Book club titles for busy moms

My friend wrote me and asked:

Since I know you're in multiple book clubs and get to read books as part of your job description, I was wondering if you could recommend any titles for a new book club. This group will consist of moms who are looking for some adult conversation and mental stimulation (but also don't have an over-abundance of time). We are primarily interested in fiction, but an engaging non-fiction title would do. Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

Here are some suggestions for Kristin and my thoughts:

Title	Author	My thoughts
The Invention of Wings	Kidd, Sue Monk	Author of The Secret Life of Bees; about the Grimke sisters (abolition and female rights)
A History of the World in Six Glasses	Standage, Tom	A new favorite. Nonfiction. Maybe too serious for your group.
The Rosie Project	Simsion, Graeme	Lighthearted. Popular book today. Be sure to watch the Bill Gates video.
The Light Between Oceans	Steadman, M.L.	Pretty serious book. A decision that changes everything.
Whistling Season	Doig, Ivan	I love this book. About one-room school house. You would love this book, Kristin. Set in Montana in 1910.
Language of Flowers	Diffenbaugh, Vanessa	The gals in my club REALLY got in to this book. Based on the Victorian tradition of assigning meaning to different flowers.
Wild	Strayed, Cheryl	If everyone has seen the movie, skip this one, if not it is a good discussion book. Memoir.
Wonder	Palacio, RJ	A junior book. About acceptance and friendship.
Half Broke Horses:  A True Life Novel	Walls, Jeannette	Based on the life of Jeannette Walls grandmother. She was a character.
Saving CeeCee Honeycutt	Hoffman, Beth	If family fails you redefine family as those women who do love and accept you.
Paris Wife	McLain, Paula	A fictional account of Hemingway’s first wife; based on real events.
Physick Book of  Deliverance Dane	Howe, Katherine	Salem/Witches past and present. I enjoyed the look back at our history.
Sarah's Key	De Rosnay, Tatiana	Set in France during Nazi occupation. A shameful event in history that has just recently come to light. Shocking.
Still Alice	Genova, Lisa	If your group are all young moms this book might not speak to them the way it did in my group; about early onset Alzheimer.
Housekeeper and the Professor	Ogura, Yoko	The math professor has an 80 second memory the housekeeper has to reintroduce herself every day yet they forge a friendship. Short and lots to discuss. (I even learned a little math.)
Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks	Skloot, Rebecca	I wouldn't start with this book but it is a treasure trove of information to discuss about medical ethics. Nonfiction.
Shanghai Girls	See, Lisa	Set in both Shanghai and in California. This would be an excellent book to start with; lots to discuss.
A Northern Light	Donnelly, Jennifer	YA; based on a real event from history; a mystery.
Esperanza Rising	Munoz, Pam	Junior; lots to discuss about cultural difference, migrant workers, poverty
City of Thieves	Benioff, David	Set in Russia during WWII about the siege of Leningrad; horrifying and yet humorous.
The Art of Racing in the Rain	Stein, Garth	Set in Seattle, narrator is a dog
The Shack	Young, William P.	If you have Christian gals in your group, do this book sometime. We loved it.
The Thirteenth Tale	Setterfield, Diane	A mystery with plenty of twists and turns.

Some of my favorite books aren't good book club selections because there is nothing to discuss or debate. The Rosie Project appeared to be one of those book but we did find quite a bit to discuss.

Have fun. Keep me posted.

Classics Club Spin #9 starts today!

The Classics Club Lucky spin number is 2.  Looking down my list, I will be reading:

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins.

I've learned a little about this book today. The Woman in White was serialized in Charles Dickens' weekly magazine, All the Year Round, from November 1859 to August 1860. It caused a sensation right from the first installment. It has been described as the first sensation novel and one of the first detective novels. Victorian readers loved it! It was so popular that other products were named after it such as "The Woman in White" perfume and other toiletries, even "Woman in White" bonnets and cloaks.

I am excited to jump in and start this classic book because it appears to be an exciting story which has stood the test of time. Wilkie himself said "...the primary object of a work of fiction should be to tell a story." I am ready to begin.

My plan is to complete the book by or before May 15th.  The version of the book I have is 609 pages so I will need to read an average of 120 pages a week. I also checked out the audiobook from my public library so I can utilize my commuting time as listening to "The Woman in White" time. I'm a little nervous that I will find this challenge to be challenging. But here I go... off to read my first chapter.

April is National Poetry Month

www.Poets.org

Celebrate your life by reading and reciting poetry this April, National Poetry Month.

Suggestions:

1. Pull out your old box of sidewalk chalk and chalk a poem on your driveway. Pick a shot one!

2. Copy off a favorite poems and carry it with you wherever you go in your pocket. Read it aloud to anyone who will listen.

3. Slip a poem in your children's lunch boxes for them to discover at lunch time. I suggest a silly poem.

4. Find a sexy poem that speaks to you. Read it aloud to your spouse at bedtime. Or better yet, ask him/her to read it aloud to you.

5. Go to your public library and check out a volume of poetry peruse it for a new favorite. Hint: poetry is shelved in the 800s in libraries using the Dewey Decimal system.

6. Attempt to write a concrete or shape poem. Don't worry about making it rhyme.

7. Memorize a poem this month then you will always have it with you.

8. If you are a blogger, dedicate one blog this month to poetry or include a poem in one of your blog posts. I dare you!

9. Reread a poem that you remember from your childhood. Take a moment to walk down memory lane in your mind.

10. Write a haiku. Remember the syllable count is 5-7-5.

Here is my attempt---

I write a haiku

to honor poetry month

in my heart today!

11. Visit www.Poets.Org for more ideas. If you are a teacher, there are even terrific lesson ideas.

"Poetry causes us to slow down, to take time to pause." 

----Naomi Shihab Nye

Sunday Salon, April 5th. Happy Easter!

Happy Easter!

Weather: lovely!

Easter: Today is a celebration in church, the holiest of all holidays in the Christian church. Afterwards we are hosting a dinner for family and friends here. Our meal will be very unconventional: salmon, potatoes, asparagus, pineapple, and carrot cake. Do you celebrate Easter? What do you usually eat?

Spring Break: It was a short but relaxing week. The highlight was the trip to the northern part of the start for a few nights stay at Birch Bay and  a visit to the tulip fields in full bloom. Amazingly, we live less than two hours from this part of our state but the last time we visited the tulip festival was in 2001. I don't think we will wait so long to visit it again.

Photo by Don Bennett, all rights reserved.

40-Bags-in-40-days: Mission accomplished. We bagged up 42 bags during the forty days of Lent! This week we attacked the linen closet and bagged up five bags of old sheets (mostly top sheets), towels, and old pillows. I also sorted through my old t-shirts and Carly bagged up some old jeans. Wow. I can't tell you how good it feels to be done with that old junk. I recommend it.

Books completed this week:

• All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
• Strong is Your Hold by Galway Kinnell
• Emily, Alone by Stewart O'Nan
• The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Books I'm reading:

• The Carnival at Bray by Jessie Ann Foley (55% completed)
• The Martian by Andy Weir (60% complete audiobook)
• The Neverending Story  by Michael Ende (20% complete audiobook)

Movies watched this week:

• Unbroken---About Louis Zamperini a true American hero (2014)
• The Theory of Everything---about the life of Stephen Hawking (2014)
• Mrs. Henderson Presents---based on a true story (2005)
• Extract---a quirky film starring Jason Bateman (2009)
• My Old Lady---starring Kevin Kline (2014)

From the kitchen: Apple Carrot Cake. I'll give you an update later as to how it is received.

Prayers for: our neighbor who is in the hospital with an infection. He has a very weak heart and any infection can be deadly. For Sheila at Book Journey, a blogging friend, who lost her son to a car accident on Saturday. Also for a gal in our church, Marie, who lost her mother this past week.

In the garden: we dug up a lilac bush which was barely alive and planted a purple azalea in its place. It felt good to be outdoors working in the dirt.

Have a lovely day! Blessings on you and your family today.

The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

When I was in high school I read the classic book, The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery. I reread it today. I loved it then. I loved it again today.

It is billed as a children's classic but I'd say it for children of all ages.

It starts with a wonderful dedication page which sets up the book as one dedicated to children and adults who can still appreciate child-like things:

TO LEON WERTH. I ask children to forgive me for dedicating the book to a grown-up. I have a serious excuse: this grown-up is the best friend I have in the world. I have another excuse: this grown-up can understand everything, even books for children. I have a third excuse: he lives in France where he is hungry and cold. He needs to be comforted. If all these excuses are not enough, then I want to dedicate this book to the child whom this grown-up once was. All grown-ups were children first. (bet few of them remember it.) So I correct my dedication: TO LEON WERTH, when he was a little boy.

I started out listening to the audiobook but the illustrations were referenced so I had to grab the print edition to look at them. The book is full of charming illustrations like this:

All illustrations were done by Saint-Exupery himself. 

It is a darling story about the importance of friendship and the problems with narrow-mindedness full of memorable quotes.

“A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.” 

“Well, I must endure the presence of a few caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies.” 

“The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or touched, they are felt with the heart.” 

The book is a mere 83 pages long. Take an hour or so and immerse yourself in this wonderful tale.

Rating 5/5

Friday Quotes, April 3rd

Book Beginnings on Friday is hosted by Rose City Reader. 
The Friday 56 is hosted at Freda's Voice. 

Check out the links for the rules and for the posts of the participants each week. Participants don't select their favorite, coolest or most intellectual books, they just use the one they are currently reading. This is the book I'm reading right now:

Book Title: The Martian by Andy Weir

Book Beginning: 

I'm pretty much fucked. That is my considered opinion. Fucked. Six days into what should be the greatest month of my life, and it's turned into a nightmare.

Friday 56: 

"One thing at a time," Teddy said. "Venk, what makes you sure he's alive?"

My comments: Mark Watney gets abandoned on Mars by his team who think he is dead. He isn't. But how does he survive until someone on earth can rescue him? I am enjoying this book which is stuffed full of accurate science. My husband and I are sharing the experience by listening to the audiobook together.

Bookish (and not so bookish) thoughts---April 1st.

1. I've been contemplating closing my blog----*April Fools!
There, now I can say I pulled a prank on someone. I am definitely not closing my blog.

2. My goal is to read four books this Spring Break and I may or may not make this goal, depending on how you look at it.

• All the Bright Places by Jennifer Nevin---I finished this book last Saturday morning, so technically I finished it during Spring Break but I only had about thirty pages to go. (.10)
• Emily, Alone by Stewart O'Nan---I started this book Saturday and finished it this morning, so this is a full book. (1)
• Strong is Your Hand by Galway Kinnell---a small volume of poetry, only 66 pages. Can I count this as a full book? Why not? (1)
• The Martian by Andy Weir---audiobook. My husband and I listened to about 60% of this audiobook on our vacation. He is back to work so it makes sense to let him finish the book as he commutes to and from his job each day. (.60)
• It makes sense to me, to reach my goal all I have to do is read 30% of another book. But that isn't my goal to FINISH four books. Sigh.

3. I've watched two fantastic movies this week, The Book Thief and Mrs. Henderson Presents. I loved The Book Thief book so it doesn't surprise me that I would love the movie. Judy Dench starred in the other film. She is just something else. So talented.

4. I bought this little gadget yesterday, an egg topper, or egg scissors, designed to cut the top off of soft boiled eggs so the eggs can be eaten without burning your fingers. I haven't used it yet.

5. The weather has been stormy today after a glorious day yesterday at the tulip fields two hours north of here. Can you believe how gorgeous the flowers are?

6. Easter is this week-end and I just invited family and friends for dinner today. Gulp. Talk about last minute planning.

Classics Spin #9

I am participating in The Classics Club #9 spin.

Rules: List 20 Classic titles you'd like to read, include a few you're a bit nervous or scared to read.
Label them 1-20. After April 6th, when the spin occurs, read the book that matches the title on that number.

Last time I participated I identified the book I really didn't want to read.  That was the selected book, of course. This time I am not going to jinx myself.

Join me, if you dare.  Create your own list of 20 classic titles or use my list.

1. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Hurston
2. The Woman in White by Collins
3. The Name of the Rose by  Umberto
4. Invisible Man by Ellison
5. Anne of Avonlea by Montgomery
6. The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Christie
7. Candide by Voltaire
8. Middlemarch by Eliot
9. The Trial by Kafka
10. Dune by Herbert
11. Wild Sargasso Sea by Rhys
12. As I Lay Dying by Faulkner
13. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Wilde
14. Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Hardy
15. East of Eden by Steinbeck
16. A Tale of Two Cities by Dickens
17. Grapes of Wrath by Steinbeck
18. To the Lighthouse by Woolf
19. Portrait of a Lady by James
20. Herzog by Bellow

A day of tulips near La Conner, Washington

Snapshot Saturday is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads.

After leaving Birch Bay, Don and I drove south through La Conner, Washington hoping to find a tulip field in bloom. We were worried about the weather because the reports said it would rain, even with the possibility of a thunderstorm. We totally lucked out. The weather was sunny, though a bit cold and windy and the tulips were in bloom. Oh boy, were they in bloom. Check out a few of our photos. They don't do justice to gorgeous colors and the whole experience.

This artist was setting up his easel just as we were parking the car. After making our way around the whole field we returned to our car and couldn't believe his progress on the painting. Amazing.

All of the photos (except one) were taken by my husband, Don Bennett. The only exception is the photo of him, taken by me. All rights reserved.

Review: All the Bright Places by Jennifer Nevin

Violet and Finch meet atop the school's bell tower. Both of them were contemplating suicide and the presence of the other saved both of them. Violet, a popular girl, was very depressed and had isolated herself after the accident that killed her sister. Finch, a misfit, did outrageous things that equally repelled and intrigued others. They each weren't sure that life was worth living but both desperately wanted it to be. When they became partners in the Geography class assignment to discover Indiana, they both jumped in with both feet. They set about to discover the oddest, most quirky places and things in Indiana and in the process to find themselves. The problem, however, is that doing fun, quirky things doesn't necessarily change the chemistry of the brain and suicide remained a real threat.

Not wanting to spoil this book for future readers I really can't say more about the plot, so let me talk about a few things this book caused me to think about.


1. Teen suicide---years ago I attended a workshop on the topic. I was horrified to learn about how common suicide ideation is. But because it is so common, it is alright to broach the subject with the depressed teen. "Are you thinking about killing yourself?" is an appropriate question. If the answer is yes, then subsequent questions can get at the immediacy and urgency. The adults in this book pretty much dropped the ball in this respect.

2. Suicide and school---over the years I've known a few students who have completed suicide and then the school officials are up against a tough decision of how to respond. If they don't do anything students are left with no outlet for their pain and grief. If they do something like an assembly to memorialize the person then some students in the crowd may think if they kill themselves they too will get all this attention. Of course that is warped thinking, but if a person is depressed their thinking may not be very clear. I remember years ago a student's friends planted a tree on campus after the death of their friend. Then they and other students would skip class and hang out at the tree, smoking pot and crying. It was extremely unhealthy and not a good idea.

3. Adults, get the help you need so that you can be good parents to your children---after reading All the Bright Places I commented to my daughter, who volunteers at a crisis hotline, how disturbing it was that the parents just ignored their children. She replied, "You'd be surprised how common that is." Sad.

4. If reading this book causes alarm, open a dialogue with a trusted adult. If that adult drops the ball, find someone else who can help you. Don't give up!

5. Cool assignment---I loved the idea of Discover Indiana for an assignment. Violet and Finch found some really funky things as they ventured out: a huge paint ball, a cluster of bookmobiles with free checkouts, a poetry point. They didn't go for the usual stuff. That got me thinking, what weird, quirky things could I find in Washington State if I was looking?

6. A quote from the book, not all the book is sad and it doesn't just focus on suicide---

“I learned that there is good in this world, if you look hard enough for it. I learned that not everyone is disappointing, including me, and that a 1,257 bump in the ground can feel higher than a bell tower if you’re standing next to the right person.” ― Jennifer Niven, All the Bright Places 

7. Apparently the book has already been optioned for a movie and the cast has been selected. Read it quick! (Germ Magazine.)

8. Germ Magazine, inspired by the book, is now a REAL magazine on-line where teens can go to discover real life. Check it out!!!!!

Rating 5/5

I reviewed an ARC of the book given to me by a third party.