This month we discussed
'The Slap' by Christos Tsiolkas, a book which we all expected to raise ethical questions about if we should hit our children. This was not the case, the book was more about Australian multi-culturism than about slapping kids. We didn't like this book much, we disliked the characters (most had awful character flaws) apart from Richie who we thought was actually based on the author and that's why he was OK. We didn't relate to anything in the story, maybe because we are not Australian, but the book portrayed everyone as either an alcoholic, takes too many drugs or has lots and lots of sex. The different ethnic characters; Greek and Aboriginal, were quite streotyped too. The Greeks were very mysogenistic and the Aboriginals drunkered (although the character was a reformed drunk, he was still a drunk at some point). All in all, a disappointing read.
Result: 1/10 (and we debated that for a while)
We chose our next book from the following:
- The Tenderness of Wolves - Stef Penney
- After You'd Gone - Maggie O'Farrell
- One Day - David Nicholls
- Stones into Schools - Greg Mortenson
- Even Silence Has An End - Ingrid Betancourt
- Super Sad True Love Story - Gary Shteyngart
- When God Was a Rabbit - Sarah Winman
We voted for
'When God was a Rabbit' by Sarah Winman, which we will be reading for the August meeting.
Our next meeting will be at my house on
Wednesday 13th July at 8pm, I'll send out directions nearer the time.
