FREE
1:00-2:00 PM

The library’s book clubs are participating in the Winter 2026 Reading Challenge, which highlights titles from the Booker Prize reading list. Join us for another vibrant discussion.

On a cold February afternoon, two longtime friends, Clive Linley and Vernon Halliday, reunite among mourners gathered outside a London crematorium to honor the life of Molly Lane. Once, both her lovers, Molly was a brilliant, charismatic woman whose influence lingers long after her death. Now in middle age, Clive is a celebrated composer at the height of his career, while Vernon is a powerful newspaper editor navigating the ethical tensions of modern journalism.

As memories of Molly resurface, so do old rivalries, ambitions, and resentments—complicated further by her past affair with Julian Garmony, a controversial right-wing politician poised to lead the nation. In the aftermath of the funeral, Clive and Vernon enter into a seemingly simple pact, one born of friendship and moral certainty. But as personal failings and public pressures collide, their agreement sets off a chain of events neither man could have anticipated.

Sharp, darkly comic, and unsettling, Amsterdam is a provocative exploration of friendship, morality, and the dangerous ease with which principles can be compromised.

Registration is required.

Copies of the book are available at the circulation desk.

Gunn Memorial Library
5 Wykeham Rd
Washington, CT 06793

2026-03-13

https://www.gunnlibrary.org/calendar/gml-friday-book-club-amsterdam-by-ian-mcewan/