Sep 15, 2010

book report

Last night was the third meeting of the bookclub I joined a few months ago.
It also was my turn to "lead".
The book I'd chosen was Peter Cameron's Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You.

I hadn't read it before, but the reviews were good, so I figured this would be a good way to force myself to read it. It did.

I loved it. You should read it too, you know, if you like that kind of thing.

My fellow bookclubbers, however, didn't. They didn't like the protagonist because he's kind of a snarky loner.

Of course, I take this as a personal affront. How can I not?

It also doesn't have a neat tidy happy ending...or a clear cut moral.
The first book we read was The Alchemist, which everyone loved.
(wtf?)

I hated it, but at least I had the politeness to keep that to myself.

Anyway, not everyone hated it....but enough.
I don't know.
I did manage to get some good provocative discussion out of the book, however, so that was good.

So who was there, you ask? Oh, you didn't? Tough, I'm going to tell you anyway .

Actually as I'm sitting here I realize that I could easily simply edit an earlier post about another group of gay men. ...ok about every group of gay men.

My list of the 14 people you meet in gay groups really seems more accurate than even I realized.

8 comments:

Miss Janey said...

Miss J thinks a stimulating conversation is more important than everyone liking the book. How else ya gonna get the quiet gay guy to pie up?

ricola said...

I know which number I am!!

cameron, p. said...

I'm glad you liked the book, but sorry the rest of your group didn't. I think you should find a new book group.

P.S. I enjoyed your blog (a lot).

Mar gar et said...

I was getting excited about the prospect of #5 for you, but then you ruined it for yourself by saying it was you.

Floyd to Andy: "Aww..nowwhatyagonnadew?"

Michael Guy said...

Perhaps a book burning group would prove more engaging?

I also hate when gay couples 'look/dress' alike. What the fuck is up with that?

mrpeenee said...

I'm with Janey, the point is to encourage discussion. If everyone says "yeah, I liked it too," it would be too dull. Actually, now that I think about it, the point is for me to show how much smarter I am than everyone else, but that's just my world view.

Ask the cute shy one out.

Frontier Psychiatrist said...

I love that book.

And that you got a comment from cameron, p.

Jill said...

I loathed The Alchemist!

I'm reading Almost Moon by Alice Sebold right now. It could be about me and my horrible Grandmother. The first sentence is...

“When all is said and done, killing my mother came easily.”

I've laughed so much reading it...I'm not sure how appropriate my laughter is though.