Acton Area LWV Book Club Website

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Annual Book Review
What are we reading?

Welcome to the Book club!

This is the place to find out about the latest book club choice, the date and time of the next meeting, or what our members have to say about the club's latest non-fiction selection.It will also list all the Titles and Authors we have selected as a reference.

Friday, August 14, 2009

Our August Meeting is Almost Here!
August 25th at 6:45 in Willow Books Cafe

The Woman Behind the New Deal: The Life of Frances Perkins, FDR'S Secretary of Labor and His Moral Conscience by Kirstin Downey

8:17 pm est

Sunday, July 12, 2009

July Meeting
Join League friends for a great discussion! July 21st at 6:45 in Willow Books Cafe
Our latest "summer read":
Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance
by Barak Obama

All are welcome bring a neighbor or friend.

4:30 pm est

Friday, May 29, 2009

Summer Book Group! Join Us.
To make the summer meetings easier to plan for, they have been planned out before
annual meeting. The usual “vote for the next book at each meeting” will begin again in September.

June 16th at 6:45 in Willow Books Cafe

Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us)
by Tom Vanderbilt

July 21st at 6:45 in Willow Books Cafe
Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance
by Barak Obama

August 25th at 6:45 in Willow Books Cafe
 
The Woman Behind the New Deal: The Life of Frances Perkins, FDR'S Secretary of Labor and His Moral Conscience by Kirstin Downey
 
6:32 am est

Thursday, April 16, 2009

Next meeting in May- Tuesday, May 26th @ 6:45
Founding Faith: How Our Founding Fathers Forged a Radical New Approach to Religious Liberty (Paperback)
by Steven Waldman

8:27 pm est

Friday, March 20, 2009

We will meet at Willow Books,on Tuesday,
April 14th, at 6:45 p.m.
Please consider bringing choices to discuss for the next book.
If you have suggestions I can post them, email n.duggan@verizon.net .
2:35 pm est

April Book:The Two-Income Trap, by Elizabeth Warren
The Two-Income Trap (Paperback)
by Elizabeth Warren (Author), Amelia Warren Tyagi (Author)

From Publishers Weekly
Warren, a law professor at Harvard (The Fragile Middle Class) and her daughter Tyagi, a former McKinsey consultant, have joined forces here to argue here that the two-parent middle-class working family is on the brink of financial disaster. The number of families declaring bankruptcy or receiving a foreclosure against their house has shot up dramatically. Presenting carefully researched economic data to support their arguments, the authors contend that, contrary to popular myth, families aren't in trouble because they're squandering their second income on luxuries. On the contrary, both incomes are almost entirely committed to necessities, such as home and car payments, health insurance and children's education costs. When an unforeseen event such as serious illness, job loss or divorce occurs, families have no discretionary income to fall back on. The authors recommend a number of useful societal solutions to get families out of this trap, such as legally prohibiting credit card companies from charging grossly unfair interest rates and exposing banks that employ a loan-to-own strategy that steers minority customers to higher mortgage rates with an eye to future foreclosures. Warren and Tyagi point out that families buy homes they cannot afford in order to live in a neighborhood with better schools. Their proposed solution, however-to institute a public school voucher system with wider choice-is less carefully thought out. Overall, however, this is a needed examination of an emerging social problem.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
2:32 pm est

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Consider these titles:
Little Pink House: A True Story of Defiance and Courage (Hardcover)
by Jeff Benedict (Author)

I just saw a piece on Emily Rooney's show with an author and I thought the book might be a good one for Book Club - Little Pink House. It has just come out, so it is only in hardback - I think. Suzanne S

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Benedict (The Mormon Way of Doing Business) has taken a complicated court case centered on eminent domain and turned it into a page-turner with a conscience. In 1997, an EMT named Susette Kelo left her husband, bought a cottage and started over in the economically depressed Ft. Trumbull neighborhood of New London, Conn. In February 1998, the New London Development Corporation began trying to muscle the neighborhood into selling homes to make way for a Pfizer research complex. Benedict's passionate account is rife with heroes and villains—he delights in pillorying Kelo's foil, Claire Gaudiani, the president of Connecticut College who lured Pfizer to consider New London. The fight escalated when the city tried exercising eminent domain to seize the homes of Kelo and others who refused to sell, leading to the case, Kelo v. City of New London, reaching the Supreme Court in 2005. Raising important questions about the use of economic development as a justification for displacing citizens, this book will leave readers indignant and inspired. (Feb.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Also reccomended but I've forgotten by whom...

The Two-Income Trap (Paperback)
by Elizabeth Warren (Author), Amelia Warren Tyagi (Author)

From Publishers Weekly
Warren, a law professor at Harvard (The Fragile Middle Class) and her daughter Tyagi, a former McKinsey consultant, have joined forces here to argue here that the two-parent middle-class working family is on the brink of financial disaster. The number of families declaring bankruptcy or receiving a foreclosure against their house has shot up dramatically. Presenting carefully researched economic data to support their arguments, the authors contend that, contrary to popular myth, families aren't in trouble because they're squandering their second income on luxuries. On the contrary, both incomes are almost entirely committed to necessities, such as home and car payments, health insurance and children's education costs. When an unforeseen event such as serious illness, job loss or divorce occurs, families have no discretionary income to fall back on. The authors recommend a number of useful societal solutions to get families out of this trap, such as legally prohibiting credit card companies from charging grossly unfair interest rates and exposing banks that employ a loan-to-own strategy that steers minority customers to higher mortgage rates with an eye to future foreclosures. Warren and Tyagi point out that families buy homes they cannot afford in order to live in a neighborhood with better schools. Their proposed solution, however-to institute a public school voucher system with wider choice-is less carefully thought out. Overall, however, this is a needed examination of an emerging social problem.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

12:36 pm est

Monday, March 2, 2009

WBUR discussed "our " next book and A Change in Meeting Time!
Recently on WBUR:According to new neuroscience studies, emotion has a strong influence on how the human brain makes decisions. Jonah Lehrer, the author of How We Decide, joins Fresh Air to discuss the latest research. You can listen on the website
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=101334645

Willow Books has changed their hours and we will start at 6:45 for the March 17th meeting. Don't forget your ballots!
10:55 pm est

Saturday, February 21, 2009

March Meeting Planned for a Tuesday, the 17th. Congratulations Book Group, Our First Year!
Our next meeting will be Tuesday, March 17. The next book is How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer. Please join us.
To celebrate completion of our first year of LWV Book Group we will vote on the year's best book group book and rate the books we've read.

Please see the bulletin or email Nancy Duggan at n.duggan@verizon.net if you need a ballot!
9:59 pm est

Thursday, February 12, 2009

The Forgotten Man, by Amity Shaels is chosen as the February book.
Join us February 18th for our next sellection. The Forgotten Man examines the New Deal policies of the 30's and 40's.
10:02 am est

2009.08.01 | 2009.07.01 | 2009.05.01 | 2009.04.01 | 2009.03.01 | 2009.02.01 | 2008.10.01 | 2008.09.01 | 2008.06.01 | 2008.05.01

Link to web log's RSS file

Please add your thoughts about the book through the Member Comments page of the site.  Since it was the first meeting, I did not think to take notes on the discussion.



Little blog people

The Next meeting is in August 25th.
We meet at Willow Books And Cafe, at 6:45 pm.

Please join us.  You do not have to be a League of Women Voters Member to participate. 


Links of Interest:
 
Acton Area League of Women Voters
 
League of Women Voters of Massachusetts
 
Willow Books and Cafe



The League of Women Voters has been working for over 80 years. It was then, and is now, a nonpartisan organization. League founders believed that maintaining a nonpartisan stance would protect the fledgling organization from becoming mired in the party politics of the day. However, League members were encouraged to be political themselves, by educating citizens about, and lobbying for, government and social reform legislation.

This holds true today. The League is proud to be nonpartisan, neither supporting nor opposing candidates or political parties at any level of government, but always working on vital issues of concern to members and the public. The League has a long, rich history,that continues with each passing year.
Join Us! Contact Acton Area Membership: nancy@allthesavages.com