Kansas City Sci-Fi/Fantasy Book Club

Please note, this month’s book contains violent and sexual content, as well as other potentially triggering themes and references. Individuals are encouraged to research the book before reading.

“Classics on the Side” is an additional, informal book club meet-up, which focuses on older and classic works from the sci-fi and fantasy genres. To see the Classics on the Side booklists, visit our Goodreads account: https://www.goodreads.com/classics_on_the_side_kc
Join us to discuss “The Handmaid’s Tale,” by Margaret Atwood. Published in 1985, this classic work of dystopian fiction won the Arthur C. Clark Award in 1987 and was nominated for the Nebula and Booker awards, among others. It is one of the most frequently banned books in the country.

Book synopsis:

In Margaret Atwood’s dystopian future, environmental disasters and declining birthrates have led to a Second American Civil War. The result is the rise of the Republic of Gilead, a totalitarian regime that enforces rigid social roles and enslaves the few remaining fertile women. Offred is one of these, a Handmaid bound to produce children for one of Gilead’s commanders. Deprived of her husband, her child, her freedom, and even her own name, Offred clings to her memories and her will to survive. At once a scathing satire, an ominous warning, and a tour de force of narrative suspense, The Handmaid’s Tale is a modern classic.

Many of our book discussions lead to broader conversations about what people have been reading and watching, as well as contemporary issues of science and culture. Each month, we have a meetup with this as the explicit goal: we'll open the conversation by talking a bit about what we have been reading lately (possibly asking everyone to give a brief synopsis of a recent book they've read and their impressions of it), and continue where the conversation takes us.

Description from Goodreads.com:

As a faithful Mormon, Soren Johansson has always believed he’ll be reunited with his loved ones after death in an eternal hereafter. Then, he dies. Soren wakes to find himself cast by a God he has never heard of into a Hell whose dimensions he can barely grasp: a vast library he can only escape from by finding the book that contains the story of his life.

In this haunting existential novella, author, philosopher, and ecologist Steven L. Peck explores a subversive vision of eternity, taking the reader on a journey through the afterlife of a world where everything everyone believed in turns out to be wrong.

Many of our book discussions lead to broader conversations about what people have been reading and watching, as well as contemporary issues of science and culture. Each month, we have a meetup with this as the explicit goal: we'll open the conversation by talking a bit about what we have been reading lately (possibly asking everyone to give a brief synopsis of a recent book they've read and their impressions of it), and continue where the conversation takes us.