Book Club: What are you reading?

[Virginia]

I am now reading a book - YEA! It is a spy thriller to keep my mind off the itching. It is by one of my favorite authors of spy thrillers. As a side note Newt Gingrich also likes this author a lot. The one and only thing he and I have in common.

[agate]

I wonder what that author's name is. I know of John Le Carré, and I'm not sure Newt Gingrich would like him. I can't think of any others just now...

[Virginia]

Agate, it is Daniel Silva. One series that he has written has as the hero Gabriel Allon. I am reading the latest in that series. I am sure Newt has already read it, since I have had it since before I had to take an enforced break from reading. It is good to be back at it.

[Lazarus]

“Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine” by Gail Honeyman
Oh my gosh I am enjoying this book. I am listening to it on audible and the person reading it is great.

Eleanor is a character who is just great....wound up tight in a straightjacket of life’s damaging events Eleanor really seems like a babe in the woods of life. This is a serious book that is very funny!

[Virginia]

I got an e-mail that The Killing of a President by James Patterson and Bill Clinton was on sale at Amazon, so I ordered it and got it on my kindle. When I get through with the one I've got I will read it. I think it was a neighbor who told me it was page turner. I usually do not get James Patterson books anymore. Since he started co-writing them I do not enjoy them, but this person said this one was different. She said probably due to Clinton knowing so much about the subject.

I'll let everyone know when I find out.

The book that Linda just mentioned sounds interesting.

[agate]

If anybody else has been voting in the "Great American Read" (PBS), the results will be given tomorrow night on PBS:

Only registered and activated users can see links., Click Here To Register...

There was a list of 100 books, and you had a chance to vote for the ones you thought should be considered great books. I voted most days.

[Lazarus]

I voted. But it was a long time ago...not sure what I voted for!

[agate]

Well, 5 of the books I was voting for came in among the top 10, but another 5 ranked in the 70s and 80s. Another way of looking at it--12 of the books I voted for were among the top 50.

Here are the results. How many of the books have you read?

Only registered and activated users can see links., Click Here To Register...

[Virginia]

Neighbor dropped off a book for the book club. Just from looking at the outside I am looking forward to it. I have not done any research on it. The name of the book is The Second Mrs. Hockaday by Susan Rivers. It says it is "taut, almost unbearable suspense". It is a historical novel, mixed with suspense and also a love story I think.

[agate]

I certainly hope you can bear the unbearable suspense, Virginia!

[Virginia]

Well, I have already finished my book The Second Mrs. Hockaday. It was outstanding. I did not want to put it down. I started it last night, so stayed up a little late and then after cleaning a little today started in on it again today.

Though set in the Civil War period it was not about the war. It was about a very young bride who's husband was away fighting in the war. When he returns home she was accused of having given birth to a baby during his absence and arrested for killing it. It is also a love story, especially on her part, as she tries to protect him from the truth fearing he could not bear to know all that happened in his absence.

The writer is a play write and this is her first novel. It is amazing what a great book she wrote for her first time.

[Sunshine]

I finally finished the book about the murders of members of the Osage nation. What a stunning tale of genocide, greed, indifference. The good guys shine, the FBI shined.

Now I start Suspect, by Michael Robotham, a fiction detective book. The protagonist was just diagnosed with Parkinson’s, . I read another later in the series, Shattered, and liked it.

Keep on reading!

[agate]

I'm reading You're the Only One I Can Tell: Inside the Language of Women's Friendships by Deborah Tannen. She's a well-known sociolinguist and some of her books have been best-sellers. This is the first book of hers I've tried. At first it seemed like just a collection of examples of bits of conversation by women, but the author makes observations as she goes along.

For instance, she found that women who confide in one another--telling things to their friends that they wouldn't normally reveal to anyone else--sometimes expect the women they confide in to reciprocate by telling them their troubles or their secrets as well. Otherwise it seems like too much of a one-way street to them.

Some even feel betrayed. They say they don't trust women who won't open up about themselves, supply details from their personal lives as well. They don't want such women as their friends.

I've only recently realized that there are people (women mainly, I guess) who feel this way.

Some people want to escape from the worst stuff going on in their lives. They don't want to talk about it. Talking about it might make it worse, not better. Whatever their reasons, they are their reasons, and in the meantime they find some comfort in just being part of a group, offering help when they can.

I don't have a problem with this kind of participation, in any group--or on any message board--or in any group. Some people are shy, reserved, quiet. I don't understand feeling uneasy about such a person.

Deborah Tannen isn't in favor of either attitude--she's just reporting that these are the attitudes and behavior that she found.

It's an interesting book, so far.

[Sunshine]

Interesting agate!

[Lazarus]

Kitty kitamura’s -A Separation-. This is the latest Public Television book in the book club they are running. I loved it. But, it has an unusual style. I mean there is a narrator and the whole book gives us the thoughts she has as she travels to Greece to where her philandering husband is researching material to use in writing a book. It is fascinating and I had no trouble finding a lot of action in the book even though the reader is following the thoughts of the narrator as she gives us her observations. The book gives the reader a lot to think about in terms of human relationships.

Nether narrator is dealing with the unfaithful husband from whom she is separating but they had not told anyone about that decision. Then she goes to Greece where her husband is gathering information for a book he is writing. She goes there because her mother in law calls her. The husband is not responding to his cell phone. So the wife, soon to be ex wife, goes to Greece and....big shock....the reader never does meet the husband alive!