Book Summary

After receiving a frantic letter from her newly-wed cousin begging for someone to save her from a mysterious doom, Noemí Taboada heads to High Place, a distant house in the Mexican countryside. She’s not sure what she will find - her cousin’s husband, a handsome Englishman, is a stranger, and Noemí knows little about the region.

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About the Author - Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Silvia Moreno-Garcia is the author of Gods of Jade and Shadow, named one of the best books of summer 2019 by Publishers Weekly; Signal to Noise, named one of the best books of the year by Book Riot, Tordotcom, BuzzFeed, io9, and other publications; Certain Dark Things, one of NPR's best books of the year, a Publishers Weekly top ten, and a VOYA "Perfect Ten"; the fantasy of manners The Beautiful Ones; and the science fiction novella Prime Meridian. She has also edited several anthologies, including the World Fantasy Award-winning She Walks in Shadows (aka Cthulhu's Daughters). She lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Book Summary

Historical Fiction | Film: Yes (2018, Netflix)

The book is set in 1946 and is an epistolary novel, composed of letters written from one character to another.

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About the Authors -  Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows 

Mary Ann Shaffer, December 13, 1934 – February 16, 2008) was an American writer, editor, librarian, and a bookshop worker. She is noted for her posthumously published work The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, which she wrote with her niece, Annie Barrows.

Annie Barrows (born 1962 in San Diego, California) is an American editor and author. She is best known for the Ivy and Bean series of children's books, but she has written several other books for adult readers as well. With her aunt she co-wrote The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society, which was later adapted into a film.

Book Summary

This novel follows Bina Blonski, a Polish Jew and former resistance fighter who survived the Warsaw Ghetto and later reinvented herself as Hollywood star Lena Browning. Set in 2005 Los Angeles, the story weaves between her wartime past and glamorous present. When young filmmaker Sienna Hayes sets out to make a documentary about Lena, she uncovers long-buried secrets of survival and revenge.

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About the Author - Lisa Barr

The Goddess of Warsaw is an enthralling tale of a legendary Hollywood screen goddess with a dark secret about her life in the Warsaw Ghetto. When the famous actress is threatened by someone from her past, she must put her skills into play to protect herself, her illustrious career, and those she loves, then and now.  

Los Angeles, 2005. Sienna Hayes, Hollywood’s latest It Girl, has ambitions to work behind the camera. When she meets Lena Browning, the enormously mysterious and famous Golden Age movie star, Sienna sees her big break. She wants to direct a picture about Lena’s life—but the legendary actor’s murky past turns out to be even darker than Sienna dreamed. Before she was a Living Legend, Lena Browning was Bina Blonski, a Polish Jew whose life and family were destroyed by the Nazis.

Warsaw, 1943. A member of the city’s Jewish elite, Bina Blonski and her husband, Jakub, are imprisoned in the ghastly, cramped ghetto along with the rest of Warsaw’s surviving Jews. Determined to fight back against the brutal Nazis, the beautiful, blonde Aryan-looking Bina becomes a spy, gaining information and stealing weapons outside the ghetto to protect her fellow Jews. But her dangerous circumstances grow complicated when she falls in love with Aleksander, an ally in resistance—and Jakub’s brother. While Lena accomplishes amazing feats of bravery, she sacrifices much in the process.

Over a decade after escaping the horrors of the ghetto, Bina, now known as Lena, rises to fame in Hollywood. Yet she cannot help but be reminded of her old life and hungers for revenge against the Nazis who escaped justice after the war. Her power and fame as a movie star offer Lena the chance to right the past’s wrongs . . . and perhaps even find the happy ending she never had.

A gripping page-turner of one of history’s most heroic uprisings and an actress whose personal war never ends, The Goddess Of Warsaw is filled with secrets, lies, twists and turns, and a burning pursuit of justice no matter the cost.

The author of The Goddess of Warsaw, will be attending our IFC book club via Zoom. 

Book Summary

At 100, retired ballplayer Murray McBride feels he has nothing left—until he meets Jason, a terminally ill 10-year-old with a bucket list. As they chase Jason’s dreams together, Murray rediscovers purpose, and both lives are forever changed by love, loss, and an unexpected gift.

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About the Author - Joe Siple

Joe Siple is the USA Today bestselling author of The Five Wishes of Mr. Murray McBride. His other works include The Final Wish of Mr. Murray McBride, Charlie Fightmaster and the Search for Perfect Harmony, The Town with No Roads, and The Last Dogs. A prequel to the Murray McBride series, The First Wish of Mr. Murray McBride, will be released in 2025.