Voting is underway for the March Book Group books, so please visit the forum and cast your vote for the books you want to read and discuss with the group next month.

Books nominated:

The Enchantress of Florence – Salman Rushdie
The Owl Killers – Karen Maitland
The Hunger Games
Vagabond – Bernard Cornwell
The Road – Cormac McCarthy
The Help – Kathryn Stocket
Her Fearful Symmetry – Audrey Niffenegger
Neil Gaiman – Fragile Things short stories
Anthony Kiedis – Scar Tissue
The Chocolate War – Robert Cormier
I am the Cheese – Robert Cormier

Please visit the forum to cast your vote.

A reminder that in April one of the books already confirmed is To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

March Book Groups is a post from: Book Addicts Book Group

I absolutely loved this book.  I was captivated by it like I never expected to be by any audio book.  I think most of the charm comes from the fact that it is narrated by two very excellent narrators; William Hope and Lauren Lefkow as Henry and Clare.  The story comes alive and welcomes you inside in such a way that I have no words for (useless I know) but hopefully you will be willing to give it a try for yourself and see what I mean.  I loved the narrators so much that I even searched to see what else they had narrated but I doubt that anything else they read (great though they are) will ever compare to this.

Absolutely brilliant, funny, heart wrenching, sweet.  Definitely in my top ten books for this year.

The Time Traveler’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger – My Audio Book of the Month – November is a post from: Book Addicts Book Group

Just a quick reminder that this month we are reading and talking about The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger and The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides.  Both fantastic books and both discussions have just started so there’s plenty of time to join in.

In December we can look forward to 1984 by George Orwell and Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer.

Both The Virgin Suicides and Into the Wild will also have a book-to-movie discussion included.

Also this month we are featuring the Richard and Judy New Writers Club book, The Marriage Bureau for Rich People by Farahad Zama, which is described as Jane Austen in India.  I have reservations that anything should be compared to Jane Austen but we’ll see.  Grab it and check it out for yourself, it looks like quite a quick read, and is apparently the start of a new series.

The December book for this New Writers Club is Loving Frank by Nancy Horan.  Don’t even get me started on the trouble I went through to get this book with the cover I wanted lol.  First edition was out in June, second edition with hideous cover came out in October, and quite honestly I wouldn’t want to read a book with a cover like that, so I made it my mission to track down a copy of the edition with the cover I liked (it is btw now out of print but you might still be able to find it in individual bookshops)  I know I know, don’t judge a book by its cover :p

Paranormal Social Club

The votes have been counted and the results are in, and November’s PSC book is Pleasure Unbound (A demonica novel) by Larissa Ione.  A book that is apparently full of wit and wicked hot demons!  First book in a brand new series, so come and join us.

What I’ve been reading

What I’ve been reading recently includes The Time Traveler’s Wife both in print form and as an audio book and I have to say that it is the best audio book I’ve “listened to” in ages.  The narrators were superb, completely faultless and utterly compelling.  I was just blown away and listened to it for 18 hours!!! There is also an abridged version but I just hate abridged books.  Just started on The Virgin Suicides for the book group and just finished the third instalment of David Wellington’s excellent vampire series, Vampire Zero.   Horror is not usually my thing and these are classed as horror/thriller.  I discovered them accidentally when browsing on Amazon and the second one was recommended to me.  I liked the cover, then discovered it was a sequel and hunted down the first book.  Kept them on the shelf for about a year lol before finding them again (there’s a lot of books there and a chair in front).  Read the first and the second and then couldn’t wait for the third one to be published here and ordered it from the US.  The vampires are not sexy, they are bloodthirsty fiends.  There are no superpowerful female characters, and no other type of supernatural creatures at all.  There are just cops and state troopers doing the best they can with what they have.  There is quite a lot of death and blood and gore but nothing to give you nightmares, they are really pretty exciting!  The books are:

13 Bullets
99 Coffins
Vampire Zero
23 Hours (is due out next year)

99 Coffins is an interesting book because it is billed as a historical vampire novel and it’s set in Gettysburg, so there is a lot in it about the civil war including flashbacks and historical references.

A bit more about the author I think is in order too since he’s very generous with his writing.  If you go to his website you will be able to read approximately six of his books online for free.  Yes, FREE.  Some of his books including 13 Bullets started off life as online serials which he wrote as a kind of test to see if it would work.  He has also written three zombie novels in the same way which are all available to read for free on his site, as well as for purchase in printed form.  Monster Island, Monster Nation, and Monster Planet – I think the titles might be an indication of how bad things get lol.  There is also another couple of books on there too, one called Plague Zone which features a Seattle librarian as its hero, and Frostbitten, a werewolf novel, which I am currently reading inbetween everything else, and it’s the first of his books that I’m reading for free on his site.  I’m about a third of the way through and I’m liking it so far.  Interesting take on the werewolf mythology.

Oh yeah and I forgot to upload a new audio to my phone so I got caught on the train yesterday with nothing new to read, so I started listening to American Gods again. It’s not Mr Gaiman narrating this time but the dude who is reading it is just perfect.  Another audio I would highly recommend.  I’m slowing collecting all of his audio books, so far I have six – The Graveyard book, Fragile Things, Stardust all read by the author, and Good Omens, Anansi Boys and American Gods.  On some of them there are some great interviews with Neil Gaiman which are just such a bonus to listen to.  The Anansi Boys is read by an British Comedian/actor called Lenny Henry who is very well known here but maybe not be so well known overseas.  He is just brilliant with all the Caribbean accents and really brings a unique flavour to the book.  I would of course, recommend them all

And now I need to go read more…

Book Group latest is a post from: Book Addicts Book Group

First things first, I need to remind everyone who is a Book Addicts Book Group member that you only have until Sunday 2nd November, to vote for the books you want to read with the group next year.  So get voting people if you want to be heard.

Ok, so now on with November book group information.

We are reading three books this month, all very different.  Here are the details.

Stephen King – Eyes of the Dragon

Hosted by Snapesgirl

Discussion starts officially tomorrow but may kick off earlier.

Audrey Niffenegger – The Time Traveler’s Wife

Hosted by Ginger

Discussion starts officially on the 8th November.  Please try to read as much of the book as you can before the discussion gets under way.

Jeffrey Eugenides – The Virgin Suicides

Hosted by Forgotten

This one will start around the 15th of November, and once again, please try to read as much of the book as possible before the discussion starts, or at least endeavour to make a start!

Click on the book covers for more information about the books.

Book Group 2009 Suggestions & November 2008 schedule is a post from: Book Addicts Book Group

BOOK LIST 2005

Cloud Atlas
David Mitchell
In his extraordinary third novel, David Mitchell erases the boundaries of language, genre and time to offer a meditation on humanity’s dangerous will to power, and where it may lead us.

The Time Traveler’s Wife
Audrey Niffenegger
The Time Traveler’s Wife depicts the effects of time travel on Henry and Clare’s passionate love for each other with grace and humour.

My Sister’s Keeper
Jodi Picoult
“A major decision about me is being made, and no one’s bothered to ask the one person who most deserves it to speak her opinion.”

Perdita: The Life of Mary Robinson
Paula Byrne
Sex, fame and scandal in the theatrical, literary and social circles of late-eighteenth century England.

The Promise of Happiness
Justin Cartwright
Charles Judd meanders round his local Cornish beach, contemplating the turns his life has taken.

The American Boy
Andrew Taylor
Interweaving real and fictional elements, The American Boy is a major new literary historical crime novel in the tradition of An Instance of the Fingerpost and Possession.

Feel: Robbie Williams
Chris Heath
This is a groundbreaking book; truly original and brilliantly written; a grippingly honest story of an extraordinary man.

The Sixth Lamentation
William Brodrick
‘Brodrick keeps the story going at a cracking pace, flitting back and forth between its various elements, characters and eras with timing so expert the reader is compelled to keep turning the pages’
Time Out

The Jane Austen Book Club
Karen Joy Fowler
A charming and intelligent bestselling novel about ordinary people who are mixed up about their lives and relationships.

The Shadow of the Wind
Carlos Ruiz Zafon
A page-turning exploration of obsession in literature and love, and the places that obsession can lead.

Richard and Judy Book List 2005 is a post from: Book Addicts Book Group

Is Amanda Ross the most influential woman in the book world right now? It’s an unlikely proposition, given that she’s the joint managing director of an independent TV company based in a grotty bit of south London. But since the overwhelming success of Richard & Judy’s book club – responsible for two of the biggest-sellers of last year, The Lovely Bones, which probably would have made it without their help, and Joseph O’Connor’s Star of the Sea, which certainly wouldn’t – publishers are suddenly taking a very keen interest in what Amanda likes to read. The 2005 shortlist is out, and the fairly secretive process by which 10 titles have been whittled down from 301 submissions is clearly dominated by the formidable Cactus TV boss.

The impact on book sales last year was dubbed the “Richard and Judy” effect. O’Connor saw a 350% increase in sales – and Bob Geldof’s fervent on- air endorsement (“Masterpiece!”) can’t have harmed. All the 10 books on the original list, bar one, showed a surge in sales, and the exception most definitely proves the rule: Monica Ali’s Brick Lane was negatively received by the studio guests, by the book group panel, and by R&J themselves. Tough on Ali; but at least it showed that the bookclub strand is no bland exercise in puffy PR.

The 2005 bookclub only started last week, but already their first choice, Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s The Shadow of the Wind, sold over 10,000 copies the week before the show aired, and Audrey Niffenegger’s The Time Traveller’s Wife, featured this Wednesday, sold just over 23,000 copies – probably because Judy Finnegan couldn’t resist giving it an advance rave. I went over to the studios on Wednesday to watch the first programme go on air. It’s often claimed that telly can’t “do” books properly, but even those with a prejudice against sofas might be pleasantly surprised by the Richard & Judy approach. There’s a short film of the author in an appropriate location – in Zafon’s case, Barcelona – a vociferous discussion between the hosts and celebrity guests, then the verdict from a readers’ group. “One of the three best books I’ve read in my life,” said Richard, and a fusillade of “brilliants” came from the Scottish readers, one of whom, charmingly, had expressed deep dubiety over having to read a book in translation at all.

“The whole point of a book club,” said Amanda later, “is to persuade people to pick up books they wouldn’t normally read.” The other titles on the list, in order of transmission, are: The American Boy by Andrew Taylor (HarperPerennial), a historical novel featuring the young Edgar Allen Poe; Justin Cartwright’s great novel The Promise of Happiness (Bloomsbury); Feel, Chris Heath’s account of celebrity madness chez Robbie Williams (Ebury); The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler (Viking), in which assorted American autodidacts seek to illuminate their problems via their favourite author; David Mitchell’s marvellous Cloud Atlas (Sceptre); The Sixth Lamentation by William Brodrick (Time Warner), a gripping thriller; Jodi Picoult’s chilling and timely My Sister’s Keeper (Hodder), about the morality of using one child as a genetic match for their sick sibling; and finally, Perdita: The Life of Mary Robinson by Paula Byrne (HarperCollins), the story of the actress, poet, Royal mistress – and friend to Mary Wollstonecraft. One of these will go on to win the “Best Read” Award at the British Book Awards. This Wednesday, Julian Clary is on the sofa to discuss The Time Traveller’s Wife (wonder if he’ll be invited back to discuss his forthcoming memoirs, A Young Man’s Passage?). That’s got to be worth watching.

Richard & Judy, weekdays at 5pm, C4

Richard and Judy – who really chooses the books? is a post from: Book Addicts Book Group