California Readin' Club: How to Read Now by Elaine Castillo

Reading is about more than just books; it’s about understanding the world and our place in it. As part of the Summer Reading Challenge for 2023, SBPL is offering an Essay Book Club using concepts from Elaine Castillo's How to Read Now as a framework for exploring the politics and ethics of reading and inviting readers to engage more deeply, not just with our fiction and our art, but with our buried and entangled histories. 

The series includes three books of essays set in or about California and begins with a discussion of How to Read Now, followed by an exploration of Joan Didion's The White Album in July and José Vadi's Inter State: Essays on California in August. The Essay Book Club will meet on fourth Thursdays this summer and participants are encouraged to attend all three meetings.

Complimentary copies of How to Read Now will be available while supplies last beginning at the Summer Reading Kickoff and Author Talk with Elaine Castillo on Friday, June 16 at 6 p.m. The title is also available as a ebook and digital audiobook.