Read Between the Wines discussion

Maybe we can use this discussion thread to throw out ideas for book club nominations. I made this list a while back when I was in an actual book club. My idea was to keep the selections away from any specific genre, so most of these are "wide appeal" best sellers, etc.

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao – Junot Díaz
The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafón
The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
The Handmaid's Tale – Margaret Atwood
The Pillars of the Earth – Ken Follett
The Diary of Anne Frank – Anne Frank
Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro
Embassytown – China Miéville
City of Thieves – David Benioff
The Heart Is a Lonely Hunger – Carson McCullers
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand – Helen Simonson
Mudbound – Hillary Jordan
The Name of the Rose – Umberto Eco
The Lies of Locke Lamora – Scott Lynch
The Art of Fielding – Chad Harbach
Salvage the Bones – Jesmyn Ward
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry – Rachel Joyce
The Good Earth – Pearl S. Buck
White Teeth – Zadie Smith
A Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden
Tigana – Guy Gavriel Kay
The Orphan Master's Son – Adam Johnson
The Round House – Louise Erdrich
The Unbearable Lightness of Being – Milan Kundera
Serena – Ron Rash
The Power and the Glory – Graham Greene
The Devil All the Time – Donald Ray Pollock
A Thread of Grace – Mary Doria Russell
The Accidental Tourist – Anne Tyler
In the Time of the Butterflies – Julia Alvarez
Jitterbug Perfume – Tom Robbins
The Dog Stars – Peter Heller
Savages – Don Winslow
Wise Blood – Flannery O’Connor
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves – Karen Joy Fowler
The Housekeeper and the Professor – Yoko Ogawa
The Snow Child – Eowyn Ivey
The Light Between Oceans – M. L. Stedman
A Tale for the Time Being – Ruth Ozeki
The Golem and the Jinni – Helene Wecker

Sue, are you interested in reading any of the choices posted in the May 2012 Nominations thread? If not, suggest one of those 2!

Sorry wrong thread! This is confusing.....

LOL! Sorry!!

I just thought this "general suggestions" thread would be a good place to store ideas for whenever we're ready to vote on a new book to read. My goal is to make this the opposite of confusing. I have failed!

I agree, I would love to "group read" one of the classics. Post a few suggestions here if you want or wait until next month when we open nominations for the next pick (we already picked May!).

Here are some on my to-read:

Huck Finn (Twain)
Return of the Native (Hardy)
Great Expectations (Dickens)
War and Peace (Tolstoy)
Lord Jim (Conrad)
Pride and Prejudice (Austen)
Mrs Dalloway (Woolf)

Not a classic, but one I'd like to read in the near future: The Fault in Our Stars
http://www.amazon.com/The-Fault-Our-S...

I've been seeing that book all over Goodreads lately. Although I don't normally read a ton of YA, we can definitely keep it mind. Also, another YA option that was a huge hit: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19...

I'm new to the group. Thank you.

The souther part of the U.S. is known for poor wine and great writers. I am currently reading two (previously unknown to me) but outstanding authors: William Gay (I Hate to see the Evening Sun go Down) and Wyley Cash (A Land More Kind than Home). I suspect the novel by Cash would be the better book club book because it has a single powerful theme, where the Gay book is a collection of short stories.

Gay, however, has several powerful, well review, novels that I am looking forward to reading. BTW Gay died in February of this year.I Hate To See That Evening Sun Go Down: Collected StoriesA Land More Kind Than Home: A Novel

Welcome to the group, Millard!

At the bottom of this group's main page there is a poll (which I've also linked to below). The poll will be up for 3 days. Please use the poll to vote on how often you'd like to do book club:

http://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/66...

I must have been trying to post on the nominations as you closed it since it said active but when I hit "post" it said Closed and your new comment was there.
Anyways, I was trying to at least put some input in but maybe for the future. I've always wanted to re-read The Great Gatsby and I'm sure many of you have already read these but they are on my soon to read list:
Princess Bride
Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

Sorry, Melanie! I wanted to pick something tonight...a lot of people don't actively check these threads and if you pick something at least a week in advance, GR will send an e-mail reminder (otherwise it won't). Let's see if we get an email reminder in the morning. :)

Gatsby is excellent and you could definitely read that in a day if you wanted to—it's super short. I, too, have always wanted to read The Princess Bride so let's keep that in mind for July (and I'll open nominations much earlier next time around; I just hadn't anticipated doing this every month until people voiced their wishes).

Les Misérables scares the living shit out of me because it's 18,000 pages but I'll do it if you do it!

Totally depends on interest, Abbie! I just go by what the people say. I think a lot of people are just going with the flow, and that's fine, but people should speak up if they want something to happen—we can make it happen! Last month we did 2 choices 'cause Daniel likes NF and Janice had already read LTGWS. But that NF thread has been kinda sluggish, so...

Initially, I was thinking of doing this every other month, so now I'm thinking maybe we can do it every month, but cycle: we could alternate classics or alternate NF or whatever. Maybe "modern-NF-modern-classic"? Or "modern-NF-classic-modern-NF-classic"??

It's totally up to the people. :)

Since we are doing it every month, which is what I would have voted for if I had got to it in time, I think we should just pick one book. I know most of you are crazy fast readers and I really want to be able to keep up but these days with the kids, I'm just not reading as much. I know I only would have to read one of the choices but like this month, I couldn't decide which one so they both lost out.

Jason, the Les Miserables one I got was the free one from Amazon which has awesome ratings and is obviously the short version since it's only 218 pages. If we did the full-length one, I would need two months. =)

I agree. Even if you read a ton, I think one book per month is enough for a book club. Also, I just got an e-mail from Abbie about perhaps doing A Christmas Carol in December...if we do a rotation of "modern-NF-classic-modern-NF-classic", then we'd totally be able to do that. And, it would keep the NF people happy, too, because it would mean a non-fiction book choice every third month (I enjoy NF, too!), so maybe we'll do that.

June – Mrs. Dalloway
July – Princess Bride (is that modern??)
August – NF (maybe "Unbroken" or "Warmth of Other Suns"?)
September – maybe Gabriel García Marquéz, as Brigid mentioned
October – something modern
November – something NF (maybe Devil in White City?)
December – Christmas Carol (or Holidays on Ice!)

Something to that effect...

Melanie wrote: "I know I only would have to read one of the choices but like this month, I couldn't decide which one so they both lost out."

Btw, you are so Type A it's not even funny. I feel your pain!

You know I love non-fiction!!

Princess Bride is modern enough and it definitely gets my vote.

What?!?? Me...type A??

:) Maybe I just project...

Anyway, I think GR might have the longer "free" version of Les Misérables: check here. Is it different from the one you already have on your Kindle? If you end up checking it out, let me know.

I do not quite have the feel for this forum but -- a few questions on the minimum?
What book should I read for June?
What day does the discussion begin?
Is this the thread where the discussion takes place,or is there another, separate thread for book discussions?

I don't mean to be pushy, but the the discussion (however interesting) seems to be wondering and disjoint.

Hi Millard,

The book to read for June is Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. On top of the main page of the group, you'll see the book being "currently read" along with the book "upcoming." The book "upcoming" is the one for June.

As far as discussions go, there is a discussion thread in the "Book Club Discussions" folder for each book we read. For Mrs. Dalloway, that thread is here. You can get to it from the main group page, or...you can get to it by clicking the green "view" link under the book display, which brings you here.

I'm sorry you feel the discussions are disjointed. Sometimes it's hard to have a coherent discussion when people are in different parts of the book (we use the <spoiler> and </spoiler> tags to hide spoilers in the discussion thread), but I guess that's just the way it goes. I think it is just fun to talk about books as you read them, though.

Also, if you post a review for the book when you're finished, it will show up on the group book page (again, that green "view" link I mentioned).

To triple clarify things, I also have a running thread that shows what we've read and includes links to both the group book page as well as its pertinent discussion thread.

Let me know if you have any other questions, or even suggestions to make things run smoother. I'd be happy to hear them.

Hi everyone

I am new to the group and am delighted with the choice for June - thanks so much, I am pleased it's also free online.

My understanding of this particular forum was to post any books we might want to read in the future. Since the nominations forum was closed, I posted here with my suggestions. Was that the wrong place? Sorry if I made it confusing.

No, Melanie, you are in the right place. This thread is for general book suggestions, etc. Millard was talking about the "book discussion" threads being disjointed, or at least that's what I assumed. If he was talking about this thread being disjointed then I responded incorrectly: again, this thread is for general suggestions. Book discussions go here.

I just re-read his post and maybe I missed what he meant. A better response would have been:

Yes, Millard, there is a separate thread for book discussions—here we just talk about suggestions for what we'd like to read in the future and what have you.

I always try so hard to make things as clear and un-confusing as possible, and I fail continually. :)

By the way, Mel, I'll open up a "July nominations" thread in mid-June and leave it open for a full week. Promise.

I am keen to read 'The Art of Racing in the Rain – Gareth Stein' in your list above, Jason. Just a thought for future.

I'll probably open noms for September at some point during the week. I was thinking...even though we are due for a classic in September, maybe we can swap with October just this once. I want us to read some sort of classic horror novel, like Dracula or The Woman in White, which would be more appropriate as an October read. That would leave us with standard adult fiction for September.

Good idea I am happy with either of these classic horror novels - another free download cool -

Here is my suggestion: Wyley Cash (A Land More Kind than Home).

Every so often, it occurs to me that I am very fortunate to have lived long enough to have experienced a certain creator. For example, I always feel sad for all the people who died without living long enough to have read Raymond Carver or Larry Brown. In my opinion, Wyley Cash is another of those authors you are enormously lucky to have lived to his time.

A warning, however, Cash's characters trod the southern earth with their bare feet in the dust. If you didn't like Faulkner, Carson Mccullers or Erskin Caldwell, you will probably not like Cash.

The Richmond Times says: "[A] powerfully moving debut that reads a little as if Cormac McCarthy decided to rewrite Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird."

Sounds good, Millard. I'll probably start a September noms thread tomorrow.

um like today, so i can make a suggestion!

What a coincidence, I just started Cloud Atlas not even 2 hours ago!

If it doesn't get picked for this book club, you are more than welcome to read along with me. There is also a discussion group for David Mitchell.

Yeah, I read about 3 books a month (the Wine Club book plus 2 more), so squeezing it in is no problem at all. I only just started it today, but I also have heard amazingly excellent things about it so I am very optimistic about it. :)

I have been pecking at "The Cloud Atlas" for several months. It is an author's book. It is very easy to get lost in the author's style. The story seems secondary, and the theme even more so.

It is a book for the head more than the heart, but a very good one. Well worth reading.

Yeah, I am still at 5%. I read nothing yesterday; I was exhausted and went to bed early but I am now eager to start getting into Cloud Atlas more hardcorely.

Chris wrote: "Jason, The discussion thread on "The Devil in the White City" doesn't work for me. Am I jumping the gun here?"

You are! I haven't even created it yet. :)

It should be there now.

Also, I just updated 'Message 2' with some fresh titles, based on some that I've added to my own personal 'to-read' list over the past few months. 2013, bring it!

Ok so when are we going to read We Were Liars - up for possible goodreads book of 2014? Anyone read it yet?

It looks a little too YA for my taste. If we pick it as a group read I might pass. =)

What? Don't look at me like that. It's not as though everyone here reads every book I pick!

YA? Please tell...

My last comment on this thread didn't go down so well so I hope this makes up for it...In SA I am part of a FB group called Writers Write as I am an aspiring writer (aren't we all!) and here's their list for 2014 of best reads. Haven't got to most of them as I seldom get new books but interested to know your thoughts! http://writerswrite.co.za/writers-wri...

Thanks, Keryn!

I want to read a scary book this month. Which shall it be?

Hi Jason! Miss this book club! Tell us what you pick! Not sure I’ll get to it in October but maybe November....still have to read my book club book....

I just finished the apartment, it was decently creepy....kinda.