December's Meeting: Jill Smolinski's The Next Thing on My List

Posting about the December meeting in January...just my style. :)

We had a great meeting at the beginning of January! We had two newbies, Danielle and Gretchen, along with myself, Kelly, Devon, and Monica. Great group! We didn't get to take a picture and I sadly don't have any pictures of my food spread...but here is one of my Christmas tree. It was present at the meeting.

Overall, most of us enjoyed The Next Thing on My List. It was about a girl who tries to take on a 'Life List' of someone, whom she just met, that dies when they both get into a car accident. The items on the list span from being very light and silly to long-term, serious goals. As she works to complete the list, you see her grow and find herself while making an impact on others as well. It was a very light and inspiring book with a really good underlying lesson...for me, that was to never take life for granted. The group discussed creating lists, what would be on our lists, etc. We all really liked the book and most of the group rated it a 4...I think, this was a while ago. :)

So for January, we are reading The Lovely Bones, and will be meeting at Monica's for a slumber party! It will be so nice to be able to hang out, get our drink on, catch up and not have to worry about going to work the next day!

Is everyone enjoying TLB? Have you started reading yet?? :)

Sue Miller's While I Was Gone

Hi Friends! I'm terribly behind but wanted to do the review from the book club at my house - so sorry!

So this book club on Thursday, November 7, me, Devon, Monica and Stacy got together! We didn't take a picture of us... sorry Shana!!.... but I have a picture of our meal - pita pizzas!

The Spread....

Zoom on the meatsa pizza (back) and pesto chicken (front)

zoom on the veggie pizza

hehe love my pizza plates - they make me laugh; can also see the Meditteranean pizza well!

Book club was a blasty – great conversation, yummy wine, fun catch-up time as well as book chat. It’s so good to have great friends, especially ones you have so much in common with! The book we discussed was Sue Miller’s While I Was Gone.I gave it a 2.5 out of 5. It just wasn’t what I expected. It was very deep. It focused on a woman married to a minister who lived a happy life with her three children. Then you find that she has a past, and it comes back in a very unexpected way. It’s less of a story and more of a series of events. It DOES make you think and it definitely lent itself to conversation because most of us disagreed with the main character and the choices she made. I gave it a 2.5 instead of a 5 because I wished more had happened - more literal and less open to interpretation. I felt like the author wanted me to do all of the work; and while I was all about gleaning ideas/thoughts from the book, I needed more to hold my interest. It definitely got our club thinking about people from the past – is it good when they pop back up? Or a reminder of what could have been? Which led to an interesting conversation about Facebook and social media. So again, not the best book for me, but a definite conversation starter!

We also chose the next books:

The Next Thing on My List: December book (Stacy’s pick/her house)
The Lovely Bones: January book (Mon’s pick/her house)

I'm again SO SORRY for the much delayed meeting recap. :)

Hi!

Hey Girls!

Just saying "hi" and "Happy 2010!"

I'm behind on my reading again. haha! Imagine that! This time I haven't even GOTTEN the book yet! yikes! Gotta say, I'm a bit unsure about reading the book b/c the trailer for the movie is quite creepy. Hmmmmm.... Better get on it since we meet next weekend. :)

btw, SO excited to see you all! So much has happened since I last saw you (holidays, new houses, and an ENGAGEMENT!) woohoo!

Anyway, just popping in...I don't know if we all even read this blog anymore!

Anyone out there reading yet???

Hey!

After marathon book shopping yesterday to only come home with no book, I decided to visit my local library. And lo and behold-- they had 3 copies! woohoo!

So apparently the book was published in '99 so since it's a little older, shall we say, the book stores don't carry many copies of it anymore. They have replenished their Sue Miller section with her newer books.

Anyway, I am going to try to start it tonight. Maybe this time I'll finish 2 days before the meeting instead of only 1 !!! :)

Hope you are all having a great start to this rainy week!

~dev

Recap from last meeting - Sept 30

What a great time we had at the last meeting. The Girl Who Stopped Swimming by Joshilyn Jackson was an awesome read that made each of us take a look within ourselves and at our relationships. It was such fun hanging out at Dev's (with a great snack spread btw) and chatting with the girls about the book, among other things...(decorating, Gossip Girl, Real Housewives of Atlanta, men - you name it).

The next book was also chosen and thanks to Kel it is on the blog (While I was Gone by Sue Miller). I'm blogger-challenged :-) Kel also put a list of the books that have been picked to choose from so we can remember a book should we choose to read it on our own (even though it wasn't selected for Book Club!) Kel will also be hosting the next event the last week of October - that Wednesday maybe?? For those who don't know, Kelly's house is in Alpharetta. We'll send the invite once a date has been selected.

Also, Stacy will be sending Kelly her book choices asap and the plan is to select a book by voting prior to the meeting. Hopefully, we can set up a poll on the blog but again, this won't be done by me because I wouldn't know where to start - so if this isn't possible, we can just do it the old fashioned way and email our selections. We thought this might be nice for those who are fast readers so they can start the next one sooner. (or in my case can buy 2 at a time on Amazon to get free shipping!!)

Looks like we'll more than likely hold November's meeting in early December because of the holidays. This means no meeting in November but also more time to read for the procrastinators - haha! You know who you are...

Book Club Meeting Pic: THe Girl Who Stopped Swimming

A pic from Wednesday's book club!

Great times! Shana or Dev - are you guys doing the recap?

And Shana - I want to see the picture from The Grape!!

Happy Friday, friends!

~Kel

So got the book but haven't started reading

I am so sorry - way far behind in updating this. I will do it asap!!! I just got the book but haven't started reading. Busy, busy lately! How bout you guys? Anyone started yet?