Tea with The Adriana -- what fun! Adriana Trigiani is just like her books -- fun, interesting, passionate, and real. Five LUCKY bloggers will share laughter and conversation with Adriana on May 27 at Alice's Tea Room in NYC . Please see TLC BookTours for detailed info.

A contest to see Adriana and now a GIVEAWAY to read Adriana! You don't have to be a blogger to win this prize. I have 5 copies of the paperback, Very Valentine, to give away. Please leave a comment and you will be entered to win. How easy is that?

Very Valentine tells the story of Valentine Roncalli, a thirty-three year old, who is struggling to bring her family's Greenwich Village shoe business out of financial distress while dealing with her family's personal dynamics, a trip to Italy to learn more about the shoe business, and her new chef-boyfriend, Roman Falconi. Filled with ups and downs, secrets, love, lost, and humor, Very Valentine is a treat for reading groups that want a great read full of characters with real life issues. Adriana fills the story with such a sense of place and love of Greenwich Village. The paperback even has recipes to help your book discussion, especially Teodaro's Limoncello. Lemons, vodka, and a big mason jar. What a hoot! 

And, Adriana's new book, Brava, Valentine, will be released February 9. Yea! More of Valentine Roncalli and her family's hi-jinks with a touching and humorous wink at life's lessons. 

Have you read any Adriana's books? Let me know and you will be entered in the Very Valentine giveaway! (sssh -- I'll be giving away Brava, Valentine next month!)

Can't decide what book to pick for your discussion? Try some oldies and goodies!

Thanks to Book Club Girl for inviting Kenneth Davis author of the bestselling Don't Know Much About Series, to recommend an entire year's worth of contempory and, some classic, book club picks. I'm thrilled that Kenneth suggested one of my favorite Christmas choices -- The Christmas Memory by Truman Capote.

Find out Kenneth's entire list on Book Club Girl.

Did you suggest an oldie and goodie for your group? Let others know how the conversation went!

Everyone has a mentor -- whether it is a family member, teacher, boss, fellow colleague. Robert Segedy, veteran bookseller, was/is mine. His knowledge and experience of the book world has assisting me though my bookseller days and beyond. Robert is also a movie buff and has offered to write some recommendations for movies that are true to the book and are great for conversation with the book. Robert's Movie Recommendations will be a frequent feature. Here is one of them. Thanks so much, Robert!

The usual consensus on which is better, the book or the film, usually has the book winning hands down, and for the most part I must concur. However, lately I have been thinking about this subject and I have found myself making mental lists of all the exceptions. Just off the top of my head there's To Kill A Mockingbird, In Cold Blood, House of Sand and Fog, No Country for Old Men, The Maltese Falcon, and The Ballad of the Sad Cafe. I must confess that I am an avid movie viewer and my Netflix queue is always overflowing, but I am also a relentless reader, so it is rather easy for me to come up with an abundant list of choices.

I had always wanted to merge this idea of film and source, and believe that it could make for some interesting bookclub discussions. When many people think of this topic, they automatically think of some of the more successful box office blockbusters, such as Jaws by Peter Benchley, The Godfather by Mario Puzo, and so forth. A few of these films are just as good as the novel, if not better. Stephen King is a veritable never-ending source of material for Hollywood (check out his book, Different Seasons -- out of the four novellas presented, three were made into very successful films).

Many mystery writers have seen successful conversions of their work onto the screen, most recently Dennis Lehane, James Elroy and Richard Price. However, none of this is startling news -- Hollywood has been taking the printed word and translating it to hit films since the start of cinema, and even serious literary writers such as Fitzgerald and Faulkner have been known to lend their talents to the dream factory.

For every successful adaption of a great novel, there are any number of terrible films that did not come close to any of the greatness that the book invoked.

Fortunately, the mind's own ability to absorb the written word and create our own mental movies is so much more talented than any number of Hollywood's efforts.

What I am searching for is a film that somehow pulls off the impossible -- a film that captures the true essence of the book, a film that can come close to matching the images that I have created in my mind directly due to the author's storytelling skills.  Some films succeed through the actor's portrayal of the character that they are playing, others are due to the director's vision, the style of the film, the cinematography, the lighting -- all of these elements are crucial in producing a film that delivers everything that the novel induced in me.

So what books/films do I consider enticing enough to venture that a bookclub may be persuaded to do a compare and contrast? Here is a selection of my favorites that I can easily endorse for both their literary value but also for their success in meeting some of the standards that I have explained earlier. Hopefully, the films that I have chosen will make a good jumping off point for your groups' own efforts.

Wise Blood by Flannery O'Connor.

Written by one of my favorite writers, this unforgettable novel was uncannily brought to life by filmmaker John Houston.

Brad Dourif, in a searing performance as Hazel Motes, returns home from the war only to find his family has deserted him. As Motes finds his way in the big city he encounters an bizarre array of misfits; Harry Dean Stanton as Asa Hawks, the false preacher, Dan Shor is Enoch Emory, a boy with wise blood, and Amy Wright as Sabbath Lily, Hawks seductive daughter. In a moment of inspiration, Motes decides to form the "Church of Christ without Christ" where "the deaf don't hear, the blind don't see, the lame don't walk, the dumb don't talk, and the dead stay that way,"

Houston mesmerizingly captures O'Connor's Southern Gothic masterpiece. Truly a  mind-bending experience.

I'm so thrilled to have Barbara Delinsky, a reading group favorite author, as the first author to write a guest post for On the Bookcase!

Barbara has been in a book group for 23 years and Barbara's novels have great themes and interesting conflicts that are perfect for creating a lively conversation for reading groups. So, why did it take until last November for  Barbara's "Book Group" to read one of her novels? In her post, Barbara shares with us her book group origins, her author chats with hundreds of reading groups, and the decision to discuss her book with her own and the momentous occasion. Thanks so much for sharing your story with us, Barbara.

November was a banner month for me.  My book group actually discussed one of my books. If this doesn’t seem momentous to you, here’s the backstory.

My book group has been meeting for 23 years. It was started by two local teachers, each of whom invited friends who invited friends. The group that resulted was a collection of women who didn’t know each other well, simply shared an interest in books. We never gave ourselves a name. We just call ourselves … Book Group.

There were no Oprah choices when we first organized. But we had no trouble picking books. Whereas each month’s meeting is held over coffee and dessert at a rotating host’s home, to pick our list we meet at a restaurant for dinner every June. There, each of us pitches several books we want to discuss and, quite democratically, we vote.

Our selections have been eclectic, ranging from fiction to non-fiction, classics to hot new it books. With no other writer in the group, I’ve always been able to bring a different perspective to the discussion. In recent years, the occasional mention was made of discussing one of my books. Being a modest sort, I was uncomfortable with that and always rejected the idea. Until last June.

Why my change of heart? Two reasons.  First, I discuss my books in book group meetings all the time – over 200 of them in the last three years. Granted, these meetings are by speakerphone, but the discussions have been intimate and compelling. How ridiculous it seemed for me to do this with other book groups and not my own.

Second, my group has discussed some pret-ty bad books of late, even ones that other groups have gone ga-ga over.  There have also been some wonderful books that we all loved but that offered little meat for discussion. By the time we were choosing out 2009-10 list last June, though, I was coming to think, thanks to the praise of book groups with which I had talked, that my books were both page-turners and discussion-sparkers.

So my own group did it – discussed While My Sister Sleeps in November, and the talk went on long past our usual cut-off time. Granted we digressed into issues relating to the process of writing and the quirks of publishing.  But the book and its characters dominated the night.

Will I do this again with my group? Not quickly, since we try not to repeat authors.  My only regret, actually, is that my new book hadn’t been for sale at the time and available for my group to discuss. Not My Daughter (Jan 5, 2010), is perhaps the best discussion book I’ve written. It raises the good mother question, as in, what it takes to be one.  My book group would love this. We’ve all had mothers. Most of us are mothers ourselves. No doubt, every one of us would have something to say on this very potent and timeless issue.

Thanks again, Barbara!

How do you select books and what's your favorite discussible book? Log in, comment, and start the conversation! Below is a video teaser for Not My Daughter.