Book Clubs San Francisco

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.

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.

East Bay Women's Book Club September Meetup: The Correspondent

Hello, fellow female readers -- The book for the September Meetup is The Correspondent by Virginia Evans For those of you who are new, I will send out the address to my house by Monday, August 14. Looking forward to gathering together and discussing the book. Bonnie

Books & Brunch September

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.

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.*

Read/Discuss: Babel by RF Kuang

Reading Group #32: Behave

Thank you to everyone who voted for our next reading! We will be reading [Behave, by Robert Sapolsky](https://www.amazon.com/Behave-Biology-Humans-Best-Worst/dp/0143110918/ref=sr_1_1?adgrpid=185640360919&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.8m5zMolcM56CW1dLiaitGI3e263eV1M7LIK_TqNqcGIfNFuf1r0Q8uyTCBGQE30qfnHSES0v7kzleJ5ZnV9dWsj8giV3SPFEsZIfSCmzQBKfYuoiv2YfzgDaIfqYexk2_TtO3huixKm1qPmdfzVRSH-DLGvDXG7HpBJJDugp-qerq6ICYSk_jP9A_aZKHBdRwR7-dFT7CDpom8SE-W2UEPwOu1kxbxWKk4_GpPlpbd0.d2xTbSMImYAyiirH3vgk8Bxn7d4omGqESe6yKpxkdHo&dib_tag=se&hvadid=792782291971&hvdev=t&hvexpln=0&hvlocint=9031944&hvlocphy=9208984&hvnetw=g&hvocijid=17402560853573214321--&hvqmt=e&hvrand=17402560853573214321&hvtargid=kwd-306996294457&hydadcr=14865_13744959_2453105&keywords=robert+sapolsky+behave&mcid=9ba5a3b845b738f490d5ff9b8bfbf4c0&qid=1783192780&sr=8-1) \- specifically\, the first 6 chapters\! If you're attending in person, please be sure to register here as well, so you can get into the building: https://luma.com/san-francisco-cognitive-science-reading--35cc If you'd like to dial in remotely, please leave a comment and we'll get that set up for you. If no-one comments, it'll be in person only. Thank you! Tom

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**

FICTION: Good People, by Patmeena Sabit

**For our September pick, I've chosen Good People by Patmeena Sabit.** I can't remember how or when I first heard about this book, but when I read The Guardian's review below, I was hooked! I also feel like it will resonate with the true-crime fans among the group. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/233717140-good-people "The novel is, in essence, a crime mystery in which a community turns detective and puts a grieving family on trial. It is also a sharp portrait of an immigrant community in the modern United States, an anatomy of poisonous gossip and a commentary on wider societal divisions. Most of all, though, it is awfully addictive." https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/feb/13/good-people-by-patmeena-sabit-review-addictive-mystery-caters-to-modern-attention-spans We'll be meeting at Lost Cat Bar & Bites for this one. Here's their menu: https://www.lostcatsf.com/menu Please don't hesitate to reach out if you have any questions. Thanks!

Living Better Book Club

Usually about seven or eight people show up FYI—even if they don't all sign up here. :) We will be reading and discussing **"Outline"** by Rachel Cusk. Rachel Cusk's Outline is a novel in ten conversations. Spare and lucid, it follows a novelist teaching a course in creative writing over an oppressively hot summer in Athens. She leads her students in storytelling exercises. She meets other visiting writers for dinner. She goes swimming in the Ionian Sea with her neighbor from the plane. The people she encounters speak volubly about themselves: their fantasies, anxieties, pet theories, regrets, and longings. And through these disclosures, a portrait of the narrator is drawn by contrast, a portrait of a woman learning to face a great loss. Should be fun. See you all there!

October Book Club: The List of Suspicious Things by Jennie Godfrey

Per usual, for October book club this year we will be reading a not-so-terrifying, mystery-esque book that will not keep me up at night. Location TBD....maybe Ghost Town or maybe we switch it up this year!! ABOUT THE BOOK Yorkshire, 1979 Maggie Thatcher is prime minister, drainpipe jeans are in, and Miv is convinced that her dad wants to move their family Down South. Because of the murders. Leaving Yorkshire and her best friend Sharon simply isn't an option, no matter the dangers lurking round their way; or the strangeness at home that started the day Miv's mum stopped talking. Perhaps if she could solve the case of the disappearing women, they could stay after all? So, Miv and Sharon decide to make a list: a list of all the suspicious people and things down their street. People they know. People they don't. But their search for the truth reveals more secrets in their neighbourhood, within their families - and between each other - than they ever thought possible. What if the real mystery Miv needs to solve is the one that lies much closer to home? \*SHORTLISTED FOR BOOK OF THE YEAR - DEBUT FICTION AT THE BRITISH BOOK AWARDS 2025\*