Booklist Online: Book Reviews from the American Library Association

Here’s a treat for Jane Austen lovers. Beginning in January, Masterpiece (formerly known as Masterpiece Theatre) will be airing The Complete Jane Austen,  dramatizations of all six Austen novels. Two of the adaptations we’ve seen before (one is the A&E version of Pride and Prejudice with a smoldering Colin Firth; the other is the version of [...]

These days most publishers include discussion questions for a lot of their books.  You can find them either on their web sites or printed at the back of books.  But what do you do when your web searching has come up with nothing and you have no time to make up questions of your own?  [...]

My book group relies on the Washington Center for the Book’s Book Group Collection for our books each month.  This way group members don’t have to buy the book or get on a hold queue.  It’s a great list and a great service, no doubt about it.  But hundreds of other Seattle-area book groups are [...]

Monthly attendance at my book group had dropped to two or three members. I was bussing back to the bookstore on book group night hoping someone would show up. I was ready to throw in the towel and consider that a five-year group had run its cycle and reached a dead end. Yesterday, however, when [...]

In a previous life, I taught the Great Literatures to ungrateful, deadline-ignoring, homesick freshmen and sophomores. I loved encouraging them wrap their brains around the many meanings of the rose in “A Rose for Emily.” All that short story/play/poetry explication and analysis in my academic past paid off big time in my librarian future.
Until I [...]

New York Times:
Publisher Seek to Mine Circles
Book clubs? Reading groups? Whatever you call them, they’re becoming an important part of the publishing world. Book groups can turn a book into a bestseller, and publishers are  turning to these groups to help create buzz.   

Stewart O’Nan’s Last Night at the Lobster is a book that’s spread like wildfire among my work group. Most everyone I know has also been reading Richard Russo’s Bridge of Sighs which depicts down-at-heel, small-town life. But Russo’s book is more like a doorstop, whereas this one, at 146 pages, is more like a [...]

There are two things Librarians don’t do on the job. The first is read. Sorry. Gotta dispel that myth right now. And if you still believe that one, I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn tucked in the side pocket of my overcoat to sell you.
The second thing Librarians don’t do is take a lunch. Unless [...]

I’ve had a rollicking good time with Mario Vargas Llosa’s new novel, The Bad Girl. There’s something about this spirited, beautiful life-wrecker (whatever her real name is) with her spellbinding sexiness and heart of ice and the poor doomed narrator who’s so hopelessly in love with her that strikes a chord of recognition in me. [...]

Okay, I must have memoirs on the brain. But the film version of Marjane Satrapi’s powerful graphic novel memoir (or “graphic memoir”—a more apt term must exist or be created) is coming out shortly and is already generating critical acclaim.

In 2006, The Seattle Public Library chose Persepolis (1 & 2) as our “Seattle Reads” [...]

It can be hard to find discussion guides for children’s books on the web.  With more and more parents taking on the leading of children’s book groups or parent/child book clubs, there is an increasing desire for discussion guides for kids’ books.  Luckily, librarians, publishers and booklovers are making more guides available online.
Here are some [...]

On Thursday, I promised the title of the book all the NEFLINers said was a successful book group read.
Flyboys: A True Story of Courage by James Bradley spurred plenty of heated debate for a few of northeast Florida’s library-sponsored reading circles.  Bradley is also the author of another book group favorite, Flags of Our Fathers. This [...]

A brilliantly funny new political novel is the Mexican mystery, The Uncomfortable Dead – but I would have misunderstood it, considered it flawed by an odd surrealism, and possibly even accused it of (gulp!) magical realism, without the explanation provided by a book club member.
The novel is written by two authors in alternating chapters. [...]

Finding discussable memoirs and biographies for your book group can be a challenge. They pose all kinds of problems.  The quality of the writing, how a group feels about an individual, and how well a biographer deals with the historical details and source material all come into play.  And again, the aim is to find [...]

On Tuesday I had the distinct pleasure to spend a day in the company of some of NEFLIN’s (North East Florida Library Information Network) most convivial and dedicated librarians. We had gathered for a workshop called Common Grounds: Book Groups for New and Experienced Readers & Leaders. Whenever I lead a workshop on this topic, I [...]

Here are a few Web sites that offer support for people interested in starting a book club, or keeping one going. 
Book Clubs Resource.com has information on running a book club, as well as links to reading guides and other resources.
Reading Group Choices recommends discussible books, and also has author interviews and book club tips. Every year it [...]

If we were divine beings and knew how to read books perfectly, we wouldn’t need to talk about them. Unfortunately we’re far from divine readers. We have short attention spans. We have limited knowledge. We’re easily distracted. We miss details. And sometimes we miss the whole point. Occasionally half a dozen smart, committed readers banding [...]