I had a great time in Philadelphia at the mid winter ALA meeting. We had a fantastic dinner last night with our panel authors (see below) plus authors Marisa de los Santos, author of Love Walked In and the forthcoming Belong to Me and Jennifer McMahon, author of Promise Not to Tell and the forthcoming Island of Lost Girls. We were joined by librarians at the delicious Fork restaurant and gourmet shop. It was scrumptious.
This am I was up (very) bright and early for the appropriately named Sunrise Panel Series to talk about book groups and it was such a good back-and-forth, with excellent questions from the attending librarians. Carol Fitzgerald, Elizabeth Noble, Victoria Lustbader and Shireen Dodson and I talked about what a great year 2008 is shaping up to be for women's fiction and how books that reflect women's lives make for such meaty discussion. My position has always been that no matter what kind of book we discuss in our book group, the second half (or last two thirds) of the night are spent talking about what's really going on in all of our lives. If we read a book about women and the relationships they have with their mothers, children and spouses, I think the conversation is all the richer.
As an aside -- turns out Shireen's group and mine are both currently reading Eat, Pray, Love, while Elizabeth's is reading A Thousand Splendid Suns.
Just wanted to say how much I enjoyed the panel with all of you--it's inspired me to get our book club going again! Thanks.
Posted by: JH | January 15, 2008 at 12:55 PM
Thanks so much! We'd love to hear how it goes -- email me at bookclubgirl AT gmail dot com with updates!
Posted by: Book Club Girl | January 15, 2008 at 01:08 PM