Reader's Ink discussion

Has anyone read this book yet or know much about it? Any ideas on whether it would be appropriate for an almost-12-y/o girl?

My stepdaughter wants to try a mother-daughter book club.

Thanks!

Which book? I'm confused.....

The Book Thief...

Oh. Duh. Sorry- can't help you here.

Since this is my pick, I'm reading this in my local book club and with you ladies at the same time. Smart huh. Some of my ladies are ahead of me, and one mentioned just the other day she was about 50 pages into it, and she personally didn't think it may be good for younger readers. I'm thinking a 16-17 year old would be able to handle it, but a 12 is a lot younger. I really don't want to discourage you either way. One idea might be to read some of the reviews in Amazon and Goodreads and see what you think. This book is classified to be in the YA genre, so maybe she'd do fine with it. Death is the Narrator of this book. I don't know if that would freak any of the kids or not, but just FYI. Maybe it will be more Halloweeny than I thought.

Carol- thank you for the input. I am thinking 12 may be a little young- we may just stick with Judy Blume or the Traveling Pants books :) Yes- very smart to combine both clubs! Would be interesting to compare both sets of discussions..

Hi Julie, just checking back with you since our last note about a month or more ago. Was curious if you decided to try the Book Thief or not. I think I remember that you would be living in a hotel for a period of time and wanted to do some reading with your daughter. Hope that is going famously with you all. Sounds like a fun adventure. Just checking in. I really liked the book a lot, and as we talked about it earlier, I am doing it with my local book club on Wednesday this week and you all on Thursday. I'll try to take some notes so that I can pull the two together. Hope you and yours had a great Thanksgiving! Carol

Discussion will probably be fairly intimate as far as I can tell, not as many readers as on other books we've read. Love to have you hop on if you can. Take good care....

Hi Carol- thanks for checking in! Yes, we have been very busy with our interstate move, but we finally found a place to live after three weeks at the hotel. Slowly but surely we are getting settled, which is awesome.

Sadly I have not yet gotten my hands on a copy of The Book Thief- I hope to do so fairly soon so I can join in on the discussion.

My daughter and I did read two awesome books together, though. 'A Long Way from Chicago' and 'A Year Down Yonder.' They are set in the 1920s/30s and follow two kids and their very eccentric Grandma. They were well-written and brought up a lot of neat historical details that fueled some awesome discussions between us. I highly recommend both books for elementary-age kids (though I thoroughly enjoyed them as well!)

Ladies: I've been kind of wondering what the book was like that I picked for my September Book Club Pick. I chose "Luncheon at the Boating Party" by Susan Vreeland. Was curious if any of you have read it. It has a French Flair to it, and I have read very little French in my lifetime. Was curious if that would be of some interest to you??? Was also looking at other books I've been thinking about, and one of those is "Les Miserables" by Victor Hugo. Have any or all of you read it. Was looking at the Kindle selection list, and you can get it for free. The Boating Party should be fine, just curious if you'd rather try something more classical.

Heaven is for Real: A Little Boys Experience...Todd Burpo & Sonja..., Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Stinky Dog by Michael Wenberg, Daniel's Gift by Freethy, Kill Alex Cross by James Patterson...

I think Vreeland sounds fine. Les Miserables is L-O-N-G, and I know I wouldn't have a prayer of getting that one done within a month!

That's just fine. Just got to thinking that maybe you guys may not like French stuff, so looked in my reading option list and thought of the other's above. I've listened to about 2/10 of it just wanting to get the gist of what it's about. We'll be fine...just a different kind of read. Enjoy.... )

Vreeland works for me as well - I'd actually looked at Clara and Mr. Tiffany for one of my pics (the Los Angeles library recommended it for book clubs), so I'm glad someone else picked one of her books.

I'm with Ashley - Les Mis is long, and, selfishly, I have a stack of very long classics I want to read before that one, and I can only do so many of those in a year. :)