The Battle of the Books

   This book club makes book selections in November for the following year.  What an experience!  We call it 'the battle of the books', and sometimes it gets 'heated'.  Those who are really anxious to promote one certain book, have to convince everyone.  The hardest sell that I remember was "Beowulf".  Sandi finally wore us down and we agreed to give it a try.

It's always exciting to settle on a full year of reading.  

And this book group does not take a break in the summer.  

So we meet 12 times a year for discussions and once to set the books for the next year.

Every other month we read a classic.

I have been reading with this group for fifteen years!

My personal favourites:

My two all-time favourite books were read in this group- "Far From the Madding Crowd" by Thomas Hardy and "Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver- one classic and one contemporary.

Other contemporary books that I loved:

The Secret Life of Bees- Sue Monk Kidd

The Power of One - Bryce Courtenay

No Great Mischief - Alistair MacLeod

My Antonia - Willa Cather

The Kite Runner - Khalel Hossieni

Other classic favourites:

The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins

To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee

Siddhartha - Hermann Hesse

The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck

All Passion Spent - Vita Sackville-West

Great Expectations - Charles Dickens

Of Human Bondage - Somerset Maugham

Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe

In 15 years, we have read many of the well-known classics.  However, this group has no problem finding new options, and this year, it seems, they chose such obscure books that we cannot get enough copies to read.  The library system discarded them long ago. Guess they weren't favourites for anyone else.  But we may revive them - if we can just find a copy!