2024 Summer Virtual Book Discussion Series

Our 2024 summer virtual book discussion series features three books with the potential to positively impact your professional practice and your personal life. We have selected best-selling novelist Adelle Waldman’s newest book Help Wanted, Real-self Care by Dr. Pooja Lakshmin, and in honor of what would have been his 100th birthday this August, James Baldwin’s Notes of a Native Son. 

The Books

One of New York Magazine’s “23 Books We Can’t Wait to Read in 2024, Help Wanted is a funny, eye-opening tale of work in contemporary America. Waldman brings her unparalleled wit and astute social observation to the world of modern, low-wage work. This is a humane and darkly comic workplace caper that shines a light on the odds low-wage workers are up against in today’s economy. Help Wanted is a moving tale of ordinary people trying to make a living.

Real Self-Care is a National Bestseller featured on Good Morning America, NPR’s Code Switch, The New York Times, and The Guardian. Pooja Lakshmin, MD is a women’s mental health specialist and New York Times contributor. Real self-care, she argues an internal, self-reflective process that involves making difficult decisions in line with our values, and when we practice it, we shift our relationships, our workplaces, and even our broken systems.

As one of the most captivating essayists and foremost intellectuals of the 20th Century, the late great James Baldwin brings us a view of Black life and Black thought at the dawn of the civil rights movement in Notes of a Native Son. Baldwin writes as an artist, an activist, and a social critic probing the complex condition of being Black in America. Notes of a Native Son is on Guardian’s top 100 books of all time.

The Details

Our book discussions will meet Wednesdays from 2:00 – 3:00 p.m. Help Wanted will meet June 12 and 26. Real Self-care will meet July 10 and 24. Notes of a Native Son will meet July 31 and August 14. You will receive a secure Zoom link one week before each session.

Please read approximately 1/2 of the book prior to each meeting. Books are not provided. We recommend you reserve a copy at your public library, order one online or visit your local independent bookstore.