Virtual International Literature Book Club

  • Posted on: 31 May 2019
  • By: TanyaMills

Join us on Zoom for now to discuss recent works written by foreign authors. Expand your literary sensibilities! If you're interested, click on the registration link below to receive an invitation with the joining link to participate. We generally meet every third Wednesday evening of the month. Please either order your books here online or call the store at 435-619-8200 to special order copies, paying in advance. (If you are interested in some of our past titles, scroll down to the bottom to access PDFs of lists from prior years.)

REGISTER ONCE TO BE ABLE TO ACCESS ALL THE MEETINGS HERE.

 

BOOK BUNGALOW 2024 INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE BOOK CLUB LIST:

 

JANUARYSmilla’s Sense of Snow by Peter Høeg (3/27/12 – Mystery)

[DANISH] When caustic Smilla Jaspersen discovers that her neighbor—a neglected six-year-old boy, and possibly her only friend—has died in a tragic accident, a peculiar intuition tells her it was murder. Unpredictable to the last page, this is one of the most beautifully written and original crime stories of our time, a new classic.

 

FEBRUARYVagabonds: A Novel by Eloghosa Osunde (2/28/23 – Literary Fiction, Magical Realism, LGBTQ)

[NIGERIAN] In Nigeria, vagabonds are those whose existence is literally outlawed: the queer, the poor, the displaced, the footloose and rogue spirits. This novel presents a wild array of characters for whom life itself is a form of resistance: a driver for a debauched politician with the power to command life and death; a legendary fashion designer who gives birth to a grown daughter; a lesbian couple whose tender relationship sheds unexpected light on their experience with underground sex work; a wife and mother who attends a secret spiritual gathering that shifts her world. As their lives intertwine--in bustling markets and underground clubs, churches and hotel rooms--vagabonds are seized and challenged by spirits who command the city's dark energy.

 

MARCHEvery Drop is a Man’s Nightmare by Megan Kamalei Kakimoto (8/29/23 – Short Stories, Fairytales, Folktales, Mythology) – NOTE: The author may join us

[NATIVE HAWAIIAN-JAPANESE] This wrenching and sensational debut story collection follows a cast of mixed native Hawaiian and Japanese women through a contemporary landscape thick with inherited wisdom and the ghosts of colonization. This is a Hawai'i where unruly sexuality and generational memory overflow the postcard image of paradise and the boundaries of the real, where the superstitions born of the islands take on the weight of truth.

 

APRILThe Cave by Amani Ballour, M.D. (3/5/24 – Autobiography)

[SYRIAN] Simply put, there is no one in Syria with a story like Dr. Amani Ballour's. The only woman to have ever run a wartime hospital, she saved her peers from the atrocities of war while contending with the patriarchal conservatism around her.

 

MAYThe Cat Who Saved Books by Sosuke Natsukawa (3/14/23 – Fantasy)

[JAPANESE] Bookish high school student Rintaro Natsuki is about to close the secondhand bookstore he inherited from his beloved bookworm grandfather. Then, a talking cat appears with an unusual request. The feline asks for—or  rather, demands—the teenager's help in saving books with him. The world is full of lonely books left unread and unloved, and the cat and Rintaro must liberate them from their neglectful owners. Their mission sends this odd couple on an amazing journey, where they enter different mazes to set books free.

 

JUNEThe Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline (9/1/17 – YA, Environment, Science Fiction)

[CANADIAN-GEORGIAN BAY METIS] In a future world ravaged by global warming, people have lost the ability to dream, and the dreamlessness has led to widespread madness. The only people still able to dream are North America's indigenous population—and it is their marrow that holds the cure for the rest of the world. But getting the marrow—and dreams—means death for the unwilling donors. Driven to flight, a 15-year-old and his companions struggle for survival, attempt to reunite with loved ones, and take refuge from the 'recruiters' who seek them out to bring them to the marrow-stealing 'factories.'

 

JULYDust Child by Nguyên Phan Quê Mai (3/5/24 – Historical Fiction) NOTE: The author may join us

[VIETNAMESE] A suspenseful and moving saga about family secrets, hidden trauma, and the overriding power of forgiveness, set during the war and in present-day Việt Nam. In 1969, sisters desperate to help their parents pay off debts, leave their rural village and become "bar girls" in Sài Gòn, drinking, flirting (and more) with American GIs in return for money. As the war moves closer to the city, one gets swept up in an irresistible romance with a young and charming American helicopter pilot. Decades later, an American veteran, Dan, returns to Việt Nam with his wife, Linda, hoping to find a way to heal from his PTSD and, unbeknownst to her, reckon with secrets from his past.

 

AUGUSTThe Wizard of the Kremlin by Giuliano da Empoli (11/7/23 – Political Thriller)

[ITALIAN/SWISS] Known as the "Wizard of the Kremlin," the enigmatic Vadim Baranov was a TV producer before becoming a political advisor to Putin, aka "The Czar." After his resignation from this position, legends about him multiply, with no one able to distinguish truth from fiction. Until one night, when he tells his story to the narrator of this book... He immerses us in the heart of the Russian state, where sycophants and oligarchs have been engaging in open warfare, and where Vadim, now the regime's main spin doctor, turns an entire country into an avant-garde political stage.

 

SEPTEMBERHow to Say Babylon by Safiya Sinclair (10/3/23 – Memoir)

[JAMAICAN] With echoes of Educated and Born a Crime, this is the stunning story of the author's struggle to break free of her rigid Rastafarian upbringing, ruled by her father's strict patriarchal views and repressive control of her childhood, to find her own voice as a woman and poet.

 

OCTOBERThe Girl They Left Behind by Roxanne Veletzos (9/3/19 – Historical Fiction)

[ROMANIAN] On a freezing night in January 1941, a little Jewish girl is found on the steps of an apartment building in Bucharest. With Romania recently allied with the Nazis, the Jewish population is in grave danger, so the girl is placed in an orphanage and eventually adopted by a wealthy childless couple who name her Natalia. As she assimilates into her new life, she all but forgets the parents who were forced to leave her behind…until as a young woman she crosses paths with Victor--an important official in the Communist regime that she used to know as an impoverished young student.

 

NOVEMBERCrooked Hallelujah by Kelli Jo Ford (7/20/21 – Short Stories, Literary)

[AMERICAN-CHEROKEE] It's 1974 in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma and fifteen-year-old Justine grows up in a family of tough, complicated, and loyal women presided over by her mother, Lula, and Granny. After Justine's father abandoned the family, Lula became a devout member of the Holiness Church - a community that Justine at times finds stifling and terrifying. But Justine does her best as a devoted daughter until an act of violence sends her on a different path forever.

 

DECEMBERThe East Indian by Brinda Charry (4/9/24 – Historical Fiction)  

[AMERICAN-INDIAN] Kidnapped and transported to the New World after traveling from the British East India Company's outpost on the Coromandel Coast to the teeming streets of London, young Tony finds himself in Jamestown, Virginia, where he and his fellow indentured servants—boys like himself, men from Africa, a mad woman from London—must work the tobacco plantations. Orphaned and afraid, Tony initially longs for home. But as he adjusts to his new environment, finding companionship and even love, he can envision a life for himself after servitude. His dream: to become a medicine man, or a physician's assistant, an expert on roots and herbs, a dispenser of healing compounds.

 

 

*If you are interested in buying any of the above titles, either to participate in the book club or for your own pleasure and enlightenment, please order below or put your order in at our cash counter in person or over the phone. In case we encounter difficulties ordering any of the above titles, we will select others as needed.

**To download lists of past picks, plus some other recommended titles, please see the attached PDF documents below.

Event date: 
Wednesday, March 20, 2024 - 7:00pm
Wednesday, April 17, 2024 - 7:00pm
Event address: 
Zoom Online
St. George, UT 84770-4087
Smilla's Sense of Snow: A Novel By Peter Høeg, Tiina Nunnally (Translated by) Cover Image
By Peter Høeg, Tiina Nunnally (Translated by)
$22.00
ISBN: 9781250002556
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Picador - March 27th, 2012

Vagabonds!: A Novel By Eloghosa Osunde Cover Image
$17.00
ISBN: 9780593330036
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Riverhead Books - February 28th, 2023

Every Drop is a Man's Nightmare By Megan Kamalei Kakimoto Cover Image
$27.99
ISBN: 9781639731169
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Bloomsbury Publishing - August 29th, 2023

The Cave: A Secret Underground Hospital and One Woman's Story of Survival in Syria By Amani Ballour, Rania Abouzeid Cover Image
$30.00
ISBN: 9781426222740
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: National Geographic - March 5th, 2024

The Cat Who Saved Books: A Novel By Sosuke Natsukawa, Louise Heal Kawai (Translated by) Cover Image
By Sosuke Natsukawa, Louise Heal Kawai (Translated by)
$18.99
ISBN: 9780063095731
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: HarperVia - March 14th, 2023

The Marrow Thieves By Cherie Dimaline Cover Image
$16.95
ISBN: 9781770864863
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Dcb Young Readers - September 1st, 2017

Dust Child: A Novel By Que Mai Phan Nguyen Cover Image
$28.00
ISBN: 9781643752754
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Algonquin Books - March 14th, 2023

The Wizard of the Kremlin: A Novel By Giuliano da Empoli, Willard Wood (Translated by) Cover Image
By Giuliano da Empoli, Willard Wood (Translated by)
$16.99
ISBN: 9781635423952
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Other Press - November 7th, 2023

How to Say Babylon: A Memoir By Safiya Sinclair Cover Image
$28.99
ISBN: 9781982132330
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: 37 Ink - October 3rd, 2023

The Girl They Left Behind: A Novel By Roxanne Veletzos Cover Image
$17.00
ISBN: 9781501187698
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Atria Books - September 3rd, 2019

Crooked Hallelujah By Kelli Jo Ford Cover Image
$16.00
ISBN: 9780802149138
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Grove Press - July 20th, 2021

The East Indian: A Novel By Brinda Charry Cover Image
$17.00
ISBN: 9781668004531
Availability: Coming Soon - Available for Pre-Order Now
Published: Scribner - April 9th, 2024