March Book Club

Hey gals,

We had a great book club this week discussing the book Don't Go by Lisa Scottoline.  We all agreed that it was a fast read but totally unbelievable.  We did have a really good discussion though about the book and everybody had read it - yeah!!  We were surprised that this was a Target Book Club Pick - not there usual high standards.  What made the book totally unbelievable was all the tragedy that happened to poor Mike Scanlon.  Especially after he returns home and his life falls apart - in ONE WEEK - okay editors - should have given that storyline three months!  (None of us had figured out the ending though.)

Lisa Scottoline has some great books - give her another try - We may have read "Look Again" by her as a book club.  Her series about a female law firm with attorney Bennie Rosato are always easy good mystery/thriller reads.

From Amazon on Don't Go - Writing for the first time from a male perspective, Scottoline tackles a number of heavy issues in this story of a soldier returning from Afghanistan who is forced to deal with even more dire crises on the home front. Mike Scanlon finds his skills as a podiatric surgeon in increasing demand in Afghanistan as a result of the proliferation of IEDs and feels grateful to be able to help so many wounded soldiers. Then he learns his wife has died as the result of a freak household accident, leaving their newborn baby girl without a mother. Overwhelmed, he agrees to let his sister-in-law and her husband take over parenting duties, and re-ups for another tour. But a devastating injury sends him home once again, where he learns a shocking secret about his wife, one that presents the possibility that her death was not an accident. Although this novel feels, at times, overstuffed with issues and superficial in its treatment of PTSD, it will no doubt find a ready audience among Scottoline’s enormous fan base. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Best-selling Scottoline’s hugely popular Rosato & Associates series as well as the success of her recent stand-alone titles guarantee an audience for this one. --Joanne Wilkinson --

In April we are reading "Where'd You go Bernadette" by Maria Semple.  Okay - gals - I absolutely loved this quirky book - please give it a shot.  When you read what the book is about - you won't want to read it.  And it's written in the form of letters & emails - takes a few pages to get into it.  But stick with it - you will laugh out loud - maybe cry - and won't be able to figure out where this crazy story is going.  Please finish it so we can discuss the ending!  So go get it NOW to pass around!!

Mark your calendars - We are meeting on Tuesday, April 8th at 11:30 at The Blue Mug - hopefully sitting outside!

April - Where'd You go Bernadette by Maria Semple
May - Heartburn by Nora Ephron

From Amazon about "Where'd You Go Bernadette?"  - Bernadette Fox is notorious. To her Microsoft-guru husband, she's a fearlessly opinionated partner; to fellow private-school mothers in Seattle, she's a disgrace; to design mavens, she's a revolutionary architect, and to 15-year-old Bee, she is a best friend and, simply, Mom.

Then Bernadette disappears. It began when Bee aced her report card and claimed her promised reward: a family trip to Antarctica. But Bernadette's intensifying allergy to Seattle--and people in general--has made her so agoraphobic that a virtual assistant in India now runs her most basic errands. A trip to the end of the earth is problematic.

To find her mother, Bee compiles email messages, official documents, secret correspondence--creating a compulsively readable and touching novel about misplaced genius and a mother and daughter's role in an absurd world.

Here are the Book Movements Top Ten for this week:
Top Ten LIst
1. The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty
2. Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline
3. The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd
4. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
5. Me Before You by Jojo Moyes
6. The Light Between Oceans by ML Stedman
7. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
8. Divergent by Veronica Roth
9. The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh
10. And The Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini

Happy Reading!