Well, we’re only about 18 months later than scheduled. Thanks, pandemic. Still, better late than never, we say.
As we told you a few weeks ago, we’ve been planning to launch our own book club for our customers for some time now, and the time is finally here to let you know all about it.
The Skylarking Book Club will take place on the last Thursday of every month, at 6:30 or thereabouts. Each month we will choose a fabulous newly released title - both fiction and nonfiction, depending on how the mood takes us - and we will gather in the shop to talk about the book, drink a little wine, and generally engage in the kind of book talk that made us want to open the bookshop in the first place.
So (drumroll please) we are excited to announce our inaugural selection: it is OF WOMEN AND SALT, by Gabriela Garcia.
It will cost nothing to attend - all we ask is that you purchase your copy of the book from us - either online, via email, in person, or over the phone at (573) 777 6990. All purchases of the book will receive a 15% discount up until September 30. (If you are buying online, you’ll need to enter the discount code “BC921” on the checkout page.)
This timely, electrifying debut novel - one of the most hotly anticipated titles of the year - traces a lineage of mothers and daughters across the Cuban diaspora. Spanning five generations and four countries—from 19th-century Cuba to contemporary Miami and Mexico—Garcia’s prismatic debut follows Latinas of fierce pride and longing, all irrevocably linked by the inheritance of trauma, and by the writings and stories passed between them.
Garcia—a former star student of Roxane Gay at Purdue’s MFA program in creative writing, and the recipient of a Rona Jaffe Award—taps into some of our most pressing issues. She writes, “As the multi-racial, multi-ethnic daughter of immigrants from Cuba and Mexico, I know firsthand that identities are chosen and assigned, fluid and confining. I’d never read a novel that spoke to the complexities of my own experience—I wanted to write one that dismantled the notion that there is a single Latinx or immigrant experience and that turned a lens on how privilege, colorism, and immigration inequality shape communities over decades.”
This novel is fabulous - but don’t take our word for it. OF WOMEN AND SALT has earned remarkable early praise. O, The Oprah Magazine raves, “A meditation on motherhood, displacement, and cultural identity . . . this stunningly accomplished first novel is both epic and intimate”; Elle chimes in, “A vast account of family, culture, politics, and the traumas inflicted by all, this gorgeous debut heralds the arrival of a literary star”; Harper’s Bazaar adds, “Garcia’s debut novel promises to be a sweeping tour de force about addiction, displacement, and the legacy of trauma"; Ms. magazine states, “This remarkable debut shines a brilliant light on the broken immigration system and legacy of trauma for the people who endure it"; and the Washington Post deems Garcia’s debut “A mesmerizing patchwork of determination, courage and survival.”
If all this wasn’t enough, we’re very please to announce that Gabriela Garcia will be attending the book club via Zoom to participate in the discussion! So you’ll be able to ask her questions directly.
We look forward to seeing you there. Here’s the link to purchase, one more time.
Gabriela Garcia is the recipient of a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writer's Award and a Steinbeck Fellowship from San Jose State University. Her fiction and poems have appeared in Best American Poetry, Tin House, Zyzzyva, Iowa Review, and elsewhere. She is the daughter of immigrants from Mexico and Cuba and grew up in Miami; she currently lives in Oakland, CA. She previously worked in music, magazines, technology, and feminist and migrant justice organizing. OF WOMEN AND SALT is her first novel.
