This is the story of Azar Nafisi's dream and of the nightmare that made it come true. For two years before she left Iran in 1997, Nafisi gathered seven young women at her house every Thursday morning to read and discuss forbidden works of Western literature. They were all former students whom she had taught at university. They were unaccustomed to being asked to speak their minds, but soon they began to open up and to speak more freely, not only about...

Lucy Calkins, founding director of the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project, presents her vision for the whole of teaching reading, discussing the importance of teacher education in ensuring every child becomes a strong reader and writer, and the central role of the independent reading workshop in the reading curriculum.

When her sister-in-law Poppy is found murdered, amateur sleuth Aurora Teagarden teams up with the victim's boyfriend, a local police detective, to solve the case, in spite of complications caused by their own past relationship.

What starts as a reading group gradually evolves into a forum where the woman may express their views through the books they read and grow to become increasingly more open as the bonds of friendship cement.