Reader’s choice for Women’s History Month
The meeting will be held on Sunday, March 24th at 3 pm in Meeting Room B of the Main Public Library downtown (68 Calhoun St, Charleston, SC). Metered street parking is free on Sundays, and there is parking available in the garage under the library (garage closes at 5).
About the book:
We will be doing things a bit differently for our March meeting. Last September we had great success with our Banned Books discussion, so we are going to try to do something similar. March is Women’s History month, and rather than everyone reading the same book, we invite participants to choose their own book to read relating to the theme. For our discussion, each person can tell the group about what they read and discuss the too often overlooked contributions women make to our culture and society.
We have a few recommendations for books you might want to choose. The author Jennifer Chiaverini writes historical fiction about women whose stories have been left out of the history books. For example her novel Enchantress of Numbers “unveils the passions, dreams, and insatiable thirst for knowledge of a largely unheralded pioneer in computing – a young woman who stepped out of her father’s shadow [the poet Lord Byron] to achieve her own laurels and champion the new technology that would shape the future.”
Chiaverini has two novels about unsung heroes of World War I: Canary Girls about women working in British munitions factories, and Switchboard Soldiers about women given exception to America’s restriction against women enlisting to operate switchboards. “They were among the first women sworn into the U.S. Army under the Articles of War. The male soldiers they had replaced had needed one minute to connect each call. The switchboard soldiers could do it in ten seconds.”
Other options from Chiaverini include Resistance Women, about women fighting the Nazi regime from within, Mrs. Lincoln’s Dressmaker about a former slave who dressed the First Lady, and Mrs. Lincoln’s Sisters about a family torn apart by the Civil War.
Another book that was suggested was The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot about a black woman who had cells taken from her body without her knowledge that “were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered secrets of cancer, viruses, and the atom bomb’s effects; helped lead to important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene mapping; and have been bought and sold by the billions.”
Feel free to add your own alternative suggestions, or share what you will be reading in the comments for this event.
After the meeting we’ll go out for food and further conversation.
Thanks to the generosity of our donors, SHL has funds available to ensure everyone feels welcome and able to participate. If you would like to participate in dining with us after book club but the cost presents a challenge, please email us at shl@lowcountryhumanists.org, and we can discreetly arrange to cover your costs.