December Selection

We have selected The Good Daughters by Joyce Maynard as our December selection. Discussion will begin on January 3, giving you New Years Eve to read! Have a happy holiday.

Next Book Choices

Darlene is the "host" for this next book club. Her book offerings are: The Knitting Circle, by Ann Hood; I'd Know You Anywhere, by Laura Lippman; Half Broke Horses by Jeanette Walls; and The Good Daughters by Joyce Maynard. For your information, I'd Know You Anywhere and The Good Dauthers are only available in hardback.

Please vote by emailing Kris (kzmclain@comcast.net) by Sunday night, November 21.

Juliet: A Novel

Who knew Juliet Capulet had a sister??? Anne Fortier has a lot of fun in this novel, showing off her ability to write complicated plots and her intimate familiarity with Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. I’m not sure this is as much fun for the reader, however.

I did enjoy the novel. While not great literature, it entertained me. I loved the Siena backdrop. Having visited Siena several times during a recent trip to Italy, and having had the Palio explained to me by my sister and brother-in-law, I could easily picture the scenes as Fortier described them. According to the author’s notes at the end, originally this legend was placed in Siena, which interested me.

While I was happy just to go along for the ride, there was little about the plot that seemed realistic. I found it hard to believe that sisters with so much baggage between them would work together as Juliet and Janice did. Certainly they were placed in a situation that called for teamwork, but old feelings die hard. Same with Umberto. Oh, oops, he’s really their father and a gangster! They didn’t seem nearly as upset at learning this as I would expect in real life.

And then, the characters… Usually, what engages me (or not) about a book is its characters. It wasn’t so much that I didn’t like these characters as that I didn’t believe them. The relationship between Juliet and Janice didn’t ring true for me. Alessandro confused me throughout the book: bad guy or good guy? At the end, good guy, but there are some unexplained actions along the way. Same for Umberto, and even Aunt Rose. Fortier leaves a few too many loose ends, character-wise, for my taste.

Ultimately, what entertained me about the book was the connection to Shakespeare’s play. I liked knowing where the quotes at the beginning of chapters came from in the play. It was a hint about what would happen in that chapter. I liked some of the questions asked about the original plot, especially the one around Friar Lawrence/Lorenzo. In the play, no one pays much attention to him after the deaths of the young lovers. In the novel, Juliet discovers that the Friar was in big trouble with the families, which seems likely to me. Because I’ve taught and seen the play many times, the obvious connections to Romeo and Juliet made the novel a worthwhile read.

So, my big question is this: If you’re not as familiar with Shakespeare’s play, did the novel work for you? Were the quotes and references interesting, helpful, or just confusing? And, if you do know the play well, did you enjoy the connections or were they a distraction?

October Book Choice

The book we selected is Juliet by Anne Fortier. We will begin discussion of this book Friday, November 5. Enjoy this book. We all need a little more romance in our life!

Next Book Club Choices

I think we had a great discussion about Diamond Ruby. If anyone has more comments, feel free to continue discussion via the comment section.

In the meantime, Beckie is hosting the next Ethereal Reader book club. Here are her book choices:

Juliet: A Novel -- Anne Fortier
The Sculptor -- Gregory Funaro
The Queen of the Big Time -- Adriana Trigiani
Whistling in the Dark -- Lesley Kagen

Please vote via an email to Kris (kzmclain@comcast.net) by next Saturday, September 25.

Diamond Ruby

I’m not a huge baseball fan, but I am a fan of historical novels that provide a good sense of time and place – particularly if I am interested in the place.

Diamond Ruby provided both of those, and it made me enjoy the book more than I perhaps would have otherwise. The 1920s have always interested me because so much was going on at the time. The world was between wars, Prohibition was wreaking havoc nationwide, and then, of course, there was the suffragette movement -- women were fighting for the right to vote. (Doesn’t it seem absolutely astounding that women couldn’t vote yet in the 20s?)

New York City was sort of the poster child for all that was happening during this time, and Ruby, the main character of the novel, it seems, was impacted by most of the things that were happening. Her mother was a suffragette, her brother was involved in bootlegging, much of her family died from the Spanish influenza, brought back from World War I.

Question 1: In Diamond Ruby, we read about the opening of the Coney Island Boardwalk, Yankee Stadium, Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey, Prohibition, the influenza epidemic and women's rights, to name a few things. Was there something regarding the time frame or Brooklyn setting that most interested you?

I thought most of the characters in the novel were interesting, though sometimes seemed to be caricatures. And frequently I thought the dialogue was unrealistic. I would think, “That’s not what a real person would say; that’s what someone in a cartoon would say.”

Having said all of this, I thought that the story told by Joseph Wallace was extremely interesting and fun to read. I often had a difficult time putting the book down. I thought it was so much fun to meet some of the real-life characters, and see how they were laced in and out of the book’s story. It led me to look many of them up in Wikipedia to find out their real story.

Question 2: It seemed like all of the characters epitomized either good or evil – there weren’t really any in-between sorts of characters. Who was your favorite character, and why? Did you find the “bad guys” to be realistic?

My favorite character, besides Ruby, was her niece Amanda. She seemed so solemn, strong-willed, and loyal. Her instincts seemed true, and her undying love and devotion to Ruby touched my heart.

While the “bad guys” were a bit predictable, I still found them to be fairly compelling – perhaps that degree of evilness is just interesting. In the back of the book, the author notes that he sort of liked Chase, which I really couldn’t quite understand. While he did seem to have a soft side for Ruby, he still didn’t hesitate to do what he had to do, even if it hurt her. To me, David Wilcox was the most despicable character.

Question 3. The author is currently working on a follow-up novel to Diamond Ruby that takes place in 1926, three years after the time period of this novel. As you finished reading Diamond Ruby, what did you envision her life being like three years later?

I love to envision what happens to characters after the book ends. In my mind, Ruby doesn’t continue playing professional baseball, because I know that the baseball commissioner, in real life, eventually prohibited women from playing. But I think she plays baseball in some capacity, and is able to provide a living for her nieces through her skills. She gets married, maybe to that FBI guy, and they all continue to live in Helen’s house – one big happy family.

Lots more to say about this book but I’m going to let you all tell me what you think.

August/September book club

And the winner (by a significant margin) was Diamond Ruby, by Joseph Wallace. Discussion will begin September 12. That gives us 5-1/2 weeks. If anyone thinks that isn't enough time, please comment and we will refigure a deadline.

Enjoy the book!