This month's choice for the Hatchet Coffee Book Club is the National Book Award winner-Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward. We'd decided as a group that we wanted to read this book back when it was only available in hardcover. However, due to the dark nature of the story, we chose to wait until there was more sunshine in the day before we jumped into Jesmyn Ward's tragic family tale. 

Don't know what the book is about? Here's what the publisher says: 
Jojo is thirteen years old and trying to understand what it means to be a man. He doesn’t lack in fathers to study, chief among them his Black grandfather, Pop. But there are other men who complicate his understanding: his absent White father, Michael, who is being released from prison; his absent White grandfather, Big Joseph, who won’t acknowledge his existence; and the memories of his dead uncle, Given, who died as a teenager.

His mother, Leonie, is an inconsistent presence in his and his toddler sister’s lives. She is an imperfect mother in constant conflict with herself and those around her. She is Black and her children’s father is White. She wants to be a better mother but can’t put her children above her own needs, especially her drug use. Simultaneously tormented and comforted by visions of her dead brother, which only come to her when she’s high, Leonie is embattled in ways that reflect the brutal reality of her circumstances.

When the children’s father is released from prison, Leonie packs her kids and a friend into her car and drives north to the heart of Mississippi and Parchman Farm, the State Penitentiary. At Parchman, there is another thirteen-year-old boy, the ghost of a dead inmate who carries all of the ugly history of the South with him in his wandering. He too has something to teach Jojo about fathers and sons, about legacies, about violence, about love.

You can get your copy of the book from the store with a 15% discount until the end of the month. If you'd like to purchase online, we have the following the formats available:

Hello folks! Welcome to the new digital home of the Hatchet Coffee Book Club!

Foggy Pine Books and Hatchet Coffee partner together to bring you a monthly book club at their location each month. We meet the final Thursday at 7:30pm. Alcohol drinks will be provided for those who are age 21 and up. If you can, please RSVP to our Facebook event so we can prepare properly for our guests. We hope you'll join us for great conversations about great books.

This month's meeting will be held on Thursday, June 29th at 7:30pm. We will be reading and discussing Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli, in honor of Pride Month.  

Book Summary: Sixteen-year-old and not-so-openly gay Simon Spier prefers to save his drama for the school musical. But when an email falls into the wrong hands, his secret is at risk of being thrust into the spotlight. Now Simon is actually being blackmailed: if he doesn’t play wingman for class clown Martin, his sexual identity will become everyone’s business. Worse, the privacy of Blue, the pen name of the boy he’s been emailing, will be compromised.

With some messy dynamics emerging in his once tight-knit group of friends, and his email correspondence with Blue growing more flirtatious every day, Simon’s junior year has suddenly gotten all kinds of complicated. Now, change-averse Simon has to find a way to step out of his comfort zone before he’s pushed out—without alienating his friends, compromising himself, or fumbling a shot at happiness with the most confusing, adorable guy he’s never met.

You can purchase a paperback copy of the book at the store for $9.99 & receive 15% off. 
You can purchase the ebook here for $9.99.
You can purchase the audiobook here for $19.99--or sign up for a monthly membership and get your first book for $0.99!

Here's what we're reading next:
July: Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson
August: Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey