Hoopla Book Club
Each quarter, Hoopla will release a new spotlight selection title, discussion guide, author content and more! Hoopla will also curate additional recommended titles for diverse audiences.
Hoopla titles are always available- no holds, or waiting! Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge will be the featured book club title, April 1- June 30, 2021.
Join the conversation- follow Hoopla on Twitter @HooplaDigital, #hooplabookclub and #discoverreadshare.
Hoopla titles are always available- no holds, or waiting! Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge will be the featured book club title, April 1- June 30, 2021.
Join the conversation- follow Hoopla on Twitter @HooplaDigital, #hooplabookclub and #discoverreadshare.
Libertie
Author: Kaitlyn Greenidge Read by: Channie Waites Genre: Literary Fiction Publisher: Algonquin Release Year: 2021 Length: 336 pages / 12h 12m The #1 Indie Next Pick for April!
A March LibraryReads Selection
The critically acclaimed and Whiting Award–winning author of We Love You, Charlie Freeman returns with Libertie, an unforgettable story about one young Black girl’s attempt to find a place where she can be fully, and only, herself.
Coming of age as a freeborn Black girl in Reconstruction-era Brooklyn, Libertie Sampson is all too aware that her purposeful mother, a practicing physician, has a vision for their future together: Libertie is to go to medical school and practice alongside her. But Libertie, drawn more to music than science, feels stifled by her mother’s choices and is hungry for something else—is there really only one way to have an autonomous life? And she is constantly reminded that, unlike her mother, who can pass, Libertie has skin that is too dark. When a young man from Haiti proposes to Libertie and promises she will be his equal on the island, she accepts, only to discover that she is still subordinate to him and all men. As she tries to parse what freedom actually means for a Black woman, Libertie struggles with where she might find it—for herself and for generations to come.
Inspired by the life of one of the first Black female doctors in the United States and rich with historical detail, Kaitlyn Greenidge’s new and immersive novel will resonate with readers eager to understand our present through a deep, moving, and lyrical dive into our complicated past.
Author: Kaitlyn Greenidge Read by: Channie Waites Genre: Literary Fiction Publisher: Algonquin Release Year: 2021 Length: 336 pages / 12h 12m The #1 Indie Next Pick for April!
A March LibraryReads Selection
The critically acclaimed and Whiting Award–winning author of We Love You, Charlie Freeman returns with Libertie, an unforgettable story about one young Black girl’s attempt to find a place where she can be fully, and only, herself.
Coming of age as a freeborn Black girl in Reconstruction-era Brooklyn, Libertie Sampson is all too aware that her purposeful mother, a practicing physician, has a vision for their future together: Libertie is to go to medical school and practice alongside her. But Libertie, drawn more to music than science, feels stifled by her mother’s choices and is hungry for something else—is there really only one way to have an autonomous life? And she is constantly reminded that, unlike her mother, who can pass, Libertie has skin that is too dark. When a young man from Haiti proposes to Libertie and promises she will be his equal on the island, she accepts, only to discover that she is still subordinate to him and all men. As she tries to parse what freedom actually means for a Black woman, Libertie struggles with where she might find it—for herself and for generations to come.
Inspired by the life of one of the first Black female doctors in the United States and rich with historical detail, Kaitlyn Greenidge’s new and immersive novel will resonate with readers eager to understand our present through a deep, moving, and lyrical dive into our complicated past.
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"Few novels have as strong a sense of place as this fascinating blend of magical realism and African American historical fiction… Greenidge creates a richly layered tapestry of Black communal life, notably Black female life, and the inevitable contradictions and compromises of ‘freedom.’"
— Booklist, starred review |
"Pure brilliance. So much will be written about Kaitlyn Greenidge’s Libertie—how it blends history and magic into a new kind of telling, how it spins the past to draw deft circles around our present—but none of it will measure up to the singular joy of reading this book." — Mira Jacob, author of Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations
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Loved Libertie? Then try these next recommended reads.
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Past Hoopla Book Club Titles and Resources
The Fixed Stars Author: Molly Wizenberg Read by: Erin Mallon Genre: Memoir Publisher: Abrams Release Year: 2020 Length: 256 pages / 6h 22m
From a bestselling memoirist, a thoughtful and provocative story of changing identity, complex sexuality, and enduring family relationships.
At age 36, while serving on a jury, author Molly Wizenberg found herself drawn to a female attorney she hardly knew. Married to a man for nearly a decade and mother to a toddler, Wizenberg tried to return to her life as she knew it, but something inside her had changed irredeemably. Instead, she would discover that the trajectory of our lives is rarely as smooth or as logical as we'd like to believe.
Like many of us, Wizenberg had long understood sexual orientation as a stable part of ourselves: we're "born this way." Suddenly she realized that her story was more complicated. Who was she, she wondered, if something at her very core could change so radically? The Fixed Stars is a taut, electrifying memoir exploring timely and timeless questions about desire, identity, and the limits and possibilities of family. In honest and searing prose, Wizenberg forges a new path: through the murk of separation and divorce, coming out to family and friends, learning to co-parent a young child, and realizing a new vision of love. The result is a frank and moving story about letting go of rigid definitions and ideals that no longer fit, and learning instead who we really are.
From a bestselling memoirist, a thoughtful and provocative story of changing identity, complex sexuality, and enduring family relationships.
At age 36, while serving on a jury, author Molly Wizenberg found herself drawn to a female attorney she hardly knew. Married to a man for nearly a decade and mother to a toddler, Wizenberg tried to return to her life as she knew it, but something inside her had changed irredeemably. Instead, she would discover that the trajectory of our lives is rarely as smooth or as logical as we'd like to believe.
Like many of us, Wizenberg had long understood sexual orientation as a stable part of ourselves: we're "born this way." Suddenly she realized that her story was more complicated. Who was she, she wondered, if something at her very core could change so radically? The Fixed Stars is a taut, electrifying memoir exploring timely and timeless questions about desire, identity, and the limits and possibilities of family. In honest and searing prose, Wizenberg forges a new path: through the murk of separation and divorce, coming out to family and friends, learning to co-parent a young child, and realizing a new vision of love. The result is a frank and moving story about letting go of rigid definitions and ideals that no longer fit, and learning instead who we really are.
The Bear
Author: Andrew Krivak Read by: Eric Jason Martin Genre: Fiction, Dystopian & Literary Publisher: Bellevue Literary Press Release Year: 2020 Length: 224 pages / 4 hours
In an Edenic future, a girl and her father live close to the land in the shadow of a lone mountain. They possess a few remnants of civilization: some books, a pane of glass, a set of flint and steel, a comb. The father teaches the girl how to fish and hunt, the secrets of the seasons and the stars. He is preparing her for an adulthood in harmony with nature, for they are the last of humankind. But when the girl finds herself alone in an unknown landscape, it is a bear that will lead her back home through a vast wilderness that offers the greatest lessons of all, if she can only learn to listen.
A cautionary tale of human fragility, of love and loss, The Bear is a stunning tribute to the beauty of nature's dominion.
Author: Andrew Krivak Read by: Eric Jason Martin Genre: Fiction, Dystopian & Literary Publisher: Bellevue Literary Press Release Year: 2020 Length: 224 pages / 4 hours
In an Edenic future, a girl and her father live close to the land in the shadow of a lone mountain. They possess a few remnants of civilization: some books, a pane of glass, a set of flint and steel, a comb. The father teaches the girl how to fish and hunt, the secrets of the seasons and the stars. He is preparing her for an adulthood in harmony with nature, for they are the last of humankind. But when the girl finds herself alone in an unknown landscape, it is a bear that will lead her back home through a vast wilderness that offers the greatest lessons of all, if she can only learn to listen.
A cautionary tale of human fragility, of love and loss, The Bear is a stunning tribute to the beauty of nature's dominion.
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"[A] tender apocalyptic fable . . . endowed with such fullness of meaning that you have to assign this short, touching book its own category: the post-apocalypse utopia."
— Wall Street Journal |
"Refreshing. . . . A simple story written with an unflinching but compassionate voice, Krivak’s tale should be thoughtfully savored while it slowly winds its way into your moral conscience."
— Kyle Evans | Springfield-Greene County Library |
A Letter from Hoopla Book Club: "Why We Love The Bear"
Libraries Transform Book Pick
ALA, American Library Association Libraries Transform Book Pick is a digital reading program that connects readers nationwide by offering free access to the same ebook through public libraries.Through the OverDrive or Libby online service, patrons will have access to the the chosen book with no hold or wait times. This title is also always available on Hoopla. Follow the Libraries Transform Book Pick on Facebook and Twitter and join in the discussion on social media using the hashtag #LTBookPick.
Get the Book of the Little Axe
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Author Lauren Francis-Sharma
Photo courtesy of photographer: © Anna Carson DeWitt
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