Reading Groups

Members Only: The Literarians

Free

RSVP Below

Wednesday, 12:30 pm EST - 1:30 pm EST December 21, 2022

Online via Zoom

Click Register above to RSVP. Questions? Please email Allison Escoto at allison@centerforfiction.org.

The Literarians is a free monthly discussion group open to members of The Center. Led by our Head Librarian Allison Escoto, The Literarians read a wide variety of contemporary fiction. New participants are welcome throughout the year!

Not a member yet? Join today!

December Selection:
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka

Previous Selections:

Stories from the Tenants Downstairs by Sidik Fofana
The Last White Man by Mohsin Hamid
The Love Songs of W. E. B. Du Bois by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
Intimacies by Katie Kitamura
The Sentence by Louise Erdrich
Crying in H Mart by Micelle Zauner
The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deeshaw Philyaw
Zorrie by Laird Hunt
Matrix by Lauren Groff
Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead
Whereabouts by Jhumpa Lahiri
How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo Mbue
The Committed by Viet Thanh Nguyen
Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell
Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart
Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
Real Life by Brandon Taylor
Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam
Indelicacy by Amina Cain
Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawakami
A Burning by Megha Majumdar
The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
Deacon King Kong by James McBride
Apeirogon by Colum McCann
Milkman by Anna Burns
Lost Children Archive by Valeria Luiselli
Disappearing Earth by Julia Phillips
The Topeka School by Ben Lerner
Red at the Bone by Jacqueline Woodson
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk
The Parisian by Isabella Hammad
Normal People by Sally Rooney
The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai
On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
Trust Exercise by Susan Choi
Asymmetry by Lisa Halliday
The Burning Girl by Claire Messud
An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

Led by

Allison Escoto

Head Librarian & Education Director

Allison Escoto

Head Librarian & Education Director

New Yorker by way of New Orleans, Allison Escoto received her BA in Creative Writing from SUNY New Paltz and closed out the 90s as a bookseller in Greenwich Village. After several years in publishing, she pursued and received her MLS from Queens College. Since then she has worked as a librarian for 15 years in various libraries in and around NYC and has been moonlighting as a poet and copywriter. She reviews books for Booklist and serves on the ALA RUSA Notables committee. From 2017-2020, she was the Associate Editor for Newtown Literary Journal, a publication dedicated to featuring writers from her beloved Queens.

December Selection

.

The Swimmers

By Julie Otsuka

Published by Knopf Doubleday

PURCHASE

The swimmers are unknown to one another except through their private routines (slow lane, medium lane, fast lane) and the solace each takes in their morning or afternoon laps. But when a crack appears at the bottom of the pool, they are cast out into an unforgiving world without comfort or relief.

One of these swimmers is Alice, who is slowly losing her memory. For Alice, the pool was a final stand against the darkness of her encroaching dementia. Without the fellowship of other swimmers and the routine of her daily laps she is plunged into dislocation and chaos, swept into memories of her childhood and the Japanese American incarceration camp in which she spent the war. Alice’s estranged daughter, reentering her mother’s life too late, witnesses her stark and devastating decline.

About this series

Reading Groups

Whether you’re looking to catch up on great novels or you’re interested in exploring a new writer or literary period, our reading groups offer high-level literary discussion led by experts in the field.

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