Kim's pick

OK, I am going to choose a book, but consider this George's pick, and he can have my turn next month. I've been pondering what you said, G, about dropping out of the club,and here's what I concluded: If you are living a life that prohibits you from reading even one book a month, then you have to change your life. In your case, that means you'll have to quit nursing school. There. A solution. You can thank me later.

In any case, my pick is "The Bridges of Madison County."

Kidding.

I actually gave this a lot of thought. I toyed very seriously with "The Name of the Rose." I even went to Borders last night and bought it, but I decided it was too long and that its dense ramblings about the history of Catholicism and monastic orders probably would not be of general interest. It's a really fun story, though. So I'll give it more thought, and maybe it will turn up as my next pick. I also thought about a short story collection by Ellen Gilchrist or an E.M. Forster novel, but my last book was British, so I passed on that.


What I came up with is John Kennedy Toole's "A Confederacy of Dunces," which is very comic, very American, and, as you'll see, a very touching tribute to New Orleans.

A fallen woman

From kc:

The scene where Evelyn tripped carrying the milk was very telling regarding her role in the family. All the bottles break. She lies injured in the shattered glass and spilled milk. And everyone either just stares or runs away. No one helps her. It's like the whole family is paralyzed by the notion that the CAREGIVER needs CARE. What are we supposed to do? Normally in a situation like this we'd go get mom. And there's even a sense that they are a bit upset with her for putting them in this predicament. Finally Evelyn ASKS for help and the family slowly (and somewhat incompetently) responds. The scene is really, really well-written, and it adds immeasurably to our understanding of the family dynamics.

Evelyn is unique in the household, and, despite the huge family, is fundamentally alone in many ways. Her husband is an unreliable contributor, both financially and emotionally. So many of the burdens that come with raising a family fall squarely and soley on her. And not only does she not get the credit she deserves, but she has to endure her husband acting like a baby because her winnings make him the object of ridicule at work; instead of feeling gratitude from him, she has to constantly soothe his self-pity.

That's why, for me, it was so damn poignant when she made some friends among the Affadaisies. It was almost like she recaptured part of her youth, and she was suddenly in a situation where she was being nurtured by others, as well as nurturing them, and she really thrived. Her connection with the woman in the iron lung was especially touching in this regard because they both were trapped by circumstances, either literally or figuratively, and that backdrop made the freedom they felt in each other's company especially sweet. Evelyn's many travails in trying to meet her friends were almost Odyssean. She was trying to get "home" (where she intellectually belonged) and kept getting thwarted by the monsters and Sirens that were needy kids, money woes, domestic emergencies and car trouble.

Another scene, one of my favorites in the book, that highlighted her uniqueness was when she won the grocery shopping spree and she was immediately drawn to a bunch of expensive, exotic food. The family was sort of horrified. Tuff writes:

No one was going to eat the caviar.
"Do you know that U.S. Army research has shown a relationship between intelligence and a willingness to eat unfamiliar foods?" Mom said.
Except for Mom, nobody would eat the lobster either — it was just too different from fish sticks.

A pregnant woman

From kc:

I was very touched by the revelation at the end that Evelyn "had" to get married, as evidenced by the grey dress and weird wedding date. The same thing happened to my mom, and to this day she has never told me that she "had" to get married. The shame that attended an unwed pregnancy stayed with her, even though she herself, like Evelyn, would never judge another woman for that. Evelyn even tells Tuff "not to judge" somewhere in the book. And I remember my mom telling me that "getting pregnant is not the worst thing" that could happen to a girl, and I think it was her way of countering all the idiots who acted like it was, of making her daughters not feel Dorrie's desperation in "A Kiss Before Dying."

I think Tuff had a persistent sadness about her mom's life, even though it was also a source of great joy and inspiration to her. She knew that in another world her mother could have been a professional writer, could have traveled all over, could have afforded new girdles, or wouldn't have felt compelled to wear a girdle at all! could have ended up with a man who was a better companion in life. And yet she has this beautiful admiration of how her mother began her married life by being trapped (by the pregnancy) and made more of her fate than most people could imagine. She lived her life.

Evelyn and Tuff in 1996
It also has struck me that Tuff grew up to be a lesbian. And I could see the generous-hearted Evelyn, if she knew, submitting a poem to the local paper: My kid is gay, and that's OK.

A lucky woman

In addition to her witty commercial jingles that kept her family fed and clothed, Evelyn had a lot of help along the way — the grocery store manager who let her take two clerks on her shopping spree, the bank accepting written word of her contest win versus the payment due to keep her house, and I got the impression that at least one of the contest "detectives" who visited was glad to award the prize to the family in need. I couldn't decide what made her so fortunate — would she be treated so kindly today? But I also thought she had this contagious sense of benevolence, and maybe it rubbed off on other people besides her family. Sort of an "It's a Wonderful Life" kind of person.

True?

How much of the book do you think is true?

Our turn

Let's try our hand at contesting! How are your haiku skills?

I found two good-looking haiku contests, one from ThinkGeek.com and one from SpaIndex.com. The ThinkGeek haikus must be geeky or techy, and the Spa Index haikus must be tranquil. The December theme is "ice or snow."

OK, everybody go enter. And be sure to post your entries here for our perusal.

Kelly Ryan

Evelyn and Kelly on their wedding day

What did you think about how Terry portrayed her father in the book? Was she too easy on him?

First of all

What was your favorite contest entry?

Erin's pick: "The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio"

Married to a man with violent tendencies and a severe drinking problem, Evelyn Ryan managed to keep her 10 children fed and housed during the 1950s and '60s by entering — and winning — contests for rhymed jingles and advertising slogans of 25 words or less. This engaging and quick-witted biography written by daughter Terry relates how Evelyn submitted multiple entries, under various names, for contests sponsored by Dial soap, Lipton soup, Paper Mate pens, Kleenex Tissues and any number of other manufacturers, and won a wild assortment of prizes, including toasters, bikes, basketballs, and all-you-can-grab supermarket shopping sprees. Between contests, Ryan provides dry-eyed glimpses of her father's violence, family medical emergencies and the crushing poverty of everyday life, showcasing the resilience of a mother who, despite her own problems, spurned television's Queen for a Day for making victims of its contestants. The result is a quirky, heartwarming celebration of one woman's resourcefulness, and of the wacky enticements of 1950s consumer culture.

Gordon -- hero material?

If the Kingship clan had their flaws and endearing qualities, the author still chose to bring in an outsider to solve the mystery for them (instead of, say, Leo investigating on behalf of his daughters, or Marion growing suspicious of Bud on her own). Any thoughts on what Gordon brought to the story?

A FEMINIST?

Do you think Levin is sympathetic to women, as evidenced by his treatment of female characters? Or do you think he's just the opposite, or somewhere in between?

the parents

Were Mrs. Corliss or Leo Kingship culpable for the actions or fates of their children?

(I originally only focused on Leo Kingship, but I was struck by the author's decision to return to Mrs. Corliss in the end.)

the sistas

Staying on the sisters theme, did you favor or relate to any of the siblings best? Despite their differences, I thought all of them engaged in some foolhardy behavior based on their character ... Dorothy trusting Bud for love; Ellen investigating and showing off her pluckiness; Marion trusting Bud because she's lonely.

Oh, Dorrie

I had trouble liking Dorrie. She seemed clingy and a little dim to me ... a nice girl, but weak. Maybe I'm the only one to perceive her that way, but ...

Do you think her behavior was setting-appropriate (knocked up in '50s America), or did the author try to build favor for Bud because he had to be the protagonist for the first third of the book? (Dorrie's death wasn't nice at all, but I think it would have been harder to read a 65-page plot to knock off the spirited Ellen.)

Plot, suspense and "A Kiss Before Dying"

"A Kiss Before Dying" is probably the best thriller I've ever read. (And if you haven't read it but still plan to, don't read on ... it's too hard to talk about this book without spoilers.)

After sweating through the first 65 pages, knowing what would happen to Dorrie, I felt like I'd already read a complete novel. Then nothing else in the book happened the way I expected (more on that, though in a comment I'll post). For one thing, I think a traditional storyteller would reverse Ellen and Marion's fates.

How did the handling of the plot or characters defy your expectations of the book?

MEXICO

Here is a picture of the cenzontle bird that fascinates Sara, the one that sings the scale backward.



And here is the maguey cactus that she lines her path with:



And the jacaranda she loves:

FAVORITE DESCRIPTION?

Did anyone have a favorite or especially telling description/passage from the book?

I thought it was touching and significant how the villagers' take on the Evertons, who resemble us more than the villagers, shed so much light on their quiet lifestyle:

"Lourdes says the senor and senora read their separate books, then stare out the window for ten minutes at a time."

And this was magnificent as a description of their home, or any home: "After the bishop left, they would return to their house, light their lamps, light their fire, and in this way reduce the world, spiritual and temporal, to a bright square space between four whitewashed walls."

The author is a master of domestic comfort. But I'd also like to hear her elaborate on this description from the chapter "The Baptists": "... a wanton girl, barefoot and merry, drifting on tides of perfumed air from sacrilege to sacrilege." (That's how I imagine the author as a young woman!)

GREAT DESIGN

I mentioned before that Doerr's writing seemed more like painting to me than linear narrative — and not just because the big-picture is always informing the details, but because she's a great designer, because she uses careful details to inform the big picture. It's sort of how like Woody Allen's films are visually thought out to the very last detail, like how in "Alice" all the colors are autumnal and imperceptibly build a very certain mood. Or how in the film "Trafffic" all the scenes in Mexico are lit differently. You know you are in Mexico now just because of the light. Doerr's chapter "Christmas Messages" is a good example of this. She writes:

"It began like any other winter day, with the oyster light of dawn ..."

We learn at the end of the chapter that that day would be the first day of snow in 60 years. But she doesn't begin with that dramatic statement. She ends with it. She builds to it:

"..beyond numb December fields ... the eastern light, turned opal by now..." (the light falls on the Evertons' faces ... Doerr sees them like a painter would)

a man's shirt "drying on a cactus under the wan sun."

of winter: "they knew all its dusks and daybreaks"

"Sara believed that the landscape, by its own force, had arrested time."

"at least util a later day, which might dawn warmer, with a yellower sun, and enough light to cast the shadow of a tree."

"Since four o'clock a heavy gray ceiling has strung itself from hilltop to hilltop ..."

And they lay abed that day, while the clouds gathered and the village drama went on around them. Doerr's way of saying they made love is so exquisite: " The Evertons had gone back to bed after the visit of Luis ... The wool robe and pajamas were slipping inch by inch from the foot of the bed to the floor... One hour later they were still in bed, and when Luis returned to knock on the door a second time there was some delay before they answered."

And then the sky falls out and the snow that has been coming all day comes.

(Doerr is fantastic)

"Where youth grows pale, and specter-thin, and dies" — Keats, Ode to a Nightingale

Did anyone else feel that Sara and Richard were sort of thinly drawn? I can't help but think this was intentional, to make them seem more wraithlike in their foreign home and in Richard's coming death. (I looked up "wraith" in my dictionary to make sure I was using it properly, and it said, "the exact likeness of a living person seen usually just before death as an apparition.") I think Sara even felt like a wraith at times — thus her admonition to "Bring stones," i.e., something to weigh down the existence that was here, to give it substance, permanence, memory. I think that's a beautiful effect, but sometimes I wanted more of these characters, to have a more material feel for them, to get inside their emotional shell. Do you think, though, that that would have destroyed the specter-thin atmosphere of the novel?

AN ENTHUSIASTIC ASIDE FOR CL

I am hooked on this book, cl. Thanks for introducing me to Ira Levin! (Have you read any Patricia Highsmith?)

"Stones for Ibarra" -- initial impressions

Lovely choice, Ben. The anti- "Ugly American."

Jumping from their journey to foreshadowing Richard's death was initially jarring, but I settled into the story.

The stories about the villagers -- Basilico Garcia, the doctor's suicide -- at times were more interesting than Sara and Richard's storyline.

For an anti-Christian tale ("better heretics than Baptists" -- hehe), the villagers blew past a number of the Ten Commandments. Was that intentional, or just the makeup of human behavior?

I want a green parrot that says, "Vamanos!"

And did anyone think this was odd in the chapter "Kid Munoz" (sorry, can't find tilda): Sara dances with a miner, and it follows: "This is how she met Basilico Garcia."

Did you expect further interaction between those two?

Hope I'm not rushing Ben or anyone else. I've got to post some questions before the story starts leaking out of my memory -- albeit this one's memorable.

November book pick

Hi, everybody. I have wavered on everything from another children's book to Agatha Christie, but am going to stick with my first idea: A Kiss before Dying, by Ira Levin.

The novel won an Edgar Award in 1954 for best first novel. The author also wrote The Boys from Brazil and, of course, The Stepford Wives.

I read it a long time ago and am looking forward to reading it again and having somebody to talk about it with. I would warn you now not to do any research on it because there would be so many spoilers to the story.

(Anyway, now I need to finish Ben's pick!)

Progress report

The plan was to begin discussing Stones for Ibarra on October 15. How is everyone progressing? I'm behind, and will probably finish a little late. Should we set a new date, or are you all going to be done by the fifteenth?

SWEET, SWEET JANE

I've been reading about JA's juvenilia. I really want to read this one (as described on Wikipedia):

Love and Freindship is a juvenile story by Jane Austen, dated 1790, when Austen was 14 years old. Written in epistolary form, like her later unpublished novella, Lady Susan, it is likely one of the tales she wrote for the amusement of her family. The installments, written as letters from the heroine Laura, to Marianne, the daughter of her friend, Isabel, "La Comtesse de Feullide," may have come about as nightly readings by the young Jane in the Austen home. Love and Freindship (the misspelling is one of many in the story) is clearly a parody of romantic novels Austen read as a child. This is clear even from the subtitle, "Deceived in Freindship and Betrayed in Love," which totally undercuts the title. In form, it resembles a fairy tale as much as anything else, featuring wild coincidences and turns of fortune, but Austen is determined to lampoon the conventions of romantic stories, right down to the utter failure of romantic fainting spells, which always turn out badly for the female characters. In this story we can see the development of Austen's sharp wit and distain for romantic sensibility, so characteristic of her later novels.

AUSTEN'S REALISM

I thought this passage at the end of the last chapter was really well done. It has a feel of Realism that seems way ahead of its time. What do you think?

Willoughby could not hear of her marriage without a pang; and his punishment was soon afterwards complete, in the voluntary forgiveness of Mrs. Smith, who, by stating his marriage with a woman of character as the source of her clemency, gave him reason for believing that had he behaved with honour towards Marianne he might at once have been happy and rich. That his repentance of misconduct, which thus brought its own punishment, was sincere, need not be doubted; nor that he long thought of Colonel Brandon with envy, and of Marianne with regret. But that he was for ever inconsolable, that he fled from society, or contracted an habitual gloom of temper, or died of a broken heart, must not be depended on- for he did neither. He lived to exert, and frequently to enjoy himself. His wife was not always out of humour, nor his home always uncomfortable; and in his breed of horses and dogs, and in sporting of every kind, he found no inconsiderable degree of domestic felicity.

For Marianne, however, in spite of his incivility in surviving her loss, he always retained that decided regard which interested him in every thing that befell her, and made her his secret standard of perfection in woman; and many a rising beauty would be slighted by him in after-days as bearing no comparison with Mrs. Brandon.

MRS. JENNINGS AGAIN

What do you make of Mrs. Jennings and the role she plays in the narrative? The narrator is constantly making fun of her and pointing out her foibles, particularly her blindness to the true nature of Lucy Steele, and yet she is held up as a model of good-heartedness and sincerity. Of all the husbandless matriarchs in the book, she is the one — rather than Mrs. Dashwood herself and Mrs. Ferrars and even Willoughby's rich aunt — who seems like JA's model of maternal love to me. And JA endows her with a wacky kind of prescience that makes her correctly predict at the VERY beginning of the book — as soon as we meet her — that Marianne will marry Col. Brandon (In Chapter 8: "She was perfectly convinced of it."). At the end of the book, when Marianne is sick, Elinor comes to truly love Mrs. Jennings, which is the narrator's signal to the reader, in case the reader didn't get it before, that she really is a woman of note — and not just some caricature of a silly society matron.

I think JA's favoring of Mrs. Jennings, the girls' de facto mother through most of the book, is also a sign of her democratic impulse. Mrs. Jennings' husband made his fortune in trade, and that sets her apart from the landed gentry who have all lived idly and forever off the incomes of their estates. She lacks refinement, but she compensates with a generous heart and a liberal spirit.

I love how she is introduced: "Mrs. Jennings, Lady Middleton's mother, was a good-humoured, merry, fat, elderly woman, who talked a great deal, seemed very happy, and rather vulgar. She was full of jokes and laughter, and before dinner was over, had said many witty things on the subject of lovers and husbands."

Compare the introduction of Mrs. Ferrars: "Mrs. Ferrars was a little, thin woman, upright, even to formality, in her figure, and serious, even to sourness, in her aspect. Her complexion was sallow; and her features small, without beauty, and naturally without expression; but a lucky contraction of the brow had rescued her countenance from the disgrace of insipidity, by giving it the strong characters of pride and ill-nature. She was not a woman of many words; for, unlike people in general, she proportioned them to the number of her ideas."

Geraldine Brooks

So if Ms. Brooks were to imagine a novel told from the point of view of one of the male characters, whose story would you be most interested to hear: Willoughby, Brandon or Edward?

NARRATIVE VOICE

What, if anything, did you think of the narrative voice? Did it seem antiquated? It seems to have poked fun at everyone from time to time, except maybe at Elinor.

One curious thing about it: Did anyone notice the sudden use of the first person by the narrator? In Chapter 36, about three pages in, there's this: "I come now to the relation of a misfortune which about this time befell Mrs. John Dashwood." Where did this "I" come from? I found it really jarring. I wonder whether it's in every edition. I have the Bantam Classic paperback reissue April 2006. It doesn't say what original text it's based on, if there's more than one.

MRS. JENNINGS AND MRS. FERRARS

These two struck me as the matriarchal pillars of the novel. In many ways, they were the most powerul people in the book — like Lady Catherine in Pride and Prejudice — and yet they were very different. JA's books seem to be peopled with anti-patriarchs, i.e., most of the men except for the main love interest seem to be sidelined and ineffectual, and it's really the women calling most of the shots. I found this very striking. I don't know whether anyone else noticed this ... or maybe it's what Christy was getting at with her "mean girls" comment ... especially in terms of when JA was writing, early 1800s, as compared with, say, the Bronte sisters' books, written in mid-1800s, which are very male-centered, even "Jane Eyre," good grief, is really about a man, as is "Wuthering Heights"..... although I can't help but see a very compelling resemblance between Cathy in "Wuthering Heights" and Marianne in S&S. (I guess Charlotte Bronte disliked JA — thought she was overrated, lacked cajones. I wonder what Emily thought...) Anyway, this is not a question, so much as a rambling, but if anyone has any thoughts on this, I'd like to hear them.

WILLOUGHBY AND MARIANNE

Did you see the revelation of Willoughby's real character coming? Did JA set him up as something too good to be true? Or were you totally surprised like Marianne? Was Marianne's abandon and lack of propriety with regard to him (in the eyes of the Age and of Elinor) something that was bound to be punished, in this case by losing him?

Potential spoiler

(Don't read if you aren't finished ....)

You'll have to have read more than one of Jane Austen's books to compare, but did you think she skimped a little on the ending in terms of intimacy, impassioned dialogue and all the perks of a romantic happy ending? Particularly with Marianne? I can't remember too well with P&P, but I think in "Emma" the author was more willing to stay with the characters as they admitted their love, committed to marriage, etc.

I felt a little cheated -- as a sentimental slob -- at how much narrative she uses to gloss over the ending at "Sense" after putting me through all that stress, damn it!

Meow!

I don't know that "Mean Girls" quite stacks up to the underhanded scheming, passive-aggressive insults and blatant snobbery from the women of "Sense and Sensibility." I had trouble even finding a sympathetic adult female character besides Elinor and Marianne.

Any thoughts on what Miss Austen had to say about her sex? Would you credit any behavior to the limited and cutthroat role for women of the day -- marriage for their own (and family's) prosperity and reputation?

SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, QUESTION 1

Elinor or Marianne?

Round two

My second pick, to be discussed starting around October 15, is Stones for Ibarra by Harriet Doerr.

More on schedule and pacing

As of yesterday, I hadn't started our next selection, and I was hoping to have it done by about September 15, when we're planning to start discussing it (as I understand our calendar). So I checked out a copy of Sense & Sensibility from the WSU library, noted that it has 335 pages and I had 11 days to read it in, so I gave myself the goal of reading about 30 pages a day. I'm just letting y'all know this in case you want to try a similar idea yourself.

Also, as I understand it, we're planning to do about one book per month, and to announce the selections early so people can procure the book and get a head start if necessary. With that in mind, I'll plan to name my selection around September 15, at the same time that we start discussing Sense and Sensibility. Then you'll have a month to procure it and read it, while we discuss Sense and Sensibility. We usually don't spend a whole month discussing (unless we're really dragging it out without a lot of comments), so even if you don't like to overlap books, it should work. We can discuss a book in the second half of the month and you can read a book in the first half. If you prefer to read slower and don't mind discussing one book while reading another, then you'll have a whole month to read each one. (We may have to change this schedule if it turns out to be too quick. Or we could change it temporarily if someone picks an especially long book.)

Let me know whether this sounds okay. Otherwise, I'll just plan to name my pick around September 15 and begin the discussion around October 15.

C is for Chuck and Creative, too

Though I've criticized some parts of the book, I still would give "Haunted" a high score for originality. There were some intriguing characters, too. I can't say that I ever could anticipate what would happen next (save for, after a while, the fact that characters would die). If 10's the best score you could give this novel sheerly for ingenuinity, what would you rate it?

Author's agenda

There was an aspect to this novel, which I think was well-written and interesting overall, that turned me off from working on it for a while. (This is no insult to the great G-Force, who chose it.) Part of it was how these stories followed each other so closely: One was Whittier's taking advantage of the suburban volunteer mom type, and the other was the journalist who'd commit murder for a Pulitzer. While I appreciate that Palahniuk works with absurdity, as both of those stories reflected (nobody would issue a Pulitzer for a celebrity profile), he still has this agenda he's working for his male, anti-Establishment type audience.

One, take the so-called "soccer moms," who are not as inane or mediocre as people relentlessly portray them. I think Salon has or had a category once called "Soccer Moms Who Think," and it really pissed me off. Starting with choosing to stay home with your kids doesn't mean you're an intellectual lightweight. Or that you would fall prey to the seductive charms of some dying man-kid.

Two, his portrayal of journalists equally offended. I understand these were supposed to be depraved characters, but the absurdity of setting up a man as a pornographer and murderer is obviously a jab at a profession that, within my limited viewpoint, is full of people with a great deal of conscience as a rule.

So yes, both stories develop the characters, but I think it's similar to "Fight Club." That first idea has made Palahniuk a literary legend -- you can still find Web sites of guys who think Fight Club is some kind of religion. So he comes up with other people to target, who are easy to hate, like moms and the media, that his fan base loves to believe are just the way he portrays them.

IS THIS CLUB DEAD?

I like this book club. I like reading books and discussing them with people. I'll be kind of sad if this club peters out right now, but if that is what is happening, maybe we should just be honest about it, huh?

TOUGH GUYS

If Chuck Palahniuk and George were in a fight club together, on whom would you bet?

Hearing voices

Did Palahniuk succeed in creating different voices for his different writers, or did it seem as if all the stories were written by the same person? Did certain character traits revealed of the writers in the narrative or the poems come through to you in the stories they were supposed to have written?

A novel idea?

How much did you care about "Haunted" as a novel? Was it more interesting just as a collection of short stories than a full narrative? Did you particularly care about the characters in the writers retreat?

And in particular, what did you think about the poems that introduced the writer before each story? Would you rather have preferred the novel have a more traditional structure to tell the story?

Best and worst

Of the stories contained in "Haunted," which did you like the best, and which the least, and why? Maybe also mention which you found particularly funny, insightful, gross and preposterous.

KIM'S PICK

My choice, because at least three out of five of us have never read it, and the other two did eons ago, is Jane Austen's "Sense and Sensibility." I think it would be a good companion piece to "Haunted." Or possibly not. We can discuss.

(My understanding is that we'll start discussing this in mid-September, but correct me if I'm wrong.)

Schedule suggestions

I wanted to propose some more formal guidelines so that we aren't lingering over one book for so long. I admit I am a bad slacker (not quite finished with Haunted, but can be done in a night), and I'd like to keep doing this because your suggestions have been so enjoyable. What about this, if we do a monthly format:

On the 15th of the month, the next moderator will announce their book choice for next month. Or, for KC, that would be soon. This gives us two weeks to start the book, if we need extra time, or to request it from the library, because I am so cheap.

Discussion could start around, say, the 10th or 15th of the actual month and remain active until the end of the month.

Or we could stretch this to a bimonthly format, but it's harder to get back into the discussion if we finish at such varying times, I think.

My other thought is that perhaps there would be a few months a year for a break ... I'm thinking mostly that G and B will be taking finals, and KC giving them, so maybe December and May should be off months. If we're still doing this by then, anyway.

What do you guys think? Is this too ambitious for all of our new kids in school?

FELLOW READERS!

When are we going to start discussing this book? I am in love with the baglady story.

BETTER YET, ANSWER THIS IF YOU DARE

OK, I made it through the notorious first vignette in "Haunted." I trust you all are champing at the bit to share your own stories about the yuckiest thing that ever happened to you while masturbating. Or not.

Seriously, though, are there kids who devote huge amounts of time and energy looking for weird ways to do it?

ANSWER THIS, IF YOU DARE

I've alluded to this issue already, but I seriously want to know what you guys think, because this topic really intrigues me, even though it's really just futile speculation and could lead to arguments — nay, plate throwing — about sexism. Nevertheless. Can you tell that the author of this book is a woman? Would it occur to you that it was, if you didn't know? Be honest. I won't get mad, probably.

George's pick: "Haunted" by Chuck Palahniuk

This is actually my second choice; I didn't want my first selection to be a Chuck Palahniuk book, but what I was planning on using others have read. Sorry.

And I don't think we're finished with "March." But I wanted to put this out there to give time for people to get a copy (in case they were using their local library).

Hero?

How effective a hero does everyone see March? His principles led him to enlisting, but it seems they also hindered him, namely instances of inaction such as at the Bluff or not taking the pistol. He was able to do some good, teaching freed men to read and write. But it seems he didn't do much for the abolitionist cause by coming down south like he expected. He didn't change any minds, he didn't free any slaves. Did his efforts justify overlooking his duties to his family?

March and Marmee

One of the things that really struck me was the way March and Marmee seemed to know each other so well, embraced each other's faults as well as virtues, anticipated each other's thoughts. And yet, when it mattered most, they misread each other completely. March believed Marmee held her abolitionist principles above all else, including her own material comfort and keeping her family together. And Marmee had no idea that March was making these rash decisions not out of a selfish passion for the cause, but out of a desire to please her and win her admiration and love. Such a tragic misunderstanding.

Beloved Beth

I wish I had the book with me so I could quote material, but I'm struck at how, again, I get so weepy over good little Beth. Her protection of Flora is one of the high points for me in the book. I won't say much else in case you don't know Beth's storyline, but she is a wonderful heroine.

I also thought, for a while, that March was never going to mention her, that he seemed more apt to mention the other three, and I'm glad the author didn't take it in that direction. All the fuss over Jo has always bugged me; I don't care that she was high-spirited. The other sisters were more interesting.

Read it in one night

Erin, I was slow to pick up the book, but I read it in one sitting. It was terrific. Now, as I expected, I've got to go back and re-read "Little Women." It'll be hard to reconcile this grim, lusty March with Alcott's March. It also puts a whole new spin on Marmee.

Favorite piece of dialogue

I am not quite finished, and I don't mean to pre-empt a possible discussion point by Erin, but this is my favorite piece of dialogue in "March" so far.

An old slave woman, upon being chastised for whippin' kids, says: "You tell me now; what the good Lord go make switches for, if it ain't for lickin' boy chilluns?"

I LOVE Geraldine Brooks.

Erin's pick: "March" by Geraldine Brooks

From Louisa May Alcott’s beloved classic Little Women, Geraldine Brooks has taken the character of the absent father, March, who has gone off to war, leaving his wife and daughters to make do in mean times. To evoke him, Brooks turned to the journals and letters of Bronson Alcott, Louisa May’s father — a friend and confidant of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. In her telling, March emerges as an idealistic chaplain in the little known backwaters of a war that will test his faith in himself and in the Union cause as he learns that his side, too, is capable of acts of barbarism and racism. As he recovers from a near mortal illness, he must reassemble his shattered mind and body and find a way to reconnect with a wife and daughters who have no idea of the ordeals he has been through.

Favorite passages?

I'll start us off with one of my picks:

"You see,"continued the minister, bowing thankfully to the duke, "Dictionopolis is the place where all the words in the world come from. They're grown right here in our orchards."
"I didn't know that words grew on trees," said Milo timidly.
"Where did you think they grew?" shouted the earl irritably. A small crowd began to gather to see the little boy who didn't know that letters grew on trees.
"I didn't know they grew at all," admitted Milo even more timidly.
"Well, money doesn't grow on trees, does it?" demanded the count.
"I've heard not," said Milo.
"Then something must. Why not words?" exclaimed the undersecretary triumphantly. The crowd cheered his display of logic and continued about its business."

Humbug

What is the purpose of the Humbug? He's a liar, a fraud, and no one likes him. Why does the author single him out to join the brave Milo and loyal Tock on their quest?

Too kid-oriented?

If my choice was too elementary, we could go with this on my next pick ...

And the people you'll see

There are times when I identify strongly with sobbing and temperamental Dynne. (I hope your copy of the book had that illustration of the blue-smog creature.) For better or worse, do you see yourself as any of "Tollbooth's" characters?

The great places you'll go

Could you relate to any of Milo's stops and visits during his journey? I personally dither in the Land of Expectations. There's also the Island of Conclusions, the Doldrums, or maybe you relate to aspects of Dictionopolis or Digitopolis. Or how about the Forest of Sight, Valley of Sound, Castle in the Air or Mountains of Ignorance?

Christy's selection: "The Phantom Tollbooth"

This fab children's book should be available at your library, and I have a copy on hand that I'll pass along to Kim if the rest of you can check yours out. This would put us on track to read a book about twice a month, which I hope sounds OK.

I'll begin posting discussion points on Monday. Ideas to consider: Whether numbers or letters are better; what letter of the alphabet you'd like to eat, and how would it taste; and casting of the Book Cases in five pivotal character roles: The Duke of Definition, the Earl of Essence, the Minister of Meaning, the Count of Connotation and the Undersecretary of Understanding.

unhappy ending?

While the book ended on a seemingly positive note (Christopher and father are getting along, Christopher gets a dog), I was still feeling sad when the book ended. I thought if Christopher had been 12 or 13, the reader would be able to excuse away his present issues as something he could still "grow out of," in part, or his school would still have more time to teach him life skills. Instead, the intense supervision he needs at 15 seems unlikely to change. Did his plan to be a scientist seem realistic, or is that as far-fetched as his dream to be an astronaut?

Child's play

Is it just me, or is Brit lit way more in to children characters than American lit? Christopher, even though he's autistic and "different," is still very reminiscent of an English fondness for the exceptional child. When I think of the great American novels, there aren't a lot of kids, like Moby Dick and The Great Gatsby and The Sun Also Rises and all of Henry James and Edith Wharton and the Beats. I mean, there are notable exceptions like Catcher in the Rye and Huck Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird, but children don't seem as pervasive as in Brit lit, where there's this great fondness for starting at the beginning (Dickens and the Brontes and Kipling and Joyce and Carroll) and possibly more cynicism about the adult world (and corrupt old aristocracies), and, of course, the peculiar British school system. Am I just imagining this?

Comedy?

Several things I've read about this book said it was "very funny" or "often blackly funny" or "full of tender humor." And the author said it was "very funny" to describe the slain dog in Christopher's flat, emotionless narrative. Am I missing something? The only thing I found funny was the strange British cursing. "Fucking Nora."

More Brit kid lit

Has anyone ever read "The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13¾"? I thought it might be a good companion piece — another book about a precocious British kid, but circa early 1980s — for those of us impatient cows (moo!) who finished early. From what I've seen, the fictional kid diary is amusing but doesn't hold a candle to Erin's brilliant chef-d'oeuvre.

Narrator's ally too contrived?

How crucial is Siobhan to the form Christopher's story takes? Is Siobhan too good to be true? Too artificial a device to get the story told?

Novel type

Is this a murder mystery, a coming-of-age story, a case study, or something else?

Narrator's descriptions

What, if anything, does Christopher's way of describing things add to the book?

The father and the mother

Do you sympathize more with Father (Ed) or Mother (Judy)?

"The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time"