The LWVLA Book Club Welcomes All Interested Readers
LWVLA Book Club meets monthly-ish, and attending members select the books to be read. As with our other League activities, Book Club is currently meeting via Zoom because of the COVID-19 pandemic. To join us: Check the calendar on our home page to find the next time we meet. Click on the calendar entry for a description of the book and a link to registration for the meeting. You will receive a confirmation email with a Zoom link to the Book Club meeting.
Below you will find a list of the books read over the past three years. Each book is linked to its entry on Goodreads, a website dedicated to helping individuals find and share books they love.
Empowering voters.
Defending democracy. The League of Women Voters.
Currently reading for February 28: Justice on the Brink: The Death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Rise of Amy Coney Barrett, and Twelve Months that Transformed the Supreme Court Linda Greenhouse At the end of the Supreme Court's 2019-20 term, the center was holding. By the end of the 2020-21 term, the right-wing supermajority had cemented Donald Trump's legacy on American jurisprudence. Greenhouse, who won a Pulitzer Prize for her Supreme Court coverage, gives us unique insight into a court under stress, providing the brilliant analysis readers of her work in The New York Times have come to expect. Ultimately, she asks a fundamental question: Is this still John Roberts's Supreme Court, or does it now belong to Donald Trump? Our Time Is Now Stacey Abrams Celebrated national leader and bestselling author Stacey Abrams offers a blueprint to end voter suppression, empower our citizens, and take back our country. Abrams chronicles a chilling account of how the right to vote and the principle of democracy have been and continue to be under attack. Abrams would have been the first African American woman governor, but experienced these effects firsthand, despite running the most innovative race in modern politics as the Democratic nominee in Georgia. The book compellingly argues for the importance of robust voter protections, an elevation of identity politics, engagement in the census, and a return to moral international leadership.
Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality Danielle Allen Allen finds new meaning in Jefferson's understanding of equality, detailing the Declaration’s case that freedom rests on equality. The contradictions between ideals and reality in a document that perpetuated slavery are also brilliantly tackled by Allen, whose cogently written and beautifully designed book “is must-reading for all who care about the future as well as the origins of America’s democracy” (David M. Kennedy).
American Dirt
The nail-biting climax of one of the greatest political victories in American history: the down and dirty campaign to get the last state to ratify the 19th amendment, granting women the right to vote.
Waking Up White is the book Irving wishes someone had handed her decades ago. By sharing her sometimes cringe-worthy struggle to understand racism and racial tensions, she offers a fresh perspective on bias, stereotypes, manners, and tolerance.