Bookclub November 2012

Hi there!

At this months meet we managed to get quite a lot sorted out. I'll give a recap of the plans we made towards the end of this post, so that the people who couldn't make it this month know what going on. Now on to the review....

This months book was Blood Red Road by Moira Young. Overall we gave it 4 stars. Most of us liked it, a couple just couldn't get on with it, more on that in a moment though...

Overall we loved this book. We found it compelling and surprising, It takes you on a journey that you're not expecting. It's a very different kind of book, mainly due to the way that it's written. It had no speech marks, and it is written phonetically. That's where a couple of us had trouble. It was a struggle to read, because you had to assess everything as you read it, to see if it was what she was thinking and feeling or if it was actually the characters speaking. For those of us that struggled with it, it stopped us from even finishing the book. Which is a shame because this book has a kick-ass story line!! The rest of us took a while to settle into the book too, but once we had, we were in for the ride and really enjoyed it.

We liked Saba and Nero. In fact we REALLY liked Nero, I for one would now like a Crow! lol We found Saba to be tough and strong, and annoyingly stubborn! We didn't quite understand why she was always so reluctant to accept help when it was offered to her. We connected well with Saba though. I think that was as a result of they style of the writing. It was like having someone sit there in front of you, and tell you the story. It intensified the connection with Saba, and swept you away with her through the book. This did have a downside though. We felt that it created a distance/barrier between ourselves as the reader, and the other characters. Which is a shame as there are some pretty cool secondary characters in this book. Jack being one of them. Em, Saba's sister being another one.

We liked the way the relationship between Saba and Em changed throughout the book though. We felt very sorry for Em at the start, because Saba is just so mean to her! Most of us have younger siblings so we know how irritating they can be, but still, she was quite dismissive of Em. I think we felt quite protective of her, and I kind of just wanted to give her a hug! lol Things change during the course of the book though. By the end, Saba is just as protective towards Em as we were at the start. She grew to love her sister, and Em learnt to trust Saba. Ultimately it was story of trust, and we are looking forward to reading the next one :0)

It wasn't all book chat last night though, we had a few plans to make for the coming Christmas season. Next month we are not having our regular meet, instead we are all going out to dinner! We will be meeting at the regular time and place, then moving on to Nando's for some nosh, chat and gifts! Yep, gifts :D We ran into a few logistical problems with the Secret Santa, so we decided that if we each pick a more general gift (no more than £5) then we will all exchange them at the dinner, a 'everyone-pass-your-gift-to-the-person-on-your-left' kind of thing. It should be fun and I'm looking forward to it. I do need to get a better idea of numbers though, so I can give the restaurant a heads up beforehand to expect a large party. So, if you weren't at the meet last night and want to come, then contact me on twitter (@yabluewater) or drop me a quick email (yabluewater@gmail.com). Also guys, I have only been given one post so far for the December members take-over. *tuts* lol So if you can have them all emailed to me before the start of December that would be ace :D If you have any Q's then feel free to email me also.

OK well that's just about it for this month. I will be doing a separate post next month about January's book and more details on our plans for that, so keep your peepers open!

See you next post,

Kaylie :0)