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What would you recommend for book club?


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Does it have to be new? How new? Who is in the book club? What kind of books do you typically read? Do you only do fiction? Are there any other criteria?

 

The books published in the last year that I've read and liked:

 

War by Sebastian Junger (this book includes the story of the recent MOH winner)

 

 

A couple of years old:

 

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

 

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

 

Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt

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It depends on what you're looking for. This month my book club is reading The Sunday Philosophy Club. In the past we have read:

 

Like Water for Elephants (excellent!)

 

The Kite Runner

 

Persuasion

 

The Book Thief (my fav so far)

 

The Little Book: A novel

 

Jane Eyre

 

Drat, I can't remember the others. I enjoyed most of the books we read. We try to be eclectic with our choices and have no theme.

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My book club of sorts just read Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder. It was very good and really interesting and thought provoking.

 

Are you looking for fiction or non-fiction? New or old? Long or short? Easier read (by which I don't mean simple or poor, but some books are just more fun and breezy to read, even when they're well written) or more challenging read?

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Well, I just bought one that I think would be fun to discuss in a club: Too Big to Fail, by Andrew Ross Sorkin.

 

I think it would be fun to be in a book discussion club with people from the Right, Center, and Left who are wedded to reason, and not their own ideology. I think everyone could learn a lot that way. :)

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Does it have to be new? How new? Who is in the book club? What kind of books do you typically read? Do you only do fiction? Are there any other criteria?

 

Ours is a very informal book club. We pool our money and then the person hosting the club in a particular month is free to choose whatever she likes for the group. I guess its more of an informal library club than a regular book club! We have both fiction and non-fiction. The books are mostly of the more popular variety than serious literature.

 

We've recently changed the criteria to books published within in the last two years, but that is the only restriction.

 

We are a group of women aged from 30 to late 60's.

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Mennonite in a Little Black Dress

 

It came out in paperback in April, so I imagine it fits your published-in-the-last-2-years criteria. Great fun, very funny but thought-provoking as well. Her descriptions of her family, and her reactions to their faith, are both funny and tender. I believe there are book club discussion questions in the back of the paperback version.

 

Terri

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which is about Thomas Cromwell. It's the kind of book that you can really *read.* The whole time I read it, I was relishing the fact that I was reading it, and I was depressed to finish. You know how that feels? I am reading her book about the French Revolution called, "A Place of Greater Safety."

 

She also wrote a memoir called "Giving Up the Ghost" which I have not read, but looks good. http://www.amazon.com/Giving-Up-Ghost-Memoir-MacRae/dp/0312423624/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1284560887&sr=1-1 I guess I am on a Hilary Mantel kick:)

 

My club is reading Death by Black Holes by Neil Degrass-Tyson, who I love enough to marry.http://www.amazon.com/Death-Black-Hole-Cosmic-Quandaries/dp/0393330168/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1284560863&sr=1-1

 

Last month I read The Lost City of Z by David Grann. It was entirely absorbing - about the exploration of the Amazon and an explorer who was lost there.http://www.amazon.com/Lost-City-Obsession-Vintage-Departures/dp/1400078458/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1284560842&sr=1-1

 

Also, DH read and loved (and I started, but got distracted) Blind Descent http://www.amazon.com/Blind-Descent-Quest-Discover-Deepest/dp/1400067677/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1284560801&sr=8-1

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My sister's book club read, "The Immortal LIfe of Henrietta Lacks" and she recommended it to me. I LOVED it! They are reading "The Help" next.

 

The Help was fantastic. I normally do not enjoy a book that gets as much hype as this one has but when I started it I could not put it down.

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Some published in the last couple of years that you gals might like (& that I enjoyed/recommend):

The Lost City of Z

The Blind Contessa's New Machine

Half Broke Horses

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

Born to Run

City of Thieves

The White Tiger

 

Ones that I haven't read yet (but want to) & have heard high praise for:

Little Bee

Let the Great World Spin

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Cutting for Stone

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet: A Novel

Super Sad True Love Story: A Novel

Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void

The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

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Does Glass Castle need to be read first? The reason I ask is that I saw Half Broke Horses at the grocery store yesterday, but not Glass Castle.

 

I think they can be read independently. Glass Castle chronicles life through the daughter's eyes and Half Broke Horses is through the Mother.

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