 |
|
ReadingGroupGuides.com Newsletter |
April 2004 |
|
|
|
|
|
New Features and Contests... |
 |
|
|
This newsletter arrives in your mailboxes a tad later than usual this month, but with good reason. We have added one new feature and are looking for some people to test another.
What's new is a feature called Upcoming Guides. It gives you an opportunity to look ahead at guides that will be available in the months to come. We know that this may influence some of your club's choices of books to read in upcoming months. Please note that while it is not indicated here, we are working on a guide for QUEEN NOOR as there have been many requests for it. Also, there is a guide in the works for JOHN ADAMS that should be ready by June. And we will be posting a guide for the Pulitzer Prize Winner, THE KNOWN WORLD by Edward P. Jones, shortly.
The second bit of exciting news is that we are going to start registering book clubs in May. Registered groups will be eligible for special book prizes and other offerings. We are looking for a SMALL group of people to "test" our signup page this month. Interested? Then please drop us a note by using the form on our Feedback page. A link to this is below. Please write "For the test" in the subject line. We will pick about 25 readers to test this with. Deadline: April 15th (Just like your taxes!)
Last month our poll was about some well-known reading guides. This month we take a look at 14 choices that may not be on your radar screen. We give you a couple of lines about them that you can read and see if these books would be of interest to your group. We are running a contest this month where poll respondents will be eligible to win a set of one of the books for their group (we'll select one title). Vote by April 3rd to be eligible and please be sure to include your name and mailing address when you reply to the second question.
I am reading a terrific book called DIGGING OUT that is a debut novel from Katherine Leiner. We share the guide with you this month and also are offering this book as a special contest prize. To be eligible you will need to read an excerpt and answer a question. The winner of last month's special contest for copies of THE LANGUAGE OF LIGHT by Meg Waite Clayton was Jo Blankenship.
We have added a guide that many of you requested --- THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE and we have the Today Book Club Pick, THE PHOTOGRAPH. Lots of books I have enjoyed are on the list this week, including GOOD GRIEF and THE BOOK OF JOE. Please note that we will be adding more guides next week!
Happy Easter to those of you who are celebrating this holiday. We will see you next month.
Carol Fitzgerald ([email protected]) |
Write to us here if you want to test the Register Your Group form.
|
|
|
DIGGING OUT by Katherine Leiner --- Enter Contest to Win Copies for Your Group |
Enter a Special Contest to Win Copies of DIGGING OUT by Katherine Leiner for Your Group.
When she was eight years old, Alys Davies survived a tragedy in the small Welsh town where she was born. It claimed the lives of 116 other children. It shattered the village with guilt and stunning disbelief and destroyed her family. Each sought their own private --- and devastating --- escape. For Alys it was to flee to the United States, far away from the memories, where she could rebuild her life, realize her budding career as a poet, and marry.
Now, a new tragedy unfolds in Alys's life, forcing her to face her demons. Grieving for her past, Alys decides to return to it. Step by step, she makes the long journey back home to Wales, to her dying father, to her estranged mother, to embrace the memories of all that she lost, and to finally open herself to love.
To enter to win up to 12 autographed copies of DIGGING OUT for your group answer our contest question by April 30th. |
Read more about DIGGING OUT here, as well as contest details.
|
|
|
THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE by Audrey Niffenegger |
 |
|
|
Audrey Niffenegger's innovative debut, The Time Traveler's Wife, is the story of Clare, a beautiful art student, and Henry, an adventuresome librarian, who have known each other since Clare was six and Henry was thirty-six, and were married when Clare was twenty-three and Henry thirty-one. Impossible but true, because Henry is one of the first people diagnosed with Chrono-Displacement Disorder: periodically his genetic clock resets and he finds himself misplaced in time, pulled to moments of emotional gravity in his life, past and future. His disappearances are spontaneous, his experiences unpredictable, alternately harrowing and amusing.
The Time Traveler's Wife depicts the effects of time travel on Henry and Clare's marriage and their passionate love for each other as the story unfolds from both points of view. Clare and Henry attempt to live normal lives, pursuing familiar goals-steady jobs, good friends, children of their own. All of this is threatened by something they can neither prevent nor control, making their story intensely moving and entirely unforgettable. |
Click here to read the guide for THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE by Audrey Niffenegger.
|
|
|
THE PHOTOGRAPH by Penelope Lively |
The Photograph, by Booker prize-winning novelist Penelope Lively, is an unflinching and unforgettable story of the many ways the past intrudes upon the present and the present alters the past. When Glyn, a landscape historian, stumbles upon a photograph of his deceased wife, Kath, holding hands with another man, his understanding of the past is "savagely undermined."
A taut and suspenseful psychological narrative, written with Lively's unmistakable nuance and insight, The Photograph is above all a profoundly moving meditation on the mysteries of time, memory, and the instability of the past. |
Read a guide for THE PHOTOGRAPH here.
|
|
|
|
|
THE LOVELY BONES by Alice Sebold is Now in Paperback |
The bestselling book of 2002 finally is available in paperback.
When we first meet Susie Salmon, she is already in heaven. As she looks down from this strange new place, she tells us, in the fresh and spirited voice of a fourteen-year-old girl, a tale that is both haunting and full of hope.
With compassion, longing, and a growing understanding, Susie sees her loved ones pass through grief and begin to mend. Her father embarks on a risky quest to ensnare her killer. Her sister undertakes a feat of remarkable daring. And the boy Susie cared for moves on, only to find himself at the center of a miraculous event.
The Lovely Bones is luminous and astonishing, a novel that builds out of grief the most hopeful of stories. In the hands of a brilliant new writer, this story of the worst thing a family can face is transformed into a suspenseful and even funny novel about love, memory, joy, heaven, and healing. |
Read a guide for THE LOVELY BONES here.
|
|
|
Upcoming Guides |
|
This month we add a new feature. Here is a list of some of the reading group guides that will be available in upcoming months. While these titles and the months they will be available are subject to change, we share this information with you so you might plan your group's future reading. |
Read our Upcoming Guides here.
|
|
tr>
|
Book Club Interviews |
This month we bring you the following book club interviews:
Amy Baird of "North Pointe Readers" of Middletown, MD
Barbara Higdon of "The BBC" of San Antonio, TX
Stephanie Somers of "The Y-Nos" of Milan, MO |
Read our Book Club interviews here.
|
|
|
This Month's Poll |
 |
|
|
The best way to choose the right book for your group is to know what's out there --- and what the books are about. For this month's poll we are giving you blurbs about 14 books. Let us know which you would be interested in reading with your group, based on these descriptions. Interested in winning up to 12 copies of one of these books for your group? One group will be selected from those who reply "yes" to the second poll question. This poll will be open until May 3, 2004
1. Which of the following books would you be interested in reading with your group based upon the description noted (Select as many as apply.):
When Rose Lloyd is forced to rethink her life after her 25-year marriage falls apart, she finds out what prolonged reflection, a little weight loss, a new slant on independence and some Parision lingerie will do for the psyche -- and that starting over doesn't have an age limit. -- Revenge of the Middle-Aged Woman by Elizabeth Buchan
Through haunting prose, Robert Alexander retells the story of the imprisonment and execution of the Romanovs through the eyes of a young family servant who claims to have been the last one to see them alive. -- The Kitchen Boy by Robert Alexander
The story of Martin Sloane, an Irish-born artist, and Jolene Iolas, the young American woman who finds herself drawn first to his art and then to the man himself. -- Martin Sloane by Michael Redhill
An intimate portrait of three women from very different walks of life whose paths collide during a brutal Texas summer. -- Sleep Toward Heaven by Amanda Eyre Ward
Was Mary Magdalene a prostitute, a female divinity figure, a church leader, or all of those? Bestselling novelist Margaret George brilliantly reimagines the story of the most mysterious woman in the Bible. -- Mary, Called Magdalene by Margaret George
"What an unlikely marvelous mix of womanhood," cries one of eight feisty women --- friends who have gathered every Thursday for years for a well-deserved break. Until one day, when a crisis sparks a spontaneous pilgrimage that's an exercise in solidarity. -- The Elegant Gathering of White Snows by Kris Radish
With keen insight into human nature, daily life, and the struggles of both family and community, Allegra Goodman tells the story of three Jewish Orthodox families that summer in the beautiful upstate New York town of Kaaterskill in 1976. A National Book Award Nominee. -- Kaaterskill Falls by Allegra Goodman
Risky, fiercely erotic and deeply touching, Davitt Sigerson's first novel is a revealing excursion into the shadowy territory where love and lust merge and the line between devotion and compulsion disappears -- Faithful by Davitt Sigerson
The women of Freesia Court have come together at life's table, fully convinced that there is nothing good coffee, delectable desserts and a strong shoulder can't fix. Laughter is the glue that holds them together --- the foundation of a book group they call AWEB --- Angry Wives Eating Bon Bons, an unofficial "club" that becomes much more. It becomes a lifeline. Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons by Lorna Landvik
Erik Larson takes his readers on a fascinating tour of the 1893 Chicago World's Fair --- its excruciating planning, building and ultimate creation --- but he also tells the chilling story of Henry Holmes, a man who preyed upon unsuspecting visitors to the Fair and committed a number of unspeakable acts against them. The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
An imaginative tale of a society in which the alphabet is impacted by superstitious dictates leaving its residents to cope with an increasingly diminished language. Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn
Mary Beth and her younger sister Leeann are trying to support themselves in their small Southern hometown. Mary Beth works to make ends meet by practicing her own unique talent --- "song reading," in which she uses the song lyrics stuck in people's minds to help them make sense of their lives. But Mary Beth eventually uncovers a devastating secret about one woman that affects the entire town --- and nearly destroys Mary Beth and Leeann. The Song Reader by Lisa Tucker
A violin prodigy disappears on the eve of his debut performance, only to be discovered and confronted forty years later by the childhood friend he had left behind. The Song of Names by Norman Lebrecht
On the night of December 3, 1984, Anjali waits for her army officer husband to pick her up at the train station in Bhopal, India. Her anger at his being late turns to horror when a catastrophic gas leak poisons the city air. Anjali miraculously survives. Her marriage does not. She remarries, but when her first husband suddenly reappears in her life, she is thrown back to the troubling days of their marriage with a force that impacts everyone around her. A Breath of Fresh Air by Amulya Malladi
None of these books are of interest to me and my group. |
Answer our poll questions here.
|
|
|
|
|
Newest Guides |
Awake by Elizabeth Graver
Beautiful Girls by Beth Ann Bauman
The Book of Joe by Jonathan Tropper
The Boy on the Bus by Deborah Schupack
A Breath of Fresh Air by Amulya Malladi
Cosmopolitan Girls by Charlotte Burley and Lyah Beth LeFlore
The Dew Breaker by Edwidge Danticat
Digging Out by Katherine Leiner
Evenings at Five by Gail Godwin
Fade to Clear by Leonard Chang
The Forest Lover by Susan Vreeland
Good Grief by Lolly Winston
The Growing Seasons by Samuel Hynes
A Hole in the Universe by Mary McGarry Morris
Little Children by Tom Perrotta
The Photograph by Penelope Lively
Pink Cadillac by Robert Dunn
A Star Called Henry by Roddy Doyle
Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi
Swimming Naked by Stacy Sims
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
Until the Real Thing Comes Along by Elizabeth Berg
The Wedding by Nicholas Sparks |
See the Newest Guides here.
|
|
|
|
|
This Month's Contest: Win GOOD GRIEF by Lolly Winston |
|
A subscription to our newsletter is all you need to be entered in our monthly contest. This month, one lucky reader will win enough copies of GOOD GRIEF by Lolly Winston for his or her entire reading group. |
Read contest details here.
|
|
Do you like what you see here, and want to forward it to a friend? Then click our link on the bottom of the page to do just that!
Happy reading. We'll see you next month.
Don't forget to visit our other websites from TheBookReportNetwork.com: Bookreporter.com, AuthorsOnTheWeb.com, FaithfulReader.com, AuthorYellowPages.com, Teenreads.com, and Kidsreads.com.
Carol Fitzgerald ([email protected]) |
|
|
