Thanks for a big turnout for the November book group meeting, and I think we have some great ideas going forward. It was wonderful to have a few new faces! We really appreciate your feedback about what you’d like to see in the group and why you may not come to a particular meeting.
December
Rings of Saturn
by WG Sebald
A fictional account of a walking tour through England’s East Anglia, Sebald’s home for more than twenty years, The Rings of Saturn explores Britain’s pastoral and imperial past. Its ten strange and beautiful chapters, with their curious archive of photographs, consider dreams and reality. As the narrator walks, a company of ghosts keeps him company — Thomas Browne, Swinburne, Chateaubriand, Joseph Conrad, Borges — conductors between the past and present. The narrator meets lonely eccentrics inhabiting tumble-down mansions, and hears of the furious coastal battles of two world wars. He tells of far-off China and the introduction of the silk industry to Norwich. He walks to the now forsaken harbor where Conrad first set foot on English soil and visits the site of the once-great city of Dunwich, now sunk in the sea, where schools of herring swim. As the narrator catalogs the transmigration of whole worlds, the reader is mesmerized by change and oblivion, survival and memories. Blending fiction and history, Sebald’s art is as strange and beautiful as the rings of Saturn, created from fragments of shattered moons.
Link
This book may be difficult to find in Spokane. It can be purchased online through Amazon, Alibris, Borders, Barnes and Noble, or Auntie’s Bookstore (if you would like to stay local)! Also, a few Violets may be willing to lend their book to you (please check the comment section on Facebook Event page or email us.)
December’s Book Club Meeting
December 19th
E.J.’s house (email us for directions)
1-3pm
*Please bring food and/or drinks to share with the group!*
Future reads include:
January
Water for Elephants
by Sara Gruen
When Jacob Jankowski, recently orphaned and suddenly adrift, jumps onto a passing train, he enters a world of freaks, drifters, and misfits, a second-rate circus struggling to survive during the Great Depression, making one-night stands in town after endless town. A veterinary student who almost earned his degree, Jacob is put in charge of caring for the circus menagerie. It is there that he meets Marlena, the beautiful young star of the equestrian act, who is married to August, the charismatic but twisted animal trainer. He also meets Rosie, an elephant who seems untrainable until he discovers a way to reach her.
February – Stones from the River – Ursula Hegi
March – The Things they Carried – Tim O’Brien (Part of the Get Lit! program)
April – Zeitoun – David Eggers
May - Three Cups of Tea - Greg Mortenson
June - Half the Sky - Nicholas D. Kristof, Sheryl WuDunn
We have had a few changes to our general plan, including having meetings at members’ houses, choosing books that are more accessible, verifying your attendance so we have a more solid count, and having a book swap/recommendation session at the end of each meeting. More details about all of this here.
Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions or would like to recommend future books for us to read:
Becky – beckyhuss [at] gmail [dot] com
Hilary – hilwhitt [at] hotmail [dot] com
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