Book Swaps San Francisco

December Book Swap!

October Book Club: The Only One Left

The arrival of October means it’s time for a spooky book! For the next meet up in October, we’ll be reading The Only One Left by Riley Sager. The Marin library system has plenty of copies available. Happy reading!

November Book Club

Book 93: The Beheading Game by Rebecca Lehmann

This looks like a fun macabre read we can enjoy in the month of October for our November discussion. -Jessica \-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\- **How it works:** We’ll meet at a local brewery for some drinks and conversation. Finishing the book is not a requirement to attend—as long as you don't mind spoilers! We’ll have an unstructured, informal discussion of the book and the themes that the book brings up. We hope to see you there! \-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\- Disgraced. Beheaded. And out for revenge . . . We all know what happened to Henry VIII’s second wife, Anne Boleyn. But what if she woke up the day after her execution and took it upon herself to seek justice? “Fabulous! A marvelously inventive and mythic reworking of the story of Anne Boleyn. I loved it.”—Kelly Link, author of The Book of Love “Nobody was surprised at Anne’s conviction. The world loves to put a woman in her place.” The Beheading Game begins in the hours after Anne Boleyn’s beheading, when she wakes to find herself unceremoniously laid to rest in a makeshift coffin, her head wrapped in linen at her knees. Discarded by King Henry VIII for being unable to give him a male heir and reviled by Cromwell for being too smart for her own good, she was ultimately executed based on trumped-up charges of adultery, incest, and high treason. Anne escapes the Tower of London, sews her head back on, then sets out on a quest to kill Henry VIII before he can marry her own lady-in-waiting Jane Seymour. The stakes are high—if Jane gives birth to a rival heir, Anne’s daughter, Elizabeth, will lose her claim to the throne. Traveling the streets of London in the guise of a commoner, with the help of a prostitute who becomes a trusted friend (and perhaps something more), Anne soon realizes how little she knew about life in the real world. A fantastical journey through the wilds of England and Tudor history, filled with danger and magic and steeped in Arthurian legend, The Beheading Game is a prescient reminder that “mouthy” women have always been punished. Now, thanks to debut novelist Rebecca Lehmann, nearly five hundred years after Anne Boleyn’s death, one of history’s most maligned women finally has the chance to tell her story.

Book, Coffee, Chit Chat, etc. (Wednesday Edition)

ATTENTION: We are now meeting in person again! Please follow current recommendations around mask usage to keep everyone safe. Masks are always welcome and accepted, no matter the current regulations. If you'd like to meet online check out our meeting on the first Wednesday of every month. It's that time again! Let's chit chat about the books we exchanged last time and welcome newcomers bringing their first book. If you've been before you know the deal, otherwise just bring a book to share and expect to say both a few words about it and why you want to share it.

Book, Coffee, Chit Chat, etc. (Tuesday Edition)

ATTENTION: We are now meeting in person again! Please follow current recommendations around mask usage to keep everyone safe. Masks are always welcome and accepted, no matter the current regulations. If you'd like to meet online check out our meeting on the first Wednesday of every month. It's that time again! Let's chit chat about the books we exchanged last time and welcome newcomers bringing their first book. If you've been before you know the deal, otherwise just bring a book to share and expect to say both a few words about it and why you want to share it.

Ancillary Justice @ Barebottle Brewing

Come enjoy a drink at Barebottle Brewing and discuss our October read! Our book for October is Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie. Hope to see you there!

November Meeting - Diavola by Jennifer Marie Thorne

Come meet us for discussion about Diavola by Jennifer Marie Thorne. Grab a coffee & a biscuit then meet us in the back garden for some scintillating literary discussion!

SF CogSci #34: Tapes Together Strong

Note: this session has been moved from November 17 to November 3 — same time, same place. Sorry for the shuffle. The vote for SF CogSci #34 is in. We’ll be reading [Tapes Together Strong: The Co-evolution of Computation and Cooperation](https://arxiv.org/html/2609.10817v1), by Jha, Cicala, Agüera y Arcas, Richards, Jaques, Kleiman-Weiner, and Niklasson (2026). You can read it here. See you Tuesday, November 3rd, 7–9pm at Frontier Tower. If you're attending in person, please be sure to register [here](https://luma.com/san-francisco-cognitive-science-reading--9b7e) as well, so you can get into the building.

November: Colm Tóibín - The News from Dublin

**Recommended Stories:** * The Journey to Galway * The News from Dublin * Five Bridges We're going Irish this November, with a collection from an author I've always wanted to read. Apologies for posting this a bit late. See you there! **For First-Timers:** We recommend reading at least one story, but feel free to read as little or as much as you'd like! Discussion is open, informal, and we try to focus on the recommended stories listed above. **About the Collection:** Nine stories of quiet, restrained realism — Tóibín's signature mode — mostly circling Ireland, exile, and the things families don't say.

The Bazaar of Bad Dreams by Stephen King

A slightly different flavor for Halloween!

Rambler Readers October Meeting

Location: Julie's house in Sunnyvale. Attendees will receive an email with the address several days prior to the meeting. Potluck, Julie will provide a main dish, we provide everything else. This month's book selection: The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan About the book: The Middle Place is about calling home. Instinctively. Even when all the paperwork -- a marriage license, a notarized deed, two birth certificates, and seven years of tax returns -- clearly indicates you're an adult, but all the same, there you are, clutching the phone and thanking God that you're still somebody's daughter. Future Books: Nov: Whistler by Ann Patchet Dec: MT