HARMONY BOOK GROUP

The next meeting is Wednesday, Sep. 10th, at 6:15PM at the Harmony Library in Fort Collins.

Typically, meetings are on the 2nd Wednesday of the month at 6:15PM at the Harmony Library. Check out the FAQ for more information about the book group.

Upcoming Selections

  • September: Classic Female: North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell. We will also discuss the 1st poem "Even Such Is Time" by Sir Walter Raleigh in the collection Great Short Poems edited by Paul Negri
  • October : Contemporary Female: The Gathering by Anne Enright. We will also discuss the 2nd poem "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day?" by William Shakespeare in the collection Great Short Poems edited by Paul Negri
  • November : Contemporary Male: TBD by TBD.
  • December : Classic Female: TBD by TBD.

    For those that have not purchased the collection yet, here is the poem for September:
    Even Such Is Time
    by: Sir Walter Raleigh (1554-1618)

    Even such is time, that takes in trust
    Our youth, our joys, our all we have,
    And pays us but with earth and dust;
    Who, in the dark and silent grave,
    When we have wandered all our ways,
    Shuts up the story of our days:
    But from this earth, this grave, this dust,
    My God shall raise me up, I trust



We will read and discuss one poem per month from the collection:
Great Short Poems edited by Paul Negri.

Previously we read one short story per month from The Best American Short Stories of the Century edited by John Updike and co-edited by Katrina Kenison. We finished the book in August of 2008.

Email: HarmonyBookGroup@comcast.net

HARMONY BOOK GROUP

Reading List (since October, 1998)
  1. July and August 2008 (summer project): Classic Male: The Aeneid by Virgil, translation by Robert Fagles.
  2. June 2008: Contemporary Male: Snow by Orhan Pamuk
  3. May 2008: Contemporary Female: The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai


    4. The February, March and April selections form a theme of late 19th century New York. The Master is a fictionalized account of Henry James.
  4. April 2008: Classic Male: Washington Square by Henry James
  5. March 2008: Classic Female: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
  6. February 2008: Contemporary Male: The Master by Colm Toibin
  7. January 2008: Contemporary Female: Hell's Bottom, Colorado by Laura Pritchett


    8. 2007 Selections

    As voted at the December meeting, the top 3 books of the year were:
    1st: The Road
    2nd The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (most 1st place votes)
    3rd: Suite Francaise
    The top short story of the year from the collection we are reading was "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien.

  8. December 2007: Classic Male: Death in Venice by Thomas Mann
  9. November 2007: Classic Female: Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky
  10. October 2007: Contemporary Male: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
  11. September 2007: Contemporary Female: On Beauty by Zadie Smith
  12. July and August: Summer Project: Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz
  13. June 2007: Contemporary Male: A Star Called Henry by Roddy Doyle
  14. May 2007: Classic Female: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontė
  15. April 2007: Classic Male: Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
  16. March 2007: Contemporary Female: March by Geraldine Brooks
  17. February 2007: Contemporary Male: The Known World by Edward P. Jones
  18. January 2007: Classic Female: The Mill on the Floss by George Elliott.


    19. 2006 Selections

    As voted at the December meeting, the top 3 books of the year were:
    1st: The Brother Karamazov
    2nd: Tale of Two Cities
    3rd: Tie: Water Music and All the Pretty Horses
    The top short story of the year from the collection we are reading was "The Rotifer" by Mary Ladd Gavell.

  19. December 2006: Classic Male: A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
  20. November2006: Contemporary Female: Possession: A Romance by A.S. Byatt
  21. October 2006: Contemporary Male: All the Pretty Horses by Cormack McCarthy
  22. September 2006: Classic Female: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
  23. July/August 2006 summer project: Category: Classic Male: The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevesky
  24. June 2006: Contemporary Female: The Liars' Club by Mary Karr
  25. May 2006: Contemporary Male: The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
  26. April 2006: Classic Female: Wise Blood by Flannery O'Connor
  27. March 2006: Classic Male: Walden by Henry David Thoreau
  28. February 2006: Contemporary Female: Becoming Madame Mao by Anchee Min
  29. January 2006: Contemporary Male: Water Music by T.C. Boyle


    30. 2005 Selections

    As voted at the December meeting, the top 3 books of the year were:
    1st: Tie: The Corrections and Pale Fire
    3rd: Pride and Prejudice
    Honorable mention: The Iliad

  30. December 2005: Classic Female Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
  31. November 2005: Classic Male Pale Fire, Vladimir Nabokov
  32. October 2005: Contemporary Female Housekeeping, Marilynne Robinson
  33. September 2005: Contemporary Male Nothing but Blue Skies, Thomas McGuane
  34. August 2005 summer project: Category: Classic Male The Odyssey, by Homer
  35. July 2005 summer project: Category: Classic Male The Iliad, by Homer
  36. June 2005: Classic Female Uncle Tom's Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe
  37. May 2005: Classic Male Tender is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald
  38. April 2005: Contemporary Female Winter Range, Claire Davis
  39. March 2005: Contemporary Male The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen
  40. February 2005: Classic Female Guns of August, Barbara Tuchman
  41. January 2005: Classic Male The Sound and the Fury, William Faulkner


    42. 2004 Selections

    As voted at the December meeting, the top 3 books of the year were:
    1st: Life of Pi
    2nd: a tie between Don Quixote and For Whom the Bell Tolls
    3rd: Sailing Alone Around the Room

  42. December 2004: Contemporary Female The Great Fire, Shirley Hazzard
  43. November 2004: Contemporary Male The Information, Martin Amis
  44. October 2004: Classic Male The Winters Tale, William Shakespeare
  45. September 2004: Classic Female: Silent Spring, Rachel Carson
  46. July/August 2004 summer project: Category: Classic Male: Don Quixote, Miguel de Cervantes (translation by Edith Grossman)
  47. June 2004: Contemporary Female: Beloved, Toni Morrison
  48. May 2004: Contemporary Male: Sailing Alone Around the Room(Poetry), Billy Collins
  49. April 2004: Classic Female: Frankenstein, Mary Shelley
  50. March 2004: Classic Male: For Whom the Bell Tolls, Ernest Hemmingway
  51. February 2004: Contemporary Female: Refuge, Terry Tempest Williams
  52. January 2004: Contemporary Male: Life of Pi, Yann Martel
    and first story in The Best American Short Stories of the Century


    53. 2003 Selections

    As voted at the December meeting, the top 3 books of the year were:
    1st: Middlemarch
    2nd: Atonement
    3rd: Emma


  53. December 2003: Classic Female: The Green Knight, Iris Murdoch
  54. November 2003: Classic Male: Macbeth, William Shakespeare
  55. October 2003: Contemporary Female: Prodigal Summer, Barbara Kingsolver
  56. September 2003: Contemporary Male: White Noise, Don DeLillo
  57. July/August 2003 summer project: Category: Classic Female: Middlemarch, George Elliott
  58. June 2003: Classic Male: The Quiet American, Graham Greene
  59. May 2003: Contemporary Male: Atonement, Ian McEwan
  60. April 2003: Classic Female: Emma, Jane Austen
    March 2003: no meeting due to blizzard
  61. February 2003: Contemporary Female: The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields
  62. January 2003: Classic Male: The Big Money, John Dos Passos


    63. 2002 Selections

    Top book of the year:
    Under the Net

  63. December 2002: Classic Female: Under The Net, Iris Murdoch
  64. November 2002: Contemporary Male: Rabbit, Run, John Updike
  65. October 2002: Contemporary Female: Birds of America, Lorrie Moore
  66. September 2002: Classic Female: Out of Africa, Isak Dineson
  67. August 2002: Contemporary Male: Waiting, Ha Jin
  68. June and July 2002: Classic Male: Swann's Way, Marcel Proust
  69. May 2002: Contemporary Female: Bee Season, Myla Goldberg
  70. April 2002: Classic Male: High Wind in Jamaica, Richard Hughes
  71. March 2002: Classic Female: Ship of Fools, Katherine Anne Porter
  72. February 2002: Contemporary Male: A House for Mr. Biswas,V.S. Naipaul
  73. January 2002: Contemporary Female: White Teeth , Zadie Smith


    74. 2001 Selections


    Top book of the year:
    War and Peace
    Exempting War and Peace, the top vote getter was
    A Month in the Country

  74. December 2001: Classic Male: A Month in the Country, J.L. Carr
  75. November 2001: Classic Female: The Optimist's Daughter, Eudora Welty
  76. October 2001: Contemporary Male: Ravelstein, Saul Bellow
  77. September 2001: Contemporary Female: The God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
  78. July and August 2001: Classic Male: War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
  79. June 2001: Contemporary Male: A Prayer for the Dying, Stewart O'Nan
  80. May 2001: Classic Female: My Antonia, Willa Cather
  81. April 2001: Contemporary Female: Alias Grace, Margaret Atwood
  82. March 2001: Amsterdam, Ian McEwan
  83. February 2001: Classic Female: The House of Mirth, Edith Wharton
  84. January 2001: Classic Male: The Good Soldier, Ford Madox Ford
  85. December 2000: Contemporary Female: Regeneration, Pat Barker
  86. November 2000: Classic Male: The Killer Angels, Michael Shaara
  87. October 2000: Contemporary Male: The Hours, Michael Cunningham
  88. September 2000: Classic Female: Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf
  89. August 2000: Contemporary Female: Close Range, Annie Proulx
  90. June and July 2000: Classic Male: Ulysses, James Joyce
  91. May 2000: Classic Female: The Bridal Wreath, Sigrid Undset
  92. April 2000: Contemporary Male: Life and Times of Michael K, J.M. Coetzee
  93. March 2000: Gigi, Collette
  94. February 2000: The Tin Drum, Gunter Grass
  95. January 2000: Ship Fever, Andrea Barrett
  96. December 1999: Passage to India, E.M. Forster
  97. November 1999: Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys
  98. October 1999: Flaubert's Parrot, Julian Barnes
  99. September 1999: Cowboys are My Weakness, Pam Houston
  100. August 1999: Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
  101. July 1999: The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers
  102. June 1999: So I Married a Communist, Philip Roth
  103. May 1999: Charming Billy, Alice McDermott
  104. April 1999: Sons and Lovers, D.H. Lawrence
  105. March 1999: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, Muriel Spark
  106. February 1999: Angle of Repose, Wallace Stegner
  107. January 1999: Friend of My Youth, Alice Munro
  108. December 1998: Catch-22, Joseph Heller
  109. November 1998: To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf
  110. October 1998: Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Ideas for future selections

Possibilities for future selections are from various literary prizes, lists of top literature, and suggestions from the members of the book group.