BIC book club!

[prettyinpa]

Some of us here have expressed an interest in a book club, myself, @mermadelove, @LCResz, @ZombieMetroAnt, @Mcakes. If you'd be interested in joining, reply below. My initial thought was to mail the books around but if it means that some people can't participate, then I'm all for dropping that requirement. I'd love this to be a place where we nominate our favorite book and others can read it and comment. Something fun for the new year!  ETA: the booklist:

1. Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng (16)
1. Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie (16)
3. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (13)
4. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (11)
4. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson (11)
4. Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie (11)
7. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid (10)
7. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (10)
7. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak (10) Discussion begins 8-13.
7. The Wedding Dress by Rachel Hauck (10) Discussion begin 9-2.
11. The Fault in our Stars by John Green (9) Time to discuss 9-26
11. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (9) Now discussing below.
11. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (9)
11. What Happened by Hilary Clinton (9) Now discussing below.
11. Fall of Giants by Ken Follett (9) Start reading now.
11. The Woman on the Orient Express by Lindsay Ashford (9)
11. milk and honey by Rupi Kaur (9)
18. A Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (8)
18. Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty (8)
18. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (8)
18. Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell (8)
18. Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D.H. Lawrence (8)
18. Mansfield Park by Jane Austen (8)
18. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (8)
18. The Paper Magician by Charlie Holmberg (8)
18. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien (8)
18. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo (8)
18. Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (8)
18. The White Queen by Phillipa Gregory (8)

Participants in spoiler

Spoiler

Participants:

PrettyinPA

AlexaSteph

Beadshopgirl

LCResz

Kim888

SoBeautiful

Fatimamummy

ZombieMetroAnt

PalomaFoster

k617

bakeamuffin
Susubee
Skcfan
Lazybeautybeast
SpaceLlama
greeneyedgirl107

Mermadelove
Mcakes
Aaliaa
Serenely
Myinsidevoice
MissPuff
juliehnguyen
lmi82
Knowledgebeauty
Titian06
quspork
darlyndar
KellW
misscg
EuniceO
Elles117
ClassicallyFab
ShiraBT
melanito
Heylady14
ChicagoEngineer
Imightneedthis
PrettyPaint
rachface2921

[mermadelove]

@quspork Agree!Agree!Agree! And Mrs. Richardson came to that conclusion herself when she was thinking of IZzy and having 'lost' her-- reflecting on maybe the reason why she rode her so hard was because she WAS her at that age, but Izzy made the decision to 'stay different.' If how I'm wording this makes any sense at all! 

[prettyinpa]

@mermadelove-   Yeah, I wondered too about why Elana rode Izzy so hard. In my experience, mothers who have had difficulty with a child's health tend to over protect them rather than push them away. Definitely a part of the story that I didn't get.

[Beadshopgirl]

To me it made sense. She loved Izzy with such a passion that it frightened her, and she was unable to handle that level of emotion. I’m pretty sure she would have had undiagnosed post partum depression and anxiety, which would explain her subjugating her love for her daughter out of fear, and her lashing out. 

[mermadelove]

@Beadshopgirl  Oh, yes!! That is an excellent point! I totally forgot the post partum angle but that is really accurate!!! 

[mermadelove]

@prettyinpa It made way more sense to me at the end when Mrs. Richardson was reflecting on how she was as a youth, *before* she gave up on all of her dreams. A lot of it came through in her ‘resentment’ at her job- not the journalistic success she anticipated for herself.  And the fact that she sees Izzy NOT ‘caving’ whee she did makes her resentful of Izzy— especially after all the ‘trouble “ her pregnancy and birth caused her. NOt logical, but more understandable after that was written into the story. At least for me, Otherwise I was like “WHY are ou so mean to her?!” 

[quspork]

@mermadelove I absolutely get what your saying! Elena and Izzy's relationship is such a mirror for the relationship between Elena and Mia. 

[mermadelove]

Yes! Exactly @quspork! Thanks for translating my 6am!

[Lazybeautybeast]

I also found Mrs. Richardson's anger fascinating. Mia was so different from Mrs. Richardson and therefore, in a sense, challenged everything Mrs. Richardson stood for. Mia also hurt her friend and I got the sense that there may have also been some jealousy of Mia's relationship with her children. But even given all that, I feel like I was missing a larger motive. This extended to the depths Mrs. Richardson went to investigating Mia's past. I got the sense early on that Mrs. Richardson was gathering the info for later use.  Digging up dirt, if you will. The motivation just didn't add up for me. 

[mermadelove]

@PrettyPaint I actually loved that aspect of the book and felt like it reminded me of so many people I’ve met and tried to stay away from. Lol! But it also was very relatable because I think everyone has had those moments in their lives!

[Beadshopgirl]

I really enjoyed the writing; some of the descriptions of motherhood brought me to tears. I was disappointed with the ending. It felt rushed and left me with so many questions. 

[Lazybeautybeast]

I felt the same way! I loved the writing style. I found it easy to read and enjoyable....until the end. The last chapter or so fell flat for me. I think I would have stopped it shortly after the Richardson's found the portraits.

[heylady14]

I agree! I enjoyed the book and thought it flowed well until the end. It sort of felt rushed and inconsistent with the rest of the story/writing. I wonder if it will get modified as this gets translated for film/TV.

[tsavorite]

To add some balance to this discussion:

I hate to say anything critical about the way the book was written, but, here goes. There was one little thing that I thought was a little "off" for me in the writing of the book.  When the mother and daughter left town at the end, that she had prepared an artistic souvenir for each person in the family, in advance of their leaving, that was perfectly meaningful for each person, seemed to me too much a device of the author, and took me out of the story to wonder at it.  I don't expect anyone to agree with me, but this caught my attention.

[skcfan]

@tsavorite I might be remembering incorrectly, but wasn’t Mrs Richardson insistent that Mia take family portraits for them, and Mia made a remark about something like people not liking how she portrayed them. I assumed that the gifts were the “portraits” that Elena was kinda begging for, so Mia worked on them a bit before the move.

[tsavorite]

@skcfan,

You are probably right!  I have forgotten.  I will have to see if I can find that passage.  That would set a better background for the personal artwork that Mia gave each of them.   I think that would make me feel somewhat better about reason for the gifts.

[PrettyPaint]

@tsavorite I did question this addition as well. It didn’t seem entirely true to Mia’s character to me (by leaving the gifts, she seemed to be passing a bit more judgment than I would have thought based on other parts of the novel). It seemed more planned and formulated than I would have expected, particularly given the urgency of their departure at the end. In some ways, I think I may have understood the gifts a bit more if additional context and detail about the photos and her perspective were provided.

[tsavorite]

@PrettyPaint,

That's exactly what I thought about the gifts.

[tsavorite]

I really enjoyed this book as well.  I found it easy to get into and easy to read because it was interesting.  I will be looking into the other book by this author.  I also liked the way we were shown so many characters' points of view.  On my own, without this Book Club, I might not have picked this book to read, but once I started reading it, I would not have put it down.  I have been glad to recommend this book to friends. 

[Lazybeautybeast]

Same here. I never would have picked this book for myself but I enjoyed it. Thank you for recommending it! 

[Titian06]

@tsavorite - I love your new HOF Pusheen-itar!

I agree with what everyone else has been saying:  well written, the use of multiple points of view, interesting from the beginning, good character development, etc.  This is the first book I've read in a long time where I didn't fall asleep after a few paragraphs or pages.  I've already promised the book to two other people.  Interestingly (to me anyway), the mother of one of them grew up in Shaker Heights.

[tsavorite]

@Titian06,

Thank you! 

Have you seen that Celeste Ng also grew up in Shaker Heights?  There is a little video of an interview with her for her first book, on Amazon, "Everything That I Never Told You."