readings for March

Dear Clubber Recruit (Does “clubber” not sound cool? It has the intimations of a lazy lounger, potential serial killer, and a sexy jazz warbler, all rolled in two syllables),

Time has a way of dematerializing quickly these days.  One moment we were trying to organize a book club at work to meet every fortnight at lunchtime, next moment, eight months have gone and well, we are still trying to organize that book club. But no matter.  We shall only give ourselves to despair if every one of us in this potential book club has finished reading Tolstoy’s War and Peace and we still have not managed to meet up again.

I have drawn up here a list of books, with the help of fellow Clubbers, which you may want to check out. When we go back to work after the Easter holiday, perhaps we can try meeting up. ("Try" being the operative word.)

There are pre-requisites for those who want to be a Clubber. An unmitigated passion for reading (although this is as clear as the noonday sun, I am stressing this here to avoid any misunderstanding); an ability to eat fast (we only meet during lunch breaks); and the capacity to talk fast (just imagine,  50 Clubbers discussing Hundred Years of Solitude and all of them afflicted with an inordinate amount of pride and prejudice… well, do your math).    
 

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn (2011)

It is Nick and Amy’s fifth year anniversary, the day Amy dramatically disappears.  The police starts interrogating Nick and they are almost sure that Nick is involved in Amy’s disappearance.  The police could not be faulted for closing the noose on Nick: he has a motive and he has no alibi.  

Gone Girl is a book which makes Fatal Attraction look like child’s play and brings the He said-She said technique to a dizzying new height.  Flynn opens the book from Nick’s point of view then juxtaposes it with Amy’s version of the story told from five years ago.  Flynn then brings the two narratives together to the present and moves it briskly forward to a thundering crescendo.  

         

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green (2012)

 

Hazel and Augustus are star-crossed lovers. They are soon going to die.  The book starts on a mawkish note but is soon able to hold ground as a sensitive and thought-provoking take on young people with terminal diseases and their struggle to live normal lives.

The Fault in Our Stars is a combination of wit, humor, and beautiful prose which reminds one of Oscar Wilde’s, The Picture of Dorian Grey. 

“There will come a time when all of us are dead.  All of us. There will come a time when there are no human beings remaining to remember that anyone ever existed or that our species ever did anything.  There will be no one left to remember Aristotle or Cleopatra, let alone you.  Everything that we did and built and wrote and thought and discovered will be forgotten and all of us will have been for naught. Maybe that time is coming soon and maybe it is millions of years away, but even if we survive the collapse of our sun, we will not survive forever.  There was a time before organisms experienced consciousness, and there will be time after.  And if the inevitability of human oblivion worries you, I encourage you to ignore it.  God knows that’s what everyone does.”

Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling (2012)

The pretty little town of Pagford was an idyllic place. Then Barry Fairbrother died and secret after secret started unraveling in this once peaceful locale.

Similar to the Harry Potter series, Rowling narrates the foibles of adults from children’s colored lenses. Casual Vacancy proves that Rowling is one mighty fine story-teller and that her powers are not solely limited to Hogwarts.

 

The History of Love by Nicole Krauss (2005)

Leo Gursky is a migrant from Eastern Europe at the twilight of his life and who wants to establish connection with his son. Alma Singer is a young girl who is concerned about her mother’s extended mourning over her husband’s death. Alma has taken it into her head that she needs to help her mother move on and find a new partner.  A book called, “The History of Love”threads the two characters' quests.

Krauss's work is undoubtedly sublime. And yet. It is also heartbreaking, wistful, poignant and as a Clubber has pointed out, full of pregnant pauses which make the book resonate.  This is the second time I have read the History of Love and it still left me at the end protesting that Krauss should have made the book (much!) longer.
 

Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier (2009)

Remarkable Creatures is set in the 1800s when opportunities for women were still limited.  The story is told from the points of view of Elizabeth Philpot, educated and with some money, and Mary Anning, a girl of few prospects. The two ladies became close friends because of their common affinity for fossil collection.

The book is a celebration of friendship and assertion of women’s independence and intelligence in a world (then) dominated by males. If you are somebody who cannot have enough of Jane Austen (and of course, Jane Austen's body of work is finite),  you will love this take by a modern writer.

 

P.S. I was kidding about the 50 Clubbers. We are more like 5. Haha.