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 Welcome to a special Reading Group Choices eNewsletter dedicated to The Women's National Book Association's 2014 Great Group Reads Selections for National Reading Group Month.
Check out our featured selections below and click on the links to connect to our lively discussion questions. These wonderful books will inspire thoughtful conversation about cultural and religious conflicts, societal expectations, human survival, self-identity, hope, love, and the unexpected moments that can change a person's life. All of these authors will propel you into their worlds with intoxicating characters, beautiful language, and satisfying conclusions.
We hope you enjoy one, many, or all! Happy reading to all of our reading groups—it's your month!
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Great Group Reads for Lively Discussion
Foreign Gods, Inc. by Okey Ndibe
 Foreign Gods, Inc., tells the story of Ike, a New York-based Nigerian cab driver who sets out to steal the statue of an ancient war deity from his home village and sell it to a New York gallery. A meditation on the dreams, promises and frustrations of the immigrant life in America; the nature and impact of religious conflicts; an examination of the ways in which modern culture creates or heightens infatuation with the "exotic," including the desire to own strange objects and hanker after ineffable illusions; and an exploration of the shifting nature of memory, Foreign Gods is a brilliant work of fiction that illuminates our globally interconnected world like no other.
Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
 Everything I Never Told You delves into the rifts within a family and divisions between cultures. It is at once a telling portrait of an earlier era—when mothers stayed home, interracial marriages were rare, and societal expectations were firmly in place—and yet deeply relevant today. The Lees’ story will resonate with anyone who has felt or been treated as an outsider and struggled to live in two worlds at the same time. It asks us to confront the lasting questions: How well do we ever really know each other? Why do we keep secrets, even from those we love most? In this stunning debut, Ng masterfully uncovers the myriad ways in which mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, husbands and wives, and siblings endeavor, all their lives, to understand one another.
The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin
 A. J. Fikry, the irascible owner of Island Books, has recently endured some tough years: his wife has died, his bookstore is experiencing the worst sales in its history, and his prized possession—a rare edition of Poe poems—has been stolen. Over time, he has given up on people, and even the books in his store, instead of offering solace, are yet another reminder of a world that is changing too rapidly. Until a most unexpected occurrence gives him the chance to make his life over and see things anew. Gabrielle Zevin’s enchanting novel is a love letter to the world of books—an irresistible affirmation of why we read, and why we love.
The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry is available now in hardcover, and will be available in paperback in December 2014.
The Commandant of Lubizec by Patrick Hicks
 The Commandant of Lubizec is a harrowing account of a death camp that never actually existed but easily could have in the Nazi state. It is a sensitive, accurate retelling of a place that went about the business of genocide. Told as a historical account in a documentary style, it explores the atmosphere of a death camp. It describes what it was like to watch the trains roll in, and it probes into the mind of its commandant, Hans-Peter Guth. How could he murder thousands of people each day and then go home to laugh with his children? This is not only an unflinching portrayal of the machinery of the gas chambers, it is also the story of how prisoners burned the camp to the ground and fled into the woods. It is a story of rebellion and survival. It is a story of life amid death.
Where Somebody Waits by Margaret Kaufman
 This “masterful first novel-in-stories” instantly transports you to small-town Arkansas where you’ll fall under the spell of magnetic, beautiful, and complicated Ruby Davidson. Self-assured, kind, always willing to take a stand for people less fortunate, Ruby loves her husband, adores her nephews and nieces, and more or less dutifully respects the tightly knit Jewish family into which she has married. Her life is filled with triumphs and failings, joy and sadness, lived with all possible grace, and told in a spirit of admirable and honest reflection. A full life, yes, but not an untroubled one, because Ruby also still loves her high-school sweetheart. How she comes to terms with this old, old conundrum and how it affects the lives of everyone around her shape the heart of Where Somebody Waits.
The World of Rae English by Lucy Rosenthal
 The World of Rae English is set in the sixties–the era of Mad Men–relocated from Manhattan to Iowa City. This second novel by Lucy Rosenthal is about a young woman who is recovering from a marriage to a disgraced politician. Once a rising political star, he has been brought down in a scandal and packed off to prison. After this, Rae English abandons New York for the University of Iowa’s Writers Workshop where she hopes to find herself as a writer and to investigate the possibilities of romance in the heartland. Funny, wryly observed and tinged with heartache, this is an unputdownable novel written in a brilliant voice that is at once tender and whip smart.
The Promise by Ann Weisgarber
 From the author of The Personal History of Rachel Dupree, shortlisted for the Orange Award for New Writers and longlisted for the Orange Prize. It's 1900, and young pianist Catherine Wainwright flees the fashionable town of Dayton, Ohio in the wake of a terrible scandal. Heartbroken and facing destitution, she finds herself striking up correspondence with a childhood admirer, the recently widowed Oscar Williams. In desperation she agrees to marry him, but when Catherine travels to Oscar's farm on Galveston Island, Texas—a thousand miles from home—she finds she is little prepared for the life that awaits her.
Prayers for the Stolen by Jennifer Clement
 A haunting story of love and survival that introduces an unforgettable literary heroine. Ladydi Garcia Martinez is fierce, funny and smart. She was born into a world where being a girl is a dangerous thing. In the mountains of Guerrero, Mexico, women must fend for themselves, as their men have left to seek opportunities elsewhere. Here in the shadow of the drug war, bodies turn up on the outskirts of the village, school is held when a volunteer can be coerced away from the big city, the drug lords are kings, and mothers disguise their daughters as sons to protect them from the rapacious grasp of the cartels. An illuminating and affecting portrait of women in rural Mexico, and a stunning exploration of the hidden consequences of an unjust war, Prayers for the Stolen is an unforgettable story of friendship, family, and determination.
What is Visible by Kimberly Elkins
 A vividly original literary novel based on the astounding true-life story of Laura Bridgman, the first deaf and blind person who learned language and blazed a trail for Helen Keller. Deeply enthralling and rich with lyricism, What is Visible chronicles the breathtaking experiment that Laura Bridgman embodied and its links to the great social, philosophical, theological, and educational changes rocking Victorian America. Given Laura's worldwide fame in the nineteenth century, it is astonishing that she has been virtually erased from history. What is Visible will set the record straight. Not since The Diving Bell and the Butterfly has a book proven so profoundly moving in illuminating the challenges of living in a completely unique inner world.
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