Welcome to Bay Books’ ‘Books and Wine’ book club. Our book club invites new members to join. The more the merrier. Once a month we meet up together to discuss the book of the month. During this time we welcome you to indulge in conversation as well as bring a beverage of your choice. We meet each month on the second Tuesday at 5:30pm here at Bay Books.
July’s Book Club
This month’s book club pick, Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar. This powerful and poetic debut novel tells the story of Cyrus Shams, a newly sober Iranian-American poet searching for meaning in the aftermath of loss. After the tragic death of his mother and a life shaped by his father’s quiet suffering, Cyrus becomes obsessed with the idea of martyrdom—both literal and metaphorical.
His journey takes him deep into family secrets, artistic revelations, and haunting questions of identity and purpose. Along the way, he discovers a mysterious painting that hints his mother may not have been who he believed, leading him to a terminally ill artist in the Brooklyn Museum and a reckoning with his own past.
Martyr! is lyrical, funny, and deeply moving—a story about faith, art, addiction, and the endless search for connection.
We welcome all readers to join the conversation, whether you’ve read every word or are just beginning. Meet us on July 8 at 6:00 PM for an evening of thoughtful discussion and community.
A newly sober, orphaned son of Iranian immigrants, guided by the voices of artists, poets, and kings, embarks on a remarkable search for a family secret that leads him to a terminally ill painter living out her final days in the Brooklyn Museum. Electrifying, funny, and wholly original, Martyr! heralds the arrival of an essential new voice in contemporary fiction.
Cyrus Shams is a young man grappling with an inheritance of violence and loss: his mother’s plane was shot down over the skies of the Persian Gulf in a senseless accident; and his father’s life in America was circumscribed by his work killing chickens at a factory farm in the Midwest. Cyrus is a drunk, an addict, and a poet, whose obsession with martyrs leads him to examine the mysteries of his past—toward an uncle who rode through Iranian battlefields dressed as the angel of death to inspire and comfort the dying, and toward his mother, through a painting discovered in a Brooklyn art gallery that suggests she may not have been who or what she seemed.
Kaveh Akbar’s Martyr! is a paean to how we spend our lives seeking meaning—in faith, art, ourselves, others.
‘Books and Wine’ Book Picks 2025
The following is our book club line up. Get your copy today to and read ahead
July 8th– Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar
August 12– Beautiful, Ugly by Alice Feeney
September 9– All The Lonely People by Mike Gayle
October 14 – The Days I Loved You Most by Amy Neff
November 11– By Way of Sorrow by Robyn Gigl
December is usually our Champagne Holiday event—-a time to celebrate what we have read this year and to share with others! Start practicing your elevator speeches now!
