Rough Drafts Book Club
Exploring literature with an emphasis on masculinity, fatherhood, history, and adventure.
First Wednesdays. 7pm discussion at the Library, optional (but encouraged!) 8pm social hour at Tecumseh Tavern.
July 1st’s book is: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
To Kill a Mockingbird is Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1960 novel, a classic of American literature set in the fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama, during the Great Depression, told through the eyes of young Scout Finch as her lawyer father, Atticus, defends a black man, Tom Robinson, against a false rape accusation, exposing the town’s deep-seated racism and prejudice. The story explores themes of racial injustice, loss of innocence, and moral courage, becoming a staple in school curricula for its powerful, yet debated, examination of these issues.
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July 2026
TDL Evening Book Club, July 15, 2026 at 6:30 pm
TDL Afternoon Book Club, July 20, 2026 at 3:00 pm
Speak to me of Home
by Jeanine Cummins
On her wedding day in San Juan, Puerto Rico, in 1968, Rafaela Acuna y Daubon has mild misgivings, but she marries Peter Brennan Jr. anyway in a blaze of romantic optimism. She has no way of knowing how dramatically her life will change when she uproots her young family to start over in the American Midwest, unleashing a fleet of disappointments.
Rough Drafts Book Club
Exploring literature with an emphasis on masculinity, fatherhood, history, and adventure.
First* Wednesdays. 7pm discussion at the Library, optional (but encouraged!) 8pm social hour at Tecumseh Tavern.
August 12th’s book is: The Living Great Lakes by Jerry Dennis
Through storms and fog, on remote shores and city waterfronts, Dennis explores the five Great Lakes in all seasons and moods and discovers that they and their connecting waters―including the Erie Canal, the Hudson River, and the East Coast from New York to Maine―offer a surprising and bountiful view of America. The result is a meditation on nature and our place in the world, a discussion and cautionary tale about the future of water resources, and a celebration of a place that is both fragile and robust, diverse, rich in history and wildlife, often misunderstood, and worthy of our attention.
*Second Wednesday in August
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August 2026
TDL Evening Book Club, August 17, 2026 at 6:30 pm
TDL Afternoon Book Club, August 19, 2026 at 3:00 pm
Heartwood
by Amity Gaige
In the heart of the Maine woods, an experienced Appalachian Trail hiker goes missing. She is forty-two-year-old Valerie Gillis, who has vanished 200 miles from her final destination. Alone in the wilderness, Valerie pours her thoughts into fractured, poetic letters to her mother as she battles the elements and struggles to keep hoping.
At the heart of the investigation is Beverly, the determined Maine State Game Warden tasked with finding Valerie, who leads the search on the ground. Meanwhile, Lena, a seventy-six-year-old birdwatcher in a Connecticut retirement community, becomes an unexpected armchair detective. Roving between these compelling narratives, a puzzle emerges, intensifying the frantic search, as Valerie’s disappearance may not be accidental.