Book Club

Start Making Sense Book Club

It's a complicated world out there, and thanks to our smartphones and social media, we're seeing more of it than ever. It can often feel daunting, exhausting, and confusing. We need some clarity.

Join us each month as we dive into books that help us understand our world—and each other—a little better. From pop culture to global issues, from memoirs to graphic novels, all topics and genres are up for grabs.

Pick up a book. Pull up a chair. Start making sense.

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This month's title:

World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Get your copy from the library - print or ebook.

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As a child, Nezhukumatathil called many places home: the grounds of a Kansas mental institution, where her Filipina mother was a doctor, the open skies and tall mountains of Arizona, where she hiked with her Indian father, and the chillier climes of western New York and Ohio. But no matter where she was transplanted, no matter how awkward the fit or forbidding the landscape, she was able to turn to our world's fierce and funny creatures for guidance.

"What the peacock can do," she tells us, "is remind you of a home you will run away from and run back to all your life." The axolotl teaches us to smile, even in the face of unkindness, the touch-me-not plant shows us how to shake off unwanted advances, the narwhal demonstrates how to survive in hostile environments. Even in the strange and the unlovely, Nezhukumatathil finds beauty and kinship. For it is this way with wonder: it requires that we are curious enough to look past the distractions in order to fully appreciate the world's gifts.

Warm, lyrical, and gorgeously illustrated by Fumi Nakamura, World of Wonders is a book of sustenance and joy.

- hoopla summary