March 2016 Meeting

For March, we will be reading The Book of Salt, by Monique Truong 


I distributed new meeting assignment cards. 

All you need to know: Next meeting is Good Friday, March 25th. Mae will bring food, Fran will bring book selections, Rachel will lead the discussion.

February 2016 Meeting

This month, we will be reading The Dressmaker, by Rosalie Ham. Take careful note of the author, as there are at least four books with this title.

Also, it is on order at Contra Costa Library, but not currently available. There are copies through Link+, and it's about $10.50 through Amazon.

Plot summary:  After twenty years spent mastering the art of dressmaking at couture houses in Paris, Tilly Dunnage returns to the small Australian town she was banished from as a child. She plans only to check on her ailing mother and leave. But Tilly decides to stay, and though she is still an outcast, her lush, exquisite dresses prove irresistible to the prim women of Dungatar.

And, some brief reviews:

“The book’s true pleasures involve the way Rosalie Ham has small-town living down pat…she channels welcome shades of British novelist Angela Carter’s sly, funny, and wickedly Gothic adornments…Blunt, raw and more than a little fantastical, the novel exposes both the dark and the shimmering lights in our human hearts.”  – The Boston Globe

“Ham’s eye for the absurd, the comical, and the poignant are highly tuned. [The Dressmaker] is a first novel to be proud of, and definitely one to savor.” —The Weekend Australian

 Our next meeting is on Friday, February 26th

Fran will bring food
Rachel will bring books
Denise will facilitate. 

See you all there!!

January 2016 meeting

Our next book group meeting will be Friday, January 22, 2016.

We will be reading The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, by Deborah Moggach. This book has been proposed three times in the past, so it looks like, in this case, the fourth time was charmed. This is our 190th book.

There are currently seven copies available in the Contra Costa County Library (and Lisa has the eighth).

"Moggach's prose is markedly more graceful than Agatha Christie's, her moral world is not dissimilar."  —The Times

“She writes beautifully, as always, and the phrase-making is as good as the characterization…brilliant.”     —Sunday Telegraph

Next month, Lisa will facilitate, Denise will bring book choices, and Rachel will provide snacks/food.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!