How do I get a copy of a book club title?

All book group selections are available, while supplies last, for $2 at the following locations:

Books Sandwiched In
Lakeland Public Library, Main Library   100 Lake Morton Drive  863-834-4280
Discussions at the E
eLibrary South Lakeland     4740 South Florida Avenue   863-838-4507

Check our online catalog for book group titles located at the public libraries in the Polk County Library Cooperative. Selections may be available in hardcover, paperback, large print, audio CD, downloadable e-audiobook and Playaway.

Classic titles may be available at Project Gutenberg  in ebook  and audiobook  formats. Project Gutenberg's nearly 100,000 volume collection is produced by thousands of volunteers.

Books for both book clubs are underwritten by the Lakeland Public Library Friends of the Library.

Discussions at the E September Selection

Discussions at the E’s September selection, Gatsby’s Girl by Caroline Preston, gives the reader an unique view of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald is generally studied through his own writings, through his contemporaries or even his tormented but talented wife, Zelda. However Gatsby’s Girl is told through the voice of Ginevra Perry, who is based on Fitzgerald’s first love, Ginevra King.

F. Scott Fitzgerald based several characters on King:  Daisy Buchanan from the Great Gatsby,  Isabelle Borge in This Side of Paradise, Marjorie Harvey in "Bernice Bobs Her Hair",  Judy Jones in "Winter Dreams" and a series of stories, in the early 1930s, about a spoiled Lake Forest (Illinois) girl named Josephine Perry.

Gatsby's Girl follows the 16-year-old character Ginevra Perry from her first meeting with F. Scott Fitzgerald, through their doomed brief courtship and the end of their lives. Author Caroline Preston excels at presenting a sympathetic view of a less than sympathetic main character.

Discussion questions and an interview with Caroline Preston is found at the Houghton Mifflin website.

Books Sandwiched In September selection

Welcome to Lakeland Public Library’s Book Groups Blog and our inaugural entry. 

Books Sandwiched In discussion group

The View from Castle Rock by Alice Munro is the September selection for Books Sandwiched In. Castle Rock is a hybrid; it is both nonfiction and fiction, yet neither. Munro calls it “a book of stories”, which is based on her ancestors’ lives in Scotland and later in Canada. She brings the stories to a close with vignettes of her own life story. 
 
Canadian Alice Munro is considered a master of the short story genre. She received the 2009 Man Booker International Prize for Castle Rock and her catalog of work. Her latest work, Too Much Happiness, was published this year. 

Read Jane Smiley’s explanation of why Munro was chosen to receive the Man Booker International Prize here. 

Read Alice Munro’s acceptance speech here. 

 The View from Castle Rock has a slow beginning but picks up speed and life as Munro moves closer in time to the present. Castle Rock initially appeals to genealogists, history buffs and lovers of Munro’s work. However with a little perseverance past the first 50 pages, the mastery Munro is hailed for comes to light.

 Book discussion questions and a book excerpt can be found at the Random House website.