Literary Exploration discussion

We are slowly building a list of books, which you are free to suggest a book. But I'm interested in Theme's as well. For Example: Each month we vote on a book, sometimes random picked books, sometimes a theme.

So feel free to suggest a theme. IE. Pulitzer Winner, Hugo Winner, Classic, Russian Literature, Steam Punk, etc.

What about a dystopian theme? There are a rather large load of great books to choose from.
1984 by George Orwell.
The Other Side of the Island by Allegra Goodman (my favorite of this genre/theme).
Fearless by Tim Lott.
Those are my suggestions, can't wait to read the latest pick!

That would be an awesome theme idea. Will definatly do it. Suggest some book ideas

What about gender identity? That theme could stem off some good discussions? There's Middlesex and Funny Boy or Kiss of the Fur Queen

We just had Middlesex in a poll, but an interesting theme

Books about goats?

Like? The Men Who Stare at Goats? The Three Billy Goats Gruff?

What about a theme of a labyrinth?
This will then encompass works of Italo Calvino ("If on a Winter's Night a Traveller"), Borges, Umberto Eco, Garcia Marquez, Joyce, Kafka, Thomas Pynchon and others.

Booksy wrote: "What about a theme of a labyrinth?
This will then encompass works of Italo Calvino ("If on a Winter's Night a Traveller"), Borges, Umberto Eco, Garcia Marquez, Joyce, Kafka, Thomas Pynchon and ot..."

I like it, what would you suggest as the 4 books to vote on?

“The Garden of Forking Paths” (Jorge Luis Borges)

"If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler" (Italo Calvino)

"The General in His Labyrinth" (Gabriel García Márquez)

"The Name of the Rose" Umberto Eco

Booksy wrote: "“The Garden of Forking Paths” (Jorge Luis Borges)

"If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler" (Italo Calvino)

"The General in His Labyrinth" (Gabriel García Márquez)

"The Name of the Rose" Umberto Eco"

Nice, I make it a poll for Novembers book

Great, I will have enough time to read one of these that I hadn't read before ("The General in His Labyrinth").

Awesome

Booksy wrote: "“The Garden of Forking Paths” (Jorge Luis Borges)

"If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler" (Italo Calvino)

"The General in His Labyrinth" (Gabriel García Márquez)

"The Name of the Rose" Umberto Eco"

--I would love to read one of these

These are all fabulous books and I've now got the last one that I hadn't read before - "The General in His Labyrinth" - from the library. Will be a great weekend read for me.

I noticed y'all did a Booker Prize list. How about a Booker Prize list for Shortlisted losers. Some of the greatest books ever up for the Booker Prize lost to something else.

Not a bad idea.

No need to limit ourselves to the Booker Prize. There'll be plenty of good losers out there :P

Brad wrote: "I noticed y'all did a Booker Prize list. How about a Booker Prize list for Shortlisted losers. Some of the greatest books ever up for the Booker Prize lost to something else."

I do like that idea, might give it a few months before we do it, Any suggestions for the four books. I'm guessing A Fraction of the Whole should be one of them

I would go with:

The Dark Room, by Rachel Seiffert
number 9 dream, by David Mitchell (or Cloud Atlas)
Empire of the Sun, by JG Ballard
The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood
Time's Arrow, by Martin Amis

I discover suddenly that I've been putting much more subconscious thought into this than I imagined. And there are plenty more where these came from.

Sounds good, It's always good to get someone else to do my job for me :D

I'd like to do a theme about the middle east. Like the kite runner. I'll have to think of some other examples

The Complete Persepolis would work as well as The Kite Runner

I like the Middle East theme. Here are some more titles:

http://www.amazon.com/Middle-Eastern-...

Brad wrote: "I would go with:

The Dark Room, by Rachel Seiffert
number 9 dream, by David Mitchell (or Cloud Atlas)
[book:Empire of the Sun..."


Handmaid's Tale is VERY interesting - definitely worthy of another read!

I really like the idea of doing a theme based on a region of the world- we could also do books about a certain time period as well... or perhaps a theme of books that focus on the ocean or desert...

What about the Holocaust theme? I know that it can be kind of a bummer topic; however, there are many good books that are stories of triumph and overcoming great obstacles. It would not have to just be Jewish in nature.
1) Night by Ellie Wiesel 2)We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families by Philip Gourevitch (About Rwanda)3)Nothing to Regret: Historical Novel by Pinkston (About Japanese Internment Camps during WWII), and The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine by Ilan Pappe all seem interesting. I have only read Night out of the four I suggested.

I am interested in the Holocaust theme.Apart from 'Night',what about'The Periodic Table'by Primo Levi or even John Boyne's 'Boy in the striped pajamas'?

I recently read "Sarah's Key" by Tatiana de Rosnay which had a very interesting twist on the "usual" Holocaust story, as well as "Skeletons at the Feast" by Chris Bojahlian (think "Midwives") which told the story of WWII from the perspective of a family of Prussians.

"Boy in the Striped Pajamas" is on my "to-read" list. I would love to read that book.

I only chose Night because it was one I knew something about. I would be thrilled to read something different. Boy in the Striped Pajamas was a good movie. I would love to read it.

The Book Thief is a really good book about the holocaust and then a very different take is a book this year called "Shades of Gray" - makes you think about different sides of any war. Would love to read about other Holocaust - Cambodia, China during WWII, some of the African ones???

Booksy wrote: "“The Garden of Forking Paths” (Jorge Luis Borges)

"If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler" (Italo Calvino)

"The General in His Labyrinth" (Gabriel García Márquez)

"The Name of the Rose" Umberto Eco"

Great choices! I like the labyrinth theme.

Here are some that have won the Man Booker or Booker prizes, or books that were written by award-winning authors.

The White Tiger

Hotel Du Lac

Andorra (did not win a prize, but I think it's a good book for discussion.)

Life of Pi

The Poisonwood Bible(did not win a Booker prize, but I believe it won some other prizes.)

South Of The Border, West Of The Sun

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time

Vernon God Little

How about a theme of novels based on famous philosophers? Here are some:

The Interpretation of Murder

When Nietzsche Wept

The Schopenhauer Cure

Barbara wrote: "Here are some that have won the Man Booker or Booker prizes, or books that were written by award-winning authors.

The White Tiger

Hotel Du Lac

Andorra..."

We recently did the man booker winners as a topic

Barbara wrote: "How about a theme of novels based on famous philosophers? Here are some:

The Interpretation of Murder

When Nietzsche Wept

The Schopenhauer Cure"

I like that idea, not sure how many others would. Speaking of philosophers; I wanna read Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love too

I see you've got the next couple months lined up KL. Looks good.

Yeah, I'm organised :)

Hi KL,

YES, thank you for reminding me! I've been wanting to check out Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love also. In fact, this was available as a giveaway in the First Reads contests and I tried to win an advanced copy, but I didn't win.

I'm a fan of Andrew Shaffer so keen to check out that book

Sorry -- I hope I'm not "over-posting"!!!!!

Here's another suggestion for a theme -- "stories that are set in unusual places" and by "unusual" I mean countries (and/or cities) that are hardly ever used as a setting for a book. I'll have to look through my list to see what else I can come up with, but here's one:

Andorra -- The entire novel takes place in Andorra (a country that many people don't even know about!!) and it's also a very interesting story. It can be interpreted in many different ways, which always makes for a good discussion.

There are probably tons of novels that take place in an unusual place -- I just can't think of any others right now.

No such think as over posting here :)

I like it; we are looking at doing a middle eastern theme soon, so might leave it for later

I'm not interested in the Holocaust theme. Being German, I've read so many books in this genre, just to get a grip on my heritage. Plus, it all hits a bit close to home occasionally, when I think what my grandparents went through.

Anyway, I've got an idea:

It seems like there are a lot of amazing authors out there, most of which have written more than one amazing book. Since we're reading one book a month, how about we up it to two?

We could have one be a theme-based book, and the other a selection of an author's works?

Also, this way we can pick between books to read for the month, just in case one of them doesn't interest us!

♥Xeni♥ wrote: "I'm not interested in the Holocaust theme. Being German, I've read so many books in this genre, just to get a grip on my heritage. Plus, it all hits a bit close to home occasionally, when I think w..."
This is my very first post (besides introduction) so a little hesitant to offer an opinion being so new to the group - apologies if I expose ignorance...but I tend to agree with Xeni about more than one book a month - especially if we're selecting based on 'theme'. I think it would be interesting to read two or three 'takes' from different authors each month. Frankly, this is always the way I read. I find I remember and enjoy the subject that much more when I can compare and contrast perspectives. Often I stumble on particularly amazing combinations - what I call 'serendipitous pairings' - for example, on a theme of social progress, I read 'The World is Flat' along with 'Sophie's World' and 'Light of Other Days'. I found the juxtaposition of a little philosophical history, a smidge of contemporary postulating, and a dash of future-tripping to be a real romp!

What about Troubles by J.G. Farrell, there was no Booker prize the year it was published (1960), it's set in Ireland, and in a different time period (1919). A lot of people love it.

Kathleen wrote: "♥Xeni♥ wrote: "I'm not interested in the Holocaust theme. Being German, I've read so many books in this genre, just to get a grip on my heritage. Plus, it all hits a bit close to home occasionally,..."

I like the idea of having more then one book from same theme in a month

The wonderful labyrinth theme (and especially Borges) inspired me to think to an another great subject in literature: the blindness. And here could be:

-"Blindness", by Jose Saramago,
-"7 nights", by Borges
-"The Tunnel", Ernesto Sabato
-"The Blinding" (Auto da Fé), by Elias Canetti

... and, I am sure, many others.

Anda wrote: "The wonderful labyrinth theme (and especially Borges) inspired me to think to an another great subject in literature: the blindness. And here could be:

-"Blindness", by Jose Saramago,
-"7 nights"..."
Thank you Anda for your comment on the Labyrinth theme.
As for the Blindness theme, I am ignorant and only know of Jose Saramago's "Blindness" work. Would love to read others in this theme that you recommended. This also made me thinking: what do we describe as "blindness": the physical blindness only or other types of blindness as well (for instance, political, social etc) which then makes is extremely hard to select books belonging to this theme.
I would, for instance, call a book by Ishiguro "Remains of the Day"
a book about blindness (among other themes, there is a theme of the butler Stevens' social blindness and inability or unwillingness to see Lord Darlington's true nature). A very interesting and intriguing theme this blindness is...

Hi Booksy,
Well, my first three suggestions for "blindness" theme (Saramago, Borges and Sabato) are reffering to the physical blindness, which makes people to "see" the world in other different ways. To see it better, or not. The last proposal (Canneti's masterpiece) is closed to yours and is about the "blindness", as an inability to see the true nature of things. Thus, I would like very much to read "Remains of the Day"...thank you for suggestion :)