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Saint Paul Book Group |
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Book Group folks have fun Book Group folks are smart and articulate Some Book Group folks have been know to have a glass of fine wine at the meetings |
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| Meetings are held on the third Sunday of
the month in the ESSE room at the church from 7:00PM to 9:00PM.
Everyone is welcome. Spirited discussions are the usual fare for
the evening along with refreshments. Each month reviews of the book chosen for that month will be posted. Book Group meets in January, February, March, April, May, June, August, September, October and then in November we will again pick the books we want to discuss for the following year. |
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FLASH !!! BOOKS CHOSEN FOR THE 2008 SEASON
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January — The Poe Shadow by Matthew Pearl A compelling thriller centered on the mysterious end of Edgar Allan Poe, who perished in Baltimore in 1849 in a mysterious fashion.. In this work of fiction a young idealistic attorney, Quentin Clark, finds himself obsessed with rescuing Poe’s reputation amid rumors that the writer died from an excess of drink. He risks his legal practice and his engagement to solve the mystery. Learning that Poe’s legendary master sleuth, the Chevalier August Dupin, was modeled after a real person, Clark journeys to Paris in the hopes that finding the real detective can help him solve the puzzle of Poe’s death. Pearl masterfully combines fact with fiction and presents some genuinely new historical clues that help reconstruct Poe’s final days. February — The Blue Clay People: Seasons on Africa’s Fragile Edge by William Powers When William Powers, fresh out a Ph.D. program in international relations, went to Liberia in 1999, he was given the mandate to"fight poverty and save the rain forest." He faced a daunting task. Liberia had just begun to emerge from seven years of civil war and was environmentally looted, violence scarred, and barely governed. Cities lacked electricity, running water and postal service; garbage lay in the streets, schoolteachers were barely literate and the economy worked largely on bribes. The government of Charles Taylor enriched itself through illicit trade in conflict diamonds, protected forests and weapons, while terrorist militias acted as they pleased. Powers hoped to help the Liberian people by giving them not handouts but by helping them sustain themselves. Even as Powers became disillusioned with his fellow aid workers and the people he was trying to help, he persisted in his efforts and his optimism. His memoir is a haunting account of one man’s determination and the struggles of people living in a deeply troubled country. March -- Water for Elephants by Sarah Gruen Life is good for Jacob Jankowski. He's about to graduate from veterinary school. Then his parents are killed in a car crash, leaving him in the middle of the Great Depression with no home, no family, and no career. Almost by accident, Jacob joins the circus. There he falls in love with the beautiful performer Marlena, who is married to the circus' psychotic animal trainer. He also meets the other love of his life, Rosie the elephant. This lushly romantic novel travels back in forth in time between Jacob's present day in a nursing home and his adventures in the surprisingly harsh world of 1930s circuses. The ending of both stories is a little too cheerful to be believed, but just like a circus, the magic of the story and the writing convince you to suspend your disbelief. The book is partially based on real circus stories and illustrated with historical circus photographs. April -- A Thousand Splendid Suns Khaled Hosseini’s first book, The Kite Runner, was a favorite with last year’s book group members. His newestbook, "A Thousand Splendid Suns," is predicted to be another favorite this year. The book covers three decades of anti-Soviet jihad, civil war and Taliban tyranny through the lives of two women. Mariam is the scorned illegitimate daughter of a wealthy business man, forced at age 15 to marry a forty-year-old man, Rasheed, who becomes increasingly violent as she fails to become pregnant. Eighteen years later he takes another wife, 14-yearold Laila, whose educated parents were killed by rocket fire. Laila's only other choices are prostitution or starvation. The two women become allies in their uneven battle with Rasheed, whose brutal conduct is endorsed bycustom and law. Hosseini gives voice to two women trying to survive in a despotic household while caught up in a war. This is not an easy feat for a male writer but he successfully evokes his female characters' inner life. While his tale is a powerful, harrowing depiction of Afghanistan, it is also a lyrical story of the lives and the enduring hopes of its resilient characters. May -- The Zookeeper's Wife by Diane Ackeman The author has written a book based on a true story that is alternately funny, moving and terrifying. The story takes place in Poland where Jan and Antonina Zabinski are the keepers of the Warsaw Zoo. The life they love however, is changed after the Nazi blitzkrieg and occupation. They shelter Jews from the Warsaw ghetto, as well as Polish resisters, in their villa and in animal cages and sheds. Ackeman describes the 1943 Jewish uprising and the Poles' revolt against the Nazi occupiers in 1944. She introduces us to a varied group of characters: Lutz Heck, the duplicitous head of the Berlin Zoo; Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, spiritual head of the ghetto. the leaders of Zegota, the Polis organization the rescued Jews; and Dr. Mada Walter, who helped many Jews to appear Aryan. June -- Cellophane by Marie Arana. Don Victor Sorbrevilla, a lovable eccentric engineer, fulfills his dream by successfully founding a paper factory in the heart of the Peruvian rain forest. There he builds a comfortable life for himself and his quirky family but still a life filled with signs and portents. But when he discovers the recipe for cellophane a new era pf plagues begins for Don Victor: a hilarious plague if truth, an erotically charged plague of desire, and a sinister plague of revolution. Love lives are toppled, new romances are started, and Don Victor is finally forced to weigh the price of pursuing a dream to its final conclusion. This a memorable fiction, rich in themes, symbolisn, conflict and character. It is also just a good tale. August –- Mistress in the Art of Death by Arianna Franklin An historical mystery set in early 12th-century England with a romantic subplot. Four children have been found dead and mutilated in Cambridge for which the Jews have been blamed. Because he needs them the king, Henry II, protects the Jews and sends to Sicily for a master in the art of death to find the murderer. But it is a mistress plus her two companions who arrive with a band of pilgrims. Adelia, the mistress, a graduate of the medical school at Salerno, finds England to be a barbarous place but at the same time she begins to know the inhabitants as real people who we can sympathize with. Though the story is set in Cambridge, the Crusades run through the culture as the author shows both the corruption and idealistic faith of the period. While the Jews come off best, the Christians and Muslims are portrayed with evenhanded understanding. Franklin has written a terrific story with satisfactory conclusions to this novel about all-too-human beings. September -- With Their Backs to the World: Portraits from Serbia by Asne Seierstad.
After
covering the 1999 NATO air strikes in Yugoslavia, Norwegian journalist
Seierstad, found herself wondering about the Serbs—a
"people that started one war after another, and lost them
all." In 2000, she returned to explore the lives of thirteen
Serbians. This book
is a collection of decidedly journalistic pieces that expose the
many sides of Serbian life before, during, and after the fall of
Slobodan Milosevic's corrupt totalitarian regime. Seierstad puts a human
face on the myriad troubles the Serbian people have endured as well as
propagated, and like all outstanding journalism, the stories are
powerful enough on their own without any proselytizing on the part of
the author. The thirteen Serbians include the famous (former Prime
Minister Zoran Zivkovic) but not surprisingly they are
eclipsed by the more compelling farmers and mothers and even criminals
who are the most unhesitant in offering their opinions and sharing their
griefs. What results is a kaleidoscopic view of the events and
personages that caused the downturn and dissolution of Yugoslavia,
eventually transforming the Serbs into the self-described "pariahs
of Europe." This
15-part harmony is fascinating reading for anyone wishing to uncover the
stark humanity hiding beneath one of the world's most troubled and
confused regions.
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