My Book Group's Next Selection is Jhumpa Lahiri's Unaccustomed Earth

I'm so excited that my book group decided our next book is Jhumpa Lahiri's acclaimed new book of stories, Unaccustomed Earth. I've heard such great things from friends who have already read and loved the book. I'm interested to see how a discussion of short stories goes, as in my last book group we had a hard time discussing stories, but I'm game. You can read an excerpt here, download the reading group guide here, read more about Lahiri here and watch a video of Lahiri on Barnes & Noble's Meet the Writers series.

Comments

[Swapna]

I have been wanting to read this book so badly! I enjoyed Interpreter of Maladies so much - great pick!!

[Julie P.]

I have this book sitting on my desk and I'm dying to read it. My friend LOVED it! We keep talking about doing this for our book club too.

[Michelle]

I'm curious how you do a book club discussion with a book of short stories - so you discuss each story, themes throughout all, or something else? My book group attempted a book of short stories, and the discussion was tough - - we didn't know how to discuss the book. One of the few times our group had extended silence... Ideas?

[Book Club Girl]

I'm curious too Michelle, I'm going to hunt around for an answer to your question, or at least some tips and at the very least, I will report on how it goes with my book group when we meet in mid July.

[Darby Lohrding]

Jen,
Does your book club meet in person or on-line? I'm interested in joining an on-line book club, do you know of one?

[Book Club Girl]

Darby,
We meet in person, but I know that Karen, a BCG reader, has an online one over at her blog: http://planetbooks.wordpress.com/
and that there is one at http://www.everydayiwritethebook.typepad.com/ as well. This month they're discussing The Septembers of Shiraz.

[Darby Lohrding]

Thanks so much, I'll check out both of them!!

[Dawn]

This is on my TBR list as well. I loved _The Namesake_, it is one of my favorite books from the past few years (the movie adaptation was very well done and true to the book, too).

Jhumpa Lahiri does an excellent job describing the immigrant/second-generation experience and the choices they make (what traditions to keep, what customs to drop).

I've read very positive reviews about this collection of short stories ... our group has struggled with discussions of collections too; I'll be interested to read how your group handled this. Enjoy!