Booklist Online: Book Reviews from the American Library Association

I’m just back from Book Expo America as well. There were exciting ideas for book groups there, but I need to let them percolate a bit before I’m ready to write on them. In the meanwhile, I’m go to reprise an entry from just over a year ago, because I think it bears repeating. If [...]

Seriously. He is going to book group. He’s not going to the bar, poker night, or a baseball game. He’s switched out the brew for tempranillo and the Bukowski for Updike.
Just ask Don Aucoin of the Boston Globe who interviewed a number of guys about their book groups made up entirely of men. Don’t believe [...]

Though it still feels like April here in Chicago, the summer reading season has arrived.  The Wall Street Journal just published “A Book Lover’s Summer,” based on recommendations from publishers, booksellers, agents, and readers. Among the fiction recommendations are The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson (which Booklist’s Bill Ott says is the best novel [...]

Last week my book group discussed The Memory Keeper’s Daughter, by Kim Edwards.  This is a book that has been extremely popular with discussion groups from the moment it was published, and I started off the discussion by asking our members why they thought it had such a strong appeal.  Their answer:  because the characters [...]

It only took 45 minutes, but I’ve found half a year’s worth of material for my book groups next year. This is just from one panel, mind you. I ran across plenty of other titles in my many laps around the Javits Center for BookExpo America. These were the highlights from the Library Journal Day [...]