May meeting at Heather D's at 5:00 on May 9th. 

May Read - The Hiding Place, Corrie Ten Boom

In May, we will be reading The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom.  While many of the mothers have read this, we hope that this book will open the eyes of our children to some of the history of the world they live in.  I'm looking forward to hearing the discussion of this book.

Hunger Games

At our last meeting (in March) we discussed the book Half Magic.

While the kids liked Half Magic, they quickly moved the conversation onto whether or not they had read "Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins.

Some kids had read it, some had mean parents who wouldn't let them read it (that would be me).

The kids all clamored to read Hunger Games for the next book club, and the moms discussed the pros and cons, as the dystopian society, violent theme, and emotional drama may be intended for a more mature audience.

After some discussion, we decided to read the Hunger Games and then discuss these mature ideas with our kids.

Since our last meeting, our schedule has been a little more complicated - filled with conflicting track meets, sicknesses, and we haven't been able to meet again.

So - calling all participating moms, please let me know when you can meet for our next book club meeting!  

Half Magic - March 14, 2012

Our next book club will be held at MaryAnn's on March 14, 2012 at 4:00 pm.

There we will discuss Edward Eager's book, "Half Magic".

Holes

Earlier this month we got together and discussed Holes.
We had a lively discussion regarding whether 'the curse' was really a curse, or whether it was imagined.  Finally, I think it was decided that because it was fiction, in this book, in this case, the curse was real.  We also enjoyed discussing the casting that was used in the movie Holes, vs. the actual descriptions of the characters in the book.

We had a very interesting discussion regarding inter-racial relationships, and we discussed the differences and norms of acceptance now in contrast to the setting of the book.  It was very interesting to hear some of our member's own personal experiences of discrimination that they've experienced in their lives. I think we all learned from our discussion how important respect and understanding for everyone is.

Opting to kill two birds with one stone, we enjoyed watching Holes (the movie) together after our discussion.  

Date change - February 9

Our February book club meeting will be on Thursday the 9th instead of the 8th.
Happy reading and see you there! 

January Book of the Month - Holes by Louis Sachar

Our first book of 2012 is Holes by Louis Sachar 

While most of the kids have seen the movie, very few have read the book.  It will be fun to compare the differences between the book and movie, and then to watch the movie together as well.

December 2011 - Book of Three by Lloyd Alexander

For our January meeting, we met to discuss our reading of Lloyd Alexander's "Book of Three".
The Book of Three is the first novel in the five-novel series, Prydain Chronicles.

Following in the tradition of J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis, Alexander creates modern fantasy out of the ancient Welsh myths of the Mabinogion, which date from the early Middle Ages, and the Arthurian traditions. Some of his characters are borrowed from these ancient tales, but others are wholly original creations. The reader follows the adventures of a young pig-keeper, Taran, who along with his friends—a princess, a harpist, and a wild twigcovered creature—attempt to rescue Hen Wen, the oracular pig of the wizard Dallben. On the mythic level the heroes encounter the dark lord of the underworld and meet the fairy folk who inhabit the hollow hills.

Due to library shortages and holiday travels, many of us weren't able to finish this book prior to our meeting.  However, many of us had seen the movie, "The Black Cauldron", and it was interesting to compare to what we'd read to the movie.  We found that several main characters and story lines from the book were completely cut from the movie.  

As we discussed our direction and plans for the future, we decided to work in groups to choose several books for the upcoming months this year.  The kids met in one group and made a list of books they wanted to read - which turned into a list of books that most of them had all already read.  The moms met and discussed all of the great classics that we grew up with and that we would love for our kids to read, as well as modern books that our kids may enjoy.  

When we compared notes, we realized that we'd like to read books that are new (if possible) to as many of us as possible rather than just re-reading books we've all previously read or listened to.  We were also disappointed to find that the kids all seem to have a stigma regarding many of the classical pieces of literature that we grew up loving - Pride and Prejudice, Little Women, anything Jane Austen, Little House on the Prairie, Huckleberry Finn.  

We put our heads together and pulled out a laptop to check the library's resources, and put together a reading list for a large portion of this year.  We hope that in posting the reading list, our readers will be able to read ahead, or bounce around and we won't run into limitations due to an inadequacy of available books.  

As we finished up, we decided that it might be fun to try adding in a movie night for any books we read that have been made into a movie.  We thought it might be fun to invite all of the families to join us.