About the Book

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer

January 1946: writer Juliet Ashton receives a letter from a stranger, a founding member of the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. And so begins a remarkable tale of the island of Guernsey during the German occupation, and of a society as extraordinary as its name.

Discussion Questions from the publisher

Better World Book Club Winter Event

In September we had a great launch to the in-person book club. Thanks to the success this Fall, we are hosting another in-person event this Winter in Atlanta. We would also love for BWB advocates around the world to get involved in our on and offline book club. If you are interested, please email me at elevin@betterworldbooks.com.

If you’re in the Atlanta area, we’d love to see you at this amazing educational and service event. Please save the date – Wednesday Janurary 18th. We will be discussing Same Kind of Different as Me, the December pick and serving and eating dinner with the residents of City of Refuge. Here is more info on the Winter event: http://betterworldbookclub.eventbrite.com/.

The December Pick

Better World Books’ own Catarina Gutierrez recommended the book and has this to share:

“It’s one of my favorite books by my favorite author because the story of sisterly love and devotion to social justice is told so well. I really enjoyed reading from the perspective of each sister and getting a better understanding of their involvement in a historical time during Latin American history. It’s undeniable how strong-willed the sisters were and how much of an inspiration they serve to the Dominican Republic.”

About the Book

Set during the waning days of the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republica in 1960, this extraordinary novel tells the story the Mirabal sisters, three young wives and mothers who are assassinated after visiting their jailed husbands.

About the Author
In her own words from juliaalvarez.com

I was born in New York City during my parents’ first and failed stay in the United States. When I was three months old, my parents, both native Dominicans, decided to return to their homeland, preferring the dictatorship of Trujillo to the U.S.A. of the early 50s. Once again, my father got involved in the underground and soon my family was in deep trouble. We left hurriedly in 1960, four months before the founders of that underground, the Mirabal sisters, were brutally murdered by the dictatorship (see In the Time of the Butterflies).

When I’m asked what made me into a writer, I point to the watershed experience of coming to this country. Not understanding the language, I had to pay close attention to each word — great training for a writer. I also discovered the welcoming world of the imagination and books. There, I sunk my new roots. Of course, autobiographies are written afterwards. Talk to my tías in the D.R. and they’ll tell you I was making up stuff way before I ever set foot in the United States of America. (And getting punished for it, too. Lying, they called it back then.) But they’re right. As a kid, I loved stories, hearing them, telling them. Since ours was an oral culture, stories were not written down. It took coming to this country for reading and writing to become allied in my mind with storytelling.

1991 was a big year. I earned tenure at Middlebury College and published my first novel, How The García Girls Lost Their Accents. My gutsy agent, Susan Bergholz, found a small press, Algonquin Books, and a wonderful editor, Shannon Ravenel, willing to give “a new voice” a chance. I was forty-one with twenty-plus years of writing behind me. I often mention this to student writers who are discouraged at nineteen when they don’t have a book contract!

I guess the only other thing I should mention about my life is our project in the Dominican Republic. About eleven years ago, Bill and I started a sustainable farm-literacy center called Alta Gracia. Rather than telling you the whole long story here about why we are growing organic, shade-grown coffee; why we started a school on the farm; why sustainability is so important a concept for us all to be thinking about, I’ll send you to A Cafecito Story, a modern, “green” fable I wrote inspired by our project. The afterword by Bill tells all about our own farm. Visit our website cafealtagracia.com and find out how to order our coffee, Café Alta Gracia, and maybe even visit the farm!

A more recent nonfiction book, Once Upon A Quinceañera: Coming of Age in the USA, also gives autobiographical information on my own coming of age in the United States and on finding my voice as a woman and as an American writer.

Discussion Questions
From The Big Read

1. The novel begins with a writer, “a gringa dominicana,” visiting Dedé at the childhood home of the Mirabal sisters. Who or what is the primary focus of the first chapter? How does opening the narrative this way give structure to the book?
2. Discuss the novel as historical fiction. How much license may an author take in recreating past events, especially those so significant to a country’s national identity? What can be gained by presenting the Mirabal sisters as characters in a novel, instead of simply telling the facts of their involvement in the revolution?
3. Most of the novel takes place from the 1930s to the 1960s in the Dominican Republic. What traits are considered appropriate for women living there at that time? Which women defy these social customs, and why?
4. Compare and contrast the personalities of the Mirabal sisters. In what ways are they alike? How do they differ?
5. Despite her anger over her father’s infidelity, Minerva insists on meeting her half-sisters and insists after his death that they get the opportunity to have an education. Why do you think she does so?
6. What prompts Patria to become involved in the revolution? How does her commitment differ from Minerva’s and María Teresa’s?
7. Why does Dedé shy away from involvement with the underground? What does her reluctance tell us about her priorities in life? What does Dedé value most?
8. Each of the sisters has different motivations for her involvement in the underground and tolerates different amounts of risk. Discuss when each sister decides to become politically active. What specific event triggers each woman’s decision?
9. The real-life Mirabal sisters are viewed as heroines and martyrs in the Dominican Republic. Discuss what makes a person a martyr. Is it necessary for martyrs to act heroically? How do the actions of the Mirabal sisters compare to other famous people who have died for important causes?

November Book Club Pick

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer

January 1946: writer Juliet Ashton receives a letter from a stranger, a founding member of the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. And so begins a remarkable tale of the island of Guernsey during the German occupation, and of a society as extraordinary as its name.

As a book company that funds and promotes literacy and education at home and all over the world, we love many authors and books. Recently, however, I have been particularly inspired by a series of love letters our fans have written to us, Better World Books, on their blogs. In this spirit, I felt led to write a love letter to one of my favorite authors.
Dear Kathryn, I read your book over Thanksgiving weekend in the crisp fall of 2009. I have no idea how it took until November for me to read your novel which debuted that February. It sat on my bookshelf begging to be opened, but I let work and life get in the way. Foolish me. “The Help” offered me a better perspective on work and on life. Growing up a sixth generation Georgian, I have been fascinated by Southern folklore, human and civil rights, social justice, and love of tradition my entire life. My deep roots here drew me to learn more. I have always dreamed of being able to adequately explain the real, and often times, positive interconnectedness between these Southern and social passions. This led me, a musically inept young lady, to learn how to play the banjo.

Through my musical journey across bluegrass, folk and rock & roll, I discovered their roots in blues and jazz. About the same time, I began diving deep into every class the University of Virginia offered on the history of the American South. Music was at the core of Southern culture and movements. It did not take much digging for this short, blonde, y’all-sayer to find where our beautiful music came from. So I finished the American history and politics classes and started cramming in every course I found on Africa.

My college thesis states that the civil rights movement could not have been successful if it were not for the songs and spirit brought over on the slave ships and strengthened across the Atlantic from Africa to the cotton fields to the white only lunch counters.

Your book is a better version of my thesis. It’s what I had been thinking about for years. It answers the questions I was sometimes afraid to ask. It goes beyond the music to the heart of the conflicts and beauties behind race relations in the American South. It is more lovely than Hilly’s home, more delicious than Minny’s chocolate pie and (my sweet mother might cry at me for saying this) more real than “Gone with the Wind.”

Rumor on the street is that you actually live in the same town as me and Better World Books. It would be an honor, much like how Skeeter felt when Elaine Stein called her from New York City, for you to kindly reply and perhaps even share your story with the Better World Books community.

In admiration,
Erin Levin
Community Manager, Better World Books

About the book

In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women, mothers, daughters, caregivers and friends view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don’t.

About the author

Kathryn Stockett was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi. After graduating from the University of Alabama with a degree in English and Creative Writing, she moved to New York City where she worked in magazine publishing and marketing for nine years. She currently lives in Atlanta with her family. The Help is her first novel.

Discussion questions from the publisher

1. Who was your favorite character? Why?
2. What do you think motivated Hilly? On the one hand she is terribly cruel to Aibileen and her own help, as well as to Skeeter once she realizes that she can’t control her. Yet she’s a wonderful mother. Do you think that one can be a good mother but, at the same time, a deeply flawed person?
3. Like Hilly, Skeeter’s mother is a prime example of someone deeply flawed yet somewhat sympathetic. She seems to care for Skeeter— and she also seems to have very real feelings for Constantine. Yet the ultimatum she gives to Constantine is untenable; and most of her interaction with Skeeter is critical. Do you think Skeeter’s mother is a sympathetic or unsympathetic character? Why?
4. How much of a person’s character would you say is shaped by the times in which they live?
5. Did it bother you that Skeeter is willing to overlook so many of Stuart’s faults so that she can get married, and that it’s not until he literally gets up and walks away that the engagement falls apart?
6. Do you believe that Minny was justified in her distrust of white people?
7. Do you think that had Aibileen stayed working for Miss Elizabeth, that Mae Mobley would have grown up to be racist like her mother? Do you think racism is inherent, or taught?
8. From the perspective of a twenty-first century reader, the hairshellac system that Skeeter undergoes seems ludicrous. Yet women still alter their looks in rather peculiar ways as the definition of “beauty” changes with the times. Looking back on your past, what’s the most ridiculous beauty regimen you ever underwent?
9. The author manages to paint Aibileen with a quiet grace and an aura of wisdom about her. How do you think she does this?
10. Do you think there are still vestiges of racism in relationships where people of color work for people who are white?
11. What did you think about Minny’s pie for Miss Hilly? Would you have gone as far as Minny did for revenge?

October Better World Book Club selection

In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez

Set during the waning days of the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic in 1960, this extraordinary novel tells the story the Mirabal sisters, three young wives and mothers who are assassinated after visiting their jailed husbands.

About the Book

In his first novel since The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen has given us an epic of contemporary love and marriage. Freedom comically and tragically captures the temptations and burdens of liberty: the thrills of teenage lust, the shaken compromises of middle age, the wages of suburban sprawl, the heavy weight of empire. In charting the mistakes and joys of Freedom’s intensely realized characters as they struggle to learn how to live in an ever more confusing world, Franzen has produced an indelible and deeply moving portrait of our time.

Discussion Questions

1. Jonathan Franzen refers to freedom throughout the novel, including the freedom of Iraqis to become capitalists, Joey’s parents attempt to give him an unencumbered life, an inscription on a building at Jessica s college that reads USE WELL THY FREEDOM, and alcoholic Mitch, who is a free man. How do the characters spend their freedom? Is it a liberating or destructive force for them? Which characters are the least free?

2. Freedom contains almost cinematic descriptions of the characters dwelling places, from the house in St. Paul to Abigail’s eclectic Manhattan apartment. How do the homes in Freedom reflect the personalities of their occupants? Where do Walter and Patty feel most at home? Which of your homes has been most significant in your life?

3. As a young woman, Patty is phenomenally strong on the basketball court yet vulnerable in relationships, especially with her workaholic parents, her friend Eliza, and the conflicted duo of Richard and Walter. What did her rapist, Ethan Post, teach her about vulnerability? After the rape, what did her father and the coaches attempt to teach her about strength?

4. What feeds Richard and Walter’s lifelong cycle of competition and collaboration? If you were Patty, would you have made the road trip with Richard? What does Freedom say about the repercussions of college, not only for Walter and Patty but also for their children?

5. How would you characterize Patty’s writing? How does her storytelling style compare to the narrator s voice in the rest of the novel? If Walter had written a memoir, what might he have said about his victories, and his suffering?

6. Which tragicomic passages in Freedom made you laugh? Which characters elicited continual sadness and sympathy in you? How does Franzen balance poignant moments with absurdity?

7. Discuss the nature of attraction, both in the novel and in your own experience. What does it take to be desirable in Freedom? In the novel, how do couples sustain intense attraction for each other over many phases of their lives?

8. Does history repeat itself throughout Walter’s ancestry, with his Swedish grandfather, Einar, who built roads, loathed communism and slow drivers, and was cruel to his wife; his father, Gene, a war hero with fantasies of success in the motel business; and his mother, Dorothy, whose cosmopolitan family was Walter s salvation? What do all the characters in the novel want from their parents? How do their relationships with their parents affect their relationships with lovers?

9. After her father s death, Patty asks her mother why she ignored Patty s success in sports, even though Joyce was a driven woman who might have relished her daughter’s achievements. She doesn’t get a satisfactory answer; Joyce vaguely says that she wasn’t into sports. Why do you think Patty did not garner as much attention as her sisters did? How did your opinion of Veronica and Abigail shift throughout the novel? Does Patty treat Jessica the same way her parents treated her?

10. How is Lalitha different from the other characters in the novel? How does her motivation for working with the Cerulean Mountain Trust compare to Walter’s? Does Walter relate to the cerulean warbler on some level?

11. What accounts for the differences between Joey and Jessica? Is it simply a matter of genes and temperament, or does gender matter in their situation?

12. What does Joey want and get from Jenna and Connie? What do they want and get from him?

13. Did Carol and Blake evolve as parents? What sort of life do you predict for their twin daughters?

14. Near the end of the novel, Franzen describes Walter s relationship with Bobby the cat as a sort of troubled marriage. Was their divorce inevitable? When Patty is eventually able to serve as neighborhood peacemaker, even negotiating a truce with Linda Hoffbauer, what does this say about her role in Walter’s life? Does she dilute his sense of purpose and principle, or does she keep him grounded in reality?

15. How would you answer the essential question raised by Walter’s deal with the Texas rancher Vin Haven: What is the best way to achieve environmental conservation?

16. Consider the novel s epigraph, taken from Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale. The lines are spoken by Paulina in the final act, after she learns the fate of her dead husband. She receives the news while surrounded by happy endings for the other characters. The most obvious parallel is to Walter, but who else might be reflected in these lines?

17. What unique truths emerge in Freedom? In what ways does this novel enhance themes (such as love and commitment, family angst, the intensity of adolescence, and the individual against the giant corporate, governmental, and otherwise) featured in Franzen’s previous works, including his nonfiction?

Discussion Forum

Please use the comment section below as a platform to share your thoughts on this book and the questions above.

August Book

This coming month, we will be reading The Blue Sweater by Jacqueline Novogratz. In addition to the online club, we will be meeting in-person in Atlanta. If you are interesting in coming to the event or skyping in, please comment below.

The Blue Sweater is the inspiring story of a woman who left a career in international banking to spend her life on a quest to understand global poverty and find powerful new ways of tackling it. It all started back home in Virginia, with the blue sweater, a gift that quickly became her prized possession–until the day she outgrew it and gave it away to Goodwill. Eleven years later in Africa, she spotted a young boy wearing that very sweater, with her name still on the tag inside.

Warning: This book changed my life! 

About the Book

July Pick

We invite you to join the discussion of “Still Alice” below and to suggest more books for us to cover in the club!

PS – For our August BWB Book Club, we are revitalizing the LIVE BOOK CLUB EVENT! Our pick is “The Blue Sweater” by my personal hero and mentor, Jacqueline Novogratz who founded the Acumen Fund. Note that for the first 5,000 copies of “The Blue Sweater” purchased from our website, a $15 donation per book will be made to Acumen Fund, a nonprofit that invests in transformative businesses to solve the problems of poverty. We will be co-sponsoring a live event in Atlanta, Georgia with Atlanta for Acumen and will be joined on Skype by representatives from the Acumen Fund. If you are in the Atlanta area or have friends here, please email Erin at 11@betterworldbooks.com for more details. We will also be including our Book Clubers around the world via Skype and live-blogging of the event!

I personally liked the book, but overall the group’s reviews were lukewarm.

The book, a memoir by Rhoda Janzen, is about her returning to her Mennonite family after her husband leaves her for a man he met on gay.com.  If that wasn’t enough, she can’t afford the mortgage on her house and she ends up with a nice collection of broken bones from a pretty bad car wreck.

We all agreed that the premise was good, but generally the feeling was that Rhoda didn’t really give us the truth.  Either that or she somehow doesn’t feel pain.  We enjoyed her humor and loved her Mom, but wondered how she really felt.

She generally seemed pretty nonplussed by things that would’ve sent most women into years of therapy or to the bottom of big box of wine.

And as for the title, though she did go back to her Mennonite family – her Mennonite-ness wasn’t really an issue.  Going back didn’t seem to bother her and no one really seemed bothered that she had left the fold in the first place.  Janzen did include a really good primer on the religion at the end of the book but we would have liked to have seen more of that woven throughout.  And while we’re talking about the title, I’m pretty sure there wasn’t a black dress at all.  I know I’m being literal here, but I think the point is that what could’ve and maybe should’ve been something like a clash of cultures was more like a dull thud of cultures.

Alas Rhoda really does have impeccable comic timing in her writing along with a biting wit and I really did enjoy getting to know her through the book.

Have you read it?  What did you think?

Wondering what the heck the Better World Book Club is?  Check it out at http://www.betterworldbooks.com/bookclub.    Join us.  Next month we’re reading SOUTH OF BROAD by Pat Conroy.  (Want 10% off and free shipping, use the code BOOKCLUB10 at checkout and save!)

We’re now announcing books a month ahead of time so that you can participate in our online and local discussions.  Our newest pick – which we’ll be discussing the first week in February is THE BRIEF WONDROUS LIFE OF OSCAR WAO by Junot Diaz.

Stay tuned for details on a twitter discussion – and also feel free to comment right here on the blog!

Our January pick is AWAY by Amy Bloom and the local discussions are taking place tonight at 7PM participating Whole Foods Markets.

Previous picks include:

OUTCASTS UNITED by Warren St. John
THE GUERNSEY LITERARY AND POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY by Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows

Have a book you’d like to suggest? Want to set up a live local meeting near you? Email me at bookclub@betterworldbooks.com.

Our Latest Pick

THE SHADOW OF THE WIND by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

If your book club has ever read a book where you struggled to find something to talk about, you will really appreciate THE SHADOW OF THE WIND.  There is so much to talk about with this book, I barely know where to begin.

From its Russian doll  – book within a book style to its use of religious imagery to the often parallel lives of two seemingly unconnected characters you will not run out of conversation.  I promise.

Our book, THE SHADOW OF THE WIND is about a book that Daniel Sempere finds in the Cemetery of Forgotten Books which is also called THE SHADOW OF THE WIND.  Uncovering the mystery surrounding the life and death of that book’s author Julian Carax becomes Daniel’s quest and is what our book is all about.

This one has been on my list for several years now, so I’m glad it finally made it to the top.   If you haven’t read it yet, give it a go for your book club.  If you have, feel free to leave a comment, and let me know what you thought.

Be sure to check our our Book Club Page for the synopsis, some interesting discussion questions and a delicious recipe for Baked Goat Cheese in Tomato Sauce from Whole Foods!

You can also catch the selections AND discuss the book here on the blog and on the new book club page.

Our Latest Pick

THE ART OF RACING IN THE RAIN by Garth Stein

I don’t mind a little crying over a good book if then end justifies the tears.  In this case, the ending and much of went on in the middle was predictable, but the book was ultimately worth the tears.

The story is told by Enzo the dog – who is nearly a human trapped in a dog’s body.  Frustrated by his lack of opposable thumbs and his inability to speak, he makes an interesting observer and sometimes participant to the life of race car driver Denny Swift.

I found his loyalty and love for his family to be both doglike and manlike at the same time.  The books deeper messages, couched in racing terms and dog thoughts were a bit like reading a novelization of The Secret.  But who couldn’t use a reminder not to give up and to believe “that which you manifest is before you’?

For some book club discussion questions and a tasty summer recipe, check out the new book club page and feel free to leave some comments and let me know what you thought of the book!

– Dana

You can also catch the selections AND discuss the book here on the blog.

Our Latest Pick

THE ACCIDENTAL BESTSELLER by Wendy Wax

Last month I promised you a great beach read for June…so here it is.  To me a beach read is not necessarily all lightness and fluff, but rather a page turner where you care about the characters and are left feeling upbeat or hopeful at the end.  Wendy Wax’s latest doesn’t disappoint.

The Accidental Bestseller does for (or to) publishing what The Devil Wears Prada did for fashion mags:  gives you an under the covers look into a world you wouldn’t otherwise get to see.

Wendy uses the backdrop of the publishing industry to explore friendship, marriage and career and introduces us to four unique women who struggle with all of it.

Here’s a couple of questions the book brought up for me:

Does you career define you?  What would you do if you woke up one morning and it was over?

Do your friends have to know everything about you in order for them to truly be your friends?

How much would you risk to help a friend?

And here’s some trivia for you…there’s a character named after me somewhere in the book.  The first person to comment here on the blog with the page number I appear on gets a $25 gift certificate!

For more discussion questions and a tasty summer recipe, check out the book club email and feel free to leave some comments and let me know what you thought of the book!

– Dana

You can also catch the selections AND discuss the book here on the blog.

Our Latest Pick

ELLA MINNOW PEA by Mark Dunn

I actually read Mark Dunn’s Ella Minnow Pea several years ago for a book club I was part of and it stuck with me, so now I want to share it with you.  While clearly a literary exercise (as letters fall off a statue – they are removed from the written and spoken vocabulary of an island community by its totalitarian government), it is also a really good story and a thought provoking political statement.

I have read other books that felt like literary exercises to me.  Some work and some don’t.  The one that pops into my mind first is Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer.    The book was very highly acclaimed but I found myself distracted by some of his literary devices, and for me that took something away for the book.  I felt like it was a project for a graduate level writing class.  It would get an A for sure, but I want to feel the emotion and discover the plot rather than be cleverly deviced to death.

But back to Ella Minnow Pea.  In this book, the literary device framework does not distract.  Instead it lays a fantastical framework for character development and political observation.  Here are some of the questions the book brought up for me.

How silly are some of the things we worship or revere?

How long would you put up with rules or laws that made no sense to you?

Is there something other than language that we take for granted but couldn’t live happily without?

I could go on and on.  But I’ll let you discover the rest on your own.  If you haven’t already, check out the book club email.  It includes the discussion questions and a great recipe for Spiced Pecans from the Starwoodgal’s  Something’s Burning blog.

Let me know if you try the recipe, what you thought of the book and get ready for a great beach read next month!

– Dana

You can also catch the selections AND discuss the book here on the blog.

Our Latest Pick

HOTEL ON THE CORNER OF BITTER AND SWEET by Jamie Ford

As you can imagine, I love books and authors and love to do what I can to help promote them.  It’s not just my current and former life as a bookseller that makes me feel this way — I have always loved books.  So, when I come across a debut novel like this one, I am especially happy to be able to help get the word out.

Jamie Ford’s HOTEL ON THE CORNER OF BITTER & SWEET has officially become one of my new favorite books.  Ford paints a personal picture of race, culture, family, love and loyalty in the 1940s in America.  He shows us, through the eyes of children, a time we, as Americans, would rather forget; when Japanese Americans were rounded up and forced to live in internment camps.  It is a politically important story for sure, but it is the personal story that sweeps you up and makes you unable to stop turning pages.

I loved Henry, both as a child and as a man.  He is loyal, brave and young Henry seems wise beyond his years.  What did you think of his quiet disobedience of his father?  What about his father’s rule that he could only speak English at home when his parents only spoke Cantonese?  Keiko and her family were so very American and worldly and open.  Did they change the way you felt about the internment?

What did you think of the jazz in the book and the way it was woven throughout the story?

Anything else you want to chat about?

– Dana

You can also catch the selections AND discuss the book here on the blog.

Our Latest Pick

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

This is one of those books that I have been curious about for awhile.  It was somewhere on my list of books to read, but just had not risen to the top.  I think it finally jumped to the top of the pile after I saw Slumdog Millionaire, which is based on the book Q & A by Vikas Swarup.  Of course the main thing these two books have in common is that they take place in India, but after seeing the movie, I was interested in reading more about the country and the culture.

I actually really loved this book.  Though I have to say I am a bit surprised that I do.  In fact, the last book that I reviewed in which the main character was a murderer (we learn that very early on, so I’m not ruining anything for you) was Almost Moon by Alice Sebold which I struggled with a bit.  Aravind Adiga does an amazing job of creating the character of Balram who is morally questionable and yet loveable all at the same time.  In fact, most of the characters in the book are morally ambiguous, and yet you really only hate the ones that our hero hates.

It is also interesting to view the culture through the eyes of someone who starts out as the servant and ends up the master and who really has no regret about the murder he had to commit to get him there.

Ashok, the master who had spent time in America was quite an interesting character as well.  It’s like he knows the way things are is wrong, but he is powerless to change it, and in reality is too soft to really try.  He constantly refers to Balram as a member of the family, but then talks about how stupid he is right in front of him.

This one is worth reading and if you’re like me, you’ll want to talk about it.

Our Pick for February 2009

Loving Frank by Nancy Horan

This month we’re talking about Loving Frank.  It’s a fictional account of Frank Lloyd Wright’s tragic love affair with Mamah Cheney. The book is very well researched but is fictionalized so that the author would have the freedom to invent the personal details of the relationship that will never be known.

I have always loved Frank Lloyd Wright’s design aesthetic and so that made me curious about the man.  The book does not paint him in the best light, but I think I tended to want to give him a pass because he’s Frank Lloyd Wright.   When my local book club discussed the book,  many of the women were very upset with Mamah for the way she handled (or didn’t) her children, but as a single mom with many career aspirations, I felt sort of sympathetic towards her as well.  Most of the time.  It’s a tragic story of course and interesting to think about how different it would have been if it were happening now.  What did you think of the book?

Book Club pick for January:

Run by Ann Patchett
“Since their mother’s death, Tip and Teddy Doyle have been raised by their loving, possessive and ambitious father. As the former Mayor of Boston, Bernard Doyle wants to see his sons in politics, a dream the boys have never shared. But when an argument in a blinding New England snow storm inadvertently causes an accident that involves a stranger and her child, all Bernard Doyle cares about is his ability to keep his children, all his children, safe.

Set over a period of 24 hours, Run takes us from the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard to a home for retired Catholic priests in downtown Boston. It shows us how worlds of privilege and poverty can coexist only blocks apart from one another, and how family can include people you’ve never even met. As in her best selling novel, Bel Canto, Ann Patchett illustrates the humanity that connects disparate lives,weaving several stories into one surprising and endlessly moving narrative. Suspenseful and stunningly executed, Run is ultimately a novel about secrets, duty, responsibility, and the lengths we will go to protect our children.”

Discussion Questions:

1.The book begins with the story about the Virgin Mary Statue that resembles Bernadette. The issue of the statue and its ownership is woven throughout the book. Why is this important?

2. Is Teddy’s speech making just a personality quirk, or do the portions of famous speeches included in his own add to the deeper meaning of the story?

3. The story presents the idea of parents who can love his/her own child in addition to children who have come into their lives by circumstance.What is the author saying about these relationships? What do the characters learn about themselves through these relationships? Does DNA really matter? Should it?

4. Why did the author choose “Run” as the title? It clearly applies to Kenya, but discuss how the idea of running applies to each of the characters. Should they run? What are they running from, to, etc.?

5. What is the significance of religion and faith in the book? How does Father Sullivan impact the story? Is it important to know the older brother is named for him? Why is his connection to Tennessee important?

6.  How is Bernard Doyle’s political career impacting his son’s development and his feelings toward Kenya?

7. Is race a part of the story in order to make it clear the boys are adopted or is there more to the issue of race as it relates to the characters and how they see each other?

8.  How do you feel about the conclusion? Did each character grow in the ways you thought necessary?