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Original poster

Help with my snobby bookclub

255 replies

HeartsTrumpDiamonds · 05/02/2015 12:16

It is my turn to pick our next book for our book club and I am stumped. And a bit scared TBH.

It needs to be fairly highbrow and literary I'm afraid. I don't know the other women all that well (apart from the friend who introduced me to the group) and they have all been picking books that are either literary classics or modern winners of Nobel and Pulitzer prizes. So no chick lit - I think I would be kicked out of the group Grin

I'd like to do something English or British because our current book is Runaway (Alice Munro) set in Canada.

I've already read lots of classics myself but don't really mind a repeat. I just want a book that won't make me look stupid.

So wise MNers - any recommendations?

OP posts:
Provencalroseparadox · 11/02/2015 20:02

No one wanted to read a sci-fi book but it went down a storm. One of us even bought the series on dvd

petitdonkey · 11/02/2015 18:22

I really like the point about the fact that you don't have to love a book for it to be a great book club choice. I once chose "blindness'' by Joseph Saramago which some people hated but it was such a great discussion.

We have just read 'The Goldfinch' which you may have already done but, again, it was a great discussion.

Original poster
HeartsTrumpDiamonds · 11/02/2015 18:11

OMG I loved John Wyndham when I was a teenager - especially Chocky and The Chrysalids.

Did anyone ever read Madeleine L'Engle - A Wrinkle in Time? I need to introduce DD1 to these.

DD2 has just started reading Hitchhiker's and she is hooked Grin

OP posts:
Provencalroseparadox · 11/02/2015 17:33

Our single most successful choice last year was Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham. We universally loved it and spent some time at out (admittedly not very high-brow book group) drawing our idea of a triffid.

skolastica · 11/02/2015 11:12

Hons and Rebels - Jessica Mitford

vdbfamily · 11/02/2015 11:00

My brother suggested 'Cutting for Stone' Abraham Verghese to me for our BC as it had been one of his BC's all time favourites. We all really loved it too so that's my recommendation.

SamG76 · 11/02/2015 10:33

Magimedi - I enjoyed the Chani Kaufman book. Obviously a bit stereotyped, and it helps if you know the area of North London they live in, but overall pretty good. Certainly a better depiction of the community than Irene Nemorovisky.

magimedi · 10/02/2015 22:28

I have got the book for you, hearts.

I've just started reading The Marrying of Chani Kaufman by Eve Harris. (long listed for the Man Booker Prize, for a bit of oomph)

The tale of a 21st century Jewish woman & her arranged marriage.

How more up to date could you get?

And I am about a quarter of the way through it & am enjoying it immensely.

pusscous · 10/02/2015 19:19

What about something by Irene Nemorovisky?

magimedi · 10/02/2015 16:24

Flowers Olivia.

This thread could keep me busy for sometime & make amazon happy!

CoteDAzur · 10/02/2015 13:46

Choose one of The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt, Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell, and The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton. As you asked for in your OP, both are "fairly highbrow" and literary, exquisitely well-written, yet have interesting plots and carry the reader along their many hundreds of pages.

Do not, under any circumstances, suggest a YA book like The Girl With All The Gifts for this book club, lest you face immediate expulsion.

MNHQ
TheOnlyOliviaMumsnet · 10/02/2015 09:42

Hi there
We've moved this thread full of great recommendations out of chat so they don't get lost forever.
(Looking forward to having a good nose through myself later Grin)

BrendaBlackhead · 10/02/2015 08:55

Sorry - The Slap is one of the biggest loads of manure I have ever read. Awful "Corrections" wannabe, written by someone who seems to have absolutely no clue whatsoever how women think. Jane Austen observed that she didn't write dialogue between men because she had no experience of how they spoke to one another. Christos Wotsit should have taken a leaf out of her book.

aeon456 · 10/02/2015 00:14

'Tulip Fever' by Deborah Moggach is very good too.

www.amazon.co.uk/Tulip-Fever-Deborah-Moggach/dp/0099288850

aeon456 · 10/02/2015 00:09

'The Slap' by Christos Tsiolkas is a good story that would stimulate a lot of debate. Made into a TV drama.

www.amazon.co.uk/The-Slap-Christos-Tsiolkas/dp/1848873565

TolstoyAteMyHamster · 09/02/2015 23:10

Wise Blood by Flannery O'Connor. Totally unlike anything else I've ever read, a minor classic, loads to discuss stylistically and thematically, and you'll look uber-cool.

Or Hangover Square by Patrick Hamilton. Heartbreaking and incredibly moving. And again, a minor classic so you'll look incredibly well informed and well read.

ladydepp · 09/02/2015 23:05

Harvest by Jim Crace. Or anything by Jim Crace. Amazing writing, not too long and lots to talk about....

CruCru · 09/02/2015 22:23

We are all completely beside ourselves.

Original poster
HeartsTrumpDiamonds · 09/02/2015 21:43

magi thank you my dear! I keep meaning to come back to the thread "properly" but RL keeps getting in the way. I have made an edited list of all the books mentioned up until the last 20 posts or so, and I wanted to regale everyone with the Story of the Snobby Friday Book Club Meeting, subtitled "Turns Out They Weren't That Bad After All" Grin

OP posts:
BuggersMuddle · 09/02/2015 20:32

'Foucault's Pendulum' by Umberto Eco? It has so many bizarre references in it you can tie yourself in knots trying to fathom them.

'A Clockwork Orange' is worth a read and stands on its own merits IMO.

I loved 'Saturday' by Ian McEwan, although I gather that this is not a universally held view!

albertcampionscat · 09/02/2015 19:58

Cold Comfort Farm. If they don't like it they're a bunch of boring twits.

BikeRunSki · 09/02/2015 19:52

The Paris Wife - Paula McLain

The story of Ernest Hemmingway's early life as a writer. Very readable. Very interesting. Gripping. But it's about Ernest Hemmingway to keep the literary snobs happy.

CruCru · 09/02/2015 19:45

The Dinner by Herman Koch (translated from the Dutch)

magimedi · 09/02/2015 19:45

I am just about to report this post to HQ - in the hope that they will move it to adult fiction in a week or two, so that it does not vanish.

So many good books recommended here.

Twinprimes · 09/02/2015 19:29

Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates ! (very critical so should put the cat amongst the pigeons in a book club)