Coming in April: James Baldwin, Rebecca Solnit, and Thelma Young Lutunatabua

Dear friends and fellow readers,

Happy spring! I’m writing to let you know about two new offerings coming up next month.

First, I’m offering another Read Like a Writer online class through Book Passage bookstore, this one focused on James Baldwin’s phenomenal second novel, Giovanni’s Room. The novel centers around a forbidden relationship between two white men, and Baldwin explained that the book was ‘‘not so much about homosexuality, it is what happens if you are so afraid that you finally cannot love anybody.’’ Written in a confessional style, the book is a nuanced portrayal of intimacy and a complex exploration of morality. In a 2016 essay in the New Yorker, Colm Toibin drew a throughline between Giovanni’s Room and Baldwin’s essays on race, thus: “In [the essays], he held up an unsparing mirror so that the stained soul of his country could catch a glimpse of itself, a glimpse as penetrating, risky, truthful and disturbing as the glimpse of lost and wasted love offered in Giovanni’s Room.”

As usual, the course is a deep dive into the mechanics of the novel, from the micro level of language to the macro level of themes and structure. These are fun and illuminating conversations helpful not just for writers, but for any serious reader.

The course starts Wednesday, April 17, and runs for four weeks. We’ll discuss the opening few pages in the first class, then work our way through the book in subsequent classes.

Second, I’m excited to launch a five-month, hope-forward, New Climate Stories book club starting on Earth Day, April 22. Alternating between nonfiction and fiction, we’ll focus on present-day and future solutions to the climate crisis, reimagining the possibilities for living in harmony with the planet. The inaugural selection is Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility, a collection of essays edited by Rebecca Solnit and Thelma Young Lutunatabua. The book is an energizing call for both hope and action that outlines the solutions already in hand and explores possible solutions for the future.

Click the link above for a list of other potential selections. Register by April 1 to request or suggest a book. Final book selections will be announced in early April.

Wishing you a spring of fulfillment, hope, and, of course, books!

Yours in all thing literary,

Jennifer