Program Description
Event Details
Join us for the Pacific Beach Library's monthly book discussion! Our group meets in a hybrid format, so you can choose whether you'd prefer to join us in-person in the PB Library's Community Room or virtually (please send an email to cwainwright@sandiego.gov for this year's Teams login info).
Description: When the enslaved Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he decides to hide on nearby Jackson Island until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father, recently returned to town. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and too-often-unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond. While many narrative set pieces of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn remain in place (floods and storms, stumbling across both unexpected death and unexpected treasure in the myriad stopping points along the river's banks, encountering the scam artists posing as the Duke and Dauphin . . .), Jim’s agency, intelligence and compassion are shown in a radically new light.
If you'd like to check out a print copy of the book, they are available 1 month before each discussion at the Pacific Beach Library's Circulation Desk. Please call 858-581-9934 x0 before coming to pick it up so that staff may confirm availability.
Book Discussion Calendar
- January 8, 2026: Select titles to discuss in 2026
- February 12: James by Percival Everett
- March 12: The Island of Sea Women by Lisa See
- April 9: The Feather Thief : Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century by Kirk Wallace Johnson
- May 14: Feeding Ghosts by Tess Hulls
- June 11: The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon
- July 9: The Greatest Sentence Ever Written by Walter Isaacson
- August 13: Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy
- September 10: Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy by Mary Roach
- October 8: What We Can Know by Ian McEwan
- November 12: One Book, One San Diego selection (to be announced)
- December 10: Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
- January 14, 2027: Select titles to discuss in 2027
- February 11, 2027: An Unfinished Love Story by Doris Kearns Goodwin