Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

A book group meeting seems a good way to say goodbye to a house, Susie has sold her house and is moving to Maidenhead although we hope she still can travel back to Reading for book group :-)

We liked this book, quite a lot.  Kidnappers storm the Vice-Presidents house in the middle of a party hoping to take hostage the President and have their demands for poor people of the small Latin American country (never named) and free political prisoners.  Unfortunately it all goes wrong and the kidnappers end up holding a group of about 50 men (and one woman) for several months.  The plot line was excellent but the real story is in the relationships between the main characters, how the rich party guests come to learn from and like their keepers and how tragedy brings people together.

Concept: 9/10
Plot: 9/10
Ending: 9/10
Cover: 7/10
Page Turner: 8/10
Who to Slap: The Accompanist (lacklustre effort of dying in the name of love)
Where's the Cheese: The weird soap opera which keeps popping up

Overall: 8.5/10

We chose the next book from:

• The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller (I know this was proposed last time)
• The Book of Human Skin by Michelle Lovric
• These Hidden Things by Heather Gudenkauf
• Dark Matter by Michelle Paver

We randomly chose 'The Song of Achilles' by Madeline Miller which we will be reading for our May meeting.

Our next meeting will be at Copa Bar on Wednesday 10th April at 8pm.

The End of Mr. Y by Scarlett Thomas

Christmas seems like months ago and it was great to catch up with the girls at our usual haunt, most of us had read all of this book which is very good considering December is usually a busy month for everyone.  This book started of as a bit of a mystery around a disappeared professor but it turned into one of the most mind-tripping books I've ever read (in a good way)!  The discussions on quantum physics and philosophical topics left most of us struggling but if you glossed over those, this book was great.  It had a slow beginning but I was flying through it towards the middle and the ending came far too soon.  Some of the details seemed a bit contrived, for example to add a bit of danger the ex-FBI agents appeared and started hunting the main characters, but thinking about it, why didn't they go after their bosses or other people involved in the project rather than trying to track a book down across the world?  I liked the mix of love story and sci-fi but I was frustrated by the ending and after discussing it with my fellow book-worms it seems it could be taken several ways.

Concept: 9/10
Plot: 7/10
Ending: 7/10
Cover: 9/10
Page Turner: 8/10
Who to Slap: Drippy Heather
Where's the Cheese: Adam & Eve linkages

Overall: 8/10

We have changed the way we are selecting our books, instead of voting on them we are putting all suggestions in a hat (yes, we borrowed Jen's actual hat) and drew one out at random.  We are hoping this means that we get to read some random books which may not have won in a vote.  The suggestions were:

• The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce
• A Dark Encounter by Roland Vernon
• The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
• Prophecy by SJ Parris
• Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
• Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick

We randomly chose 'Bel Canto' by Ann Patchett which we will be reading for our March meeting.

We also discussed our book of the year 2012, it came down to a tie between 'How to be a Woman' by Caitlin Moran and 'Rivers of London' by Ben Aaronovich, it went down to a final vote and 'Rivers of London' won!

Our next meeting will be at Jen's house on Wednesday 13th February, 8pm.