December 19, 2018
This is the time of year when “Best Books of the Year” lists are popping up everywhere. You can see a number of them here, including ones from the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, People, Time, Huffington Post, Publishers Weekly, Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Goodreads.
Now it’s YOUR turn! Once again, we would like you and your book group to help us compile ReadingGroupGuides.com’s “Best of 2018” list. Click here to share both your favorite book that you read with your group this year and your favorite book that you read outside your group. One Grand Prize winner will receive a collection of six outstanding book group titles releasing in 2019: THE AGE OF LIGHT by Whitney Scharer, THE GIRLS AT 17 SWANN STREET by Yara Zgheib, THE HUNTRESS by Kate Quinn, THE ISLAND OF SEA WOMEN by Lisa See, LOST ROSES by Martha Hall Kelly, and THE ONLY WOMAN IN THE ROOM by Marie Benedict. I promise that each of these is discussion worthy!
Bets On 2019 (RGG)
Editorial Content for Becoming
Book
Teaser
An Oprah's Book Club pick, BECOMING is an intimate, powerful and inspiring memoir by the former First Lady of the United States, who invites readers into her world as she chronicles the experiences that have shaped her.
Promo
An Oprah's Book Club pick, BECOMING is an intimate, powerful and inspiring memoir by the former First Lady of the United States, who invites readers into her world as she chronicles the experiences that have shaped her.
About the Book
An intimate, powerful and inspiring memoir by the former First Lady of the United States
In a life filled with meaning and accomplishment, Michelle Obama has emerged as one of the most iconic and compelling women of our era. As First Lady of the United States of America --- the first African American to serve in that role --- she helped create the most welcoming and inclusive White House in history, while also establishing herself as a powerful advocate for women and girls in the U.S. and around the world, dramatically changing the ways that families pursue healthier and more active lives, and standing with her husband as he led America through some of its most harrowing moments. Along the way, she showed us a few dance moves, crushed Carpool Karaoke and raised two down-to-earth daughters under an unforgiving media glare.
In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her --- from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world’s most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it --- in her own words and on her own terms. Warm, wise and revelatory, BECOMING is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations --- and whose story inspires us to do the same.
Editorial Content for The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell
Teaser
Wall Street Journal and New York Times bestselling author Robert Dugoni’s coming-of-age story is, according to Booklist, “a novel that, if it doesn’t cross entirely over into John Irving territory, certainly nestles in close to the border.”
Promo
Wall Street Journal and New York Times bestselling author Robert Dugoni’s coming-of-age story is, according to Booklist, “a novel that, if it doesn’t cross entirely over into John Irving territory, certainly nestles in close to the border.”
About the Book
Wall Street Journal and New York Times bestselling author Robert Dugoni’s coming-of-age story is, according to Booklist, “a novel that, if it doesn’t cross entirely over into John Irving territory, certainly nestles in close to the border.”
Sam Hill always saw the world through different eyes. Born with red pupils, he was called “Devil Boy” or Sam “Hell” by his classmates; “God’s will” is what his mother called his ocular albinism. Her words were of little comfort, but Sam persevered, buoyed by his mother’s devout faith, his father’s practical wisdom and his two other misfit friends.
Sam believed it was God who sent Ernie Cantwell, the only African American kid in his class, to be the friend he so desperately needed. And that it was God’s idea for Mickie Kennedy to storm into Our Lady of Mercy like a tornado, uprooting every rule Sam had been taught about boys and girls.
Forty years later, Sam, a small-town eye doctor, is no longer certain anything was by design --- especially not the tragedy that caused him to turn his back on his friends, his hometown and the life he’d always known. Running from the pain, eyes closed, served little purpose. Now, as he looks back on his life, Sam embarks on a journey that will take him halfway around the world. This time, his eyes are wide open --- bringing into clear view what changed him, defined him and made him so afraid, until he can finally see what truly matters.
Editorial Content for A Gentleman in Moscow
Teaser
From the New York Times bestselling author of RULES OF CIVILITY comes a transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel.
Promo
From the New York Times bestselling author of RULES OF CIVILITY comes a transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel.
About the Book
From the New York Times bestselling author of RULES OF CIVILITY comes a transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel.
In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel’s doors. Unexpectedly, his reduced circumstances provide him entry into a much larger world of emotional discovery.
Brimming with humor, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count’s endeavor to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose.
Editorial Content for The Splendor Before the Dark: A Novel of the Emperor Nero
Teaser
Nero’s ascent to the throne was only the beginning. Now, Margaret George, the author of THE CONFESSIONS OF YOUNG NERO, weaves a web of politics and passion, as ancient Rome’s most infamous emperor cements his place in history.
Promo
Nero’s ascent to the throne was only the beginning. Now, Margaret George, the author of THE CONFESSIONS OF YOUNG NERO, weaves a web of politics and passion, as ancient Rome’s most infamous emperor cements his place in history.
About the Book
Nero’s ascent to the throne was only the beginning. Now, Margaret George, the author of THE CONFESSIONS OF YOUNG NERO, weaves a web of politics and passion, as ancient Rome’s most infamous emperor cements his place in history.
With the beautiful and cunning Poppaea at his side, Nero Augustus commands the Roman empire, ushering in an unprecedented era of artistic and cultural splendor. Although he has yet to produce an heir, his power is unquestioned.
But in the 10th year of his reign, a terrifying prophecy comes to pass and a fire engulfs Rome, reducing entire swaths of the city to rubble. Rumors of Nero’s complicity in the blaze start to sow unrest among the populace --- and the politicians.
For better or worse, Nero knows that his fate is now tied to Rome’s --- and he vows to rebuild it as a city that will stun the world. But there are those who find his rampant quest for glory dangerous. Throughout the empire, false friends and spies conspire against him, not understanding what drives him to undertake the impossible.
Nero will either survive and be the first in his family to escape the web of betrayals that is the Roman court, or be ensnared and remembered as the last radiance of the greatest dynasty the world had ever known.
Editorial Content for Where the Crawdads Sing
Teaser
WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder.
Promo
WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder.
About the Book
For years, rumors of the “Marsh Girl” have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life --- until the unthinkable happens.
WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder. Owens reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we are all subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.



