Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Books for Book Clubs

This month's reading room book display, Books for Book Clubs, combines fiction and non-fiction titles which have been popular with book discussion groups and were recommended in the following titles:

More Book Lust, 1,000 reading recommendations for every mood, moment, and reason by uber-reader's advisor/librarian, Nancy Pearl.

Between the Covers, the book babes' guide to a woman's reading pleasures by Margo Hammond and Ellen Heltzel.

A Year of Reading, a month-by-month guide to classics and crowd-pleasers for you or your book group by Elisabeth Ellington and Jane Freimiller

Read It and Eat, a Month-by-month guide to scintillating book club selections and mouthwatering menus by Sarah Gardner. Book discussions can make you hungry.

Books currently on display are:

I am Charlotte Simmons, a rollicking tale of undergraduate life (at UNC?) by Tom Wolfe, original master of the snarky turn-of-phrase.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, a memoir by Dave Eggers.

Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser, you won't eat fast food for a while after reading this; factory-farmed, feces-laden beef patty your way? Om-nom nom...

The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro, an English butler's view of a wartime household. Emotions stifled? check. Nazi sympathizer? check. Good movie? check. Even better book? yes!

The Abstinence Teacher by Summit, New Jersey's own Tom Perrotta treats hot-button issue.

The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, wife of time-traveling librarian has unique marital issues...husband randomly disappears and reappears - naked. Better than movie.

People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks, rare book dealer traces the history of the Sarajevo Haggadeh.

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen, a sure bet for book groups, travel with Depression-era circus veterinarian on animal- and clown-laden train.

My Sister's Keeper, Jodi Picoult's thought-provoking, ripped-from-the-headlines story of a sister conceived to save her ailing sibling. Her formula works for most groups.

One Thousand White Women by Jim Fergus, what if the U.S. had traded institutionalized white women for horses in a swap with Native Americans?

Related websites:
Reading Group Guides
Random House Reading Group Center
Penguin Book Clubs
Amazon Book Clubs

Library Databases for literary criticism and reviews, available from website:

NextReads: sign up for book newsletters by genre
Contemporary Authors: the reference series online
Literary Reference Center: reference books online
Online Book Clubs: get book chapters by email
Next Good Book: browse booklists by subject

5 comments:

Ellen said...

This has got to be the first time UNC has been thought of as the setting for Tom Wolfe's book. You're just trying to make UNC bigger than Duke in the tag cloud, aren't you?

Anne said...

yes, but honestly, everyone at UNC said he did "research" there. don't know why they thought that was a good thing.are you going to add a Duke tag?

Anonymous said...

Good reference material for next time a group is going to choose titles for upcoming discussions.

Ellen said...

I was just kidding about the tag cloud. UNC isn't even showing up in it anymore. (I didn't do it, I promise.)

Anne said...

I know. I chose which tags to show up in the cloud. took out Knut and weird things like that.