BETHEL — Beginning in April, Mahoosuc Land Trust (MLT) of Bethel will host a monthly book club with books that focus on environment-related topics. MLT Development Coordinator Georgia Grzywacz said she hopes the club will inspire more conversation and community around environment-related literature in the Bethel area.

The first meeting will take place on April 16 at 6 p.m. with the group discussing, “Braiding Sweetgrass” by Robin Wall Kimmerer, a Potawatomi Professor. The book explores the role of indigenous knowledge as an alternative or complementary approach to Western mainstream scientific methodologies.

The book club idea and focus came from MLT member Betsey Cooper who passed it along to Executive Director Kirk Seigel and Grzywacz. Since then Cooper and Grzywacz have been working together to get the club off the ground.  Grzywacz said while they haven’t decided all of their titles, over the summer they hope to read Ethan Tapper’s “How to Love a Forest,” because he will be MLT’s keynote speaker at their Fifth Annual Monarch Festival, August 23 and 24.

Tapper described his book as, “a reimagining of forests and our relationship to them. It’s a vision for a new ethic for the modern world – one that recognizes how vital and how beautiful ecosystems are, and also the many bittersweet decisions necessary to care for them.”

 The book club will meet in-person with a Zoom option. Grzywacz stressed that the club is open to members and non-members alike.

Grzywacz also noted that the intention for the meeting is to discuss the book in its entirety, rather than approach it sectionally. “We hope participants can come to the meeting having completed the book to the best of their ability and, if not, to be prepared for spoilers,” she said.

For the Zoom link and discussion questions, write to Grzywacz at: [email protected]

April 9, 6 p.m. at Valentine Farm, 162 North Road