The Ivanhoe Reading Circle are a literary book club based in Melbourne. The group celebrated their 100-year anniversary in 2021 and continue to meet monthly from March through to December on Tuesday nights to discuss diverse texts and literary topics.
Yarra Plenty Regional Library are proud to support two special Open Sessions per year at Ivanhoe Library and Cultural Hub, where members of the public can attend a session for free. In May, annual speaker and local author, Nicole Smith will discuss her publications Sideshow and Local Hero and share her experience of writing, editing, and publishing.
The Ivanhoe Reading Circle welcome new members all year-round. If you love reading, sharing ideas and discussing books then this might be the book club for you. Readings are varied and cover 5 fiction and 3 non-fiction books per year – by both Australian and International authors.
Register now!
Selected titles the Ivanhoe Reading Circle will read for 2023 include:
The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell
Also available as an Audiobook (MP3)
Florence, the 1560s. Lucrezia, third daughter of Cosimo de' Medici, is free to wander the palazzo at will, wondering at its treasures and observing its clandestine workings. But when her older sister dies on the eve of marriage to Alfonso d'Este, ruler of Ferrara, Modena and Reggio, Lucrezia is thrust unwittingly into the limelight: the duke is quick to request her hand in marriage, and her father to accept on her behalf. Having barely left girlhood, Lucrezia must now make her way in a troubled court whose customs are opaque and where her arrival is unwelcomed.
In the court's eyes, she has one duty: to provide the heir who will shore up the future of the Ferrarese dynasty. Until then, for all of her rank and nobility, her future hangs entirely in the balance.
Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson
Also available in eAudio (Borrow Box), eBook (Borrow Box), Large Print, eAudio (Libby).
I was dreading the Cunningham family reunion even before the first murder. Before the storm stranded us at the mountain resort, snow and bodies piling up. The thing is, us Cunninghams don't really get along. We've only got one thing in common: we've all killed someone.
My brother. My step-sister. My wife. My father. My mother. My sister-in-law. My uncle. My stepfather. My aunt. Me.
The First Astronomers: How Indigenous Elders Read the Stars by Duane Hamacher
Also available as an eBook (Borrow Box), eAudio (Libby).
The First Astronomers is the first book to reveal the rich knowledge of the stars and the planets held by First Peoples around the world. Our eyes have been drawn away from the skies to our screens. We no longer look to the stars to forecast the weather, predict the seasons or plant our gardens. Most of us cannot even see the Milky Way. But First Nations Elders around the world still maintain this knowledge, and there is much we can learn from them. These Elders are expert observers of the stars. They teach that everything on the land is reflected in the sky, and everything in the sky is reflected on the land. How does this work, and how can we better understand our place in the universe? Guided by six First Nations Elders, Duane Hamacher takes us on a journey across space and time to reveal the wisdom of the first astronomers.
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
Also available as eBook (Borrow Box).
A stunning book of electric honesty and passion. This autobiographical portrait explores an intensely personal experience of Joan Didion, one of America's iconic writers, where she tells of her critically ill daughter Quintana, and the sudden death of her husband. The result is an exploration of an intensely personal yet universal experience: a portrait of a marriage, and a life, in good times and bad.
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus
Also available as an eBook (Libby), eBook (Borrow Box), eAudio (Borrow Box), eAudio (Libby) and Large Print.
Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing. But it's the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute take a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans, the lonely, brilliant, Nobel-prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with - of all things - her mind. True chemistry results. Like science, life is unpredictable. Which is why a few years later, Elizabeth Zott finds herself not only a single mother, but the reluctant star of America's most beloved cooking show, Supper at Six. Elizabeth's unusual approach to cooking proves revolutionary. But as her following grows, not everyone is happy. Because as it turns out, Elizabeth Zott isn't just teaching women to cook. She's daring them to change the status quo.