist sister, Jessamine, struggles with her own doubts about her beliefs and love affair.
Approximate number of books in kit: 7

Corelli's Mandolin
by Louis De Berniaeres
A fifty-year epic follows the lives of the residents of the Greek island Cephallonia, exploring their peaceful, remote experiences before the onset of the Second World War.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

The Corrections
by Jonathan Franzen
What appears as a typical Midwestern family is anything but, as preparations are made for an ideal family holiday. Alfred, the father is losing his fight to control Parkinson's disease and dementia. His wife, Enid is no longer in control of her household and feels her choices slipping away. Their three grown children are struggling with their own lives. But for this Christmas, Enid is determined to bring them together for the perfect family holiday.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

Crossing to Safety
by Wallace Stegner
This deceptively simple story traces the lives and hopes of two couples who met as young parents in Madison, Wisconsin in the early part of the 20th century. Their friendship continues through the years, and provides a glimpse into the transformative power of friendship and marriage.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

Crow Lake
by Mary Dawson
In the rural farm country of northern Ontario, the lives of members of two families--the farming Pye family and the Morrisons, zoologist Kate Morrison and her three brothers--are brought together and torn apart by misunderstanding, resentment, family love, and tragedy.
Approximate number of books in kit: 10

The Crucible
by Arthur Miller
A veiled reflection of the anticommunist witch-hunts of the 1950s, this play portrays seventeenth-century Salem, Massachusetts as a rigid theocracy eager to ferret out real or imagined deviations from the norm, and indicts everyone in Salem--and by extension American society--for the crimes of intolerance and blind hatred.
Approximate number of books in kit: 10

Cry, the Beloved Country
by Alan Paton
A black minister from the country searches for his son, now a criminal, in this story on South African apartheid.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
by Mark Haddon
Despite his overwhelming fear of interacting with people, Christopher, a mathematically-gifted, autistic fifteen-year-old boy, decides to investigate the murder of a neighbor's dog and uncovers secret information about his mother.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

Cutting for Stone
by Abraham Verghese
Twin brothers born from a secret love affair between an Indian nun and a British surgeon in Addis Ababa, Marion and Shiva Stone come of age in an Ethiopia on the brink of revolution, where their love for the same woman drives them apart.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

The Dante Club
by Matthew Pearl
In 1865, the preparations of the Dante Club--led by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Oliver Wendell Holmes--to release the first translation of Dante's "The Divine Comedy" are threatened by a series of murders that re-create episodes from "Inferno."
Approximate number of books in kit: 11

Daughter of Fortune
by Isabel Allende
An orphan raised in Valparaiso, Chile, by a Victorian spinster and her rigid brother, Eliza Sommers follows her lover to California during the Gold Rush of 1849 and meets a Chinese herbalist, who becomes her soul mate, on the journey.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

The Dear One
by Jacqueline Woodson
Twelve-year-old Feni has to adjust when the pregnant young daughter of an old friend of her mother comes to stay with them.
Approximate number of books in kit: 10

Death Comes to Pemberley
by P. D. James
A rare meeting of literary genius: P. D. James, long among the most admired mystery writers of our time, draws the characters of Jane Austen's beloved novel Pride and Prejudice into a tale of murder and emotional mayhem.
Approximate number of books in kit: 10

Devil in the White City
by Erik Larson
A compelling account of the Chicago World's Fair of 1893 brings together the divergent stories of two very different men who played a key role in shaping the history of the event--visionary architect Daniel H. Burnham, who coordinated its construction, and Dr. Henry H. Holmes, an insatiable and charming serial killer who lured women to their deaths.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

Disgrace
by J.M. Coetzee
Written with austere clarity , Disgrace explores the downfall of one man and dramatizes with unforgettable, almost unbearable vividness the plight of South Africa-a country caught in the chaotic aftermath of the overthrow of Apartheid.
Approximate number of books in kit: 10

The Dive from Clausen's Pier
by Ann Packer
When her fiance is left paralyzed following a tragic accident, a woman begins to question her familiar world, from her everyday life to her relationships, as she sets out to rediscover her own identity.
Approximate number of books in kit: 12

The Dogs of Babel
by Carolyn Parkhurst
Discovering clues that indicate that his beloved wife may not have died accidentally, Paul Iverson begins a perilous search for the truth while attempting to teach his dog, who witnessed the crime, to communicate.
Approximate number of books in kit: 11