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

Recently, the chapter compelled members of the campus to help collect books to be donated overseas to US troops.  They received 400 copies of the illustrious Connecticut Review.

The semi-annual journal as been published since 1967 and has included literary plays, translations, creative nonfiction and essays as well as poetry, artwork, photography and academic articles of general interest. In recent years Connecticut Review has won awards from the Council of Editors of Learned Journals and National Public Radio. Pieces published in the magazine have also earned Pushcart Prizes and appeared in Best American Short Stories, Best American Essays, and Best American Poetry.

I am consistently impressed in my capacity as an RD with the abilities of student groups to affect change and create positive development in their community and abroad. Great work, CCSU!

I found out about this over at Cool Justice.

[N.B.  The views at said website are the author's own and do not represent the views of Better World Books or yours truly.]