These are the books we’ve consumed over the years. We are nearing a total of 200 books.
- We read mostly fiction (from literary fiction to popular, including a hefty dose of science fiction),
- Non-fiction over the years ranges from history and memoir to economics, astronomical science, and philosophy
- We welcome authors to join us when we discuss their works
- Two members have listed their favorites).
Scott’s Top Books List
John’s Top Books List
| 2026 | ||||
| February | Chasing Chi | James Gaylord | ||
| January | Theo of Golden | Allen Levi | ||
| 2025 | ||||
| December | No Meeting | |||
| November | Some Final Beauty and Other Stories | Lisa Alvarez | ||
| October | Salt Bones | Jennifer Givham | ||
| September | No Meeting | |||
| August | Mark Twain | Ron CHernow | ||
| July | Summer Break | |||
| June | The Nightingale | Kristen Hannah | ||
| May | Nothing But the Bones | Brian Panowich | ||
| April | Tap Dancing on Everest | Mimi Zieman, M.D. | ||
| March | No Meeting | |||
| February | Soldiers and Kings: Human Smuggling | Jason De Leon | ||
| January | North Woods: A Novel | Daniel Mason | ||
| 2024 | ||||
| December | No Meeting | |||
| November | Nexus: Information Networks | Yuval Noah Harari | ||
| October | Pachinko | Min Jin Lee | ||
| September | The House on Via Gemito | Domenico Starmone | ||
| August | Summer Break | |||
| July | Summer Break | |||
| June | James: A Novel | Percival Everett | ||
| May | No meeting | |||
| April | The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store: A Novel | James McBride | ||
| March | Under Alien Skies: A Sightseer’s Guide to the Universe | Philip Plait | ||
| February | No meeting | |||
| January | The Night Circus | Erin Morgenstern | ||
| 2023 | ||||
| Nov./Dec. | The Wager | David Grann | ||
| October | California Soul | Keith Corbin | ||
| September | This Other Eden | Paul Harding | ||
| August | Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow | Gabrielle Zevin | ||
| July | Demon Copperhead | Barbara Kingsolver | ||
| June | Where I Was From | Joan Didion | ||
| May | (No meeting) | |||
| April | Small Things Like These | Claire Keegan | ||
| March | Backpacking with the Saints | Belden C. Lane | ||
| February | The Sense of Wonder | Matthew Sallesses | ||
| January | The Rabbit Hutch | Tess Gunty | ||
| 2022 | ||||
| December | (Postponed) | |||
| November | Shuggie Bain | Douglas Stuart | ||
| October | A People’s History of the Supreme Court | Peter Irons | ||
| September | (No meeting) | |||
| August | Sea of Tranquility | Emily St. John Mandel | ||
| July | Great Circle | Maggie Shipstead | ||
| June | Where the Crawdads Sing | Delia Owens | ||
| May | The Lincoln Highway | Amor Towles | ||
| April | Bullet Train | Kotaro Isaka | ||
| March | Mesopotamia | Serhiy Zhadan | ||
| February | Dad’s Maybe Book | Tim O’Brien | ||
| January | The Plundered Planet | Paul Collier | ||
| 2021 | ||||
| December | Dune | Frank Herbert | ||
| November | Klara and the Sun | Kazuo Ishiguro | ||
| October | Circe | Madeline Miller | ||
| September | The Bomber Mafia | Malcolm Gladwell | ||
| August | The Sweetness of Water | Nathan Harris | ||
| July | The Blacktop Blues | Richard Levesque | ||
| June | A Man Called Ove | Fredrik Backman | ||
| May | ||||
| April | The Soul of an Octopus | Sy Montgomery | ||
| March | We Have Been Harmonized | Kai Strittmatter | ||
| February | Interior Chinatown | Charles Yu | ||
| January | The Pale-Faced Lie | David Crow | ||
| 2020 | ||||
| December | Anxious People: A Novel | Fredrik Backman | ||
| November | Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents | Isabel Wilkerson | ||
| October | Blacktop Wasteland | S. A. Cosby | ||
| September | The Dearly Beloved | Cara Wall | ||
| August | The Devil’s Half Mile | Paddy Hirsch | ||
| July | The Luminaries | Eleanor Catton | ||
| June | American Dirt: A Novel | Jeanine Cummins | ||
| May | The Splendid and the Vile | Erik Larson | ||
| April | Daisy Jones & The Six | Taylor Jenkins Reid | ||
| March | Dark Towers: Deutsche Bank, Donald Trump, and an Epic Trail of Destruction | David Enrich | ||
| February | The Woman in the Window | A. J. Finn | ||
| January | Life 3.0 | Max Tegmark | ||
| 2019 | ||||
| December | ||||
| November | The Overstory | Richard Powers | ||
| October | This Tender Land | William Kent Krueger | ||
| September | Educated | Tara Westover | ||
| August | Why We Sleep | Matthew Walker | ||
| July | Master and Commander | Patrick O’Brian | ||
| June | ||||
| May | Norwegian by Night | Derek B. Miller | ||
| April | The Library Book | Susan Orleans | ||
| March | The Falconer | Cana Czapnik | ||
| February | Red Notice | Bill Browder | ||
| January | How to Change Your Mind | Michael Pollan | ||
| 2018 | ||||
| December | ||||
| November | Undermajordomo Minor | Patrick deWitt | ||
| October | The Kindness of the Hangman | Henry Oster | ||
| September | The Soul of America | Jon Meacham | ||
| August | ||||
| July | Ready Player One | Ernest Cline | ||
| June | ||||
| May | The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy | Douglas Adams | ||
| April | Imagine Me Gone | Adam Haslett | ||
| March | ||||
| February | The Doomsday Machine | Daniel Ellsberg | ||
| January | A Gentleman in Moscow | Amor Towles | ||
| 2017 | ||||
| December | The Underground Railroad | Colson Whitehead | ||
| November | ||||
| October | ||||
| September | Moriarty | Anthony Horowitz | ||
| August | Orange County: A Literary Field Guide | Lisa Alvarez & Andrew Tonkovich | ||
| July | Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis | J. D. Vance | ||
| June | Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind | Yuval Noah Harari | ||
| May | ||||
| April | The True Flag: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire | Stephen Kinzer | ||
| March | War and Turpentine | Stefan Hertmans | ||
| February | The Mothers | Britt Bennett | ||
| January | ||||
| 2016 | ||||
| December | The Watchmaker of Filigree Street | Nataxha Pulley | ||
| November | The Fifth Season | N. K. Jemisin | ||
| October | American Heiress | Jeffrey Toobin | ||
| September | Hamilton | Ron Chernow | ||
| August | The Unfair | Adam Benforado | ||
| July | ||||
| June | The Sympathizer | Viet Thanh Nguyen | ||
| May | ||||
| April | Little Bee | Chris Cleave | ||
| March | ||||
| February | Future Imperfect | Scott Chambers | ||
| January | Pacific | Simon Winchester | ||
| 2015 | ||||
| December | Straight Man | Richard Russo | ||
| November | Fates and Furies | Lauren Groff | ||
| October | All the Light We Cannot See | Anthony Doerr | ||
| September | Half World | Scott O’Connor | ||
| August | The Brothers K | David James Duncan | ||
| July | ||||
| June | Station Eleven | Emily St. John Mandel | ||
| May | ||||
| April | Waterloo: The History of Four Days and Four Armies | Bernard Cornwell | ||
| March | Citizen: An American Lyric | Claudia Rankine | ||
| February | Deep Down Dark | Hector Tobar | ||
| January | The Gods of Olympus | Barbara Graziosi | ||
| 2014 | ||||
| December | ||||
| November | The Narrow Road to the Deep North | Richard Flanagan | ||
| October | The Zone of Interest | Martin Amis | ||
| September | The Children Act | Ian McEwan | ||
| August | The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August | Claire North | ||
| July | Room | Emma Donaghue | ||
| June | One Summer | Bill Bryson | ||
| May | A Tale for the Time Being | Ruth Ozeki | ||
| April | ||||
| March | The Goldfinch | Donna Tartt | ||
| February | On Such a Full Sea | Chang-Rae Lee | ||
| January | Dr. Sleep | Stephen King | ||
| 2013 | ||||
| December | ||||
| November | Dear Life: Stories | Alice Munro | ||
| October | Faith in Carlos Gomez and Failing Paris | Samantha Dunn | ||
| September | The Sound of Things Falling | Juan Gabriel Vasquez | ||
| August | The Barbarian Nurseries | Hector Tobar | ||
| July | ||||
| June | A Delicate Truth | John LeCarre | ||
| May | Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk | Ben Fountain | ||
| April | As They See ‘Em | Bruce Weber | ||
| Aug. 2008 — | March 2013 | |||
| The Afrika Reich | Guy Saville | |||
| The Tenth of December | George Saunders | |||
| Flight Behavior | Barbara Kingsolver | |||
| The Dispossessed | Ursula Le Guin | |||
| Four Fishes | Paul Greenberg | |||
| Lastingness | Nicholas DelBanco | |||
| The Sisters Brothers | Patrick DeWitt | |||
| The Windup Girl | Paolo Bacigalupi | |||
| Under Heaven | Guy Gavriel Kay | |||
| Rin Tin Tin | Susan Orlean | |||
| Snow Crash | Neal Stephenson | |||
| The Gravedigger’s Daughter | Joyce Carol Oates | |||
| The Chinese Nail Murders | Robert Van Gulik | |||
| Spin | Robert Charles Wilsons | |||
| An Unpardonable Crime | Andrew Taylor | |||
| Survivor | Chuck Palahniuk | |||
| McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern #13 | Chris Ware | |||
| Parrot and Oliver in America | Peter Carey | |||
| Super Sad True Love Story | Gary Shteyngart | |||
| The Imperfectionists | Tom Rachman | |||
| Winter’s Tale | Mark Helprin | |||
| A King of Infinite Space | Tyler Dilts | |||
| Why Architecture Matters | Paul Goldberger | |||
| At Day’s Close | Roger Ekirch | |||
| The Swerve | Steven Greenblatt | |||
| How Doctor’s Think | Gerome Groopman | |||
| Between the Assassinations | Aravind Adiga | |||
| The Increment | David Ignatius | |||
| The Sense of an Ending | Julian Barnes | |||
| To Say Nothing of the Dog | Connie Willis | |||
| The Garden of Evening Mists | Tan Twan Eng | |||
| A Visit from the Goon Squad | Jennifer Egan | |||
| Winter and Night | S. J. Rozan | |||
| For Kings and Planets | Ethan Canan | |||
| The Long Walk | Slavomir Rawicz | |||
| What Should I Do? | Alexander George | |||
| The White Tiger | Aravind Adiga | |||
| The Bottom Billion | Paul Collier | |||
| 2010 | ||||
| March | Shooting Polaris | John Hales | ||
| 2008 | ||||
| June/July | The Man Who Loved China | Simon Winchester | ||
| May | The World Made By Hand | James Kunstler | ||
| April | Blood Meridian | Cormac McCarthy | ||
| March | Blindness | Jose Saramago | ||
| February | Christine Falls | Benjamin Black | ||
| January | Confessions of an Economic Hit Man | John Perkins | ||
| 2007 | ||||
| December | The White Castle | Orhan Pamuk | ||
| November | Ask the Dust | John Fante | ||
| Sept./October | Underworld | Don DeLillo | ||
| August | California, A History | Kevin Starr | ||
| July | March | Geraldine Brooks | ||
| June (optional) | The God Delusion | Richard Dawkins | ||
| May | The Glass Castle | Jeannette Walls | ||
| April | Soldier of the Great War | Mark Helprin | ||
| March | A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier | Ishmael Beah | ||
| February | A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius | Dave Eggers | ||
| January | The Dante Club | Matthew Pearl | ||
| 2006 | ||||
| December | American Gods | Neil Gaiman | ||
| November | A Long Way Down | Nick Hornsby | ||
| October | A Poverty of Reason | Wilfred Beckerman | ||
| September | ||||
| August | Running with Scissors | Augusten Burroughs | ||
| July (optional) | Time and Again | Jack Finney | ||
| June | Beloved | Toni Morrison | ||
| May | Fooled by Randomness | Nassim Nicholas Taleb | ||
| April | The History of Love | Nicole Krauss | ||
| March | The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the 21st Century | Thomas Friedman | ||
| February | A History of the World in Six Glasses | Tom Standage | ||
| January | Popco | Scarlett Thomas | ||
| 2005 | ||||
| December | Funny in Farsi | Firouzeh Dumas | ||
| Nov. (optional) | The Life of Pi | Yann Martel | ||
| October | The Left Hand of Darkness | Ursula Le Guin | ||
| September | Gilead | Marilynne Robinson | ||
| July/August | The Nine Parts of Desire | Geraldine Brooks | ||
| June/July | Cloud Atlas | David Mitchell | ||
| May | The Kite Runner | Khaled Hosseini | ||
| April | The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love | Oscar Hijuelos | ||
| March | The Coffee Trader | David Liss | ||
| February | Stiff: The Curious Life of Human Cadavers | Mary Roach | ||
| January | Empire Falls | Richard Russo | ||