Brown Bag Book Talks to Build a Better World
Lunchtime get-togethers to talk about memoirs and non-fiction books that can help us build a better world.
Each talk explores three main themes. Below are some recommended titles available at the library, but feel free to share whatever you’re reading!
Build a Better World: Memoir
Thursday, August 10th 12:00-1:00 p.m.
Overcoming Personal & Family Challenges
Sheryl Sandberg, Option B
Jeanette Walls, The Glass Castle
Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
David Small, Stitches
Temple Grandin, Thinking in Pictures
Roxanne Gay, Hunger: A Memoir of My Body
Young People Changing the World
Malala Yousafzai, I am Malala
William Kamkwamba, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind: Creating Currents of Electricity and Hope
Sonia Nazario, Enrique’s Journey: The True Story of a Boy Determined to Reunite with His Mother
Jazz Jennings, Being Jazz: My Life as a (Transgender) Teen
Facing Social Issues
Carl Lynn and Susan Burton, Becoming Ms. Burton: From Prison to Recovery to Leading the Fight for Incarcerated Women
Steven Hatch, Inferno: A Doctor’s Ebola Story
Joshua Hammer, The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu: and Their Race to Save the World’s Most Precious Manuscripts
Nicholson Baker, Substitute: Going to School with a Thousand Kids
Build a Better World: Non-fiction
Thursday, July 13th, 12:00-1:00 p.m.
Working Together in Society
Alain de Botton, Religion for Atheists
Sebastian Junger, Tribe
David Brooks, The Social Animal
Malcolm Gladwell, David and Goliath
Rebecca Solnit, Hope in the Dark
Racial Justice
Debby Irving, Waking Up White: and Finding Myself in the Story of Race
Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me
John Edgar Wideman, Writing to Save a Life
The Fire This Time
James Baldwin, Notes of a Native Son
Food, Climate, & Sustainability
Louise Gray, The Ethical Carnivore: My Year of Killing to Eat
Mark Kurlansky, The Food of a Younger Land
Michael Pollan, Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual
Didi Pershouse, The Ecology of Care
Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming