February 4th7pm
Join the New Directions crew on an odyssey, no caper, called: THE LIFE OF THE MIND (to borrow a beloved expression by Helen DeWitt). We'll read staff favorites and New Directions staples with an emphasis on writerly genius and comic relief; and for each doorstopping magnum opus there's a jewel of a book so slight we could barely get a spine on it. Do you have to have read HERSCHT 07768 to understand HERSCHT 07769? If you know you know. If you don't know, come and find out... there will be wine....
This month we'll discuss Fran Ross' pioneering, dazzling satire about a biracial black girl from Philadelphia searching for her Jewish father in New York City, Oreo.
"It took me two years to 'feel' Wu Tang's first album, even longer to appreciate Basquiat, and I still don't get all the fuss over Duke Ellington and Frank Lloyd Wright. But I couldn't believe Oreo hadn't been on my cultural radar." — Paul Beatty, The New York Times
"A brilliant and biting satire, a feminist picaresque, absurd, unsettling, and hilarious ... Ross' novel, with its Joycean language games and keen social critique, is as playful as it is profound. Criminally overlooked. A knockout." — Kirkus (Starred Review)
Oreo is raised by her maternal grandparents in Philadelphia. Her black mother tours with a theatrical troupe, and her Jewish deadbeat dad disappeared when she was an infant, leaving behind a mysterious note that triggers her quest to find him. What ensues is a playful, modernized parody of the classical odyssey of Theseus with a feminist twist, immersed in seventies pop culture, and mixing standard English, black vernacular, and Yiddish with wisecracking aplomb. Oreo, our young hero, navigates the labyrinth of sound studios and brothels and subway tunnels in Manhattan, seeking to claim her birthright while unwittingly experiencing and triggering a mythic journey of self-discovery like no other.
Reserve your place with a $5 voucher, redeemable on the night of the book club meeting on any product in store.