College of DuPage Great Read Series is built on the belief that learning is not limited to the walls of the College. Rather, the College seeks to extend ourselves to offer more active learning opportunities for students outside of the classroom and provide further access to our resources to the community. The Great Read Series is designed with the goal of providing students the chance to see themselves within literature, highlighting contemporary voices, and encouraging everyone to learn from and listen to a new perspective.
How the Great Read Series Works
Each year, the College will select one book students, faculty, and the community can read together:
- A calendar of engaging events will be designed around the book where all audiences can participate. The events will encourage reading for all ages and generate discussions between COD and the community on important topics through literature. All events are free and accessible.
- Select classes across the college will be officially linked to the program to approach the text through different lenses. Free copies will be provided to the students enrolled in these linked courses, as well as to local libraries and our own COD library.
- Programming will culminate with the author visiting COD.
Current Programming
The fall 2024 Great Read Series selection is "Gods of Jade and Shadow" by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.
Gods of Jade and Shadow 
About the Book
The Jazz Age is in full swing, but Casiopea Tun is too busy cleaning the floors of her wealthy grandfather’s house to listen to any fast tunes. Nevertheless, she dreams of a life far from her dusty small town in southern Mexico. A life she can call her own.
Yet this new life seems as distant as the stars, until the day she finds a curious wooden box in her grandfather’s room. She opens it—and accidentally frees the spirit of the Mayan god of death, who requests her help in recovering his throne from his treacherous brother. Failure will mean Casiopea’s demise, but success could make her dreams come true.
In the company of the strangely alluring god and armed with her wits, Casiopea begins an adventure that will take her on a cross-country odyssey from the jungles of Yucatán to the bright lights of Mexico City—and deep into the darkness of the Mayan underworld.
About the Author
Mexican by birth, Canadian by inclination, Silvia Moreno-Garcia is the author of a number of critically acclaimed novels, including Gods of Jade and Shadow (Sunburst Award for Excellence in Canadian Literature of the Fantastic, Ignyte Award), Mexican Gothic (Locus Award, British Fantasy Award, Pacific Northwest Book Award, Aurora Award, Goodreads Award), and Velvet Was the Night (finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the Macavity Award).She has edited several anthologies, including She Walks in Shadows (World Fantasy Award winner, published in the USA as Cthulhu’s Daughters). Silvia is the publisher of Innsmouth Free Press. Her fiction has appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies.
Silvia Moreno-Garcia
She has an MA in Science and Technology Studies from the University of British Columbia. She lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Contact Information
Alejandra Ortega, Assistant Professor, English
Berg Instructional Center (BIC), Room 2444G
(630) 942-3958
Email: ortegaa406@cod.edu