Book Clubs: Part 3

What on earth will we read?

When it’s your turn to choose the book club book do you dash into the nearest bookshop, have a quick rummage, and grab something off the shelf because it looks good? If so, you need to go back to your club and spend some time deciding exactly what kind of book you all want to spend your hard earned money and limited amount of time on reading.

The main thing is that you should stretch yourselves, improve and challenge your reading habits, move out of your comfort zone and for goodness sake resist choosing something that everyone will simply enjoy. What on earth would you talk about? Oh, I loved it! So did I! Me too! Anyone for coffee? Reading for sheer pleasure is what most of us do anyway so if you’re going to leave your comfortable home on a dark and wintry evening there’s got to be a challenge, an enthusiasm, and a zest for exploration with like minded literary lovers.

Oisin and Stella (aka my nephew and niece-in-law) are setting up their own book club in sunny Albuquerque. First off they discussed the project with like-minded friends to see what kind of group they would form; then they emailed Aunty Mary for a comprehensive guide on how to set about the business and then they sat down and planned exactly what they wanted to read. They have come up with an ingenious plan and a list of excellent books that should see them well on their way for the year ahead. Everyone is on board, everyone has the list, and all the books can be bought second hand or borrowed from the library. Oh I’d love to be a fly on the wall at their first meeting. I’m sure we’ll hear more from this innovative book club.

~Posted by Mary

Enough is Enough!

I'm sick of housework! Now that I've fulfilled the motherly duties that are expected of me at this time of year (open house for my nearest and dearest, endless supplies of laundered sheets and towels, cupboards bursting with food etc.), I'm thinking of shutting up shop and putting the closed sign over the door. I have, after all, a life outside the confines of these four walls. I have New Year's Resolutions to make (I only do positive ones so I shall be starting something new rather than giving something up), old friends to reconnect with, and holidays to plan.

While I'm waiting for my twenty-ten life to get into gear I intend reading some wonderful books that have been sitting on my bedside table begging for attention. I think I'll start with, The Drinker by Hans Fallada. I lent it to Sara first who thought it was brilliant but utterly depressing so I will gird my loins and get stuck in. This novel was discovered after the death of the author and is most likely based on personal experience. It was originally written in an encrypted notebook and found in the Nazi insane asylum in which Fallada was incarcerated. It does sound dreadfully gloomy but having read Alone in Berlin, also by this author, I know that it will be well worth the effort.

Ayn Rand

I don't believe in coincidences; I'm convinced there's an underlying reason why concurrent events seem to occur without apparent causal connection. For instance, on Thursday I noticed that Sara has got stuck into yet another blockbusting classic novel. It was lodged on the corner of the kitchen table, as big as a brick but far more interesting with an arresting cover that caught my eye: Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. Hmmm... I sat down, cup of green tea in hand and started reading. My allotted fifteen minutes passed far too quickly and I reluctantly returned the tome to its resting place before returning myself to my workstation.

Last night, as the world outside my window was blanketed in a white duvet, I dived into my pre-heated bed to watch another episode of Mad Men (set in the glamorous world of a Madison Avenue advertising agency in the 60s – it's excellent), the series that Santa so kindly left at my request. I was deep in episode eight when advertising exec, Donald Draper, was handed a cheque for $2,500 by his boss who pointed to a large book on his shelf and asked: "Have you read her? Rand, Atlas Shrugged. That’s the one." He looked meaningfully at his employee and advised him to take $1.99 and buy himself a copy! It was obviously a sign, aimed at the reader in me to go out and get myself a copy post-haste.

Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum was born in Russia (1905 – 1982). She studied, at the University of Petrograd, in the department of social pedagogy, majoring in history and was an ardent student of Aristotle, Pluto and Nietzsche. On her emigration to the US in 1926, she decided on Ayn Rand as a professional name for her writing and began her career as a screenwriter in Hollywood. Rand embraced philosophical realism and objectivism the essence of which she described as, "the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute."

Of all her writing, she is best remembered for two of her novels: The Fountainhead, written in 1943, a slim volume that concentrates on the life of architect Howard Roark who struggles in obscurity rather than compromise his personal and artistic vision. And also Atlas Shrugged, published in 1957, that tells of a man who said that he would stop the motor of the world - and did. When the character Francisco d’Anconia is asked what sort of advice someone would give Atlas, he replied that he’d tell him "to shrug". Well, I for one, am intrigued!

You'll love it!

That’s exactly what she said when she handed me the latest novel due to hit the shelves of bookshops everywhere: "You'll just love it, it's fantastic!" I took the advance reading copy home and tried to wait until the weekend before getting stuck in. But no, delayed gratification doesn't work for me when it comes to books. Dinner over, cat fed, plants watered, feet up, book out: I got stuck in straight away and gave it my total concentration as I took in the setting, got to know the characters, mentally visualised the plot as it proceeded to unfold. No one could say I didn't give it time. I read to page 112 before coming to my senses. It was a load of baloney dressed up in a fancy jacket with superlatives dancing across the front and back exclaiming in loud and flamboyant language all kinds of precious nonsense in the full expectation of huge sales. Well, I won't be recommending it to anyone but I may have to tell a white lie, even use a mental reservation (that's the most fashionable equivalent of not telling the whole truth) to ensure that I don't cut off my supply of advance reading copies.

No fanfare greeted the arrival of The Journey Home by Olaf Olafsson as it landed on my desk via a mistake somewhere down the line. Its quiet cover promised nothing but neither did it offend; the back had three simple reviews from Time Out, The Irish Times and my favourite, The Times. "Disa is exquisitely well portrayed. The picture of her frustrations, regrets and achievements is subtly built up and the revelations about her life are carefully structured to maintain surprise. A quiet and beautiful novel."

Then I read about the author who was born in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 1962 and now resides in New York. He studied physics and became Executive Vice President of Time Warner. I wasn't sure I had read anything written by an Icelandic author, and this definitely sounded interesting so my curiosity got the better of me and I took the plunge.

Three days later I set The Journey Home down with huge regret. Regret that I had reached the end, regret that I would have to leave Disa and her family, but also delight in having discovered a beautifully written novel that seems to have passed under the radar.

Decisions, decisions, decisions!

How can I plan my life when I don’t even know what book to start reading next? It’s simply crazy: books piled beside my bed, on the hall table, in the sitting room, a couple in the car, one in my bag; they are even reaching the kitchen where my otherwise pristine surfaces are beginning to sprout novels, biographies, proof copies, library books and some that very kind friends have insisted on lending me – "Oh, you have to read this, I simply adored it!"

One such was a neighbour’s "favourite book ever", Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt. It was a grand read, don’t get me wrong, and I did finish it, but I’m not sure I’d rate it among my favourite books ever. And I do have a problem with the term, "non fiction novel". Either it is or it isn’t, fiction or non-fiction, though who determines what is true and what is invention and aren’t they both part of the same thing anyway, the broad human experience and all that. I am now getting my knickers in a literary/literal twist but forgive me, it’s early in the morning, and I’m still in an indecisive mood.

So how does one write a book blog in such an indecisive world? Well, usually, when I have carefully crafted a piece of indefinable quality I email Raven and settle back, another job well done. Of course, just after I've sent the attachment (that is if I remember to attach the attachment) I think of some small thing that would improve it, and another, and another.

It's rather like choosing blinds for my fancy new kitchen: I decided on one thing, plain white or cream, went up to the showroom and was completely taken with another - fancy patterns, swirling flowers, gorgeous designs - but went back to the safe option. Went home and decided that the safe option would make my kitchen look like an office so rang and asked yer man to bring a few samples when he came down to re-measure (men never trust women to measure but having measured for a living in my former life as a picture framer he found nothing to change – ha!). I chose a demure but tasteful Olive green. Drove up to return samples and found a lovely orange - to match my new Le Creuset kettle - which I brought home to show the girls, for hard won approval. Back up and found a blackout orange but not so strong in colour; home again, girls thought I was mad choosing blackout, so rang up (couldn't drive up again), got him to cancel his order for the blackout and went back to the strong orange which I hoped they'd remember. Anything could arrive next week and I'll be happy with whatever does arrive.

And that was only the blinds! Oh for a simpler life where someone else makes all the decisions. Mind you, would they open the doors long enough for me to dash out to the bookshop for a quick fix at least four times a week or would they make me go cold turkey. I shudder to think, but then that’s my problem, thinking.