FEBRUARY BOOK

Our book for February is The Dawn of Everything  (link) by David Graeber and David Wengrow (a hefty tome, so I hope everyone started reading early). We'll stick with our ZOOM meeting once again (ZOOMlink) as we wait for the pesky Omicron variant to recede into the dustbin of history.  Join the virtual fun this Tuesday evening (Feb. 1) at the usual 7pm start time.  All are welcome but supply your own food and drink.

For generations, our remote ancestors have been cast as primitive and childlike―either free and equal innocents, or thuggish and warlike. Civilization, we are told, could be achieved only by sacrificing those original freedoms or, alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. David Graeber and David Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself.

JANUARY BOOK

Happy New Year to one and all.  Our book for January is The Kraken Wakes  (link) by noted English sci-fi author John Wyndham.  (Several of his novels have been filmed.)  We'll be having a virtual ZOOM meeting once again (ZOOMlink) as we wait for the Omicron variant to reach its omega point.  As usual, the entire universe is invited to join us dedicated bookateers, commencing at 7pm this Tuesday evening, January 4.  White tie and tails strictly optional.

An "ingenious, horrifying" (The Guardian) first contact story by one of the twentieth century's most brilliant—and neglected—science fiction and horror writers, whom Stephen King called "the best writer of science fiction that England has ever produced."

What if aliens colonized Earth's oceans, rather than its land?