Cramlington Book Club

Despite a hip replacement we still managed a joint best ever 9 members this month including two new ones. I really must take time out to say thank you to Sainsburys for their notice board. Nearly every new member who comes to a meeting mentions the Sainsburys sign, they are one of the few places in Cramlington that allows us to put a sign up and it's free! Hooray for Sainsburys . Anyway books! Or perhaps two books as The Island certainly seemed to be a book of two halves. The book starts off with Alexis heading off on holiday complete with imperfect boyfriend and mysterious mother. Chick lit alert! Well I said to myself I can totally guess where this is going, of to Greece where she will meet some handsome hunk and imperfect boyfriend will be kicked to the curb. Except no, suddenly we were transported to the 1940s where a whole different book emerged, with twists and turns, strong characters, and not a hint of Chick lit in sight. Nearly all of us thought that the Alexis part o...

Ok so everyones New Years Resolution in Cramlington must have been to join a Book Club as we had a record number of attendees including (fan fare please) our first male member!!!! How exciting. However that meant the pressure was now on for the meeting to be a success and for the book to have been good. Let the mass reviewing commence; The story was told from the point of view of Death. We all found it unusual for death to be portrayed as a character. I had only really ever come across this concept in the Disc World Novels by Terry Pratchett. Although I don't think that the book actually ever specifically stated we all believed Death to be a man. The text of the story was also unusual in that the story kept being punctuated by Death adding his own (see, I told you we viewed him as a man) comments. This style of writing left some of our group finding the beginning of the book difficult to get into Death was an interesting character. He didn't seem to have any control over people...

The snow was coating the ground like icing sugar falling to lie gently on a victoria sandwich. The temperature was below zero and underneath the snow lay a steely layer of black ice. Could be the opening line of a Dickens book couldn't it? But no it was the weather conditions before our book club meeting and I was receiving cancellations faster than an airport at Christmas. 4 in less than an hour no less. Hmmm not a good start. Nevertheless like a snow shovel those of us who did brave the arctic conditions ploughed on regardless (and it was arctic, I even had to wear my woolly hat to the pub) I think I was most surprised at the length on this book. I read the childrens version as a child which was relatively short even including the beautiful illustrations. Being a 'proper' Dickens I expected the book to be lengthy but it wasn't and it was also not too far removed from book I read as a child. The language was really easy to understand (yes for all those smart arses out ...

Ooh how exciting. I approached the table and there were not one, not two but three new members! Except, wait, no, two are standing up, they are actually walking away, come back!!!! I smile, firmly block their path and say ' book club ?' 'No we thought you were going to talk about Angels and Angel Cards' ????????? I quickly side step to let them passed whilst frantically trying to remember whether I had put words ' Cramlington Book Club' on the signs. Yes pretty sure I had. In quite large font. They launch into a short speech about how much they love Angels and everything about them and I suddenly think this could go off track quite rapidly if I don't reign in quickly. (We still have one new member, what must she think, must impress!) 'Well you're most welcome to stay and talk about books if you want but we are definitely not talking about Angel Cards' I cut in and off they popped Phew I had read A Quiet Belief in Angels by R J Ellory last mon...

Is a book good if you all liked it but can't find much to say about it? That was the case with Wedlock . A true story about Mary Eleanor Bowes ' marriage to Captain Stoney , the violence she suffered at his hand and her subsequent struggle to obtain a divorce in the 1700's. We started off fine, enthusing about how much we all liked it until suddenly we were talking about X Factor. Ahem. This is a serious book club don't you know Ok so lets have a serious conversation about all the local history the book contained. Oh yes we loved the fact that it was all about Newcastle. Didn't it make you want to visit Gibside Hall that is so close to us but that we've never been to. And Bowes Museum, we should have a field trip. Now Peshwari Naan Bread is far superior to Garlic...how did that creep in?! A Chicken Chaat discussion later and we managed to discuss how easy the book was to read. Despite it being a period book there was no archaic language making it very acce...

ARGH !!!!!!!!!!!!! 7.35pm and only 3 people in attendance . Including me! Not a good start. However we had all read the book so there was nothing to do but to see whether we could actually make the meeting last for more than 10 minutes. The book was suggested by a member of the group (who was in attendance ) who had read it before a number of years ago. It is set in Shanghai during the second World War and is loosely based on Ballards early childhood experiences . I hadn't heard of Ballard until recently and hadn't read any of his books. This may sound strange but I'm an avid reader of books based around the second World War, I hadn't really come across any books that were based around China during the war and so was looking forward to reading it. As my husband said it was 'right up my street'. As said above the book was based on real life but Ballard had apparently 'pumped up' the content and also removed Jims parents for most of the story. Despite th...

I will be honest with you I was worried about this bookclub . It was the month of August and I knew before hand that at least 2 people were going to be on holiday. This may not be a lot to you but when your bookclub has a rolling total of 8 all of whom have never been in attendance at the same time it's a lot. I was so nervous that I arrived super early and then made myself even more nervous by having to wait for agggeeesss for someone/anyone to turn up. What also added to my nerves was the fact that the notice I had put up in Sainsburys had been mysteriously taken down and having only just got back from holiday myself I didn't realise until the day before the bookclub . Argh ! My regulars didn't let me down however (thank you) and there were four of us in total reviewing Ordinary Thunderstorms by William Boyd . This is Boyds tenth outing based on a man who after being in the wrong place at the wrong time finds himself the wrong end of a man hunt for murder and has to ...