fiction

I just got back from the Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC. Two Book Club Bashes -- what fun! Nancy Olson, the owner, and her crack staff have two book clubs events discussing their book club picks of the season. Wine and cheese are provided at the night event and coffee and doughnuts at the morning event. At the end of the programs, book clubs members talked abot some of their selections of the past year -- some good and some  not so good. Over 100 reading group members at each program -- got to love that.

Booking through Thursday

Question of the Day. How do you feel about illustrations in your books? Graphs? Photos?

Does the National Book Critics Circle select great reading group picks? You decide!

The National Book Critics Circle Awards nominees were announced on Saturday.

Friday is Findsday! What books did you find this week? Old or new, fiction or nonfiction, adult or children's -- anything goes.

There are lots of book challenges hosted by book bloggers. I read for work or I work to read or my work is to read -- whatever. So, I can't participate in very many of them, though I wish I could do all.

But I have to do this one --Typically British Challenge hosted by Book Chick City! Besides my immediate family, all of my relatives live in England -- my parents came across the pond in the 50s.

I found this post online -- a review of Olive Kitteridge, Elizabeth Strout"s novel, by Rebecca Wells Jopling. 

Jopling expresses the incredible way Strout using emotion to develop and portray her characters.

The term Women's Studies is "the multidisciplinary study of the social status and societal contributions of women and the relationship between power and gender.". (Webster's dictionary). The Women Unbound reading

Do you cherish a “classic book" that you want others to read and love, as well? Ten authors, including Ruth Rendell, Hari Kunru, Joanna Trollope, Colm Toibin, relate their favorite neglected classics for BBC Radio Open Book series.

National Reading Group Month is over. Or is it? Reading groups and book clubs celebrate the book and literary conversation all year.

One case in point, reading groups have weighed in on the Guardian's First Book Award.

I love short stories -- characters coming alive in compact narratives. There are many short story collections that makes great reading group picks and create lively conversation.