sametimenextmonth

Thursday, May 21, 2009

My House Guest

Meet Elaine, if you haven't. This is Lauren's bird and she has been my house guest while Lauren was going to OU and living next door to me.

Congratulations to all the graduates! Denise McGough's two daughters, Lauren and Cassie have graduated, respectively, from college and high school with all kinds of honors! Lauren is planning a trip to China and then is off to study Eagles in Mongolia for 10 months. Cassie is headed to Costa Rica to teach English before starting college. Pam Boeck's daughter, Katy and her finance, Cory, both graduated with Master's Degrees and are also celebrating their engagement. Congratulations to all and best wishes for very exciting futures!

Monday, May 11, 2009

Update of June Meeting and Book

June's meeting will still be at Barb's house but the date has changed to Saturday, June 13. This month's book is The Help by Kathryn Stockett.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

ANNOUNCING! Two New Novels

Carlos Zafon Ruis' latest book "The Angel's Game" will be released in June. You can follow the link at the right to Amazon to get a "pre-ordered" copy. We so enjoyed his "Shadow of the Wind". According to the web site he is writing 4 stand alone novels that will be set in Barcelona and will have overlapping characters and a common thread of the Cemetary of Forgotten Books. I can't wait!

AND TA DA... Pat Conroy's newest novel is due out in September. Follow the link to the right to check out "South of Broad." He is one of my favorite writer's! I am so excited about both of these new novels.

Saturday, May 9, 2009

The Big Stromboli,

Or Mark and Phil's Big Book Club Adventure May's book, Twin Motives, was suggested by Arnora. She is best friends with author Mark's sister. Mark Robinson and Phil Kemp graciously agreed to join us for book club and discuss the book and their writing experience. We met at Janie's house on Easy Street (no kidding!) and she served a deliciouso Stromboli complimented by the most eye appealing salad I do believe I have seen. Lou and Laura co-created the salad. Diana brought assorted mouth watering cookies and Carla G. brought marinated olives and cheeses. Appletini's, wine and iced tea embellished the meal.

Twin Motives takes place in my home town of Norman, Oklahoma disguised as Hall Park. Reading a story set in your home town is at once comforting and surprising as you wind your through familiar settings. The story is a romance/murder mystery and it's genre Christian fiction. One of the things we discussed was how the authors struggled with sending a message that was important to them but weaving it in subtley. Mark and Phil talked about their experience of collaborating on the book, how they worked together on the story, the characters, and their experience with the high end self-publisher they decided on.

Writing a book is a complicated, complex and time consuming undertaking. Plot devises and timelines must be considered as well as character development. Another point we discussed was the lack of an obvious time line. The story is set some 10 years after the Vietnam war but the exact timing is purposely ambiguous. It was interesting to know the authors did not know how they were going to end the story until about half way through the process.

Everyone enjoyed the book and we so appreciate Mark and Phil taking time to come by. Having them discuss their experience writing the book has enriched our experience of reading the book. The authors are currently working on a sequel to Twin Motives. To your right I have added a link to the authors web site. Be sure to drop by and leave them a comment.

Saturday, April 11, 2009

April Book Club

Seems that this year is already flying by. April book club, already? Really? Where is the time going? Seems like only yesterday I was a little girl growing up in "Moore", descendant from the Bohemian Gypsies, starting school, learning to ride my bike, playing with my granny's chickens (in her city backyard) and getting into all kinds of mischievous activities as I learned to negotiate my way through life. Oh no, wait, that wasn't me that was "A Girl Named Zippy" our April Book Club book. Well, it was sort of me. In fact, most of us found elements of Zippy's life that we related to. After the last couple of books we were all begging for something light and funny and I do believe that Zippy fit that bill perfectly. I found myself laughing out loud at her antics and her perspective. Zippy was smart, precocious and lived life with full on zest. Those of us that finished the book really enjoyed it and we had a lot of laughs reading out loud our favorite parts or quotes. The book rated a 3.5 to 5.

We missed Denise and Carla G., who were vacationing, and Lou who had other business to attend to.

April's book club was at Lis' home. She graciously switched with Janie who had a weekend warriors fiasco at her home and needed to reschedule for May. We had to switch our April book, Twin Motives, to May also because the local authors had a conflict and couldn't attend. We're looking forward to this event.

Lis' made a savory Schinkennudeln, which is egg noodles, ham and sharp white cheese. Barb brought a scrumptious salad, and there were brownies, cream puffs, toffee, wine and coffee and Lis' world famous Pfannkuchen mit Apfelmus or Applesauce Crepes. To top the evening off a gorgeous night sky, illuminated by the full moon and brilliant stars, greeted us for the ride home . I'm not sure why a big luminous rock in the sky is so romantic, but it gets to me every time!

Monday, March 16, 2009

March Book Club

March book club was held at Denise's. We missed Darby and Terry. As always the food was stupendous. I think we may be running out of words to describe all of our wonderful meals. The food is always as varied as the books we read. For appetizers we had a shrimp cocktail and Diana brought two cheeses, the Pecoroni Truffaleto and an aged Gouda with walnuts whose pungent flavors melded wonderly with her olives. For the main course, Denise made a tasty pasta and white bean dish drizzled with olive oil and rosemary. Garlic bread, two salads (one by Lis and one by me) rounded out the meal. Carla and Pam brought the chocolate mousse cake made famous by La Baguette, Janie brought gorgeous chocolate covered strawberries, there were also brownies and cookies. As always, Arnora brought the floral arrangment. The usual assorted wines and coffee topped it all off.

The book, Interpreter of Maladies received somewhat mixed reviews. This was a Pulitzer Prize winning book and is a collection of 9 short stories. The title put a few of us off initially after reading, or attempting to read The Hour I First Believed. And, with short stories you have to put on the brakes and adapt your reading style as well as your expectations. There isn't time for much character development and often the stories seemed to end abruptly. Some of the girls felt they wanted more closure. The stories were little snapshots of immigrants from India living in Amercia. Stories of how they were adapting, or not, to American life but they were also stories of people going through painful circumstances that anyone in any culture would be faced with. Lou pointed out that the stories were about how, in spite of cultural differences, we are more alike than different. Some thought the stories too sad and others were satisfied with how well written they were.

Our local authors have a conflict with our April meeting so Twin Motives has been moved to May and we opted for a book we hope will be humorous; A Girl Called Zippy.

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2015 Hosts and Books

Jan 9 - Pam Boeck - All the Light We Cannot See
Feb 6 - Lou Christian - Alif the Unseen
March 6 - Terry Cummings - Kind of Kin
April 3 - Janie Tisdale - The Girl on the Train
May 1 - Arnora Parish - The Stolen Child
Jun 5 - Barb Barrow - The Elephant Whisperer
July 10 - Diana Beal - Lone Wolf
Aug 7 - Denise McGough - The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry
Sept 11 - Sherrie Phillips - H is for Hawk
Oct 2 - Arnora Parish - The Boy Who Drew Monsters
Nov 6 - Sherrie Phillips
Dec - Laura Madden - A Child's Christmas in Wales & Christmas Day in the Morning

The Honey Tree - Mary Oliver

And so at last I climbed

the honey tree, ate

chunks of pure light, ate

the bodies of bees that could not

get out of my way, ate

the dark hair of the leaves,

the rippling bark,

the heartwood. Such

frenzy! But joy does that,

I'm told, in the beginning.

Later, maybe,

I'll come here only

sometimes and with a

middling hunger. But now

I climb like a snake

I clamber like a bear to

the nuzzling place, to the light

salvaged by the thighs

of bees and racked up

in the body of the tree.

Oh, anyone can see

how I love myself at last!

how I love the world! climbing

by day or night

in the wind, in the leaves, kneeling

at the secret rip, the cords

of my body stretching

and singing in the

heaven of appetite.

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Lis and Diana's Review of Isaac's Storm

Lis said: This book centers around the devastating hurricane that hit Galveston, Texas, in 1901 and is blamed for the death of over 4500 people. Although the story wasn't a page-turner for most, it was full of interesting historical and scientific data while building up to describing accounts of the devastation and aftermath that the storm created. In my opinion, it is debatable whether the book should be considered a true fiction or a non-fiction. Hand in hand with the storm description, the book tells about the creation of the National Weather Service and the struggle that the organization went through to earn the people's trust. When looking back over the disaster, the author identifies areas of misuse and false pride - in the bureaucratic sector as well as the people's personal lives - that, if it had been overcome, might have averted some of the lost lives. Building up to the storm, the author touches on many historical facts surrounding the era, such as the state of Arkansas passing legislation a few decades earlier to legalize the proper pronunciation of its name to be "Arkansaw." Into this background, the author creates the characters that he was able to find in his research that made up the early Weather Service and some of the residence of Galveston, their spouses and children, making us shiver with dread over successful and unsuccessful rescue efforts. After bringing to life the unimaginable aftermath, with whole neighborhoods destroyed and bodies at every step, the book concludes with Galveston's recovery and a large chapter of Acknowledgements for the extensive support and research that the author relied on. I for one enjoyed the book immensely and, after the first third, found it difficult to put down till the end. Elisabeth Too many people put off something that brings them joy just because they haven't thought about it, don't have it on their schedule, didn't know it was coming or are too rigid to depart from their routine. I got to thinking one day about all those women on the Titanic who passed up dessert at dinner that fateful night in an effort to cut back. From then on, I've tried to be a little more flexible.

Diana said: The old saying, "hind sight is 20/20" comes to mind while reading the hurricane account of Galveston, Texas in 1901. Author Eric Larson's story reminded me of his first book we read, Devil in the White City, as he combined historical facts and real people while piecing together a plausible tale of personalities and lives. I have huge respect for writing historical fiction, as the writer not only has to devise an interesting story but also works as an investigator and researcher in the process. The first third of the story was slow and at times I found myself skimming the pages waiting for action. I think this may have been purposeful by Larson. As a reader I was going about my daily business and uninvolved like the townspeople of Galveston noting the changing winds and heading off to work. I took occasional notice of Isaac's trip to the American west by stage and his appearance as a "dandy", the use of telegraph as the primary form of communication from on location to another and it was surprising to find out the American and Cuban weather men held so little regard for each other. Americans found the Cuban forecasters primitive, romantic and unreliable. But once the hurricane was upon Galveston, I was spellbound for the remainder of the book. With the exception of once when I had to put the story down due to the brutal descriptions of decaying bodies which I found overwhelming. For me the story telling mimicked the event itself. Galveston and the rest of the U.S. were going along with business as usual, and then wham! A hurricane the magnitude no one expected or had experienced before bursts forth with action and drama and left no one untouched including me.

Lis' review of A Thousand Splendid Suns

The story playing in Afghanistan made it another compelling read and a walk through a different culture, very foreign to most of us. I had the fortune to have also read the book The Kite Runner by the same author and found that the two stories make great companion books, almost a must-read duo. Our month's selection takes us into the Arabic culture through the life of two women, one of them a servant girl's bastard child - and yes, I used the old fashioned term for illegitimate child on purpose to stay with the tone of the novel. The other woman is depicted as a well-educated, emancipated young woman from a progressive, westernized family. Through the turmoils surrounding Afghanistan's recent 30-year history, their lives intertwine with the same abusive husband and their attempt to deal with the changes brought on by the Russian occupation, the takeover of the Mujahedin and, eventually, the Taliban. The companion book, The Kite Runner, deals with the same political and social upheavals in Afghanistan but is told through the life of a man and his very devoted male servant. A Thousand Splendid Suns evoked a lot of emotion for most of us, feeling comfortable as well educated American women that have rights and can expect a certain social standing that greatly exceeds the animal-like treatment of our female Afghan counterparts under Taliban rule. Needless to say, we had a lively discussion about Afghanistan's troubles, the interactions of both women's parents' influences, their different upbringing, and how it made them relate to each other. We found similarities to the book Shanturam in this author's use of the cinema, especially Bollywood movies. One thing we did not discuss though that I found enticing, was the advantages of being able to skip hair and make-up treatments through the use of a Burka! Blue was, after all, the favored color of my youth, although I always preferred much darker shades. What do you think, ladies, Burkas in our future?