Book Clubs San Francisco

David Foster Wallace on Irony, Television, and Sincerity

In *E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction*, David Foster Wallace examines the strange relationship between television, irony, and contemporary American culture. Television, he argues, became extraordinarily good at absorbing the attitudes once used to criticize it: self-awareness, cynicism, parody, and knowing detachment. The result is a culture in which being sophisticated increasingly means anticipating every possible criticism of yourself before anyone else can make it. Irony gives us a way to avoid being naive, but it can also make sincerity, commitment, and genuine belief feel embarrassing. Wallace is ostensibly writing about television and fiction in the early 1990s, but the essay reads remarkably well as an account of the culture that followed: advertising that mocks advertising, brands that joke about being brands, and online personalities who seem permanently aware of how they are being perceived. We’ll use the essay to ask what happens when criticism itself becomes part of the system it is meant to criticize. Can irony still function as a form of resistance once everyone speaks its language? And if detachment has become the default posture of modern culture, what would it mean to communicate sincerely without simply becoming naive? the reading can be found [here](https://jsomers.net/DFW_TV.pdf)

YOU READ LIKE A GIRL 📚✨

FREE COMMUNITY EVENT We’re taking over North Light for a little Sunday reading session 📚 This one will be hosted by Gloria. The book of the season is Happy Place by Emily Henry. No need to have finished the book, come grab a drink, and come hang with us for a couple hours. We’ll spend some time discussing, then put the books down and actually talk to each other 😂 We will also pick a book for next season here. This is really just an excuse to get out of the house, read somewhere cute, and meet some new girls while you’re at it. Come alone. Most people do.

Book Club: "The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise" by Colleen Oakley

After such a serious book in August, let's go for a lighthearted and fun read in September - we'll discuss "The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise" by Colleen Oakley. There are several copies available at the library as well as the audiobook so it should be easy to get! The location is TBD but will be in the Burlingame/San Mateo/Foster City area. We'll decide after the August meeting! Everyone will be waitlisted initially. Priority will be given to previous attendees of book club and regular attendees of the group. For details on attendance & waitlist, please see the "About us" description for the group. **Book Summary - "The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise" by Colleen Oakley** Publication Year: 2023 Page Count: 337 21-year-old Tanner Quimby needs a place to live. Preferably one where she can continue sitting around in sweatpants and playing video games nineteen hours a day. Since she has no credit or money to speak of, her options are limited, so when an opportunity to work as a live-in caregiver for an elderly woman falls into her lap, she takes it. One slip on the rug. That’s all it took for Louise Wilt’s daughter to demand that Louise have a full-time nanny living with her. Never mind that she can still walk fine, finish her daily crossword puzzle, and pour the two fingers of vodka she drinks every afternoon. Bottom line: Louise wants a caretaker even less than Tanner wants to be one. The two start off their living arrangement happily ignoring each other until Tanner starts to notice things—weird things. Like, why does Louise keep her garden shed locked up tighter than a prison? And why is the local news fixated on the suspect of one of the biggest jewelry heists in American history who looks eerily like Louise? And why does Louise suddenly appear in her room, with a packed bag at 1 a.m. insisting that they leave town immediately? Thus begins the story of a not-to-be-underestimated elderly woman and an aimless young woman who—if they can outrun the mistakes of their past—might just have the greatest adventure of their lives.

Book Club: "Cat's People" by Tanya Guerrero

Halloween is coming up but instead of reading a scary horror story, let's read an uplifting tale where a black cat is a main character! We'll discuss "Cat's People" by Tanya Guerrero. There are several copies available at the library so it should be easy to get! The location is TBD but will be in the Burlingame/San Mateo/Foster City area. We'll decide after the September meeting! Everyone will be waitlisted initially. Priority will be given to previous attendees of book club and regular attendees of the group. For details on attendance & waitlist, please see the "About us" description for the group. **Book Summary - "Cat's People" by Tanya Guerrero** Publication Year: 2025 Page Count: 300 Núria, a single-by-choice barista with a resentment for the "crazy cat lady" label, is a member of The Meow-Yorkers, a group in Brooklyn who takes care of the neighborhood’s stray cats. On one of her volunteering days, she starts finding Post-It notes from a secret admirer at the spot where her favorite stray lives—a black cat named Cat. Like most cats, he is rather curious and sly, so of course he knows who the notes are from. Núria, however, is clueless. Are the notes from Collin, a bestselling author and self-professed hermit with a weakness for good coffee? Are they from Lily, a fresh-out-of-high school Georgia native searching for her long-lost half-sister? Are they from Omar, the beloved neighborhood mailman going through an early mid-life crisis? Or are they from Bong, the grieving widower who owns her favorite bodega? When Cat suddenly falls ill, these five strangers find themselves connected in their desire to care for him and discover that chance encounters can lead to the meaningful connections they've been searching for.

September 2026 Bookclub Discussion: The Correspondent — Virginia Evans

**📚 Our September Book Has Been Chosen!** Thanks to everyone who voted! Our next **Books & Brew** read is: ***The Correspondent — Virginia Evans*** Grab a copy, start reading, and join us for a great conversation! **About the Book** Sybil Van Antwerp has spent much of her life putting pen to paper. Through letters exchanged with family, friends, authors, and strangers, she shares her thoughts, frustrations, memories, and the pieces of herself that can sometimes be easier to express in writing than face-to-face. Told entirely through correspondence, *The Correspondent* gradually reveals the story of a complicated, sharp-witted woman confronting the relationships, regrets, and losses that have shaped her life. Warm, reflective, and deeply human, the novel explores connection, forgiveness, grief, and the ways we continue to grow and understand ourselves—even when we think we already know our own story. ────────── 📸 Follow us on Instagram **@booksandbrew_oakland** for meetup photos, book announcements, and future events.

2nd Saturday "Not quite a book club" in the Richmond District

Show up having read a book\* you want to talk about. Get a beverage and/or food inside the cafe. We will probably meet outside in Bazaar Cafe's back garden.\*\* (The garden is accessible through an alley. There is a door to the alley next to the register inside. You can also go directly to the back garden from the street via the alley entrance on the right side of the right Cafe window.) Once you've spotted the group, we will introduce ourselves and have a brief period of chit chat. Then we will go around our group each talking about the (different!) books we read. Afterwards, you are welcome to stick around and chat. If you have a physical book you are done reading and want to offer other folks in the group, you are welcome to do that, but there is absolutely no obligation to do so. \*Any book! Could be a graphic novel, or non-fiction, or fiction, or a mystery or a romance novel or SciFi or Fantasy! \*\*If it is raining or a really bad air day from wildfires, it may be too crowded inside Bazaar Cafe to find a table, although it was raining during a few meetings early last year and the Bazaar cafe folks helped me stake out a table. In the event of rain and no space inside, I will probably move the event a few blocks away to Ilana Coffee or Royal Ground Coffee on Clement. I will message the group if we meet inside or if the location moves to another coffee shop.

Books & Brunch September

Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki!

**📚This month we will be reading Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki.** **📍We’ll meet as usual in Dolores Park. Specific location in the park will be shared on the day of with pictures and a map on our Instagram page.** **🎒BYO blanket, chair, snacks, beverages, sunscreen, etc.** **💚Our bookclub prioritizes community, conversation, and connection over strict literary analysis. Members use the chosen book as a fun excuse to gather, relax, and catch up with friends or meet new people.** **@queersapphicbookclubsf**

The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith

IMPORTANT: please note the location on this event is just a placeholder; we're working on finding a quieter venue than previous meetings. For the next meeting of A Queer Book Club we'll be reading and discussing *The Price of Salt* by Patricia Highsmith. From the publisher: **"A great American writer…Highsmith's writing is wicked…it puts a spell on you." ―Entertainment Weekly** *Patricia Highsmith's story of romantic obsession may be one of the most important, but still largely unrecognized, novels of the twentieth century. First published in 1952 and touted as "the novel of a love that society forbids," the book soon became a cult classic.* *Based on a true story plucked from Highsmith's own life, The Price of Salt (or Carol) tells the riveting drama of Therese Belivet, a stage designer trapped in a department-store day job, whose routine is forever shattered by a gorgeous epiphany―the appearance of Carol Aird, a customer who comes in to buy her daughter a Christmas toy. Therese begins to gravitate toward the alluring suburban housewife, who is trapped in a marriage as stultifying as Therese's job. They fall in love and set out across the United States, ensnared by society's confines and the imminent disapproval of others, yet propelled by their infatuation. The Price of Salt is a brilliantly written story that may surprise Highsmith fans and will delight those discovering her work.*

"The Good Earth" by Pearl S. Buck

"Travel to 1920s China, a time when the last emperor still ruled and the sweeping changes of the twentieth century were distant rumblings, with this timeless, evocative classic tale of the honest farmer Wang Lung and his family as they struggle to survive in the midst of vast political and social upheavals. Nobel Prize and Pulitzer Prize winner Pearl S. Buck traces the whole cycle of life: its terrors, its passions, its ambitions, and rewards. 'A comment upon the meaning and tragedy of life as it is lived in any age in any quarter of the globe' (The New York Times), this brilliant novel—beloved by millions—is a universal tale of an ordinary family caught in the tide of history."--Publisher

SFVS Members Only: Book Club September Meeting

**\*\*\*SFVS Members Only Event RSVP Via Partiful Not Meetup\*\*\*** The invite was sent directly to members on 8/15 please [message us](bookclub@sfvs.org) if [you are a member](https://www.sfvs.org/membership) and didn't receive an invite. Due to how popular/loved Oryx and Crake and Year of the Flood was by the group in July and August, we'll be reading Margaret Atwood's final book of the trilogy: MaddAdam! Don't worry if you haven't read the prior books though, Atwood said during an interview you can absolutely read it as a stand-alone book without getting lost :) We look forward to another month of great conversation, connection, and community! Book Club is for SFVS Members only. If you are a new member and Partiful does not let you RSVP, it's because we need to manually add you to the invite. Questions? Need help? Reach out to us at [bookclub@sfvs.org](mailto:bookclub@sfvs.org).

Profs & Pints San Francisco: The Rise of Vampires

[Profs and Pints San Francisco](https://www.profsandpints.com/sfbayarea) presents: **“The Rise of Vampires,”** on the folkloric origins and literary evolution of today’s fanged fiends, with Sara Hackenberg, professor of English at San Francisco State University and scholar of Victorian literature and literature’s vampire tradition. [Tickets must be purchased online, at [https://events.ticketleap.com/tickets/profsandpints/san-francisco-rise-of-vampires](https://events.ticketleap.com/tickets/profsandpints/san-francisco-rise-of-vampires) .] Did you know that vampires sprang from literature nearly a whole century before Bram Stoker wrote *Dracula*, and that they prowled in folklore for centuries before that? You’d have to visit a lot of gravesites to witness the unearthing of as many vampires as will be raised at the October 12th debut of Profs and Pints at The Dairy community space at San Francisco’s Presidio Sports Basement. The excavation will be carried out by Professor Sara Hackenberg, who previously has given excellent Profs and Pints talks on vampires and Christmas ghost stories. She’ll show you the vampire beneath the vampire beneath the vampire, tracing their evolution in old European folklore and the English literature of the nineteenth-century. You’ll get to know the seductive, snaky Lamia in Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s 1816 poem “Christabel” and the sapphic seductress at the center of Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s 1872 novella Carmilla. You’ll spend time with the mad, bad, and dangerous Byronic vampire that originated in John Polidori’s 1819 gothic horror story “The Vampyre,” found his way into theatrical adaptations such as James Planché’s 1820 “The Bride of the Isles,” and then stalked through cheap popular publications–known as “penny bloods” or later as “penny dreadfuls”—such as James Malcolm Rymer’s mid-1800s serial *Varney, The Vampire.* We’ll consider how Bram Stoker was influenced by all of these texts and folded a variety of characteristics of their fearsome femmes and hommes fatales into Count Dracula, the most famous literary vampire of all. (Advance tickets: $13.50 plus processing fees. Door price: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. The talk starts 30 minutes later.) Image: “The Premature Burial,” an 1854 painting by Antoine Wiertz (Wiertz Museum / Wikimedia).