NEXT BOOK: Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy

Hello!  Our review of Naked by David Sedaris was really great!  Thanks to everyone who was able to make it!  Our next book will be Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy.  Here is a quick synopsis:

 Cormac McCarthy's masterwork, Blood Meridian, chronicles the brutal world of the Texas-Mexico borderlands in the mid-nineteenth century. Its wounded hero, the teenage Kid, must confront the extraordinary violence of the Glanton gang, a murderous cadre on an official mission to scalp Indians and sell those scalps. Loosely based on fact, the novel represents a genius vision of the historical West, one so fiercely realized that since its initial publication in 1985 the canon of American literature has welcomed Blood Meridian to its shelf.

Our next meeting will be on Sunday, December 5th at 6pm at Kyles!  Discussion questions and details for the next meeting will be posted shortly!

In the meantime, happy reading!

-Nicole

Questions and menu items for NAKED

So Nov. 7th is the date for our meeting for "NAKED"!  Since Sedaris' "Naked" deals so much with his childhood we ask that you bring a favorite from your own.  So far on the menu will be:

• Pumpkin Pie from Jordan
• Pigs in a blanket from Kyle
• Mac and Cheese from Nicole

So there are a few ideas as to what people have in mind.  Hope you are enjoying the book and Happy Reading!  We will meet on Sun. Nov. 7th at 6pm

Here are the questions:
How is your relationship with your mother in comparison to the one that Sadaris illustrates?

Did your parents ever get called in to talk to your teacher for some reason? What was it? Did you have any annoying or strange habits when you were a child? How did people react to them? Do you have them anymore?

. Were there things that you always did with your parents when you were growing up? What were they? Did you like them, or not?

What is the worst or strangest job you have ever had? Would it compare with Sadaris' experiences working in a mental hospital?

Do you remember the things you worried about most when you were still in school? Fashion, dating, sports, sexuality?

Sedaris' dad always tells him awful tales to keep him and his siblings from doing things they shouldn't.
What are some things that your parents told you, or that parents in general tell their children so they won't do certain things

Sedaris tells of his early ambitions to become a professional actor.
What did you want to become when you were a child? What was your dream job?

Now that we are almost at the end of the book you have been given a lot of information about Sedaris' parents. What was their relationship like? Was it a good one? A normal one for people who have been married for so long?

Sedaris attends a holiday at a nudist camp.
Would you ever attend a nudist camp? Why do you think people go to nudist camps or beaches? Did reading this make you want to try it, or not?

Next on the list...

drumroll please........NAKED by David Sedaris

Welcome to the hilarious, strange, elegiac, outrageous world of David Sedaris. In Naked, Sedaris turns the mania for memoir on its ear, mining the exceedingly rich terrain of his life, his family, and his unique worldview-a sensibility at once take-no-prisoners sharp and deeply charitable. A tart-tongued mother does dead-on imitations of her young son's nervous tics, to the great amusement of his teachers; a stint of Kerouackian wandering is undertaken (of course!) with a quadriplegic companion; a family gathers for a wedding in the face of imminent death. Through it all is Sedaris's unmistakable voice, without doubt one of the freshest in American writing.

Thanks all for Octobers discussion of Revolutionary Road
and welcome Teresa!
We will continue the theme of potuck in November for the meal
so just bring your favorite dish. Since many of Sedaris' stories
revolve around childhood, I urge you to bring a favorite from
that time in your life!
BookClubATX will next meet on Sunday NOV. 7th at 6pm in Round Rock
Happy Reading!
Kyle

Book Questions and Dinner infor for Rev. Road

Hey Everyone!
Well Oct 3 will be this Sunday and I now have book questions for Revolutionairy Road
they are as follows:
1.April and Frank go to such lengths to manipulate each other's perception of their gender roles. April wants to get to Paris, but feels the need to convince Frank that it's all for him and that, as the good wife, she's willing to go to work to support the family. Do we believe this? Or is she just supporting Frank's idea of what a man and a woman should be like when she truly wishes to work?
2.What does Paris represent for Frank and April? What did the East Coast represent for Shep? Are those two things related, and what do all the escapism fantasies in the book really mean?
3.Does Frank want to "find himself" or does he really just want to be appreciated? Would accepting the promotion be resigning himself to a life he doesn't really want, and if so, why would he consider it? Does he really want to "excel at crap like that" (p. 126) despite protestations otherwise? What does that say about the nature of work and his relationship with it?
4.What's up with Mrs Givings? She's another one of the Wheeler foils we meet in this section, and as such, what part of their lives is she reflecting? Her breakdown scene really struck me because it was so sudden — does she represent the suburban lie that everything is really just fine?
5.Then there's her husband. If anyone's pretending suburban life is just fine, it's him turning his hearing aid off. Is this perhaps the key to surviving this world? Is he maybe the happiest, and most well-adjusted character because he is able to tune it all out?
6.Finally, it's interesting that the Givings' son John is so creepy and mentally disturbed; clearly he is supposed to represent something. Is his ugliness and crudeness like a cautionary tale? It's all autumn leaves and glossy appliances on the outside, but maybe John represents the ugly truth about what's going on deep down inside the American suburban soul.

ALSO!
The dinner for this month is simply POTLUCK Just bring your favorite potluck dish
doesn't matter what it is!
we will meet at 6pm
if anyone needs further directions
let me know,
Kyle
HAPPY READING

And the next book is...

REVOLUTIONARY ROAD by Richard Yates!!!

"A young couple living in a Connecticut suburb during the mid-1950s struggle to come to terms with their personal problems while trying to raise their two children."

Thanks to all for making September's meeting such a success. Welcome to New member Rachel and congrats on your book being drawn for the next read!

We will meet again on Sunday October 3rd at 6pm

Dinner deatails coming soon!

-Kyle