Events

All our events are free, and everyone is welcome.

During our monthly meetings, the first half is a book discussion, the second half an activity. No pressure to read or finish the book. Come for the community!

Join the book club

Next Meeting

June

Sat, June 20, 9:30 - 11:30 AM

Beverly Main Library, Sohier Room

Book: The Stonewall Reader edited by the New York Public Library

Good news: The full text is freely available on the Internet Archive, courtesy of NYPL. You can download the PDF and other formats.

Flyer for NAGLY: North Shore Alliane of LGBTQ+ Youth. Title: Donation Guidelines. Are you looking to donate physical items to NAGLY? Here is what we need: Current Needs: Snacks & drinks, summer clothes, general supplies. The Deets: All food items must be packaged and well before the expiration date. All clothing must be appropriate for young people, clean, and in good condition, and appropriate for the season. For supplies, we always need paper towels, trash bags, dish detergent, etc. Scan the QR code for our Amazon wishlist.

Activity: Donation drive for NAGLY, the North Shore Alliance for LGBTQ+ Youth. Read their flyer above and check out their wish lists:

Books On Deck

July

Sat, July 18, 2-4 PM

Beverly Main Library, Sohier Room

Media: The 1619 Project by The New York Times Magazine

Choose your preferred format:

interactive website
magazine PDF (100 pages)
book (624 pages)
podcast (4 hours)
Hulu TV series (6 hours)

Activity: TBD

August

Date/time TBD

Location TBD

Nonfiction option: "Prisons Make Us Safer" and 20 Other Myths about Mass Incarceration by Victoria Law

Poetry option: My Blue Days Sound Like Blue Jays by Amos Don

Activity: Write cards to incarcerated people, in partnership with the Abolitionist Mail Project

September

Date/time TBD

Location TBD

Book: Nasty Work: Resist Systems, Explore Desire, and Liberate Yourself by Ericka Hart

Activity: TBD, possibly something in partnership with HealthQ

Even more...

October - Kuleana: A Story of Land and Legacy in Old Hawai'i by Sara Kehaulani Goo

November - Children of the Jacaranda Tree (fiction) by Sahar Delijani OR For the Sun After Long Night: The Story of Iran's Women-Led Uprising (nonfiction) by Fatemeh Jamalpour and Nilo Tabrizy

December - The Future is Peace: A Shared Journey Across the Holy Land by Aziz Abu Sarah and Maoz Inon

January - As We Have Always Done: Indigenous Freedom Through Radical Resistance by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson

February - Madness: Race and Insanity in a Jim Crow Asylum by Antonia Hylton

Past Events

2026 Books & Activities

May 2026

Book: Weathering: The Extraordinary Stress of Ordinary Life in an Unjust Society by Arline T. Geronimus.

Activity: Soft launch of the Beverly Engagement Project with special guest City Councilor Keith Sonia

April 2026

Book: All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis edited by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Katharine K. Wilkinson

Activity: Upcycle cardboard into postcards and write to our state legislators (Rep. Hannah Bowen and Senator Joan Lovely) about bills we care about:

Oppose HR.2289 - American Broadband Deployment Act of 2025 (learn more)
Support H.3755 - An Act Establishing Driver Privacy Protections (read this one-pager from the ACLU of MA)
See also: Progressive Mass legislaive agenda and endorsed legislation for 2025-2026

March 2026

Nonfiction option: Another World Is Possible: Lessons for America from Around the Globe by Natasha Hakimi Zapata

Fiction option: Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements edited by adrienne maree brown and Walidah Imarisha

Activity: Period supplies

Collected donations of period supplies for Beverly Bootstraps
Packed 60 grab-and-go period kits for River House
Folded zines: Tips to Fight Menstrual Stigma, from this NPR story

Learn more about period poverty and menstrual equity from the Alliance of Period Supplies and PERIOD.

February 2026

Book: All About Love: New Visions by bell hooks

Activity: Wrote birthday and Eid cards to incarcerated people, for the Abolitionist Mail Project

January 2026

Book: Survival Is a Promise: The Eternal Life of Audre Lorde by Alexis Pauline Gumbs

Activity: Pack 50 kids' snack bags for Beverly Bootstraps

Community Event: Martin Luther King, Jr. Annual Breakfast, where 5 members of the book club read the land and labor acknowledgments at the start of the program, at the invitation of the city's DEI Director.

2025 Books

December 2025

No book this month - action planning instead!

June 2025

A Land With a People: Palestinians and Jews Confront Zionism edited by Esther Farmer, Rosalind Pollack Petchesky, and Sarah Sills

May 2025

What It Takes to Heal: How Transforming Ourselves Can Change the World by Prentis Hemphill

April 2025

Loving Corrections by adrienne maree brown

2025 Candidate Forum

Social Justice Candidate Forum

Sunday, October 26, 2025 | 1:30 - 3:00 PM

🎬 Watch the recording

Ahead of Beverly's municipal elections on November 4, 2025, we hosted a candidate forum at the Beverly Public Library. We asked candidates questions that were submitted in advance by community members.

Topics we covered:

Immigration & ICE
LGBTQIA+
Diversity & Representation
Access & Affordability

Mayoral candidates who attended in person:

Mike Cahill
Brendan Sweeney

City Councilor at Large candidates who attended in person:

Kenann McKenzie-DeFranza
Keith Sonia
Euplio "Rick" Marciano
Kyle Stanley Retallack

City Councilor at Large candidates who submitted video entries:

Julie Flowers
John Mullady

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