Book Club Recap 8/23/11

Attendees: Denise, Heather, Lauren, Lisa I., Michelle, and Rhonda. With a special appearance by Cooper.

First, I would like to welcome Lauren to our book club group! Christopher and I know Lauren and her family through some old co-workers of Christopher's. I really like Lauren and she likes to read and run and I thought that she would enjoy our book club. Hopefully, she did like us and wants to continue to come :)

The book that we were discussing was The Paris Wife by Paula McLain. This was a fiction book about Ernest and Hadley Hemmingway and their time together in Paris. Although this book was a work of fiction, most of it was factual. The author did a ton of research about their relationship and looked at a lot of their correspondence and other materials about them and got a feel for how they were and then she added in her own thoughts to how they would have behaved during this time in Paris.

We all liked the book (well Rhonda and Lisa were the only two that finished the book and I was 3/4s of the way done) and thought that it was an interesting read. For me I didn't think that the book was a page turner and when I put it down I could keep it down for awhile and I never had the feeling of, "I can't put this down." The book did make all of us interested in that time period and all of the people involved. It also made us want to read some Hemingway. We thought that Hadley was a very needy person and this bothered Rhonda a bit, but I kind of understood why she was that way because she was so out of place where they were living and who they were hanging out with. One of Lisa's complaints was how she didn't like how the book was told in the first person like an autobiography, but it actually wasn't (if you know what I mean). Rhonda and Lisa also did some private talking about the end, which was very considerate of them! So far my reviewing of the book sounds negative, but we didn't think that the book was that bad!

After and in-between the book discussion we got to hear of a delivery that Cooper did. Denise seemed completely mortified by the discussion! We talked a little about running, chickens, gardening, Rhonda's vacation, and I can't remember what else. Rhonda made this delicious corn salad, which I will need the recipe to. There were these yummy banana cookies and then my favorite Argentinian cookies, yum!

Since the Aedo clan will be out of town for most of September we are going to have our next book club in October. Here are the details:

When: Tuesday October 18
Where: Rhonda's house at 7pm
What We Are Reading: Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin and Love and Other Impossible Pursuits by Ayelet Waldman

I hope to see everyone there!

-Heather

Book Club Next Week Tuesday 8/23/11

Details:

When: Tuesday 8/23 7pm
Where: Rhonda's house
What we are reading:
The Paris Wife by Paula McLain