I’ve signed on to participate in the Huffington Post Book Club, an online gathering hosted and operated by the Huffington Post. I’m hopeful that the looser requirements of time and place will allow me to fit the interactions into my unreliable schedule.
I’ve always wanted to be in a book club but never felt I had the time. My mother loved the one she was in. As I wrote in my family memoir: “[A] force that got Mom out of the house was the monthly book club meeting with the women in the neighborhood. This particular book club did believe in imbibing, and I suspect all the women in the group looked forward seriously to their meetings.”
Huffington’s club also covers a book a month, but you don’t have to participate in all of them. If you imbibe, no one needs to know. If you smoke, no one needs to know. You don’t even need to comment but can simply lurk. Yup, sounds like my kind of club. (Not that I smoke; gave that up a thrilling 24 years ago.) I’m even thinking I’ll participate, since I already have 6 sticky notes identifying concepts or thoughts that might be worth throwing into the mix. This is fun!
The first book in the queue is The Tiger’s Wife by Tea Obreht. I’ve gotten a late start, with the first four chapters due to be read by January 15. I just finished chapter one. I’m having trouble getting into the book, although at the same time it’s obviously an extremely well-written one. I’m just not sure where and when it’s set. My first clue is on page 22, when the narrator hears Polish and Italian being spoken as she drives by a local convenience store. I’m sure many other readers would already be up to speed, because many other readers have a better grasp on international history than I do. Anyway, I think I will enjoy this book and my very first book-club experience. I just need to catch up.
Image of reader under tree: jannoon028 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
