Between the Covers: Professionally Led Book Discussions

Please join us on Wednesday, September 18, 2024 at 7pm CST for our next virtual event, Fall Favorites, designed to help you break through the clutter of new releases and bestseller lists. 

During the hour-long presentation, Alice & Ann will recommend 20+ titles guaranteed to captivate, move, and inspire you.We’ll depict tales from a rural village in Nigeria  to a palazzo on Venice’s Grand Canal; we’ll take you on a journey to coastal Maine, a posh London hotel room, and the war-torn streets of Northern Ireland; we’ll share insights about everything from the lure of theater to the magic of bookshops to the ethical dilemmas that confront us all. 

The $20 fee includes a printable copy of the complete list, link to the event recording (in case you can’t attend live), and an automatic raffle entry ($100 value). To register, send payment via Venmo (@alice-moody) or Zelle (alice.moody@comcast.net). Be sure to include your email address in the memo so we can forward the Zoom link a few days prior. For personal checks, reach out and we’ll provide a mailing address. 

For additional information, please contact Ann Walters at bksonthetable@gmail.com or Alice Moody at alice@platinumpenconsulting.com.

The light you bring to the world in the form of literature and language is so special.

I enjoyed listening to the discussion and found the book fascinating.

It was a great discussion last night . . . this book really gave me deep understanding.

We’ve just wrapped up our second year of Between the Covers with Alice & Ann (formerly Talking Books with Alice & Ann), with readers from all over the country joining us every other month for enlightening conversations (sometimes with cocktails). We began in October 2022 with Feast Your Eyes by Myla Goldberg, a literary novel about art and motherhood, then read Songbirds by Christy Lefteri, suspenseful fiction about migrants on the island of Cyprus, and delved into the shadow history of adoption with American Baby by Gabrielle Glaser. We challenged ourselves with A Manual for Cleaning Women by Lucia Berlin, a collection of 43 short stories by an underappreciated writer, and then discussed When the Stars Go Dark by Paul McLain, a mystery informed by the author’s own experiences in the foster care system. We finished the year with Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson, a modern classic.

In response to feedback from our terrific subscribers, we’re making some changes to our literary series for the upcoming year (2023-24). Between the Covers has transitioned to a CONVERSATION ONLY format. Here’s how it works:

• You receive six “surprise” announcements of our hand-selected, under-the-radar titles — one every other month.
• You can buy the book at your choice of bookstore, purchase the audio version, or borrow it from the library.
• On alternate months, you receive a Zoom link to a 60-minute live Siskel & Ebert style conversation where book facilitators Alice and Ann discuss, dissect, and debate the work.
• If you can’t join us live, you have access to the recorded conversations for two months.

The fee is now $100 for an entire year — six emailed title announcements and six talks. To subscribe, please send payment via Venmo (@alice-moody) or Zelle (alice.moody@comcast.net) by September 1. If you prefer to send a check, let us know and we’ll provide a mailing address. You can reach us by email at bksonthetable@gmail.com or phone/text at 847.843.6321.

We hope you’ll join us for another year of enriching literature and thought-provoking conversations!

Happy Spring!

If you’re looking for great books you can’t put down this spring and summer, look no further.

On Wednesday, May 24 at 7:00 p.m. CST, we’d love for you to attend our virtual event designed to help you break through the clutter of bestseller lists. During the hourlong presentation, we’ll recommend 24 titles guaranteed to captivate, move, and inspire you. We’ll depict tales from the onset of WWII to Berkeley in the ’90s; we’ll take you on a journey to Colorado peach orchards, Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood, and the villages of rural Ireland; we’ll share insights about everything from friendship to preserving memories to understanding one’s place in the world.

The $15 fee includes a printable copy of the complete list, a link to the event recording (in case you can’t join us “live”), and an automatic raffle entry ($150 value). To register, send payment via Venmo (@alice-moody) or Zelle (alice.moody@comcast.net). Be sure to include your email address in the memo so we can forward the Zoom link a few days prior. For personal checks, reach out and we’ll provide a mailing address. For additional information, please contact Ann Walters at bksonthetable@gmail.com or Alice Moody at alice@platinumpenconsulting.com.

We hope you’ll join us for this special literary evening!

I want to thank you both for opening me up to new books.

I really love the depth of discussion you bring and the types of books you choose.

My daughter and I really enjoyed the discussion last night . . . I think you have done a great job with book selection and your discussions are comprehensive and provide a lot of food for thought.

I love your format, insights and book choices.

The first year of our literary subscription series, Talking Books with Alice & Ann, has been a success, with over 100 readers joining us for conversations about a wide range of books. We started in October 2021 with a modern classic, Crossing to Safety, moved on to The Mercies, historical fiction with a feminist twist, and then immersed ourselves in This Is All I Got, narrative nonfiction about a young homeless mother in New York City. Our next book, Leonard and Hungry Paul, which could be categorized as “uplit”, explored the deep friendship between two lonely men and how it helped them join the wider world. We jumped into magical realism in The Enchanted as we imagined the lives of condemned criminals in a stone prison, and next month we will discuss a book in translation, The Shadow of the Wind, a historical mystery that pays homage to the power of literature.

We hope you’ll subscribe for another year of exciting reading and stimulating conversations. Every other month, beginning in August 2022, subscription holders will receive a surprise title in the mail and a link to a 60-minute “live” edition of “Talking Books with Alice & Ann” – to be held the first Monday (at 7pm CST) the following month. During the virtual, Siskel & Ebert-style conversation, Alice and Ann will discuss, dissect, and debate the work. Participants can submit questions and make comments via chat. The dates of the conversations are October 3, 2022, December 5, 2022, February 6, 2023, April 3, 2023, June 5, 2023, and August 5, 2023. If you miss the live discussion, no worries — all discussions are recorded.

Subscription fees:

6-month subscription (3 books + 3 talks) – $150

12-month subscription (6 books + 6 talks) – $225

To subscribe, please pay via Venmo (@alice-moody) or Zelle (alice.moody@comcast.net). Let me know if you don’t have access to either, and we’ll provide a mailing address to send a check. You can reach us by email at bksonthetable@gmail.com or phone/text at 847.843.6321.

We hope you’ll join us for more engaging, enriching literature as we embark on Year Two of what has been a labor of love.