The official home on the internet of the Sunderland Book Group, Sunderland
Please tell us some more about yourself so that we can pass your information on to the group leader.
Please note, meeting dates are occasionally subject to change, so please wait for a response from the group leader before attending your first meeting.
(This website will no longer be updated and is being kept online for archive purposes only.)
This month’s book was this years winner of the Man Booker International Prize – The Vegetarian by Han Kang – which, interestingly, required the rules to be changed so that the prize could be accepted by both the author Han Kang and the translator Deborah Smith.
The general vote for this book was a positive one this month, it really is a beautiful, although sad, story – no one could say they were happy after reading even though it was technically an enjoyable read.
The story centres on Yeong-hye and is told in three parts through the eyes of her husband, her brother in law, and her sister. Although Yeong-hye is the main focus of the story, we do not see it through her eyes, we find out what others think of her and her actions, and how she affects others.
The novel starts out with her becoming a vegetarian and shows us how frowned upon the lifestyle is in South Korea, however it quickly becomes a commentary on mental illness rather than vegetarianism, and really teaches you a lot about the culture in South Korea, such as the submissiveness of women, and the hierarchical positions in the family and society in general.
Overall it is a great read, a passionate story and absolutely beautiful!
We currently meet at Holmeside Coffee on the third Wednesday of the month at 6.30pm, and in July we will be discussing The Waiting Room by F.G Cottam – hope to see you there!
Hello!
Unfortunately we had to cancel our November meeting, as I had a very snotty son on my hands. However, we’ll be back in December (on the 9th) for our Christmas meeting when we’ll be discussing “The Shock of the Fall” by Nathan Filer.
Looking forward to seeing you all and eating some Serendipity mince pies,
Laura xx
Well, this month we scored a rare and (almost) unanimous hit with Robert Galbraith’s (aka JK Rowling) The Cuckoo Calling! EVEN MARGARET LIKED IT!
Though not a challenging read by any means, all agreed that this is an easy-to-read page turner, that falls solidly into the very English tradition of the slightly eccentric private detective. Most of us enjoyed the larger than life characters and Rowling’s uncanny ability to create an entire world which may not necessarily be realistic (some people commented on the rather sanitised, old-fashioned quality of the book) but is throughly believable if you take it on it’s own terms. A lot of us were kept guessing to the end about the identity of the murderer and all enjoyed the twisty-turny plot. Interestingly, it was a hit with our avid crime fiction fans and our crime avoiders- AND with Harry Potter lovers and haters alike. And everyone will be seeking out the next Cormoron Strike novel when it hits the shelves.
A rare moment of book group consensus. Let’s enjoy it while it lasts….
We’re all looking forward to our May meeting where we’ll be discussing the much-discussed crime fiction “debut” by Robert Galbraith, also known as JK Rowling, “The Cuckoo’s Calling”. A detecive novel of the old school, we’ll be asking: Is it any good? Is it worth the hype? And would we have noticed if it wasn’t by JK Rowling??
I know what i think- looking forward to finding out what you think!
Serendipity once again opened its doors to welcome our little book group. Fewer people attending this month, but we hope, we will be back to full numbers next month. Good news is that a few of the new members from January returned so we are not that scary after all.
This month we were reading Private Life by Jane Smiley, a book offering ‘a cold-eyed view of the compromises regarding by marriage’ according to one website.
Quite a lot of people found the book hard to get into, and the pace very slow. After 100 pages, nothing had really happened. Our readers also felt that while it was good to know what had happened in history while the book took place, it felt like the history was just background noise and not actually leading the book. It sometimes felt like history was forced into the storytelling. One reader particularly enjoyed the scientific theories of Andrew.
What we all could agree on, was that we were very happy that lives of women and marriage have changed since Margaret lived. We did not feel like it was a book about women on the same level as Little Women, as some critics had claimed.
See you all next month where we are reading Magnificent Joe by James Wheatley – the author will even be there.
Hello everyone and welcome to the Sunderland book group blog for 2014! Unfortunately we’re starting on a bit of a downer as our January group has had to be cancelled, HOWEVER after that we have a bumper season of new books to discuss!
We have some exciting events coming to our group this year too. In March we will be discussing literary legend Jane Smiley’s Private Life, which coincides with her visit to Tyneside Cinema on March 9th. Ideally we’d be doing this book BEFORE her event in Newcastle, but the dates don’t stack up that way. Boo!
In April author James Wheatley will be joining the group to discuss and read from his book Magnificent Joe. James is a Read Regional author for this year, which means he’s been selected as an OUTSTANDINGLY BRILLIANT Northern author and will be doing events and readings all over the region!
Looking forward to meeting members old and new in 2014.
Laura xx
Hello all. Sorry but the October group is cancelled. We’ll be reading the October book in November instead (I’ve updated the list to the right). See you on the 12 November, 6.30pm. x
Jackie Kay’s hero, Audre Lorde. I love this picture.
Summer is over, the dark nights are rolling in, there’s a, autumnal chill in the air, everyone’s back to work (lots of teachers in the ranks!), soall have a reason to be feeling a bit miserable. Luckily, for September we’d been reading Red Dust Road by Jackie Kay— a rare, joyful gem of a book which, though it didn’t TOTALLY rock everyone’s world, was universally praised for its generosity and big-heartedness. Here’s what we thought:
PROS
*We loved the way a story which could be a “tragic life story”— adoption, racism, dementia— became, in Jackie’s hands, a humane, joyful story of her search for her “roots”. A testament to her own character and her awesome (adoptive) parents that she manages all these events with such grace and lack of anger.
*Her awesome (adoptive) parents who this book is a love letter to and are the absolute stars of Red Dust Road. Their frank Scottish humour, their total love of Jackie and her brother, their honesty, their communism, their strong colourful characters— we wanted a whole book about them!
*It’s really funny.
*Deceptively easy to read, yet also poetic and conjors incredibly vivid pictures.
*Thought provoking exploration of what makes a person “themselves”.
CONS
* Some people found that because they didn’t know who Jackie was before reading the book they found it difficult to care too much about the story. I vehemently disagreed.
*The jumping back and forth in time annoyed the life out of some people and made it difficult to follow.
*A bit underwhelming. Lots of people felt that while they enjoyed the read it wouldn’t “stay with them”.
Mostly the whole book group wants to take Jackie for a drink and a natter. Also, a special mention for a group member who became a Jackie groupie, researched her life AND read her short stories. Big gold star for you Laura!
Next time, we’re onto something totally different— a novel called How I Killed Margaret Thatcher by Anthony Cartwright. We’re doing it in October because it’s been nominated for the first Gordon Burn Prize, the result of which will be announced at this years Durham Book Festival. You can even come to the prize ceremony too! It’s well worth checking out the rest of the programme too: http://www.durhambookfestival.com/home.html
Enjoy reading and see you next time!
Goths + pink fluffy tea cosies
We couldn’t have been more incongruous really, meeting at our cosy, pink, bunting-strewn new venue Serendipity Cafe to discuss a dark, gothy, crime-noir which was full of witchcraft, child prostitution and murder. Yup, this is the month we did Cathi Unsworth’s Weirdo. And it inspired love, hate and everything in between from our members. Here’s a neat surmise of our thoughts:
WHAT WE LIKED
WHAT WE DIDN’T LIKE
And we’ve got another cheerful one for next month, The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers, set during the Iraq war. I’m really looking forward to it. At least we’ll have cocktails in teapots, cake and cheese toasties to offset the (possible) gloom.
The Sunderland Book Group 