Potato Peel Pie

I have to add my delight over our latest book to Beverly's comments. Reading it is teaching me so much about a place and time I had never really thought about and find fascinating. My favorite thing is the format, something that at first I was afraid would be off-putting. Hearing the characters speaking through their letters brings them to life in a very pleasing, vibrant way. In fact, when I get around to writing my own novel, I might attempt it.

Don't hold your breaths on that happening, but do enjoy this novel. It'll be a joy to discuss it at book club.

Beverly, will you be baking one of those pies for us???

Best to all,
Amy

Catching Up

I'll be sending an email reminder to the group as soon as I finish this post. Thanks for your faithfulness, Amy. I received no responses to create a composite list of recommended books if people would send titles to me, so I'll include mine here as Amy did. Some of these are oldies that you have probably read, but I'm including ones that I think are worth a reread.

THESE IS MY WORDS--Nancy Turner
GOOD DOG. STAY.--Anna Quindlen
MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL--John Berendt
A MIND AT A TIME--Mel Levine
THE AUDACITY OF HOPE--Barack Obama
OUR ENDANGERED VALUES--Jimmy Carter
THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE THUNDERBOLT KID--Bill Bryson

Now to the current reading--I'm 125 pages into the large print edition, and I am thoroughly enchanted with THE GUERNSEY LITERARY AND POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY. I like the title, the concept, the characters, and the dear comments they make about their reading. I'm desperately trying to cull my library and trying not to acquire any more books. Thus, I was on the waiting list for this one at RCPL forever, but now that I've started reading it, I want to own it. I may break over and buy it, but it will probably go the way of THE THIRTEENTH TALE. I've loaned that to someone without making careful note of who has it. This literary society has a totally different approach to sharing their reading. Very interesting, and I suspect that I will continue to delight in this book.

I was dismayed to read Amy's comments about EDGAR SAWTELLE. This is on our list for later reading, and it has come highly recommended to me by several people. We'll see.

My reads

Hi, 'Feasters,

Since our May meeting was so teeny (just three of us,) I'm using our blog to offer a few do reads and don't reads. For the "do's": NEMESIS by William Bernhardt, which is a nonfiction novel in the vein of IN COLD BLOOD and is even gorier but reads like a movie; TO UNDERSTAND by Ellin Oliver Keene, a most elegant and thought-provoking professional book; and LOVING FRANK by Nancy Horan, referring to none other than Frank Lloyd Wright but basically telling the story of his lover and the scandal their affair generated.

The "don't" reads aren't really passionate but are books that disappointed me: RESILIENCE by Elizabeth Edwards, as she spends more than half of the book detailing how she coped with the death of her son Wade rather than more current trials she's faced; EDGAR SAWTELLE by David Wroblewski which I confess I haven't read much of yet but am daunted by the heft of the book; and one that I thought had great potential but turned out to be silly fluff with an unforgivably banal ending, HANDBAGS AND HOMICIDE by Dorothy Howell.

Next month's selection, THE GUERNSEY POTATO PEEL PIE AND LITERARY SOCIETY by Mary Ann Shaffer holds great potential if I can just get my hands on it. (I'm on the hold list, Beverly!) Our book club continues to be a great avenue to reading some books that I might never have considered reading plus monthly visits to look forward to. I hope we can get our attendance back on track now that school's almost over and things might settle down a bit.

Best to all,
Amy

Long time, no blog

Hi Fellow 'Feasters,

I agree with Beverly's assessment of the Bryson book on Willie the Shake. It wasn't as good as I'd expected, but I was still glad I read it. My favorite part, besides his wry humor, is the great stuff about Shakespeare's contributions to language (chapter five.) I had a list before, but this one is much better.

Having attended Ellin Keene's seminar last week, I am all fired up about her newest book, TO UNDERSTAND. I'll bring it tomorrow night for you to see how elegant it is. We may chose to read it after next month's WWII epistolary read.

I now feel better; I have honored the blog.

Best to all,
Amy

Shakespeare

I'm certainly going to have to send out a BLOG reminder. I thought I was remiss, as it's been almost 2 months since I posted, and now I see I was also the latest contributor.
So--SHAKESPEARE by Bill Bryson. He didn't shed a lot of new light on the subject, but he did a good job of bringing the time period to life and entertaining me at the same time. I would read most anything written by Bryson and also recommend his audios, especially his memoir, THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE THUNDERBOLT KID. If this one doesn't make you laugh out loud, something is wrong with you.
My favorite observation in SHAKESPEARE was his comment that everyone can immediately recognize a likeness of Shakespeare yet no one knows what he looked like.

The Lace Reader Revisited

I do think having this blog adds a richness to our book club. It's interesting to reads your posts after I've already written about the book. They always give me something new to think about.

I haven't started the Shakespeare book yet, but I'm a huge fan of Bill Bryson. Don't know quite what to expect from this one, as Bryson is usually terrifically funny, but from what I've heard, he takes a rather serious approach in this one. However, coming from him, it should not be heavily academic.

The Lace Reader

I finished the Lace Reader on Friday during third block while I was reading with my students; I love my 30 minutes of independent reading each block. I am most upset with this book and the way it ended. I feel like you get to the end and you question everything you read and what can you believe. It feels like Towner just made everything up in her mind! Also, what is up with May not being her mother. Despite my frustrations, I still look forward to discussing the book further later this month. Beverly, I loved your post, and all of the problems you had with the book. I read the blog as soon as I finished the book, and then I told my students that I was irritated with the book's ending. It was a great teaching moment, because many of them then mentioned books that they had read that didn't end the way they thought they should have.

Lace Reader

Beverly, I just read your post and it sounds as if that sense of confusion may get worse as I go along. I haven't read much yet (only to page 121) because I didn't get the book until late. So far, though, I'm not annoyed. Seems almost as if I'm supposed to be confused! I'm reminded of the feeling I'd get as a kid if I went in the house of mirrors at a carnival.

Lace Reader

I am fascinated by this book! I have been reading very carefully because of all the warnings from the rest of you, and I don't think I have misread anything or overlooked any important connections. And yet, I constantly have the feeling that I'm missing something - that there is something going on beneath the surface that I haven't figured out yet. I can't wait to get back to it!

Mimi

Do, Beverly!

I enjoyed reading your take on LACE and agree. It wasn't a total loss, since the novel did provide some memorable scenes (such as the well-endowed statue) and inspired one of our best-ever "bookfeasts."

My overall impression was that if she could self-publish THAT and do so amazingly well, surely each of us should get cracking on a book!

Best to all,
Amy

The Lace Reader

Obviously, I had not been to our blog page in some time. Even at this date, I enjoyed going back and reading what people had posted about the Kingsolver book. Amy must be the most faithful of us all, as she is the only person who wrote about DEWEY. Though I'm a dog person at heart, I like cats too and enjoyed DEWEY but really didn't have anything to say about it.

Now THE LACE READER is a different matter. I'm a good reader, but I felt confused early on, and by the time I got to the end, I felt duped. The experience was similar to reading Toni Morrison. (I've read every one of her books and have not understood any of them.) I wonder how my reading experience would have differed if I had done a chart of characters because I kept feeling that I needed one. Angela is planning to do one when she reads it, as several of had mentioned that we thought it would help.

I thought the twin issue was well established and had even made a mental comparison to THE THIRTEENTH TALE. However, once here are some things that bothered me:

Towner says she hates her mother (May), yet why is she so obsessed in looking for May's lights?
There was a mention that May and Emma were half-sisters. What?
Towner talked about how she and Lyndley grew up separately, yet there were many, many accounts of them playing the game together and spending what sounded to me like massive amounts of time together.
Reference to Cal and Emma not allowing Lyndley near May (p. 242) Why not?
Reference to Towner being Eva's grandniece (p. 285) What? I thought Eva was Towner's grandmother.
Then toward the end Emma is referred to as Auntie Boynton.

It may be that I'm totally confused and didn't really understand the book, but on the whole, it did not resonate with me, and I wanted it to. There were many characters and ideas that I liked, but Barry's writing is not in the same league with Setterfield or Kingsolver. Do you really think Towner could have dragged Angela by the hair while swimming? The book just felt like a rip-off. Okay, at the end we just wrap it up with a mentally ill narrator--almost like saying, "I woke up, and it was all a dream."

One last interesting note. This week's TIME magazine had an article about how publishing is changing. THE LACE READER was originally self-published but went on to a $2 million deal with a publisher.

Where's our editor?

I reread my last post and was appalled by the subject-verb error in the last sentence. Somebody needs to remind me not to blog before breakfast...

Amy

Reading the Lace

Okay, Janie, where is it? You promised a blog, and I've been waiting with bated (baited?) breath!

Teasing, but I am eager to hear anybody's take on READER besides my own. I finished it in such a rush that she caught me completely by surprise with that twin thing. I had to go online and read every review/reaction I could find, and most of them agreed with me, as in "Huh?"

It'll be great fun to enjoy Angela's show and tell with her personal collection of lace. The curry sounds appetizing, too.

Happy January, All! I'm all happy about not having to go back to school on the Monday after Christmas break. Twenty-two of those was enough.

Amy