Downtown Springfield Association

Welcome to your new favorite book club! Join the Downtown Springfield Association and the Springfield-Greene County Library District every second Thursday of the month at 6 p.m. for the Downtown Book Club.

October 2023 Pick:

The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna

Description

As one of the few witches in Britain, Mika Moon knows she has to hide her magic, keep her head down, and stay away from other witches so their powers don’t mingle and draw attention. And as an orphan who lost her parents at a young age and was raised by strangers, she’s used to being alone and she follows the rules…with one exception: an online account, where she posts videos pretending to be a witch. She thinks no one will take it seriously.

But someone does. An unexpected message arrives, begging her to travel to the remote and mysterious Nowhere House to teach three young witches how to control their magic. It breaks all of the rules, but Mika goes anyway, and is immediately tangled up in the lives and secrets of not only her three charges, but also an absent archaeologist, a retired actor, two long-suffering caretakers, and…Jamie. The handsome and prickly librarian of Nowhere House would do anything to protect the children, and as far as he’s concerned, a stranger like Mika is a threat. An irritatingly appealing threat.

As Mika begins to find her place at Nowhere House, the thought of belonging somewhere begins to feel like a real possibility. But magic isn’t the only danger in the world, and when a threat comes knocking at their door, Mika will need to decide whether to risk everything to protect a found family she didn’t know she was looking for….

Content Warnings:

  • Swearing
  • Sex
  • Discussions of trauma and past abuse
  • Racism
  • Homophobia

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Previous Reads

Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala

Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas

One Two Three by Laurie Frankel

The Reading List by Sara Nisha Adams

Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley

One to Watch by Kate Stayman-London

The Seed Keeper by Diane Wilson

Homegoing by Yaa Gysai

The Bad Muslim Discount by Syed M. Masood

Queerly Beloved by Susie Dumond

Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton

The Black Kids by Christina Hammonds Reed

Olga Dies Dreaming by Xóchitl González

Need a copy of this month’s book?

Visit the Park Central Branch of the Springfield-Greene County Library District to grab a copy! Put your request in now, because it may take about a week to get your copy.