The Help by Kathryn Stockett
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
Growth of the Soil by Knut Hamson (a winner in 1920 of the Nobel Prize in literature. It is a novel about persons in a farming community in Norway and their struggles.)
What I Thought I Knew by Alice Eve Cohen--gripping, frank and difficult memoir of a late-in-life pregnancy by a supposedly infertile woman who is a DES daughter and is diagnosed wrongly as menopausal but turns out to be six months pregnant. Many readers report devouring the book in one sitting, and it is not particularly long. This might be a good choice for a book club for a month when you need a short but still worthwhile book to discuss. I don't know whether this appeals to anyone, but I heard an NPR interview of the author. She is a well known (but not to me!) playwright who does a lot of first person, one woman show-type of writing for the stage, so writing this sort of memoir was right up her alley, apparently. It would seem to be a good source of discussion about the twists and turns life takes when you finally THINK you have gotten into a comfortable situation. More importantly, how do you respond to these situations--a death, an illness, caring for an aged parent, a marriage, an accident, even the possibility of a birth and all the attendant uncertainties.
Another possibility is a work by Edmund White, two possibilities named below:
Forgetting Elena, A Boy's Own Story--two books among many by Edmund White, the first is his first novel (a satire or allegory with the plot device of being a secret amnesiac where you have to define yourself and your status by those around you) and the second is a coming of age tale of a young homosexual (a novel but loosely autobiographical which has been called a bildungsroman where one experiences first hand the psychological development of a young character) which was very popular; he is a prolific writer and a biographer of Marcel Proust; homosexuality is central in much of his work, living as he did during the time of the Stonewall Riots and the emergence of gay culture more into the mainstream--or at least into the open. These books are supposedly classics which have relevance beyond gay culture. I am a little leery about that, since it looks like most of his writing involves gay culture and biographies exclusively of famous gay authors. Nevertheless, the various comments by readers make me inclined to at least try something by Edmund White. He is said to be a very literary writer, but a few find him to be self consciously so. I probably heard something about him on NPR, too...seems to be where I get most of my reading tips.
Edmund White has more recently written a play about his imaginings of the prison conversation between Gore Vidal and Timothy McVeigh called Terre Haute after our federal prison which holds the prisoners condemned to death.
Lastly, I am presently reading The Necklace, another short work, easily read in a day or two. This is not a literary work (is that required?). It was recommended to me by a friend as her book club read it and had great discussions. A woman who is not generally into luxury goods, has an inspiration to purchase a $36,000 diamond necklace (don't worry they drive a harder bargain) beyond her reach by recruiting 12 additional woman, some of whom she knows and some of whom she doesn't to join in the purchase. They own and wear it according to plans they develop during routine get-togethers. It ends up being a social experiment which has surprising impacts on their lives, but I don't want to spoil the surprises. It may sound like a Desperate Housewives plot, but though I had a lot of reservations and am not yet finished with it, I can promise it has more depth than appears on the surface.
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