The FOPSL Book Club meets on the third Friday of the month at 2:00 p.m. (September-June) in The Learning Center at the Palm Springs Public Library and is open to everyone. Members of the club read the selected book for the month and join in lively discussions.

To join the FOPSL Book Club email list, please contact Friends Book Club Coordinators Mary Marks and Lisa Walters at friendspslibrary.bookclub@gmail.com

For more information about the FOPSL Book Club, including summaries of past book discussions and additional notes about the titles selected, please visit the Friends of Palm Springs Library Book Club Page.

Most titles are available as Downloadable Audiobooks and/or eBooks from PSPL.

March 15, 2024
Please note the earlier start time of 1:00 p.m. for March as we will be discussing Book Club choices for next season.

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

—Winner of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

—Winner of the 2023 Women's Prize for Fiction

From the acclaimed author of The Poisonwood Bible and The Bean Trees, a brilliant novel that enthralls, compels, and captures the heart as it evokes a young hero’s unforgettable journey to maturity

Set in the mountains of southern Appalachia, Demon Copperhead is the story of a boy born to a teenaged single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father’s good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit, and a fierce talent for survival. Relayed in his own unsparing voice, Demon braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing losses. Through all of it, he reckons with his own invisibility in a popular culture where even the superheroes have abandoned rural people in favor of cities.

Many generations ago, Charles Dickens wrote David Copperfield from his experience as a survivor of institutional poverty and its damages to children in his society. Those problems have yet to be solved in ours. Dickens is not a prerequisite for readers of this novel, but he provided its inspiration. In transposing a Victorian epic novel to the contemporary American South, Barbara Kingsolver enlists Dickens’ anger and compassion, and above all, his faith in the transformative powers of a good story. Demon Copperhead speaks for a new generation of lost boys, and all those born into beautiful, cursed places they can’t imagine leaving behind.

Assisted Listening Devices (ALDs) are instruments designed to amplify sounds to make it easier for persons who are hearing‑impaired to enjoy a library program.

Anyone who requires an auxiliary aid or service for effective communication, or a modification of policies or procedures to participate in a program, service, or activity of the City of Palm Springs, should contact the ADA Coordinator, as soon as possible but no later than 48 hours before the scheduled event.