Mostly Nonfiction Book Club

James by Percival Everett 2024  

A retelling of Mark Twain’s canonical novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884) from the perspective of Jim, an enslaved man who is one of the principal characters in Twain’s text. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a continuation of many of the characters and plotlines in Twain’s The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), although Huck Finn, like James, is more serious in tone and wrestles with themes related to morality, the nature of freedom, and enslavement. James, too, delves deeply into The Brutality of Enslavement and Huck’s moral development. Additionally, it foregrounds the resilience, intellectual acumen, and humanity of enslaved people and reexamines both history and literary history through the lens of contemporary discourses on Black experiences in the United States. It shares with many of Everett’s other texts an interest in race, racial identity, history, and interracial relations in the US. (303 pages)

Library Catalog

The Thursday Mostly Nonfiction Book Club focuses on nonfiction but also enjoys classic and contemporary fiction. The group meets on the 3rd Thursday of each month at 2 pm. New members are always welcome. The selection is available on the hold shelf one month before the discussion date. Please visit Mostly Nonfiction Book Club – John C. Hart Memorial Library (yorktownlibrary.org) for book selection of the month.