The Literary Wineaux Society OC

1. It's the 10th anniversary of the publication date of this most-loved book
2. The publisher has just released a special commemorative edition of this book with beautiful sprayed edges - see it here.
3. Elle Fanning and Dakota Fanning will soon star in the Netflix film based on the book. The film is currently in development.

What is The Nightingale about?
France, 1939 - In the quiet village of Carriveau, Vianne Mauriac says goodbye to her husband, Antoine, as he heads for the Front. She doesn't believe that the Nazis will invade France … but invade they do, in droves of marching soldiers, in caravans of trucks and tanks, in planes that fill the skies and drop bombs upon the innocent. When a German captain requisitions Vianne's home, she and her daughter must live with the enemy or lose everything. Without food or money or hope, as danger escalates all around them, she is forced to make one impossible choice after another to keep her family alive.
Vianne's sister, Isabelle, is a rebellious eighteen-year-old girl, searching for purpose with all the reckless passion of youth. While thousands of Parisians march into the unknown terrors of war, she meets Gäetan, a partisan who believes the French can fight the Nazis from within France, and she falls in love as only the young can … completely. But when he betrays her, Isabelle joins the Resistance and never looks back, risking her life time and again to save others.
With courage, grace, and powerful insight, bestselling author Kristin Hannah captures the epic panorama of World War II and illuminates an intimate part of history seldom seen: the women's war. The Nightingale tells the stories of two sisters, separated by years and experience, by ideals, passion and circumstance, each embarking on her own dangerous path toward survival, love, and freedom in German-occupied, war-torn France―a heartbreakingly beautiful novel that celebrates the resilience of the human spirit and the durability of women. It is a novel for everyone, a novel for a lifetime.

Note: please obtain any format of this book for the event - no need to get the special edition - it’s the same story

'The Woman in Cabin 10' by Ruth Ware - (fiction) Travel magazine writer Lo Blacklock has just been given the assignment of a lifetime: one week on a luxury cruise with only a handful of cabins. The sky is clear, the waters calm, and the elite guests jovial as the exclusive cruise ship, the Aurora, begins her voyage in the picturesque North Sea. But as the week wears on, frigid winds whip the deck, gray skies fall, and Lo witnesses what she can only describe as a dark and terrifying nightmare: a woman being thrown overboard. The problem? All passengers remain accounted for—and so, the ship sails on as if nothing has happened, despite Lo’s desperate attempts to convey that something has gone terribly, terribly wrong… Amazon Link

This will soon be a movie starring Keira Knightley and Guy Pearce. See Netflix's announcement here!

Further Reading and Viewing

• Article: Q&A with Ruth Ware in CultureFly Magazine
• Video: Ruth Ware on the Creation of The Woman in Cabin 10
• Article: Kirkus Reviews Announces Sequel to 'Cabin 10'

Location: The Wine Gallery Laguna Beach
Let's pray for warmer weather this time! We will be on the heated patio outside. Should be a lot quieter. Street parking is available. Going forward we will be at Five Vines, San Juan Capistrano each month.

1. 'The Names' by Florence Knapp - In the wake of a catastrophic storm, Cora sets off with her nine-year-old daughter, Maia, to register her son's birth. Her husband, Gordon, a local doctor, respected in the community but a terrifying and controlling presence at home, intends for her to name the infant after him. But when the registrar asks what she'd like to call the child, Cora hesitates...Spanning thirty-five years, what follows are three alternate and alternating versions of Cora's and her young son's lives, shaped by her choice of name. In richly layered prose, 'The Names' explores the painful ripple effects of domestic abuse, the messy ties of family, and the possibilities of autonomy and healing. Amazon Link.

2. 'The Bee Sting' by Paul Murray - The Barnes family is in trouble. Dickie’s once-lucrative car business is going under―but Dickie is spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman. His wife, Imelda, is selling off her jewelry on eBay and half-heartedly dodging the attention of fast-talking cattle farmer Big Mike, while their teenage daughter, Cass, formerly top of her class, seems determined to binge drink her way through her final exams. As for twelve-year-old PJ, he’s on the brink of running away. If you wanted to change this story, how far back would you have to go? To the infamous bee sting that ruined Imelda’s wedding day? To the car crash one year before Cass was born? All the way back to Dickie at ten years old, standing in the summer garden with his father, learning how to be a real man? Amazon Link.

3. 'The Bright Years' by Sarah Damoff - Ryan and Lillian Bright are deeply in love, recently married, and now parents to a baby girl, Georgette. But Lillian has a son she hasn’t told Ryan about, and Ryan has an alcohol addiction he hasn’t told Lillian about, so Georgette comes of age watching their marriage rise and fall. When a shocking blow scatters their fragile trio, Georgette tries to distance herself from reminders of her parents. Years later, Lillian’s son comes searching for his birth family, so Georgette must return to her roots, unearth her family’s history, and decide whether she can open up to love for them or herself while there’s still time. Told from three intimate points of view, The Bright Years is a tender, true-to-life novel that explores the impact of each generation in a family torn apart by tragedy but, over time, restored by the power of grace and love. Amazon Link.

4. 'Run For The Hills' by Kevin Wilson - Ever since her dad left them twenty years ago, it’s been just Madeline Hill and her mom on their farm in Coalfield, Tennessee. While it’s a bit lonely, she sometimes admits, and a less exciting life than what she imagined for herself, it’s mostly okay. Mostly. Then one day Reuben Hill pulls up in a PT Cruiser and informs Madeline that he believes she’s his half sister. Reuben—left behind by their dad thirty years ago—has hired a detective to track down their father and a string of other half-siblings. And he wants Mad to leave her home and join him for the craziest kind of road trip imaginable to find them all. As Mad and Rube—and eventually the others—share stories of their father, who behaved so differently in each life he created, they begin to question what he was looking for with every new incarnation. Who are they to one another? What kind of man will they find? And how will these new relationships change Mad’s previously solitary life on the farm? Amazon Link.

5. 'Shuggie Bain' by Douglas Stuart - Shuggie Bain is the unforgettable story of young Hugh “Shuggie” Bain, a sweet and lonely boy who spends his 1980s childhood in run-down public housing in Glasgow, Scotland. Thatcher’s policies have put husbands and sons out of work, and the city’s notorious drugs epidemic is waiting in the wings. Shuggie’s mother Agnes walks a wayward path: she is Shuggie’s guiding light but a burden for him and his siblings. Married to a philandering taxi-driver husband, Agnes keeps her pride by looking good—her beehive, make-up, and pearly-white false teeth offer a glamorous image of a Glaswegian Elizabeth Taylor. But under the surface, Agnes finds increasing solace in drink, and she drains away the lion’s share of each week’s benefits—all the family has to live on. Shuggie is meanwhile struggling to somehow become the normal boy he desperately longs to be, but everyone has realized that he is “no right,” a boy. Agnes is supportive of her son, but her addiction has the power to eclipse everyone close to her—even her beloved Shuggie. Amazon Link.

6. 'The Emperor of Gladness' by Ocean Vuong - One late summer evening in the post-industrial town of East Gladness, Connecticut, nineteen-year-old Hai stands on the edge of a bridge in pelting rain, ready to jump, when he hears someone shout across the river. The voice belongs to Grazina, an elderly widow succumbing to dementia, who convinces him to take another path. Bereft and out of options, he quickly becomes her caretaker. Over the course of the year, the unlikely pair develops a life-altering bond, one built on empathy, spiritual reckoning, and heartbreak, with the power to transform Hai’s relationship to himself, his family, and a community on the brink. Following the cycles of history, memory, and time, The Emperor of Gladness shows the profound ways in which love, labor, and loneliness form the bedrock of American life. At its heart is a brave epic about what it means to exist on the fringes of society and to reckon with the wounds that haunt our collective soul. Amazon Link.

7. 'Down the Drain' by Julia Fox - famous for many things: such as her breakout role in the film Uncut Gems; her trendsetting style, including bleached eyebrows and cutout dresses; her mastery of social media, But all these share the trait for which she is most famous: unabashedly and unapologetically being herself. Fox recounts her turbulent path, her parents’ volatile relationship that divided her childhood between Italy and New York City and left her largely raising herself; a possessive and abusive drug-dealing boyfriend whose torment continued even from within Rikers Island; her own trips to jail as well as to a psychiatric hospital; her work as a dominatrix that led to a complicated entanglement with a sugar daddy; a heroin habit that led to New Orleans trap houses and that she would kick only after the fatal overdose of her best friend; an emotionally explosive, tabloid-dominating romance with a figure she dubs “The Artist”; a whirlwind, short-lived marriage and her trials as a single parent striving to support her young son. Yet as extraordinary as her story is, its universality is what makes it so powerful. Amazon Link.