Good Ole Robert Louis

I really hope that you are all enjoying Treasure Island, or at least the way the Robert Louis Stephensen writes, because he won the choice for Oct.'s book too. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde won the vote for next months book. Hopefully it will help get you all in the Halloween mood. "OOOooohhhhhhh."

Let's Find a Treasure

The Poll has ended and Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stephenson came out on top. Looks like Sept. should be full of adventure.

Happy Reading!

Let's Try Two

We really seem to like ties around here. Every month I've tried to come up with a new way to break the ties that we end up with on reading selections, and this month I've decided to do something new yet again........ I'm not breaking the tie.

We will have two books for the month of Aug.

To Kill a Mocking Bird AND The Grapes of Wrath

So here's how it will work: Everyone will pick one of the two books and read it in Aug. I will TRY to get both of them read and we will have a discussion for BOTH books on Sept. 5. You can participate in the discussion for the book(s) that you read.

This way we should have more happy readers.... we'll see how it goes anyway.

Happy Reading.

(I'll see you all back here on Aug 6th for the discussion on White Fang.)

Did Anybody Finish?

May and June turned out to be much busier months than I thought. And I have to be honest, I haven't finished the book.  So this is turning into more of an announcement post for me.

If you did finish, let everyone know what you thought.  It is my goal to finish Anna K. and The Red Badge of Courage this month.

On a happier note, "CONGRATULATIONS!" are in order.  Mrs. and Mr. Mordecai welcomed their newest family member .  They had their 1st girl (2nd child) on June 9th.  Visit her personal blog at:http://be-it-ever-so-humble.blogspot.com/ to see the cute pics and get all the details.

Congratulations again!  I am so happy for you and your family.

Also the poll is going up today for July's book so don't forget to cast your vote.

I can't wait to read your thoughts.  Sorry, again, that I don't have many yet.

And the Winner Is...

Well, we did get a couple more votes and the book selection for May will be....

Anna Karenina by Tolstoy.  

The Three Musketeers came in a very close 2nd place and will be added to my list of previously voted on books to be chosen from again early next year.

I hope that you are all enjoying this months read, Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne.

Happy Reading.

We Like Ties Around Here Don't We?

Once again it looks as if this months voting is going to end in a tie.  If you have not voted yet PLEASE do so. If the result is still a tie when the poll ends tomorrow, I will remove my vote to break the tie.  (The only reason I didn't vote for the other favorite is because I've already read it, but I can read books twice *wink*)

A Very Close Race and Some Questions

Apparently I chose three very interesting books to decided between for April's book. By one vote the winner is:

Around the World in 80 Days, by Jules Verne.

However, all three books received more than one vote, which has lead me to ask some questions that have been on my mind lately:

About 2 weeks ago, I started looking into the book choices for next years time frame, and to be honest I'm having a hard time coming up with enough classic novels, and I've been wondering how to remedy the situation.

Here are my ideas for fixes so far and I would appreciate your inputs.

1. We can have an assigned book, instead of voting. (for example we could say Jan. book IS the Odyssey, by Homer- no voting)

2. We can have both books and authors to vote on. (for example in Jan we can read the Illiad by Homer, however in Feb. the topic will be Plato and you comment on which ever of his works you found and read that month during discussion time. This is a much more you have to do some work alternative.)

3. We can combine the Ancient-400 time frame with the 400-1600 time frame. (getting through all of these books in one year instead of two.)

4. We can spend the first 3-6 months of 2010 continuing this years era and read some of the books that have narrowly escaped the votes, like: Great Expectations, Les Miserables, Bleakhouse, The House of Seven Gables, and others that I'm sure will come close later this year, etc. before moving on to the ancients the second half of the year.

I realize that you have all been very kind in letting me run the show since I took over for Mrs. Brooke, however, I really do want you to feel like this is YOUR book club too. So please let me know your feelings about how we should keep the group going next year.

There Wasn't a Tie!

By 4 votes to 1 the book for March is: Uncle Tom's Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Hope you are enjoying Moby Dick.  Happy Reading.

To Fill You In

Thank you to all who voted for January's book.

Nathaniel Hawthorne's, The Scarlet Letter, won the vote and will be the book selection for Jan.

I hope you have all had a chance to get started on A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens. The discussion will be here on Jan. 5th, and I will be on time, this time.

Also, I just remembered that when the book club started, Mrs. Brooke had a monthly give-away.
Due to our family budget, the fact that this is a monthly deal and my proximity to book stores, I will be giving a $5 Barnes and Noble gift card to the winner. (I am looking into email-able certificates from different locations, but for now, I will have to snail mail the real deal.)

I forgot to do it last month. So I decided to do both last months and this months at the same time. For the Nov discussion on Oct.'s Book Pride and Prejudice I had my children pick a number. They chose 2. The second commenter that month was Sharon from KY.

For this months discussion on Nov.'s book, Jane Eyre I played eeny-meeny- minney, mo between the two who commented and again the winner is Sharon from KY.

So congratulations Sharon! If you will email me (shimmywith4[at]yahoo[dot]com) with your address, I will send you a $10 Barnes and Noble gift card. ($5 for each month)

This month's in between question will be up on Dec. 15th. Until then, "Happy Reading!"

Good Ole Nathaniel

Next year's time period is 1850- Present. So naturally I started at the beginning. And when I was looking for books written or about 1850 one name kept coming up over, and over and over again... Nathaniel Hawthorne. So I decided to dedicate the month of Jan to him. So go to the side bar and vote for which Nathaniel, novel, you want to read.

Don't forget our discussion for Jane Eyre starts on Dec. 5th.

In Lieu of Voting

Before Mrs. Brooke, officially removed herself from this blog. The two of us talked and made an executive decision.

We will not be voting for Decembers book. Instead we have chosen: A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.
It fits perfectly, not only with the time of year, but also with the era we are reading.

Never fear, though, voting for January's book will be here on Dec. 5th. And I did a lot of research this week on novels for our 2009 scheduled time frame. I have a nifty little list of 38 books to choose from. So this is the only time (at least for a year) that the decision will be made for you.

Discussion for Oct.'s read, Pride and Prejudice, will start (as usual) on the 5th of November. So you have a couple more days to finish up. I can't wait to hear all of your opinions. I have a few myself. And until I "see" you again, work on getting, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte and A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens for our next two months.

*hugs*