Our August pool party book was nominated by Jennifer - The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. Annette hosted our meeting at her house by the pool.The weather was absolutely gorgeous! Several members brought friends to this meeting since it seems that everyone and their mother (or mother-in-law) has read this book and wants to talk about it.
All of one of the gals at the meeting enjoyed this book. Most of us REALLY liked it, some thought it was good, and one didn't like it at all.
Topics we discussed included:
- books written in epistolary format - did we like that about this book? Most of us said yes.
- characterization - we disagreed over whether the characters were or were not well developed through the letters they wrote
- individual characters - who we liked, who we didn't
- the history of Guernsey - none of us were familiar with this part of WWII history so there was a lot to learn
- WWII - we talked about concentration camp experiences, food shortage, the evacuation of children, and much more
- the authors - their relationship, who wrote what, etc.
- and much, much more
This is another of those books with an excellent marketing team behind it. There are TONS of great resources available - I highly suggest checking out the book's website if you haven't already.
Here's a clip of Annie discussing the book.
I had the opportunity to interview her by phone. Check back at my book blog on 8/27/09 to see what we talked about. Or click here to read my review of this book.
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Our next meeting will be on Sept. 16 when we'll discuss Melissa's nomination, Till We Have Faces, by CS Lewis. We will also choose our next three books and do some additional admin stuff so please try to be there if you can!
