November Read, Christmas Cheer and an Afternoon of Delight !

Hi All

Mainly for Ruthie who wasn’t with us on Sunday, and for those of you who follow and read vicariously.  Next month’s book is, The Visionist by Rachel Urquhart.  The GoodReads book summary i have sheepishly copied and pasted below, yet i openly declare this as i wish to take no credit for this summary.


"15-year-old Polly Kimball sets fire to the family farm, killing her abusive father. She and her young brother find shelter in a Massachusetts Shaker community called The City of Hope. It is the Era of Manifestations, when young girls in Shaker enclaves all across the Northeast are experiencing extraordinary mystical visions, earning them the honorific of "Visionist" and bringing renown to their settlements.  The City of Hope has not yet been blessed with a Visionist, but that changes when Polly arrives and is unexpectedly exalted. As she struggles to keep her dark secrets concealed in the face of increasing scrutiny, Polly finds herself in a life-changing friendship with a young Shaker sister named Charity, a girl who will stake everything--including her faith--on Polly's honesty and purity.”   (Ref: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17841897-the-visionist )

And to top it off - we committed to read a short story about Xmas

This has got to be a great read for us all, harkening back to childhood times.

 (thanks Jen for the suggestion).

So our second book is, “How the Grinch Who Stole Xmas” by Dr Seuss.  

October's Book : The Light Between Oceans

Hi Book Lovers,

It is agreed our next book is, The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman. It has interesting reviews on GoodReads and their is an ABC Tuesday Bookclub podcast available online if you are interested.

Next meeting date is Sunday 26th October and we have agreed to head over to Woolloongabba and stop by Moose & Gibson. An 8am start.

Lily is joining us and remember our agreement to read Flora and Ulysses to promote Lily's interest in starting her very own Bookclub!

Both books are available from the BCC library. Get online now and place a hold!!

Reading is a pleasure best enjoyed when you surrender to the pages and forget all else that has. The potential to distract you 📖📗📔📙☕️
Ven-nice

Bookclub this Coming Sunday

Hi Ladies

Just a reminder it is book club this Sunday. Meeting at Shouk Paddington 8am.
Hope you have all had a chance to read the book - it was a very sweet read.

Also if anyone has been able to problem solve Robyn Fleming's dilemma she will be forever in your debt!

Got the Same Memory.....Help

With Robyn now.....Rob says you are both having the same brain problems! She is glad she is not imagining the combination of plots!!!! It is the other one.... what is it????? Did you like Michelle de Krester, Rob really did!

Robyn has a book question....

Hi book lovers,
Can anyone please recall books that end with Boxing Day tsunami? Please don't spoil it for others but I recently read one and am trying to recall another and it's hurting my brain!
I hope you are all well
Happy reading
Robyn

An unexpected plot

Ok just finished the book. Very unexpected plot and twist... a few tears and from my perspective an awkward ending! Looking forward to hearing your view!

Reading this month's Book

Enjoying a Sunday morning read in the sun! Hope you all have gotten the book to start your reading!

May Book - Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

Our next book is by a favourite author of mine, David Mitchell.  Mitchell writes with such an intricate eloquence. His characters are complex and yet he handles the narrative with strength and delicacy weaving a web that catches you like the fly in the spider's web.  This book is so very different from Black Swan Green which some of us read a few years ago - and it differs considerably from our last few reads.  I hope it captures our imaginations, entices great conversation and transports you so that you don't want to put it down.

Here is a link to a review by AS Byatt from the Guardian, if you want to know a little more

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/mar/06/fiction.asbyatt 

NEXT MEETING

Date  : 22nd June 

Time :  3pm

Venue :   Little Brew, 131 Latrobe Tce, Paddington.  http://littlebrew.com.au 

Book is available from Amazon Kindle for less than $12 and Brisbane City Council Libraries have copies 

Get reading and see you all on the 22nd June

April Book - The Comfort of Figs by Simon Cleary

We are next meeting in May to discuss both the Rosie Project, which by my cheeky quick account was a very sweet light hearted read; and this month's pick done by email.
Meeting date is 18thMay.

Ruthie's Pick

Message from Ruth...
"Oh I am having trouble posting on the blog... must fix that... and need to acquire this month's book..."

I am hooked on the Flavia de Luce mysteries at the moment... 1950... small English village... 11yr old girl on a bike solving mysteries and getting into mischief... light easy reading to offset my arduous marking

Apart from that reading it is all chooks, chooks, chooks...

(:>=

:)))

What is a must read for your Bookclub friends?

March Book - The Rosie Project

Our next book is, The Rosie Project, by Graeme Simsion.  It is a comedy-romance with a serious backstory of the dynamics of relationships and an exploration of the human personality.  Marian Keys, says, "it is arrestingly heartwarming and funny".  Well people, we need a good laugh after our last few reads and our very own Cheryl says, "expect to laugh out loud!"

Next Meeting : Sunday 13th April 2014 at 7:30am, Union Street Cafe.

See you all there - Ps it is available from the library - so get on line and reserve.  It is quite affordable from Amazon also as an e-book.

Enjoy!

Burial Rites - Our Breakfast Review

Burial Rites is an interesting factional read.  We all enjoyed the book, and appreciated the author's exploration of the lives of the relevant people, and held a shared view that, Hannah Kent, did a great job intertwining the facts of this historical event to create this piece of faction.

Agnes Magnusdottir's will to survive was very palpable, and it raised the question of how strongly the human spirit strives to maintain it's connection to life, in spite of the sufferances that may be defining one's existence.  

We agreed that the author provided a descriptive account of the impact of the landscape, class, power and the politics of gender, to assist the reader to both emphasise and related with the characters and their place in the narrative of the events which took place.

Having recently read, "Alias Grace" by Margaret Atwood, it was hard not to compare the stories of these two women, whose fate was inevitably influenced by their status and servitude at a particular time and place in history.  One has to wonder if those living in poverty and their capacity to have a fair hearing within the criminal justice system in today's  really changed.   Both the characters in Atwood's classic and Kent's novel could be judged as murderer's and in their time, were criticised for being calculating killers and women of loose morals.  How revealing though that in looking at their lives and the relationships they were bound by, they were actually victims in so many ways.  They made choices about how to survive the best they could.  They were both bright women who took opportunities within their hard working lives and station within the class structure of their time, to improve themselves.  Both knew the value of education.  The immense power differentials across gender and class of their time, was always going to be a limiting factor to their sense of safety and security quality of their relationships.

We were all appreciative of how Kent powerfully and sensitively crafted the journey of the account of Agnes' journey toward her own execution.

We were left wondering about the indelible impact that Agnes would have left on Jon Jonsson's family and thought an Epilogue would have helped round this out for us…. I guess that is now to our own research.

Thank you Hannah Kent for being moved to write this story!

French booksellers pose naked to support children's book on nudity

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/feb/26/french-booksellers-pose-naked-childrens-book-nudity-tous-a-poil

An interesting story

Ven-nice

Spare Copy of Burial Rites Anyone….

Message from our founder,

Hi V,

Thank you for the invitation.  I'd love to come along if I can.  I have a spare copy of Burial Rites if anyone would like to borrow it.  I will take it to coffee on Wednesday and see if Ruthie needs it.  I bought a copy for my friend Robyn who would be more than happy to loan it to someone in the group too if needs be.  Just let me know if you would like it.  My own copy is on my iPad.

I loved the book.  I'm sure you will too.

 

Smiles,

Cheryl 

February 2014 - Book of the Month

Hi Ladies

Thanks for a great gathering this morning.  So we have agreed on our book for this month and i can't wait to get started, Burial Rites by Hannah Kent. Cheryl if you are free for our March meeting we would love you to come and join us for this book review!  C'mon, you know you will want to....

We are all looking very much forward to reading this book, and i have made the prediction that by page 5 (*even a bit earlier is my suspicion) none of us will want to put the book down.  Now you can borrow it from the library, this is what Sara did just before xmas, so if you want a hard cover an not an electronic version, put a 'hold' on now.  Sara, if you are feeling up to it, it would be great if you can  come along and join us.

A bit of background on the story, Burial Rites is a historical fiction set in 1830 that tells the story of the final year in the life of the last woman to be publicly executed in Iceland. The woman is, Agnes Magnúsdóttir.   If you would like some more information on the author and reviews you can go and check out Hannah Kent's website http://hannahkentauthor.com/burial-rites-reviews/

Next Meet : 9th March 2014
Time: 7:30am 
(*a wee earlier, than usual, but we had agreement, so hope you are all up for it)
Where: Union Street Cafe Spring Hill (*unless of course it isn't open and we need to regroup)

Happy Reading!  If i identify the March book earlier than our next meet, i will let you know so, if you finish Burial Rites early and want to start something else, you can have a head start.... I know I will need it :)

Hope you have a great month - (and the family move goes well Jfer)

Book Sharing Kicks Off 2014

We all gathered at a new hang out ... Union Street Cafe Espresso Bar and got stuck right into it!

Book Club Meeting Sunday 2nd February 2014 - The Time Has Arrived!!!

Welcome to 2014 and looking forward to catching up with all who can make it this coming Sunday.  The new venue has been picked, thanks Ruthie.  Location is Union Street Cafe Espresso Bar, unionstreetcafe.com.au/‎ on Cnr of Union and Water Street, Spring Hill.  Meeting time is 8am.

I am proposing an interesting approach to Bookclub this year, and it is inspired by Sara's summer challenge of working her way through the reading list of the Australian's top 50 Reads.  Now we are not going to read 50 books this year in bookclub, but collectively we probably will easily cover off on getting through quid a few. Yet i thought, how about we set ourselves the challenge of choosing from a list, to extend ourselves in terms of repertoire.  Also it may help us work our way through some of those must read books one should have an opportunity to read in their lifetime!
So I have done a google search and found the Guardian's must read list,   1000 novels everyone must read: the definitive list.  

... Or Not... I guess we shall see ...
Here is how I propose we approach it... When it is your turn to pick, you can choose from the list by genre... We can edit out what we collectively have and haven't read, so along the way we will all be trying something a little new and different.  

Here is the link:  http://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/jan/23/bestbooks-fiction

Look forward to seeing you on Sunday :)

New book club location required!

Happy New Year everyone.  Hope your summer reading has been enjoyable.  I have found out that Crosstown is no longer serving breakfast but going back to their 'roots' of dinner service.  Thought their breakfast roots were just fine but alas a new locality is required.  Did we want to try another place in that same area?   or somewhere new?  We are scheduled to meet again on 2 Feb at 7.30 so some time before we have to commit!  Let me know your thoughts.  Cheers  Jen

Elegance of the Hedgehog & TEdx

Hi girls,

I finished Elegance of the Hedgehog yesterday and then watched a TEDx talk by Brene Brown today... If you have read Elegance of the Hedgehog you'll see why the first 5 min of the video made me reflect on the book... Hmph.... made me like the book less

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UoMXF73j0c

Forwarded and posted on behalf of Ruthie 

Ven-nice 

The Snow Child - Fable, Fantasy,Hope, Magic

What a beautiful story.  An exploration of the healing journey of hope and how the human experience of connection can foster a spirit of discovery and personal growth....healing from a broken heart of grief and loss is not a journey that can be done solely through solitude. 💜
Keeping it simple.... Thanks for a great year of reading  2013 .... Looking forward to this year 2014!!