Members met in March to discuss Michael Lewis’s The Premonition: A Pandemic Story, dealing with the way our government and health care agencies handled the COVID-19 crisis. As described in the book, a small group of resourceful scientists and health officials recognized that the new fast-spreading virus would soon take on epidemic proportions. They developed plans for controlling it—including quick tests and rapid delivery of results—but they found no centralized authority among our health organizations and government agencies to take leadership and implement preventative strategies in the early stages of the virus spread. Because of this, there were no consistent rules for the nation’s handling of COVID-19 and local health officers were left to determine procedures within their communities, leading to conflicting mandates across different parts of the country. The book is factual, but narrated in a thriller-like mode with intriguing back-stories for the central figures and a race to beat the virus as the action that carries it along.
In April, our discussion focused on The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan. The book shows how East-West trading networks brought the min- gling of ideas, cultures, religions, and desires for foreign goods that drove economies, built nations, and shaped the ancient and modern world.
We will meet this month on May 24 at 2:00 p.m. to examine the first half of Klaus Muhlhahn’s work Making China Modern. Please join us if you are interested in discussing non-fiction works on social, cultural, political, and economic topics.
Contact nortlynne@cox.net for more information.
—Norton Schwartz
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