When I committed to book club, I thought it would be a bit of fun. Seriously, that is what I thought. Then I read the first page in the assigned book and I wondered what I had got myself into, as the book was dry and depressing. The star character was a stick in the mud, and I found the only fun this book brought me was a sure sign of falling asleep every night. Nighty nights I thought as I re read a sentence three times trying to really pay attention each time.
I asked my friend, a mother of three, how far she had read and she said she had not started yet. I explained it was a hard one… and she might want to get started, since the meeting was less than a week away. I persisted to read the following day, trying to hold onto what seemed like a fun idea at the time, joining a book club; when she called. She was ten pages in and had no interest in reading on. We laughed about how she attracts boring book clubs and always finds herself reading dry and drab books in every new club she joins.
I think we were both looking for a bit of a mind break, and some fun with the girls, not a new thing to wrap our overused brains around. After our phone call, I got an email from her; she decided to start her own book club, with designated fun books. The idea was simple, but appealing and something I had always wanted in a book club. The first book on our list “The art of racing in the rain” by Garth Stein. It was a simple, cute, nice story, from a dog’s perspective, which was a breeze to read and fun to talk about. It made me love our little guy Byron even more, if that’s at all possible.
A girl in the group however was not too impressed with this book, or the writing and chose a more ambitious book, The Alienist by Caleb Carr. Funnily enough though, after reading the first book, I’m now in the mood for a bit of a challenge.
