The Book Club: Taylor Jenkins-Reid, ‘Apple in China’ and more
Editor s note The opinions of the smart well-read women in my Denver book club mean a lot and often determine what the rest of us choose to pile onto our bedside tables So we questioned them and all Denver Post readers to share their mini-reviews with you Have any to offer Email bellis denverpost com Barbara Ellis Apple in China The Capture of the World s Greatest Company by Patrick McGee Scribner Apple in China The Capture of the World s Greatest Company by Patrick McGee Scribner If you re not clear as to why Apple can t just start making iPhones in the U S this book will enlighten you Although the main focus is on Apple s enmeshed relationships with its Chinese suppliers the story can t be described fully without also reviewing Apple s history too It was a slippery slope for Apple in turning away from its touted in-house manufacturing to embrace contract manufacturing first in Japan then to other Asian contractors before decisively landing in China for the attractive fiscal benefits of cheap and abundant labor greater scalability speed to sphere and minimal direct overhead costs Apple soon learned that these were not solely business arrangements they were also influenced by largely unspoken political and cultural undercurrents McGee details the incremental decisions mistakes and comprises made along the way all in the name of corporate profit An eye-opening read stars out of Kathleen Lance Denver Heart Be at Peace by Donal Ryan Viking Winner of the Irish Book of the Year the novel is composed of voices each a short chapter Set in a small Irish town each character reflects on a pivotal case Relationships intersect in such a town everyone has history The stories undercurrent is an emerging drug ring that pulls in young men as distributors buyers users and casualties What s a righteous man to do A laborious but beautiful book stars out of Jo Calhoun Denver Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid Ballantine Books Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid Ballantine It is at the height of the Space Shuttle exploration activity when one crew of astronauts finds themselves in dire trouble on a flight Joan the Mission Control specialist must verbally guide her friends and co-workers back to Earth after an explosion has damaged the shuttle We are taken back a limited years to when this group is hired on by NASA the first to include several female astronauts and put through a grueling years-long training that a great number of will fail Joan and Vanessa two of the newly hired women begin a hidden romance that if discovered could liability their careers and destroy their dream of being one of the first women to explore outer space In this male-dominated field in an era of little acceptance a warning comes from their boss that sexual deviancy will not be tolerated and the two women have a choice to make stars out of Karen Goldie Hartman Westminster The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O Farrell Mariner Books Esme Lennox has spent over years in an insane asylum when she is issued into the care of her great-niece Iris Over just a sparse days both of them will change in cataclysmic techniques Multiple voices chorus together to make this story mesmerizing In this an early novel O Farrell shows her growing command of her craft Although not as dazzling as her latest novels like Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait O Farrell s writing here is already more accomplished than that of multiple writers This is decidedly a book worth discussing stars out of Neva Gronert Parker Great Black Hope by Rob Franklin Summit Books Related Articles Colorado books Mrs Wilson s Affair is a whole new way of viewing Gatsby saga The Book Club How to End a Love Story is a Reese s Book Club pick The Book Club A History of Women Walking and a Shakespeare rewrite The Book Club Kamala Harris polling memoir Impossible Fortune and more Good Morning America book club pick follows a woman trying to solve her own murder The protagonist is a young entitled black man skating merrily along in the New York City clubbing scene as the story opens It feels like Bright Lights Big City meets Nina Simone Our hero is then given a chilling dose of reality following a drug arrest He has to put his promising future on hold and retreat to his family home in Atlanta where Great Expectations await and he evades owning up to the real reason for his presence there His class status and family connections help to keep him out of prison but race is still a barrier to his achieving the success he sought within the East Coast establishment He was his family s hope but what are his hopes stars out of Kathleen Lance Denver Subscribe to our weekly newsletter In The Know to get entertainment news sent straight to your inbox
