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View Full Version : Book club nominations! Sara 03-26-2007, 04:51 PM Since lots of us are interested in doing the book club, lets start nominating books for our first read! Just list 1 book you would be interested in reading this month with a small description of what it is about (they have good descriptions on Amazon). I will close nominations 11:59pm this Friday (3/30) and start the voting on Saturday (3/31). We can start the discussions online at first, then maybe choose to do a book club meeting if we feel it would be good. Sara 03-26-2007, 05:45 PM Snow Flower and the Secret Fan: A Novel by Lisa See See's engrossing novel set in remote 19th-century China details the deeply affecting story of lifelong, intimate friends (laotong, or "old sames") Lily and Snow Flower, their imprisonment by rigid codes of conduct for women and their betrayal by pride and love. While granting immediacy to Lily's voice, See (Flower Net) adroitly transmits historical background in graceful prose. Her in-depth research into women's ceremonies and duties in China's rural interior brings fascinating revelations about arranged marriages, women's inferior status in both their natal and married homes, and the Confucian proverbs and myriad superstitions that informed daily life. Beginning with a detailed and heartbreaking description of Lily and her sisters' foot binding ("Only through pain will you have beauty. Only through suffering will you have peace"), the story widens to a vivid portrait of family and village life. Most impressive is See's incorporation of nu shu, a secret written phonetic code among women—here between Lily and Snow Flower—that dates back 1,000 years in the southwestern Hunan province ("My writing is soaked with the tears of my heart,/ An invisible rebellion that no man can see"). As both a suspenseful and poignant story and an absorbing historical chronicle, this novel has bestseller potential and should become a reading group favorite as well. Lynette 03-26-2007, 08:43 PM Just wondering, do you think we should stick to paperbacks or new releases? Sara 03-26-2007, 08:50 PM Maybe we should try to go for paperbacks so people don't have to pay the high prices of new releases? There were a couple of new releases I wanted to nominate, but didn't because of the cost. HeatherK 03-26-2007, 09:01 PM Sara, Have you read Snow Flower and the Secret Fan? It's fabulous! I read it when I was pg last year. My3sonsplus1 03-26-2007, 09:02 PM umm... I was hoping to catch the book from the library :bag meeg124 03-26-2007, 09:27 PM umm... I was hoping to catch the book from the library :bag Another good reason no to do new releases, so some people can get the book from the library. ;) Sara 03-26-2007, 10:50 PM New it is! ;) Start nomitating!!! meeg124 03-27-2007, 03:25 PM I hope it's okay to nominate more than one... Evening Class by Maeve Binchy From School Library Journal YA. Aidan Dunne, a middle-aged Latin teacher, has lost out on his bid to become headmaster of his Dublin school. Lonely and estranged from his family, he dreams of returning to Italy, where he had spent several holidays as a young man. Aidan is given the opportunity to start a program of evening classes at the school, and to his delight, Signora appears and offers herself as a teacher of Italian language and culture. Signora is a native Dubliner who followed her Italian lover to Sicily 20 years earlier, knowing he would not marry her, but living for the times he could slip away from his wife and family. His sudden death has brought her home. Her enthusiasm and energy attract students of all ages to her class, and the novel is their story, as well as hers and Aidan Dunne's. Relationships between the young students and their parents, and the relationships that develop among the students in the class are vividly portrayed. The climax of the book, a class trip to Italy, involves a threat of murder, a chance for Signora to return to Sicily, and the opportunity for several of the students to demonstrate their resourcefulness as well as their language skills. As with Circle of Friends, Binchy brings a diverse group of characters together and draws readers into their lives. YAs will identify with these people and their struggles to find independence, love, and self-respect. meeg124 03-27-2007, 03:28 PM The Cold Moon by Jeffrey Deaver From Publishers Weekly Bestseller Deaver's twisty seventh Lincoln Rhyme novel (after 2005's The Twelfth Card) pits Rhyme, the quadriplegic NYPD detective, against a brilliant criminal mastermind called the Watchmaker. Assisted by his longtime partner, Det. Amelia Sachs, an expert at forensic analysis, Rhyme probes two bizarre murders linked by the killer's calling card—a clock left at the scene. The Watchmaker, as an ominous poem also left at the scene suggests, is bent on executing eight more people in a variety of ways intended to prolong their suffering. Deaver cleverly alternates between the Rhyme/Sachs team and the Watchmaker and his assistant, heightening tension by introducing the next targets and humanizing them. Sachs loses some focus when she also has to probe a suicide that she suspects is connected with some corrupt brother officers. Deaver fans won't be surprised that the investigations overlap, or that the several apparent climaxes are building to something more, but even they will be hard-pressed to peel back all the layers of the cunning plot at work beneath the surface. LMS 03-27-2007, 04:01 PM New it is! ;) Start nomitating!!! lol, did you mean old? Lynette 03-27-2007, 04:05 PM Shoot, I dunno what to nominate :bag I have a whole list on Amazon.com that I use to keep track of what I want to read but I dunno if they are everyone else's style. I kind of like books that make me think a little like some of the stuff Oprah has put on her book club is good....not that she is the epitomy of academia :D My3sonsplus1 03-27-2007, 04:17 PM well I like to think a little ;) to keep my brain functioning at an "adult" level but I don't really want to read 'debate heavy' materials . I'd like to remain friends with as many of you as possible and all... Lynette 03-27-2007, 04:18 PM well I like to think a little ;) to keep my brain functioning at an "adult" level but I don't really want to read 'debate heavy' materials . I'd like to remain friends with as many of you as possible and all... :yeah meeg124 03-27-2007, 04:30 PM Shoot, I dunno what to nominate :bag I have a whole list on Amazon.com that I use to keep track of what I want to read but I dunno if they are everyone else's style. I kind of like books that make me think a little like some of the stuff Oprah has put on her book club is good....not that she is the epitomy of academia :D I think part of the reason to belong to a book club is to expand your horizons a little bit. I have to admit that I tend to read the same types of books over and over again, just because that is my comfort zone. So I wouldn't be afraid to suggest something, because who knows it could become everyone's new favorite. Sara 03-27-2007, 05:04 PM lol, did you mean old? I think they wanted new so people could get it from the library easier. Yeah, nomitate whatever you like. I wanted to nominate Jodi Piccoult's new book 19 minutes but didn't because I thought it might be a bit too heavy. It is about a school shooting and comes from everyone's perspective including the shooter. It is pretty long too, but if you like something that makes you think more, she is a great author. My3sonsplus1 03-27-2007, 05:08 PM Super new releases would probably not be at the library/they are only 7 days loans. But nominate whatever and whoever wants to try the library can check the library system before voting ;) Lynette 03-28-2007, 01:12 AM Snow Flower and the Secret Fan: A Novel by Lisa See I was reading the reviews on Amazon.com about this book and it looks good :) I noticed it was pretty short at 280+ pages but it seemed to get its point across :D Otherwise the next book I was going to read was Lolita which was on one of their lists as reader's all time favorites or something. meeg124 03-28-2007, 08:49 AM Otherwise the next book I was going to read was Lolita which was on one of their lists as reader's all time favorites or something. I've been wanting to read Lolita. I heard that Police song the other day... you know the lyric that goes "Just like the old man in that book by Nabokov"... and it reminded me again that I wanted to read that book. :lol Marisa 03-28-2007, 12:24 PM oooh, Lolita's on my list too! FTM2Hannah 03-28-2007, 02:53 PM The Road By Cormac McCarthy Set in the smoking ashes of a postapocalyptic America, Cormac McCarthy's The Road tells the story of a man and his son's journey toward the sea and an uncertain salvation. The world they pass through is a ghastly vision of scorched countryside and blasted cities "held by cores of blackened looters who tunneled among the ruins and crawled from the rubble white of tooth and eye carrying charred and anonymous tins of food in nylon nets like shoppers in the commissaries of hell" [p. 181]. It is a starved world, all plant and animal life dead or dying, some of the few human survivors even eating each other alive. The father and son move through the ruins searching for food and shelter, trying to keep safe from murderous, roving bands. They have only a pistol to defend themselves, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food—and each other. Awesome in the totality of its vision, The Road is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation. ********* This is one of Oprah's new picks... Lynette 03-29-2007, 04:24 AM The Road By Cormac McCarthyThis is one of Oprah's new picks... I just read that today too, seems interesting! Ugh, I tried finding a good synopsis since it seems to be on other people's "To Read" list too but I am a moron and can't find one on Amazon. I did see it was made into a movie and that Jeremy Irons is the protaganist and narrates the audio book. Now I don't normally do audio books but I could defintely put up with listening to his voice for hours :D |