The Long Overdue Book Club discussion

Okay, we're going to switch gears here for the next book that you can read anytime for the next two months! This selection is going to be a non-fiction book, but the story is every bit as captivating as something that was developed out of an author's imagination. Our next book choice is going to be A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail by Bill Bryson. You can jump in at any time to share your progress with us, or you can still go back and talk about our first book with us. We hope you enjoy our selection, and happy reading!

PERFECT book for me! My fiance is fascinated with the AT so I've been learning a lot about it whether I wanted to or not. :) I'll definitely be reading this one in the next week or two.

Great! Bryson brings some humor to the topic, which I think is necessary if you plan on hiking that much. We actually have some hiking aficionados here at the library, so if you need any more recommendations on the topic, we'll be happy to help!

How is everyone doing with the book? Did it ignite any desire to go out and hike the Appalachian Trail? If you decided to go, would you want to go with a friend like Katz?

I finished the book a couple of weeks ago. 6 pages in, I said to my fiance "I can tell I'm not going to like it, not my kind of humor". 23 pages in the book had grown on me and I did enjoy it. Even developed a crush on Katz. :) The end was a bit of a shock, just BAM, over. I was interested in the characters enough to look them up and see what they're doing these days.

I agree about the ending, it was kind of abrupt. I found Katz to be the kind of person that I love to read about, but if I had to deal with him on a long trip, I probably wouldn't make it. Bryson's humor isn't for everyone, but I love his sarcasm. I'm glad you liked it enough to wonder about the characters though! I have looked them up before as well, and knowing about their backgrounds a little bit from reading this book and a few other of Bryson's works, I found that they've led very interesting lives. This book got me interested in the Appalachian Trail enough to read a few other books on the topic, the best I've found being Grandma Gatewood's Walk, which approaches the subject without any sarcasm or complaining on the character's part.

Grandma Gatewood's Walk is my fiancé's favorite as well. I haven't read it yet. We're not ready for that kind of hiking, but we did visit High Point State Park in New Jersey over the summer, just to walk on the trail a bit. We got to talk to a couple of hikers too, which was pretty cool.

Bryson is sometimes too cynical for my taste but he shares a lot of good info here with a good bit of emotion. I liked Katz as he reminded me a bit of myself. Awakened the tree hugger in me.

I can appreciate some cynicism every now and again, but what I find odd is that Bryson made a living out of essentially being a travel writer, when most of the time it seems he doesn't have much faith in the human race. I really like his sense of humor, but if my view was that hopeless, I don't know that the thing that I would be doing would be traveling to new places to meet new people that I probably wouldn't be able to put much faith in anyway. I still wouldn't mind sitting with him and ranting about all of the injustices of the world though!

Nicole wrote: "I can appreciate some cynicism every now and again, but what I find odd is that Bryson made a living out of essentially being a travel writer, when most of the time it seems he doesn't have much fa..."

I find his humor to be engaging though humorous as well.