Wednesday, October 21st, at 7 PM

Katherine Grandjean, Wellesley professor and author of American Passage, joins us to discuss her examination of a chilling true story, Kingdom of Devils: A Tale of Murder in the Shadow of the American Revolution.

Bristling with tense, page-turning storytelling—and driven by a historian’s obsessive detective work—Kingdom of Devils recovers a series of long-forgotten murders as a haunting tale about the darkness at the heart of the American dream.

Katherine will be in conversation with fellow Wellesley College professor Ryan Quintana.

Thursday, October 22nd, all day @ UMass Charles River Campus

Curated and sponsored by Gennari Aronson LLP, with support from Wellesley Books, Authors and Innovators is the book event for business minds. 

Featuring more than a dozen entrepreneurs and leaders, this free festival is brimming with fresh ideas, meaningful conversation, and inspiration for the journey of building what’s next.

Click the link below to learn more and register for free.

Owen recommends: Agrippa by Robert Harris

In this excellent work of historical fiction, which stands in for an actual memoir lost to history, renowned general and statesman Agrippa looks back on his rise from lowly plebeian to Augustus’ instrumental right hand. As Agrippa ascends, we also come to see the slow but deliberate chipping away of the Republic and how small concessions to power breed larger losses of freedom.

Jerry recommends: The Weight of Angels by John Boyne

What if Oscar Wilde had not gone to prison and died shortly after at 46? This alt-history gives Wilde a full life, mirroring the events of the first half of the 20th century as he continues to write while interacting with the likes of Eliot, Yeats, Shaw, Churchill, and even Katherine Hepburn. Boyne captures both the voice and wit of Wilde and his many relationships, including a male partner of fifteen years, as he somehow thrives in the anti-Queer legal structure of Great Britain. It is the human aspects of Wilde, including personal pitfalls and subsequent guilt, that guide the story. Wilde is a likable yet damaged person who ultimately contributes even more to society. This is a creative and extraordinary novel which brings new appreciation to both Wilde and what could have been.

Karen recommends: Partita by Barbara Kingsolver

No preexisting knowledge of classical music is required for full, intoxicating immersion in Kingsolver’s brilliant literary partita*. It relates a woman’s incredible life of passion, heartaches, healing, resolutions, all played out into a beautiful whole—a deeply moving, triumphant partita.

*partita: a musical work (most often solo instrumental) that presents a series of disparate movements as a unified whole.

Rebecca recommends: Night Ride by Christopher Myers (picture book)

There is so much to enjoy about this wordless picture book, told entirely in the medium of stained glass. (Really!) Lovers of wordless picture books will enjoy all of the little visual details that make the narrative flow. Kids will enjoy feeling that sweet sense of freedom and adventure as a group of boys spends precious, unsupervised time together, flying through their city on their bicycles. And, hopefully, everyone will enjoy a picture book that, lovingly and timelessly, shows Black kids being kids.