HPL Book Group

February Book Pick [Rescheduled]

Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

Tuesday, March 24 at 7:00

March Book Pick

Stay True by Hua Hsu

Tuesday, March 31 at 7:00

This meeting will be held in the Whiton Room at the Hingham Public Library. No registration is necessary.

The HPL Book Club is a friendly group of library patrons and bibliophiles which has been meeting regularly for over ten years. We average 15-20 members each meeting and are always happy to see new faces! Our meetings are held on the last Tuesday of every month at 7pm, and we alternate between fiction and non-fiction titles -- suggestions always welcome! Whether you're someone who wants to meet regularly or just pop in when a title piques your interest, you'll always be welcome in the HPL Book Club.

Copies of the book are available to pick up at the Reference desk starting around the first of each month.

Interested in seeing what we've read so far? Click this link to view a complete list of titles from 2019 through the end of 2025 and don't forget to check the library's calendar for upcoming group reads!

About the Book:

In the eyes of eighteen-year-old Hua Hsu, the problem with Ken—with his passion for Dave Matthews, Abercrombie & Fitch, and his fraternity—is that he is exactly like everyone else. Ken, whose Japanese American family has been in the United States for generations, is mainstream; for Hua, the son of Taiwanese immigrants, who makes ’zines and haunts Bay Area record shops, Ken represents all that he defines himself in opposition to. The only thing Hua and Ken have in common is that, however they engage with it, American culture doesn’t seem to have a place for either of them.

But despite his first impressions, Hua and Ken become friends, a friendship built on late-night conversations over cigarettes, long drives along the California coast, and the successes and humiliations of everyday college life. And then violently, senselessly, Ken is gone, killed in a carjacking, not even three years after the day they first meet.

Determined to hold on to all that was left of one of his closest friends—his memories—Hua turned to writing. Stay True is the book he’s been working on ever since. A coming-of-age story that details both the ordinary and extraordinary, Stay True is a bracing memoir about growing up, and about moving through the world in search of meaning and belonging.