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A brave few of us risk later embarrassment by choosing the
books that the group will read for the next year. This "Supreme
Leadership Task Force,"
as a member jokingly put it, has enjoyed many successes in
the past ("Trumpet" springs to mind) and some dismal
failures (still surprised that "Anthills of the Savannah"
was such a bust). Regardless, all the books give us the opportunity
to flex our brain-muscle with our thoughtful, funny and creative-minded
peers!
Everyone is welcome
to recommend books for the discussion (see more on that at
the end), but it is just this small group that gathers one
evening with book review clippings, downloaded Amazon summaries
and award lists. We read about the books and then choose those
that best fit the following criteria:
- Affordability:
Must be available
in paperback. Titles that are currently in hardback but
likely to soon be available in paperback by the time it
is on our reading calendar are also eligible.
- Diversity:
Must be 6 female
authors and 6 male. Must represent different parts of the
world, including work that is translated into English. Subject
matter also must be diverse (can't all be war histories,
for example).
- Notability:
Must be an award-winning
or award-nominated work. Some risk will be taken with new
authors that have been highly praised by the literary community
("The Intuitionist" anyone?) or a work by a well-known
author ("Feast of the Goat" for example).
- Political:
Must have something
to say about the socio-economic world in which we live (e.g.
no beach material, however widely praised it may be). The
personal is political, but the story has to have some larger
complexity to it. Historical fiction counts.
- Readability:
Must not make
us want to run to the kitchen for a knife with which to
commit suicide. Also, can't be such a huge book (500+ pages)
that no one actually can finish by the time of the next
meeting. At least, no one with a life. Toni Morrison and
Salman Rushdie are the exceptions to this rule.
And, the overarching rule:
Fiction:
No, this book
group will not read non-fiction. Thanks for asking...again.
As noted above,
recommendations from all ARE WELCOME. However, to make the
process work, folks do not simply submit a title. Rather,
the person making the recommendation is asked to submit a
title, a summary of the book and why they believe it fits
the criteria of the book group. They must also include a link
to Amazon or wherever s/he read a review of the book. And,
to make it even easier, all this information is sent to the
small group point person to collect for the group review.
One of the best
things about participating in a book group is reading unfamiliar
works, so members are NOT welcome to recommend books that
they have already read.
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