September Book Club

Join us in the Irish Cultural Center Book Club. We’ll enjoy good craic and delve into Irish and Irish-American literature, with guided discussion in a welcoming, relaxed atmosphere. This event is open to all.

Our meeting will take place on Thursday, September 12 from 5:30–6:30 pm at the ICC. 

We are reading Northern Spy by Flynn Berry. Participants are encouraged to arrive a few minutes early to get settled, perhaps grab a drink, mix and mingle. You are welcome to stay after at the Trinity Pub to socialize with dinner or drinks. 

To Register
The Book Club is free to join. Please register ahead so we know how many people to expect. Register online >

About the Book
A producer at the BBC and mother to a new baby, Tessa is at work in Belfast one day when the news of another raid comes on the air. The IRA may have gone underground in the two decades since the Good Friday Agreement, but they never really went away, and lately bomb threats, security checkpoints, and helicopters floating ominously over the city have become features of everyday life. As the news reporter requests the public’s help in locating those responsible for the robbery, security footage reveals Tessa’s sister, Marian, pulling a black ski mask over her face.

When the truth about Marian comes to light, Tessa is faced with impossible choices that will test the limits of her ideals, the bonds of her family, her notions of right and wrong, and her identity as a sister and a mother. Walking an increasingly perilous road, she wants nothing more than to protect the one person she loves more fiercely than her sister: her infant son, Finn.

Riveting, atmospheric, and exquisitely written, “Northern Spy” is at once a heart-pounding story of the contemporary IRA and a moving portrait of sister- and motherhood, and of life in a deeply divided society. (text from Amazon)

Available from several vendors online or your favorite local book shop. Or, check your local library.
• Amazon.com (new) >
• Better Worlds Books (used) >

Books for Upcoming Meetings
October 10, 2024: Last September by Elizabeth Bowen
November 14, 2024: An Irishman’s Story of Survival by Jack Cashman – Special Book Club Presentation with author
December 12, 2024: The Lost Bookshop by Evie Woods
January 19, 2025 (Sunday at 1 pm): Nora by Nuala O’Connor – Special Book Club Presentation with author via Zoom