Join us on Friday, August 12 at 7 p.m. at the WUUC Church Campout at Rasar State Park in Concrete, WA for a meeting of the WUUC Nonfiction Book Club. We will be discussing These Precious Days, a collection of essaysby Ann Patchett. RSVP to Alaine <alaine.davis@yahoo.com>. RSVP not required, but helpful for planning purposes.
If you aren’t attending the campout, but are still interested in reading and discussing the book, consider volunteering to lead a Zoom discussion on the same day!
These Precious Days, a collection of essays from beloved novelist Ann Patchett, spans decades but leads to our present moment. As the title of her collection suggests, she is grateful and acknowledges all the luck she’s had.“We don’t deserve anything,” she writes. “Not the suffering and not the golden light. It just comes.”
Patchett’s essays are sharp and honest. She confronts her faults frequently while also remaining candid, unafraid to talk about getting a prestigious award or acknowledging that she’s a pretty big deal. She writes too about getting rid of her possessions and a year of no shopping, about her love of Snoopy and getting her MFA at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop—a program helped her understand the importance of community, something she nurtures with her bookstore in Nashville.
Each of the essays in These Precious Days is moving, but the title essay stands out. Patchett starts it off with Tom Hanks and you don’t see what’s coming, and that’s just how we’ve all felt that last year and a half. After all this waiting, it’s always nice to be surprised by love.
- Modified from The Chicago Review of Books
Four times a year, the WUUC Book Discussion Group gathers to read and talk about a nonfiction book. You only attend the meetings about books that interest you, so we end up with a different group of participants every time. We meet to connect and talk about a book in depth. Anyone is welcome to suggest a book and/or lead a discussion. Contact Alaine to RSVP, suggest a book, or offer to host a future discussion.
