more housekeeping...

We've ordered God Grew Tired of Us and the Jess/Geet/Paul house have got hold of a copy of Secret River. Should we aim to be finished with the posting by the end of April?

It is also probably a good idea to stay a book ahead of ourselves so we can 'order in' or, for the more financially pressured, save up for, or scrounge a copy of, the book. So the first person (who hasn't previously chosen) that posts on Secret River can pick the book after Jane's (?)

Raring to go... as soon as I have enough money in my bank account to buy the books!

I like Jane's suggestion... let's order our copies of her book now and in the meantime read The Secret River. Wooh! Yeah! I'm so happy - Lilian's Story was such an uplifting book. Can't wait!

Not that books have to be all fun and games. And I think it's a good idea to read The Secret River sooner rather than later while it's still a bit hot.

New Book continued

Hi all,
I actually already have 'God Grew Tired of Us' - i got it through amazon a while ago...
I'm happy to read Secret River though for now and do my book next if everyone is OK with that??

next book

Hi Super friends, Just called a local book store and apparently God Grew Tired of Us has not yet been released and will come out initially in hardback for about $45. I suppose we could order over amazon et al but it will take time. Does anyone have alternative information and if not should we try a more accessible book? Maybe book this one in for next time? Just a thought...

PS - i finally finished In Cold Blood this weekend past and believe the book would be more appropriately titled In Minute Detail. As Gita pointed out, the narrator is conspicuously absent from the story. This becomes especially annoying towards the end when he (Truman Capote) becomes one of the most important people in the protagonists' lives (particularly for Perry who had no other regular visitors).

Good work Jane non-fiction gets my thumbs up.

And the new book is...

Well sorry to say Nick but the book i'd really like to read is a memoir but i'm pretty sure its written with a narrative style...

Its 'God Grew Tired Of Us' by John Bul Dau (published through National Geographic Society)
which is a memoir of a boy from the Sudan who eventaully gets to america and university. I read an excerpt from it in National Geographic mag a few months ago and it really captured me...

Its a new release and has been made into a movie (it won awards at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival)
Well I hope its easy to get a hold of and you enjoy it!
I'll say that we should be aiming towards the end of April to begin comments...
Happy Reading!

New Book

Super friends,
Please excuse me. I haven't read In Cold Blood, I've just been too busy the last couple of months. However, I am pleased to see the level of response on superfriends and I'm itching to get started on the next book. Go Jane!

By the way, could we ban all non-fiction books?

Nick

Umm, mistaken identity

The post below was mine but I was somehow logged in as Paul. Just for the record.

new book

yep, I think Jane should go ahead and pick a book and then we rotate the book choosing thereafter, depending on who first posts and who hasn't had a recent go....I think we should also allow at least 6 weeks to read the book. I was going to suggest 8 weeks so we have time to read other books but it will naturally stretch out anyway I suppose. Go for gold Jane....

Re: new book

Just wanted to announce that I hereby declare my intentions to once again be the first person to blog on Jane's book choice, solely in order to not have to read a book about revolutionary movements in latin america. game on, bitches!!

New Book?

I have been wanting to read Secret River for a while if anyone is interested in that? I have had many a recommendation. But democracy might not be the best way to work this. I am happy with Jane chosing the next book and then maybe the first person to post gets to chose the following one...

Also interested in reading Communism: a love story, something by Thomas Pynchon or a book about revolutionary movements in latin america (i've seen a few that look good from AK Press).

Should this be a comment attached to Jane's last post?

New Book?

Well having been a slow start to the book club and now that we all except Els (last i heard she hadn't started it) have posted i thought i'd suggest that we move on to the next book....
Figured that we can still comment about In Cold Blood over the next week or two while we go about getting the next book and then i suggest 5-6 weeks of reading time??

I also have a book i'd like to suggest if there are no objections??

Let me know if you are ready for the next book by making a comment on this post..

What a relief!

Well first i am totally relieved to have finally finished it! I dont know whether it was because i kept reading it when i was tired or otherwise but I'm sorry to say i found the last quarter of the book really boring! While i'm not totally in agreeance with Jess I found that the ending really dragged out and had quite a few aspects that really irritated me...Overall i decided that i think the story of Capote writing the book was more interesting than the story itself. While i haven't seen any of the movies about Capote himself i think its an interesting concept that he went to Holcomb before the murders were actually solved to write the story and like Gita i would have liked to have heard more of his "voice" , discussing how he sought out the people in the town and perhaps even their reactions to him. Was he just part of the problem that the town complained about, wanting to move on etc and get on with their lives. I know if a family i was close to had been murdered, having a writer in the town pursuing a 'story' would have been pretty trying. I also would like to know Perry and Dick's feelings towards Capote...did the fact he was writing a book about them give them a sense of immortality and fame that they knew would go on after they were executed??

I found the descriptions of Perry and Dick's lives moderately interesting, to me Dick seemed like so much more the 'bad guy' whereas i guess Perry was more scary in a sneaky kind of way. The type of person you might have a reasonably normal conversation before finding out he had just murdered someone...maybe thats what led to my nightmare of him hacking someone to pieces on my front porch! I did however find the descriptions from the psychologists a bit dull and almost as if it was from a psychology text book (unloved child--not given boundaries and role models-- lacks social skills--hurts animals--kills people) but maybe, as has been said by you all, that our views on violence and so different to when this all happened, we all have a greater understanding of what may lead people to react in such a way and that 'modern day murders' whether real or on the tele contain more twists and depth and therefore this story doesn't capture our attention....

I'm finding it really hard to write my ideas...its much easier chatting and bouncing ideas off one another but i think it's totally sweet that you've all posted!! Cheers to the superfriends!!