The Quality of Life Report

Click Here for a Reading Group Guide on this book.

This was our book for December. (Hoping somebody will write a review here).

Those Who Save Us

Thanks everyone for coming last night. It was fun, though we missed
Reid, Jayne, Amanda, and Elizabeth, and I now have leftover
sachertorte.

I think we all agreed with Elizabeth's remark that Those Who Save Us
was somewhat predictable. To me, I felt that the author took a good
story line and then decided to add what was needed to give it movie
potential. Somehow, inconsistencies, lack of plot development, and
preposterous but happy coincidences are more acceptable in a movie
format. However, despite the inconsistencies, and the lengthy and
overdone sex scenes, it was a good read.

Some of us felt confused that Anna could be so cold to her adult
daughter after having sacrificed everything for her when she was a
child, and showing so much love for her early on. Perhaps this was
understandable since she had to block out her past as a survival
technique, and did not want to dwell on actions that were done in
desperation. In part, this is a theme of the entire book -- trying to
understand how such horrible events could have occurred, how people
felt about being a part of those events -- even condoning the events
-- and how survivors dealt with their past.

Frances posed the interesting possibility that Trudy's German-Jewish
survivor boyfriend Reiner was in fact a Nazi who has been in hiding as
a Jew in Minnesota all these years and that is the reason that he
suddenly must leave for Florida. Hadn't thought of that, but it's a
good possibility.

When I was in Chile, I chatted in Spanish with a blue-eyed elderly man
in the supermarket who had a strong German accent. I later thought --
this man might have been a Nazi!! He seemed so friendly and harmless
and I would have liked to have asked how it was that he had come to
Chile. Many Nazis as well as Jews escaped to South America after the
war, though he might have come for business or family. Anyway, it is
interesting to ponder the question of the "banality of evil" and
wonder what you would have done as a German or a Jew in Nazi Germany.

Pam suggested reading "The Quality of Life Report" by Meghan Daum for
the December meeting -- something light and not war related.

November meeting will be at Reid's.

A Thousand Splendid Suns

Click here for a Reading Group Guide on A Thousand Splendid Suns

Well, we rarely read a book that we don't like, but this one ranks up there among our favorites. We've been floating around the literary Middle East for three months now and we're beginning to feel like experts on the region. We read Kite Runner a few years ago, but we all liked this book better. Here's another example of a guy who can give a pretty good female perspective (See One Thousand White Women) It's a book about hope and sacrifice. We found a lot to talk about with this book, which isn't always the case.

Charlie Wilson's War was recommended as a possible follow-up book or movie.

Up For October: Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum

Three Cups of Tea

Jayne introduced us to this book after meeting the author at a book fair in Charlottesville last March. (Visit the link for an audio bit from Greg). She had become a groupie at first sight and spoke so warmly of Mortenson that we were compelled to add his book to our reading list. Needless to say, we all fell a little bit in love with Greg after reading his book. His bumbling way of saving the world was endearing and inspiring.

We decided that it's one of the best books we've read so far, which is saying a lot if you look at the list of everything we've read. Mortenson opened a window to another part of the world for us, and in a very readable way. We listen to the news more carefully now, and we understand the region and its people far better than we did before. Amanda even xeroxed the map out of the book to use as a reference. And, most of us were inspired to go on and read more about Pakistan and Afghanistan.

For more information, visit the Three Cups of Tea website.

Frances followed up by reading Lone Survivor, a book she says she couldn't put down. Reid is in the process of reading Ghost Wars, which won the Pulitzer Prize and tells the history of the region from the Soviet Invasion up through 9/11. Amanda started reading Benazir Bhutto's autobiography, which the author finished in the months before she was assassinated. Our August book, A Thousand Splendid Suns, will carry on the theme. The meeting is at Reid's house August 4.

Up Next - Straight Man

William Henry Devereaux Jr., is almost 50 and stuck forever as chair of English at West Central Pennsylvania University. It is April and fear of layoffs--even among the tenured--has reached mock-epic proportions; Hank has yet to receive his department budget and finds himself increasingly offering comments such as "Always understate necrophilia" to his writing students. Then there are his possible prostate problems and the prospect of his father's arrival. Devereaux Sr., "then and now, an academic opportunist," has always been a high-profile professor and a low-profile parent. Hank tries to explain to one class that comedy and tragedy don't go together, but finds the argument "runs contrary to their experience. Indeed it may run contrary to my own." It runs decidedly against Richard Russo's approach in Straight Man, and the result is a hilarious and touching novel.

Meeting Chez Reid at 7 pm April 7

EAT, PRAY, LOVE by Elizabeth Gilbert

We had mixed opinions on this book. Frances and Carolyn thought that the narrator was terribly self-centered and had no compassion for her whatsoever. Reid thought she took the first part of the book to rake her ex-husband across the coals. We all found it interesting that she is about to publish a second book on her continued travels - rough life!

But the concept of going on a year's journey around the world (three places with a four-month mission in each place) inspired us all. We've since been discussing where we would go and what we would study in each place. Jayne has a plan that would involve studying different kinds of textiles, perhaps in Nepal, New Zealand and Ireland?). Reid likes the idea of studying the cuisine of different countries (Mexico, Thailand and ??- still thinking on that). Frances wants to go to Israel, but is having a hard time finding somebody who wants to go along with her.

Carolyn recommended an interesting audio book as a follow up about a woman who travels around the world on a bicycle before the turn of the 20th century: Around the World on Two Wheels

Also - Looks like Julia Roberts is making this into a movie

Up Next - Eat, Pray, Love

Plagued with despair after a nasty divorce, the author, in her early 30s, divides a year equally among three dissimilar countries, exploring her competing urges for earthly delights and divine transcendence. First, pleasure: savoring Italy's buffet of delights--the world's best pizza, free-flowing wine and dashing conversation partners--Gilbert consumes la dolce vita as spiritual succor. "I came to Italy pinched and thin," she writes, but soon fills out in waist and soul. Then, prayer and ascetic rigor: seeking communion with the divine at a sacred ashram in India, Gilbert emulates the ways of yogis in grueling hours of meditation, struggling to still her churning mind. Finally, a balancing act in Bali, where Gilbert tries for equipoise "betwixt and between" realms, studies with a merry medicine man and plunges into a charged love affair.

Meeting Chez Frances 7 pm March 3