The Nashua Public Library invites you to participate in the fifth annual One City, One Book program. For 2007, as you may have heard, the book is Zorro by Isabel Allende. I’m sure you’ll enjoy this swashbuckling adventure story that reveals how Diego de la Vega became the masked man we all know so well.

As of February 2, over 150 Nashuans had checked a copy of Zorro out of the library. Are you one of them? If not, reserve it now; read it; talk about it with your friends, coworkers, and neighbors; and then attend the book discussions and other programs planned at the library relating to the story.

We hope that sharing our impressions on a common book will once again help to strengthen our community.

From now until the end of April, visit this blog to join the discussion of the book. Just be aware that some of our comments might reveal the ending of the book.

To get the discussion going, let's talk about Diego's and Bernardo, his "milk brother." Why do you think they are drawn to one another? How do you think they are able to maintain their relationship, which flies in the face of societal attitudes about class and race?

I was captivated by the Zorro story as presented on television by Walt Disney in 1957 as many other girls and boys were I'm sure. I could hardly wait for 8:00 on Sunday night.

Allende's book was a chance to relive those death defying feats and foxy tricks played by Zorro. Never a fan of adventure books myself, I found myself following the action in the sword fight passages with interest as the masked man, a combination of Superman, the Lone Ranger, and Robin Hood, outwits the villain(s) with his almost magical acrobatics and swordsmanship.

I love how he plays possum and how, through his loyal accomplices, seems to be everywhere. This book, part adventure, part romance and part historical fiction, is exciting and fun.--Margaret

The five-part course on Zorro, sponsored by the library and the Rivier Institute for Senior Education, began last week with 30 people attending. I wasn't able to attend the first session, but discussion was lively at the second one on Tuesday, where we discussed parts one and two of the book.

Not everyone loves the novel (Penny preferred Paula, a memoir by the same author), but the general reaction seemed to be that people are enjoying it much more than they expected to. Some readers said they would prefer to read about historical events in nonfiction, where they didn't have to sort out what's true from what's not. But others said that they like having the story of Diego, Bernardo, Regina, White Owl, and the others, as a vehicle for stimulating their interest in the history. What do you think?

(By the way, you can get some of these historical questions answered by coming to "Spain in the Time of Zorro," a lecture on the history of Spain in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It will be held on Tuesday, March 27, at 7 pm at the library.)

If you're free during the day, try to come to the next discussion on Tuesday, March 6, at 10:45 am in the library theater. If you aren't, maybe the discussion on Thursday, March 22, at 7 pm, also in the library theater, will work better for you.