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ReadingGroupGuides.com Newsletter |
February 2008
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Blogging --- ReadingGroupGuides.com Style
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A few months ago I realized that while we update ReadingGroupGuides.com monthly, there always is news or interesting tidbits and ramblings that I want to share with our readers throughout the month. I also recognized that, over the last eight years since we launched this website, we have come to know a very interesting group of readers, authors, book club facilitators, librarians, booksellers and publishing contacts who have shared their own ideas for what make a reading group something that gives people both joy and satisfaction.
I wanted to give these people an opportunity to share their book club insight and wisdom on this site beyond the features like our interviews and our message board. Thus we are starting a ReadingGroupGuides.com Blog. Throughout the month we will share postings from regular contributors and special guests. The regular contributors will have their photos and biographies added to the site so you can get to know them better. The special guests will have their photos with their postings and short biographies following them.
We'll start out five days a week, and then move to daily postings once we get some momentum going. I look forward to your feedback on this blog, and if you would like to be a contributor, please write me ([email protected]) with some background about you and the topic that you would like to share. Oh, one more thing. I still would like to title this blog, but nothing is coming to mind just yet. If you have a suggestion, I would love to hear it.
I know that readers can be the best advocates for their favorite books. I have pressed MANY a book into my friends' hands and said, "Just read this." Thus I am very excited that we have FOUR book giveaways on ReadingGroupGuides.com this month. Each is an opportunity for you to win a recently published, or soon-to-be published book, for your group. If you like it, it's a perfect way to suggest a title for future discussion. And more than that, you are in the inner circle for sharing the early buzz on a favorite book with friends, co-workers and family members. It's one of the joys of doing what I do that I never tire of.
A few months ago I met with my son's high school to discuss their summer reading list, which left a lot to be desired. At the time I also wondered why there was no Book Club at the school. Think about it. At school we have clubs for just about everything, but I have yet to find one with a Book Club! I was looking for titles to suggest. Two readers suggested Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult, one of this month's contest books, as a perfect choice. If any of you have more ideas for this, I would welcome them.
I love hearing feedback from readers about advance copies that we have shared. Last week I was at Books & Books in Coral Gables. During their monthly reading group event, one of the women there was raving about Firefly Lane by Kristin Hannah, which I had shared advance reading copies of back in October when I did an event there. This book is just now in stores, and it has been resonating with readers of every age in our office for the conversation it spurs about women’s friendships. We'll have a guide for it next month. I look forward to hearing from you with feedback about the titles that we are offering this month, as well as those that we are featuring as New Guides.
In our poll this month we ask you how your group makes its reading selections. Click here to respond. Our tip this month is themed around the Leap Year. The 29th of February is called Leap Day. Think about discussing what period in time members of your group would love to leap back --- or ahead --- to read about.
Our contest book this month is Tallgrass by Sandra Dallas. For your group to win 20 free copies of this book, all you have to do is sign up for the ReadingGroupGuides.com newsletter by March 1, 2008. If you are receiving this newsletter in your mailbox, you already are signed up! Click here to read more about Tallgrass.
We are pleased to share interviews with four book clubs: Frances & Friends Book Club, The Magnolia Tree Book Club, NoVa Lit Chicks and Word Chasers.
Looking for a title for a special Valentine in your life? Our Valentine’s Day feature on Bookreporter.com may have the answer. Selected titles include Beginner's Greek by James Collins, Body Surfing by Anita Shreve, Four Letter Word: Invented Correspondence from the Edge of Modern Romance edited by Joshua Knelman and Rosalind Porter, Love is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time by Rob Sheffield, The Mathematics of Love by Emma Darwin, Other People's Love Letters: 150 Letters You Were Never Meant to See by Bill Shapiro and Socrates in Love: Philosophy for a Die-Hard Romantic by Christopher Phillips.
We have a storm brewing here. I am anticipating an early closure from school --- and a storm day tomorrow. While many people race to the store for bread and milk (something that never ceases to amaze me), I instead turn to my bookshelves and the stack of firewood. If I have a book and I have some wood, there's no reason to fear a storm.
Have a great February. Enjoy the extra day that this leap year brings with a book.
Carol Fitzgerald ([email protected])
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Click here to answer our poll.
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Special Contest: Win NINETEEN MINUTES by Jodi Picoult for Your Group
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We are celebrating the paperback release of Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult --- a startling and poignant story about the devastating aftermath of a small-town tragedy --- with a special contest. Twenty-five readers will have the opportunity to each win one finished copy of Nineteen Minutes, which will be available in stores on February 5th, for their group. Enter between now and Monday, February 25th by filling out the form found here.
More About Nineteen Minutes:
Sterling is an ordinary New Hampshire town where nothing ever happens --- until the day its complacency is shattered by an act of violence. Josie Cormier, the daughter of the judge sitting on the case, should be the state's best witness, but she can't remember what happened before her very own eyes --- or can she? As the trial progresses, fault lines between the high school and the adult community begin to show --- destroying the closest of friendships and families. Nineteen Minutes asks what it means to be different in our society, who has the right to judge someone else, and whether anyone is ever really who they seem to be.
-Click here to read the guide for Nineteen Minutes.
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Click here to read all the contest details.
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Special Contest: Win WHAT LOOKS LIKE CRAZY by Charlotte Hughes for Your Group
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We are celebrating the release of What Looks Like Crazy by Charlotte Hughes --- a quirky and humorous book about one woman’s attempt to maintain her sanity while her life falls apart --- with a special contest. Two groups will have the opportunity to each win 12 finished copies of What Looks Like Crazy, which will be available in stores on February 26th. Enter between now and Wednesday, February 20th by filling out the form found here.
More about What Looks Like Crazy:
Psychologist Kate Holly's own life has become the stuff of intensive therapy. She's divorcing her gorgeous firefighter husband, she has an eccentric secretary, her mother and aunt have erected a vaguely sexual sculpture in her front yard, and her psychiatrist ex-boyfriend won't stop calling to find out what color panties she's wearing. Now, Kate's being bombarded with mysterious threats, and the only person who can help her is the one man who always makes her lose her mind --- and heart.
-Click here to read the guide for What Looks Like Crazy.
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Click here to read all the contest details.
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Special Contest: Win THE TEN-YEAR NAP by Meg Wolitzer for Your Group
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We are celebrating the release of The Ten-Year Nap by Meg Wolitzer, a feverishly smart novel about female ambition, money, class, motherhood and marriage --- and what happens in one community when a group of educated women chooses not to work --- with a special contest. Fifty readers will have the opportunity to each win one advance reading copy of The Ten-Year Nap, which will be in stores on March 27th, for their group. Enter between now and Wednesday, February 20th by filling out the form found here.
More about The Ten-Year Nap:
For Amy, Jill, Roberta and Karen, the past decade has been largely defined by marriage and motherhood. But when Amy meets a charismatic and successful working mother of three who appears to have fulfilled the classic women's dream of having it all --- work, love, family --- a lifetime's worth of concerns, both practical and existential, opens up. As Amy's obsession with this woman's bustling life grows, it forces the four friends to confront the choices they've made in opting out of their careers --- until a series of startling events shatters the peace and, for some of them, changes the landscape entirely.
-Click here to read the guide for The Ten-Year Nap.
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Click here to read all the contest details.
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Special Contest: Win SEPULCHRE by Kate Mosse for Your Group
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We are celebrating the release of Sepulchre by Kate Mosse, the New York Times bestselling author of Labyrinth --- a haunting tale of secrets, murder and the occult set in both 19th-century and 21st-century France --- with a special contest. 100 readers will have the opportunity to each win one advance reading copy of Sepulchre, which will be in stores on April 1st, for their group. Enter between now and Wednesday, February 20th by filling out the form found here.
More about Sepulchre:
In 1891, young Léonie Vernier and her brother Anatole accept an invitation to visit their widowed aunt’s infamous estate in Southwest France. But soon they begin to hear rumors in the Village of something evil that happened there.
More than a century later, Meredith Martin, an American graduate student, arrives at a grand hotel to study the life of Claude Debussy, the 19th-century French composer. But something about the hotel feels eerily familiar, and strange dreams and visions begin to haunt Meredith’s waking hours.
-Click here to read the guide for Sepulchre.
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Click here to read all the contest details.
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THE SECRET BETWEEN US by Barbara Delinsky
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Deborah Monroe and her daughter, Grace, are driving home from a party when their car hits a man running in the dark. Grace was at the wheel, but Deborah sends her home before the police arrive, determined to shoulder the blame for the accident. Her decision then turns into a deception that takes on a life of its own and threatens the special bond between mother and daughter.
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Click here to read the guide for The Secret Between Us.
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LIFE CLASS by Pat Barker
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From the Booker Prize–winning author of The Regeneration Trilogy comes an exceptional new novel. In the spring of 1914, Paul Tarrant and Elinor Brooke are two parts of an intriguing love triangle. In the first days of war, they turn to each other. As spring turns to summer, Paul volunteers for the Belgian Red Cross and tends to wounded, dying soldiers from the front line. By the time he returns, Paul must confront the fact that life and love will never be the same for him again.
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Click here to read the guide for Life Class.
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THE OPPOSITE OF LOVE by Julie Buxbaum
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When successful 29-year-old Manhattan attorney Emily Haxby ends her happy relationship just as her boyfriend is on the verge of proposing, she can’t explain to even her closest friends why she did it. As the holiday season looms and Emily contemplates whether she made a huge mistake, the rest of her world begins to unravel. How this brave, original young heroine finally decides to take control of her life and face the fears that have long haunted her is the great achievement of Julie Buxbaum’s marvelous first novel.
-Click here to see our One to Watch feature for Julie Buxbaum and The Opposite of Love on Bookreporter.com. |
Click here to read the guide for The Opposite of Love.
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I'M LOOKING THROUGH YOU: Growing Up Haunted - A Memoir, by Jennifer Finney Boylan
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From the bestselling author of She’s Not There comes another buoyant, unforgettable memoir. For Jennifer Boylan, creaking stairs, fleeting images in the mirror and the remote whisper of human voices were everyday events in the Pennsylvania house in which she grew up in the 1970s. But these weren’t the only specters beneath the roof of the mansion known as the “Coffin House.” Jenny herself --- born James --- lived in a haunted body, and both her mysterious, diffident father and her wild, unpredictable sister would soon become ghosts to Jenny as well.
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Click here to read the guide for I'm Looking Through You.
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LADY MACBETH by Susan Fraser King
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Lady Gruadh, called Rue, is the last female descendent of Scotland’s most royal line. Married to a powerful northern lord, she is widowed while still carrying his child and forced to marry her husband’s murderer --- a rising war-lord named Macbeth. Encountering danger from Vikings, Saxons and treacherous Scottish lords, Rue begins to respect the man she once despised. Among the powerful warlords, only Macbeth can unite Scotland --- and his wife’s royal blood is the key to his ultimate success.
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Click here to read the guide for Lady Macbeth.
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THE COMMONER by John Burnham Schwartz
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It is 1959 when Haruko, a young woman of good family, marries the Crown Prince of Japan. Being the first non-aristocratic woman to enter the monarchy, she is met with cruelty and suspicion by the Empress and her minions.
Thirty years later, now Empress herself, she plays a crucial role in persuading another young woman --- a rising star in the foreign ministry --- to accept the marriage proposal of her son, the Crown Prince. The consequences are tragic and dramatic.
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Click here to read the guide for The Commoner.
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THE ADULTERY CLUB by Tess Stimson
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Nicholas Lyon is the perfect husband --- a handsome divorce attorney who dotes on his family. Sara Kaplan is the perfect seductress --- a vivacious young lawyer unburdened by sexual scruples. And Malinche Lyon is the perfect wife --- a beautiful cookbook writer and mother to three darling daughters. But in The Adultery Club, one happily married man and two very different women are about to discover the difference between fulfilling your wildest desires --- and getting your just deserts.
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Click here to read the guide for The Adultery Club.
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NECESSARY SINS by Lynn Darling --- A Memoir
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When Lynn Darling met Lee Lescaze at the Washington Post, they could not have been more different. He was older, married, more “establishment,” a celebrated foreign correspondent and editor. She, who entered Harvard at age 16, was a brilliant wild child of the ’60s. She lived life in the present tense, where every affair was an adventure. Then Darling fell in love and everything changed.
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Click here to read the guide for Necessary Sins.
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Registered Book Club Offers
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For February we have THREE very special opportunities for Registered Book Groups. Our featured titles this month are Stealing Buddha's Dinner by Bich Minh Nguyen, Kindness Goes Unpunished by Craig Johnson and Speaking of Faith: Why Religion Matters -- and How to Talk About It by Krista Tippett. Groups who have registered with us by Thursday, February 14th have the chance to win author chats and free books. If your group is not registered, click here to register.
Stealing Buddha's Dinner by Bich Minh Nguyen --- Author Chat and Book Giveaway: 10-12 groups will have the opportunity to chat with Bich Minh Nguyen and receive 12 copies of the book.
More About Stealing Buddha's Dinner:
As a Vietnamese girl coming of age in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Bich Minh Nguyen is filled with a rapacious hunger for American identity, and in the pre-PC-era Midwest (where the Jennifers and Tiffanys reign supreme), the desire to belong transmutes into a passion for American food. More exotic-seeming than her Buddhist grandmother’s traditional specialties, the campy, preservative-filled “delicacies” of mainstream America capture her imagination.
Vivid and viscerally powerful, this remarkable memoir about growing up in the 1980s introduces an original new literary voice and an entirely new spin on the classic assimilation story.
Kindness Goes Unpunished by Craig Johnson --- Author Chat and Book Giveaway: 10-12 groups will have the opportunity to chat with Craig Johnson and receive 12 copies of the book.
More About Kindness Goes Unpunished:
Craig Johnson’s mystery series --- starring Walt Longmire, the straight-shooting sheriff of Absaroka County, Wyoming --- is attracting more and more fans with its distinctive blend of humor and action. In Kindness Goes Unpunished, Walt’s pleasure trip to Philadelphia to visit his daughter, Cady, turns into a nightmare when she is the victim of a vicious attack that leaves her near death. Walt is forced to unpack his saddlebag of tricks to mete out some Western-style justice, and the result is another action-packed thriller from this up-and-coming star of crime fiction.
Speaking of Faith: Why Religion Matters -- and How to Talk About It by Krista Tippett --- Author Chat and Book Giveaway: 10-12 groups will have the opportunity to chat with Krista Tippett and receive 12 copies of the book.
More About Speaking of Faith: Why Religion Matters -- and How to Talk About It:
Krista Tippett, widely becoming known as the Bill Moyers of radio, is one of the country’s most intelligent and insightful commentators on religion, ethics and the human spirit. With this book, she draws on her own life story and her intimate conversations with both ordinary and famous figures, including Elie Wiesel, Karen Armstrong and Thich Nhat Hanh, to explore complex subjects like science, love, virtue and violence within the context of spirituality and everyday life. Her way of speaking about the mysteries of life --- and of listening with care to those who endeavor to understand those mysteries --- is nothing short of revolutionary.
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Click here to register your group.
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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])
The Book Report Network
250 W. 57th Street - Suite 1228
New York, New York 10107
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