Page By page Book Club
Page by Page, the intermediate ELL book club, meets every Wednesday at 1 pm on Zoom. Each week, we discuss a few chapters from the book until we have read it all the way through.
Current selection
Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
We’ll read about 40 pages a week of this book starting July 24, 2024. (It is told in verse, so there are many fewer words per page than usual.) Copies to keep are available at the Reader’s Advisory Desk, and ebook and audiobook versions are also available through Libby, though there may be a wait and you will need to go to your own library’s website to get them if you are not a Plymouth or Plymouth Township resident.
“Jacqueline Woodson, one of today’s finest writers, tells the moving story of her childhood in mesmerizing verse. Raised in South Carolina and New York, Woodson always felt halfway home in each place. In vivid poems, she shares what it was like to grow up as an African American in the 1960s and 1970s, living with the remnants of Jim Crow and her growing awareness of the Civil Rights movement. Touching and powerful, each poem is both accessible and emotionally charged, each line a glimpse into a child’s soul as she searches for her place in the world. Woodson’s eloquent poetry also reflects the joy of finding her voice through writing stories, despite the fact that she struggled with reading as a child. Her love of stories inspired her and stayed with her, creating the first sparks of the gifted writer she was to become…: Ms. Woodson writes with a sure understanding of the thoughts of young people, offering a poetic, eloquent narrative that is not simply a story. but a mature exploration of grown-up issues and self-discovery.” -The New York Times Book Review
Previous Selections
October-December 2021 – Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White
December 13 2021 – “Fish Cheeks” by Amy Tan (short story)
January-February 2022 – Great Illustrated Classics: The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum. Adapted by Deirde S. Laiken and illustrated by Pablo Marcos Studio.
February-May 2022 – A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman
May-August 2022 – The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
August-September 2022 – The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros
September 19, 2022 – “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin (short story)
September 26, 2022 – “Thank You, Ma’am” by Langston Hughes (short story)
October 2022 – The Midwife’s Apprentice by Karen Cushman
November 2022 – The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry (short story)
December 2022 – “A Jury of Her Peers” by Susan Glaspell (short story)
January 2023-February 2023 – The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer
March 2023 – Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis
April 5, 2023 – “One Boy Told Me” by Naomi Shihab Nye (poem)
April 12, 2023 – “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant (short story)
April-June 2023 – Hidden Figures by Margot Shetterly
July 2023 – Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf
August-October 2023 – State of Wonder by Ann Patchett
October-November 2023 – The Maid by Nita Prose
December 2023-February 2024 – Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng
February – May 2024 – The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes
May-July 2024 – Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson
July-September 2024 – Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson