Once-in-a-While Book Club
Contact me if you’d like to join us for the April 27th meeting.
We are meeting on April 27th from 3:30 to 5 PM
at my house in Rancho Palos Verdes.
The Once-in-a-While Book Club is for book lovers who can’t commit to monthly meetings (I crack myself up). It’s an afternoon of bookish conversation that happens around my dining room table once-in-a-while. Read the book. Show up comfy and casual. I’ll do the rest.
We are reading The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of the bestselling Braiding Sweetgrass. From the publisher, “This book is a bold and inspiring vision for how to orient our lives around gratitude, reciprocity, and community, based on the lessons of the natural world.” This instant New York Times bestseller is our first nonfiction selection and I hope you’ll join us.
Books we’ve read together so far
once-in-a-while book club DETAILS
Who: Limited to the first eight book-loving humans who email me at LorrieTom@LorrieT.com and say they’d like to attend. Address supplied after your spot is confirmed. Feel free to share this with a friend!
What:
Read our book selection by April 27th.
Show up COMFY and CASUAL.
Light snacks, tea, and fizzy water served. If you’d like to bring something to share, that’s welcome but not expected.
When: Sunday, April 27th from 3:30 to 5 PM PACIFIC.
Where: My dining room table in my actual house! Address supplied after enrollment confirmation, but for your planning purposes, I live in Rancho Palos Verdes near Peninsula High School.
How: Email me (LorrieTom@LorrieT.com) to see if there is still space and then I’ll send you my address. People who are subscribed to my newsletter get priority registration.
Cost: This one’s on me. It’s free.
4.6 Amazon rating
4.4 Goodreads
128 pages (this will be a fast one!)
Published November, 2024
As Indigenous scientist and author of Braiding Sweetgrass Robin Wall Kimmerer harvests serviceberries alongside the birds, she considers the ethic of reciprocity that lies at the heart of the gift economy. How, she asks, can we learn from Indigenous wisdom and the plant world to reimagine what we value most? Our economy is rooted in scarcity, competition, and the hoarding of resources, and we have surrendered our values to a system that actively harms what we love. Meanwhile, the serviceberry’s relationship with the natural world is an embodiment of reciprocity, interconnectedness, and gratitude. The tree distributes its wealth—its abundance of sweet, juicy berries—to meet the needs of its natural community. And this distribution ensures its own survival. As Kimmerer explains, “Serviceberries show us another model, one based upon reciprocity, where wealth comes from the quality of your relationships, not from the illusion of self-sufficiency.”
As Elizabeth Gilbert writes, Robin Wall Kimmerer is “a great teacher, and her words are a hymn of love to the world.” The Serviceberry is an antidote to the broken relationships and misguided goals of our times, and a reminder that “hoarding won’t save us, all flourishing is mutual.”
If you have any questions, contact me.
And remember, even if you hate this book, come to the meeting cuz different opinions make for good conversations—at least in The Land of Lorrie Tom Writes (and Reads).