In this series, five outstanding contemporary novels invite us into worlds shaped by memory, injustice, longing, resilience, and human connection. Rich in emotional insight and literary accomplishment, these works resonate with the Skirball's core values of honoring memory, seeking learning, pursuing justice, building community, showing kindness, and welcoming the stranger. Together, they demonstrate the power of literature to deepen understanding, awaken empathy, and bring people into meaningful conversation with one another.

SEPTEMBER: Flashlight by Susan Choi (2025)

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize and Women's Prize for Fiction

A spellbinding investigation of family, loss, and memory spanning continents and decades, set in motion when a father and his young daughter walk out onto a breakwater one summer night — and only she comes back. 

OCTOBER: Kin by Tayari Jones (2026)

Previous Women's Prize for Fiction–winning author

In the Jim Crow South, two motherless daughters' diverging lives—one toward privilege, one toward peril—are held together by an unbreakable friendship.

NOVEMBER: Audition by Katie Kitamura (2025)

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize and a Pulitzer Prize finalist

An accomplished actress navigates marriage, motherhood, and regret through two competing narratives that rewrite our understanding of the roles we play every day. 

DECEMBER: The Correspondent by Virginia Evans (2025)

Winner of the PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel and the 2026 Women's Prize for Fiction

Meet Sybil Van Antwerp, a retired lawyer whose lifelong practice of writing letters gradually reveals a life shaped by grief, secrets, and the transformative power of connection.

JANUARY: The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden (2024)

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize and Women's Prize for Fiction

A quietly devastating story set in postwar Netherlands, where a rigidly controlled woman's life is upended when her brother's girlfriend moves in.

Facilitator: Stacey Bieber attended Boston University for both her undergraduate studies and law school.  She also has a Master of Law degree in Taxation from New York University. Following graduate school, she and her husband, Mark, moved to Los Angeles for her clerkship and never looked back.    

After having three children, Bieber decided to follow her passion and returned to school earning a Master of Arts in Literature from California State University, Northridge, where she taught in the English Department for eighteen years until recently retiring.   

Facilitating book clubs allows Bieber to combine her love for reading, learning, and teaching without the grading. In addition to teaching, she loves spending time with her family, hiking, traveling, and learning from her students.

GROUP 1: Tuesdays, 10:00 am–12:00 pm (IN PERSON)
September 15, October 13, November 3, December 15, January 19

GROUP 2: Tuesdays, 1:00–3:00 pm (IN PERSON)
September 15, October 13, November 3, December 15, January 19

GROUP 3: Wednesdays, 1:00–3:00 pm (IN PERSON)
September 16, October 14, November 4, December 16, January 20

GROUP 4: Fridays, 10:00 am–12:00 pm (ONLINE)
September 18, October 16, November 6, December 18, January 22