Recommended

The following books are additional (optional) reads, as recommended by Fircrest Book Club members.  Note that many of these had been nominated for our book club picks in previous years, but we just couldn’t fit them all into our reading season.  So, if you’re looking for something interesting, heartfelt, amusing, or gripping to read, consider one or more of these titles!

Note: Moving the mouse cursor over a book cover will display some basic info as well as a  [Book Details…]  link to view its complete description.   For mobile devices (tablet or smartphone), this info can be displayed/hidden with a quick tap on and off of the book cover area.

Dancing Girls is Margaret Atwood’s highly praised first collection of short fiction.  In it she explores the dark intricacies of the mind, the comp...
[Book Details...]
Author : Margaret Atwood
Published : 1998-10-03
Publisher : McClelland & Stewart Ltd
ISBN : 9781551994901
Pages : 256
Chosen by : Cayce
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.001
Dancing Girls and Other Stories
FBC Recommended R2.001
book cover
The Reluctant Fundamentalist is the story of Changez, a young, Princeton-educated Pakistani who goes on to work at a prestigious financial analysis fi...
[Book Details...]
Author : Mohsin Haid
Published : 2008-04-08
Publisher : Doubleday Canada
ISBN : 9780385663458
Pages : 224
Chosen by : Nikki
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.002
The Reluctant Fundamentalist
FBC Recommended R2.002
book cover - Chop Suey Nation
In 2016, Globe and Mail reporter Ann Hui drove across Canada, from Victoria to Fogo Island, to write about small-town Chinese restaurants and the ...
[Book Details...]
Author : Ann Hui
Published : 2019-02-02
Publisher : Douglas and McIntyre
ISBN : 9781771622233
Pages : 248
Chosen by : Kirsten
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.003
Chop Suey Nation
FBC Recommended R2.003
Female wrestler-turned-detective Eva Wylie, star of Bucket Nut, returns in her second novel as a self-defense instructor for London's East End prostit...
[Book Details...]
Author : Liza Cody
Published : 2012-08-07
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
ISBN : 9781408837306
Pages : 216
Chosen by : Gwen
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.004
Monkey Wrench
FBC Recommended R2.004
A queer Syrian refugee reckons with a life spent out of place. “Writing this memoir is a betrayal.” So begins this electrifying personal accoun...
[Book Details...]
Author : Danny Ramadan
Published : 2024-05-28
Publisher : Viking
ISBN : 9780735242227
Pages : 352
Chosen by : Luisa
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.005
Crooked Teeth – A Queer Syrian Refugee Memoir
FBC Recommended R2.005
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE • WINNER OF THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION From the acclaimed author of The Poisonwood Bible and The Bean Trees, a br...
[Book Details...]
Author : Barbara Kingsolver
Published : 2022-10-18
Publisher : Faber & Faber
ISBN : 9780571376490
Pages : 560
Chosen by : Luisa
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.006
Demon Copperhead
FBC Recommended R2.006
A debut novel full of magic, adventure, and romance, The Book of Doors opens up a thrilling world of contemporary fantasy for readers of The Midnight ...
[Book Details...]
Author : Gareth Brown
Published : 2024-02-13
Publisher : William Morrow
ISBN : 9780063324008
Pages : 411
Chosen by : Tom
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.007
The Book of Doors
FBC Recommended R2.007
The CWA Gold Dagger Award-winning British espionage novel about disgraced MI5 agents who inadvertently uncover a deadly Cold War-era legacy of sleeper...
[Book Details...]
Author : Mick Herron
Published : 2013-05-07
Publisher : Soho Press Inc.
ISBN : 9781616952266
Pages : 348
Chosen by : Gwen
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.008
Dead Lions
FBC Recommended R2.008
Set in Bombay in the mid-1990s, Family Matters tells a story of familial love and obligation, of personal and political corruption, of the demands of ...
[Book Details...]
Author : Rohinton Mistry
Published : 2011-02-18
Publisher : Emblem Editions
ISBN : 9781551994369
Pages : 504
Chosen by : Tom
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.009
Family Matters
FBC Recommended R2.009
1996 Minnesota Book Award winner — A Native American book The heart of the Native American experience: In this 1996 Minnesota Book Award winner, ...
[Book Details...]
Author : Kent Nerburn
Published : 2002-09-01
Publisher : New World Library
ISBN : 1577312333
Pages : 310
Chosen by : Sue
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.010
Neither Wolf nor Dog
FBC Recommended R2.010
A marvelous and absorbing debut novel about a chance meeting between two supernatural creatures in turn-of-the-century immigrant New York. Chava is...
[Book Details...]
Author : Helene Wecker
Published : 2013-04-23
Publisher : HarperCollins Canada
ISBN : 9780062110855
Pages : 496
Chosen by : Tom
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.011
The Golem and the Jinni
FBC Recommended R2.011
A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry’s stunning internationally acclaimed bestseller, is set in mid-1970s India.  It tells the story of four unlikely pe...
[Book Details...]
Author : Rohinton Mistry
Published : 2010-10-29
Publisher : McClelland & Stewart
ISBN : 9781551991382
Pages : 628
Chosen by : Gwen
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.012
A Fine Balance
FBC Recommended R2.012
The stunning Booker Prize–winning novel from the author of Amnesty and Selection Day that critics have likened to Richard Wright’s Native Son, The...
[Book Details...]
Author : Aravind Adiga
Published : 2008-04-22
Publisher : Free Press
ISBN : 9781416562733
Pages : 304
Chosen by : Gwen
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.013
The White Tiger
FBC Recommended R2.013
Here, in one volume: Marjane Satrapi's best-selling, internationally acclaimed graphic memoir of growing up as a girl in Iran during the revolution ha...
[Book Details...]
Author : Marjane Satrapi
Published : 2007-10-30
Publisher : Pantheon
ISBN : 9780307518026
Pages : 341
Chosen by : _
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.014
The Complete Persepolis
FBC Recommended R2.014
“Wondrous...masterful...The Shadow of the Wind is ultimately a love letter to literature, intended for readers as passionate about storytelling as i...
[Book Details...]
Author : Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Published : 2005-01-25
Publisher : The Penguin Press
ISBN : 9781101147061
Pages : 512
Chosen by : Wanda
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.015
The Shadow of the Wind
FBC Recommended R2.015
FINALIST FOR THE GOVERNOR GENERAL’S LITERARY AWARDS Penny, an artist, has lived in the same apartment for decades, surrounded by the artifacts an...
[Book Details...]
Author : Iain Reid
Published : 2022-09-27
Publisher : Scout Press
ISBN : 9781982169374
Pages : 304
Chosen by : _
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.016
We Spread
FBC Recommended R2.016
• Named Book of the Month Club's Book of the Year, 2017 • Selected one of New York Times Readers’ Favorite Books of 2017 • Winner of the 201...
[Book Details...]
Author : John Boyne
Published : 2017-08-27
Publisher : Hogarth
ISBN : 9781524760809
Pages : 592
Chosen by : Ceri
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.017
The Heart’s Invisible Furies
FBC Recommended R2.017
• Winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction • Winner of the 2016 Edgar Award for Best First Novel • Winner of the 2016 Andrew Carnegie Med...
[Book Details...]
Author : Viet Thanh Nguyen
Published : 2015-04-02
Publisher : Grove Press
ISBN : 9780802191694
Pages : 384
Chosen by : Gwen
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.018
The Sympathizer
FBC Recommended R2.018
From Graham Norton—the BAFTA Award-winning Irish television host and author of the “charming debut novel” (New York Journal of Books) Holding—...
[Book Details...]
Author : Graham Norton
Published : 2018-10-04
Publisher : Hodder & Stoughton
ISBN : 9781473665002
Pages : 336
Chosen by : _
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.019
A Keeper
FBC Recommended R2.019
In this “compelling, bighearted, emotionally precise page-turner” (Sunday Times), the New York Times bestselling writer and acclaimed television h...
[Book Details...]
Author : Graham Norton
Published : 2020-10-01
Publisher : Hodder & Stoughton
ISBN : 9781473665156
Pages : 368
Chosen by : _
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.020
Home Stretch
FBC Recommended R2.020
Nevil Shute’s most powerful novel—a bestseller for decades after its 1957 publication—is an unforgettable vision of a post-apocalyptic world. ...
[Book Details...]
Author : Nevil Shute
Published : 2010-01-22
Publisher : Vintage International
ISBN : 9780307476982
Pages : 320
Chosen by : Gwen
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.021
On the Beach
FBC Recommended R2.021
In this Hugo nominated science fiction thriller by Mur Lafferty, a crew of clones awakens aboard a space ship to find they’re being hunted-and a...
[Book Details...]
Author : Mur Lafferty
Published : 2017-01-30
Publisher : Orbit
ISBN : 9780316389662
Pages : 400
Chosen by : Cayce
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.022
Six Wakes
FBC Recommended R2.022
Inspired by the 1970 Bhola Cyclone, in which half a million people perished overnight, The Storm seamlessly interweaves five love stories that, togeth...
[Book Details...]
Author : Arif Anwar
Published : 2018-03-13
Publisher : HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
ISBN : 9781443454230
Pages : 368
Chosen by : Gwen
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.023
The Storm
FBC Recommended R2.023
“Time did not exist; or if it did it did not matter.  Our world then was both wide and narrow—wide in the immensity of the sea and mountain; ...
[Book Details...]
Author : M. Wylie Blanchet
Published : 2016-01-27
Publisher : Pickle Partners Publishing
ISBN : 9781786258342
Pages : 199
Chosen by : _
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.024
The Curve of Time
FBC Recommended R2.024
From the acclaimed Nobel Prize winner—a powerful examination of our obsession with beauty and conformity that asks questions about race, class, and ...
[Book Details...]
Author : Toni Morrison
Published : 2004-06-01
Publisher : RosettaBooks LLC
ISBN : 9780795331329
Pages : 196
Chosen by : Joan
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.025
The Bluest Eye
FBC Recommended R2.025
In this stunning bestseller that inspired the Amazon Prime series, praised as our era's Handmaid's Tale, a fierce new power has emerged—and only wom...
[Book Details...]
Author : Naomi Alderman
Published : 2016-10-27
Publisher : Viking
ISBN : 9780670919970
Pages : 340
Chosen by : _
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.026
The Power
FBC Recommended R2.026
INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • A contemporary literary classic and "an accomplished psychological thriller ... absolutely chilling" (Village Voice), fro...
[Book Details...]
Author : Donna Tartt
Published : 2011-10-19
Publisher : Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
ISBN : 9780307765697
Pages : 544
Chosen by : Cayce
Meeting : FBC Recommended R2.027
The Secret History
FBC Recommended R2.027