LETSBuzz Book Club Sunday 16th January 2000
Andrew described this book as a simple-minded tale; a girl
splitting up with a bloke and having trouble coming to terms with
the idea. He said that he didn't really enjoy the book and had
some difficulty finding sympathy for the mddle class-ness of the
characters. Perhaps the only saving grace of the book was in the
minor characters - a couple and their son, who took heroine after
she had left the bloke.
Andrew
Andrew described this as a good first novel. The book is
narrated in the first person by a character whose name we never
get to know (the author plays with this to tease the reader). The
main character is an uneducated, though not unintelligent, young
man who has been brought up by his Aunt Nalda - who has lived a
bohemian life. He is making his way around the world, and while
doing so he is keeping a strange secret. The book deals with him
keeping his secret while making friends. Generally a good
read.
Andrew
Finally, Andrew noted that Female Ruins by Geoff Nicholson had a
lousy cover (and the group agreed). However, as this was a book
by one of his favourite authors he was not put off. Andrew
described it as a good read, featuring Nicholson's great style
-though not perhaps his best. The plot deals with a woman who has
dropped out of society and becomes a taxi driver. We find out in
the course of the plot that she is the daughter of a famous
architect, and this becomes important when her life is disturbed
by a stranger. Andrew felt that this book dealt very well with
the Norfolk/Suffolk landscape.
Andrew
Jean described this as trash and questioned whether we really
learnt a lot from it about the life of a Geisha. Jean admitted
that she had speed read quite a bit of it.
Jean
Jean has been reading the Pat Barker trilogy backwards (not from
choice!) and said that despite this she thought this book was
excellant. She commented that it was one of those books that she
did not want to end. She particularly enjoyed the humanity
portrayed in characters such as Rivers.
Jean
Jean said that she found the stories enjoyable. By and large they
seemed to deal with relationships in cold places. She
particularly enjoyed one of the stories that dealt with a woman
and daughter going out skating on a frozen lake.
Jean
Doreen admitted that having heard some excerpts of this on the
radio she had rejected the book without reading a page.She
commented that after listening to Art Malik reading a few
chapters it all sounded like an introduction. She also commented
that the book seemed too full of silly ideas.
Doreen
Doreen opened her remarks by saying that she had read this book
because she was on a train and she did not have anything else to
read. She also commented that she was not sure what the blurb in
the book meant when it said the book was 'delightfully literary'.
The story features a Hungarian dissident dealing with the
problems of being on a watched list. The first section of the
book highlights the problems of paranoia. However as the book
moved on it became a sort of whodunnit before a final section
which Doreen found absurd.
Doreen
Doreen found this book deeply affecting, as it dealt with the
horrors of McCourt's childhood while still being funny. She noted
that she had, however, been a bit worried by McCourt's comments
about the truthfulness of the book. In interview he has described
it as "a memoir not an autobiography." For Doreen this raised the
unwelcome question of having to think that some of the story was
not true.
Doreen
Penguin Classics translation
Gavin said that he tried to read at least one classic a year as a
way of broadening his reading about other cultures and times. He
commented that he was surprised to find how unsympathetic the
main characters (and in particular the Trojan Æneas) were.
The author describes Æneas as being "The True" despite his
running out on Dido. He was also surprised at the portayals of
the wars in Italy caused by the arrival of the Trojans. It was
hard to imagine how the Romans could look back on this mythic
piece of colonisation and not be ashamed. Finally, Gavin
commented that when he had read the book he had a strange senseof
déja vu as the story of the Æneid forms the
background to and the model for so many other stories that he had
read before.
Gavin
The frames have gone all
funny - click to make it good.