April Book Club Summary and May Book Announcement
Thank you to those who joined us on Zoom for the April book club of the novel “Silent Night” by Nell Pattison. The author didn’t join us but we had a great discussion with the group and the following are links and information related to that discussion. For May book club we will be changing the day to THURSDAY, May 29th (instead of our typical Tuesday). It will still be 5pm Western/7pm Central/ 8pm Eastern Time. See the end of this blog post for more info on May book club.Links and information related to April book club:
- This was the second book in a three book series of Pattison’s that we started last March 2024 with the book “Silent House.” (we won’t be reading the third book as a group, but I encourage you to read it on your own: Book 3 is “The Silent Suspect.”
- The website with British police acronyms
- Sign Language Alphabet from Around the World
- My blog summary from last year’s book club on “Silent House”
- To request a PDF of the Question and Answers from Nell Pattison from last year, please email Laura: social@hlaatc.org
- TV/Other media discussed:
- “Only Murders in The Building” (an Original Hulu TV show, old seasons have aired on ABC eventually): this is a less gritty take on a crime/murder show. Funny and lighter with several comedic actors (Steve Martin, Martin Short, Nathan Lane) and many big guest stars like Meryl Streep and Paul Rudd.
- We talked preferring non-gory mysteries (like “Murder She Wrote” and the term for that genre is a “cozy” mystery. This genre covers books, TV and movies. IMDb list of Cozy Mystery TV & Movies and this list of Cozy Mystery Books.
- CBS is doing a “Matlock” reboot now airing that stars Kathy Bates.
- Technology discussed (and more info found after book club):
- Captions for devices (see this website for great resources and descriptions on turning on captioning on devices like computers and smart phones) and here for Text to Speech Audio Tools
- This article on Audible: You can get transcript/captions for Audible books while listening to them. Sounds like it is far from perfect though.
- This article on best Text to Speech software (newly updated in 2025)
- BookShare is a website and app that those who qualify have access to audiobooks with a visual caption-like “karaoke-style” highlighting.
- How to get captions for all podcasts
- Use Google Chrome to caption: Caption audiobooks and all video and audio using Google Chrome Live Captions on your computer (only works on computers), works for using web-based applications (anything you want captions of: book, meeting, video, etc. just make sure you can use the Google Chrome web browser).
- Other books we talked about:
- A book club member shared they were reading this book: “Last Bus to Wisdom: A Novel” (Two Medicine Country) by Ivan Doig
- We mentioned Haben Girma (we read her book in November/December 2023) “Haben: The Deafblind Woman Who Conquered Harvard Law” by Haben Girme
- (We originally read it in August 2022): ”A Maiden’s Grave” by Jeffrey Deaver (Fiction/Mystery) In NLS not in LOC.
- (We originally read it in MAY 2024): “The Sign for Home” by Blair Fell (fiction) BARD/NLS: Braille BR 24152; BARD: DB 11605.
- (We originally read it in October 2024): “Resurrection Bay” By Emma Viskic BARD/NLS: DB 110305. WITH SPECIAL GUEST AUTHOR EMMA VISKIC.
- Will Dean’s “Tuva” Series that begins with “Dark Pines” (we do have this on our future books list to read eventually).
Next Book Club: