March 20, 2011
The Vicious Circle, from here to November 2012
The Vicious Circle Book Club turned one year old this weekend, and came to the end of our list of selected books. So each of us brought a book or two, or three, to Saturday’s meeting to propose for the meetings to come. We ended up deciding to read every single one (except Great Expectations— long story, both the novel and the reason why it was shut down) so that we’re now set for our next twenty meetings– we’ve tried to read more men, less Canadian, and try to venture out into nonfiction once or twice. Anyway, I sure hope nothing good gets published between now and November 2012, because we’ve got no room to move until then.
April: The Anthills of Savanna by Chinua Achebe
May: Last Night in Montreal by Emily St John Mandel
June: Every Time We Say Goodbye by Jamie Zeppa
July: Hotel World by Ali Smith
August: Hell by Kathryn Davis
September: The Rachel Papers/Lucky Jim by Amis n’ Amis
October: Saving Rome by Megan K. Williams
November: Imagining Toronto by Amy Lavender Harris
December: SKIP
January 2012: Skippy Dies by Paul Murray
February 2012: TBA
March 2012: Human Amusements by Wayne Johnston
April 2012: My Life in France by Julia Child
May 2012: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
June 2012: This All Happened by Michael Winter
July 2012: Trespass by Rose Tremain
August 2012: Incendiary by Chris Cleave
September 2012: Migration Songs by Anna Quon
October 2012: The First Man by Albert Camus
November 2012: Straight Man by Richard Russo
I really, honestly want to read them ALL right now. I know it’s not remotely practical but they’re like Christmas presents I know are in my parents’ closet and I CANT WAIT TO OPEN THEM.
Last Night in Montreal is on my list to read, as well as Skippy Dies, Migration Songs, and Incendiary.
I have a feeling the latter especially will make for great discussion in your club! (Thanks for the idea!) 🙂
Kerry, can you talk a bit more about how your group selects books? I’ve started a poetry book club, but the picking of books always slows down the process and I find has been kind of painful. This is such an amazing and diverse list, I’d love to know how your group made it.
There really is no process. The first time we all (except for me, because I was too intimidated) brought three books for consideration, laid them out and picked which ones we wanted. We attempted to do the same thing again this time, except we decided to choose all the books, because they were great. This round was selected with a mind to balance out our reading– more men, more international and some nonfiction. But even that wasn’t much of a constraint. And all of this, I suppose, isn’t much help to you. We benefit from having a group with really diverse tastes and open minds, and whose members almost relish the chance to read something they might hate.
That is really helpful, actually. I love reading about your book club. It sounds so wonderful.
Heheh. I was in a bookgroup that did this with one nomination session. We just couldn’t refuse any of the choices and worried that we’d read ahead of ourselves with such a long list, but it worked out brilliantly. Those reading months slipped right past and I still think back to those discussions with as wide a variety as your group has chosen here.
Enjoy!