Book Club Recap 2/15/11

Attendees: Callah, Christopher, Denise, Heather, Lisa I., Michelle, Rambo and Rhonda. With special appearances by Cooper, Anderson, and Nathan.

**If you haven't read the book you'll want to skip the below because there will be spoilers**

We discussed the book Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand and we were all in agreement that this book was very unbelievable. We all thought that it was a great read and that the story was remarkable. Some members questioned how Louis could remember all of those details that happened so long ago, but we all thought that he documented a lot of what went on with him. I believe that Rhonda said that the raft part was the part that got her the most. It was incredible to have survived a plane crash and then to be on that raft for so long and forced to eat bird blood and rain water all while having sharks surround your raft and try to attack you to eat you. We thought that it was so crazy that he met Hitler and that he was such a mischievous youth, but found focused on running in high school and became this great runner. We all didn't want to talk much about the portrayal of the Japanese in this book until Denise got there because we were really curious to hear what she had to say.

Denise thought that the way that the Japanese were in this book was horrible but also that in a war situation most captors will be like this. She talked about how the Japanese-Americans were treated in the States during this time (not very well). Christopher brought up the fact that he didn't really see WWII as a war with Japan and saw it mostly has a war with Germany and to see how the Japanese were was really surprising to him. We did discuss all wars later on and why people would want to join the military.

Most of us there are not religious, but we all thought that it was great that it was religion that saved Louis' life. We all agreed that had he not found Billy Graham his marriage would have ended and he would have either been a drunk for the rest of his life or he would have ended up killing himself. Instead his life was turned around and he is still kicking it today. Speaking of killing himself, there were many times during the book where we thought it would have been better to just be dead than to go through what he did, especially with The Bird.

There was a ton more talk about this book and it could have been one of the most talked about books in our book club.

I was the only one that read Room by Emma Donoghue I enjoyed the book and thought that it was an interesting story. Lisa said that she was having a hard time getting into the book because it was told from the five year old's perspective. I thought that the author did a good job at writing the story.

We talked about Rambo's crazy running that he is doing. We talked about how Denise's neighbors are all dying and she wants all of us to move to her street; it would be a very fun thing to do! We talked about chickens and their lack of egg laying in the winter. We talked about backyards, the Slymar and Northridge earthquakes, and lastly the Ted Talks. This talk is about the mammography testing that I was telling you about. There are so many talks that are great to watch and listen to!

For our next book club we will be reading The Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua. From the reviews it looks like it will be a little bit of a controversial read and should be a good discussion! We haven't picked a day yet (Rhonda will get back to us), but the book looks like it is on the short side and I heard that it is a fast read.

Looking forward to seeing everyone at the next book club!

-Heather