SHELF-ISH PURSUITS: Where’s she going with this?

It’s my weekend off and I am up by 3 am thanks, in part, to a wee dachshund’s wee bladder.  We aren’t even going to talk about the Fireball I consumed last night.  No headache, but plenty of sound sleep and snoring (if you believe a dainty dame such as myself actually snores).

Today’s forecast calls for a high in the mid-60s, a welcome change from the cold and wind we’ve experienced over the last several days.  We even had cold temperatures over Christmas which hasn’t happened since I was about eight years old.  A long time ago, indeed.

Today I wanted to touch on something I’ve been getting messaged about.  I assume (yes, I know that’s bad…) that if one person asks, others may feel similarly but haven’t spoken up.

Book selections.

I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say I bet, considering the diversity of our group, that we have very eclectic tastes in reading material.  As I’ve said before, I’m a sucker for cozy mysteries, CJ Box, and the WWII genre (fiction or nonfiction).  I also like romance novels.  Not Fifty Shades, but tawdry to say the least.  I had two coworkers who referred to them as “loin-burners” or “he cupped her breast novels”.  I can’t help it; I’m a sucka for luv!  Point being, we all like what we like and reading something outside of our usual fare can be difficult, if not at times, impossible.  I get that.  If you plunked down anything by Dickens, I’d tell you to take a long walk off a short pier. Yuck.  Same with Hemingway and Ayn Rand.

So why is Stephanie picking *these* books?!

As I said about The Accidental Book Club, we aren’t an accident, but we are a club.  Each of the women are different, have different trials, different coping mechanisms.  That’s us!  Can you see us there?  Can you see people in your life, yourself even, in this story?  Are you Jean?  Was your mom Laura?  Was your dad harried and distant?  Is your child like Bailey?  What do these people make you feel?  With the exception of Bailey, who is still a child, albeit a teenager, I dislike them all and it’s making for difficult reading.  I could quit, but I’m soldiering on!

Some have mentioned they’d prefer all nonfiction, T4 or Holocaust centered; those tomes focused on the disabled; something of a more meaty subject.  I get it.  But there’s only so much I can take before I have to fall back to a no-brainer, quick read.

February’s book, The Seamstress, is meatier and I’m sure it’ll be difficult to digest in spots.  I encourage you, if something in there is simply too much to take, to skip a few pages.  But I picked this one because of the feistiness of the author, her willingness to stand up and say “this isn’t right”.  Now, how willing are you?  If you heard about it or saw it with your own eyes, what would you do?  Would you be shamed into silence; stunned by embarrassment, your face flushing bright red; or would you, like Sara Tuvel Bernstein, say “hell, no!”?  Can we even know until it happens to us?  And isn’t that a scary thought?

I am, with Jeanne’s permission and approval, considering posting articles related to T4 to The Campfire page.  More bite-sized than king-sized, so we aren’t overwhelmed and left wrung out.  Thoughts?

I also intend to continue to flip-flop from lighter to weightier topics, but there will always be some connection from the current book to the what-wases and what-ifs of the WWII era.  Please be on the lookout for those.

As for the discussion of January’s book, I’ll post it as an event probably for next weekend.  I’d like everyone to have a chance to delve into it since I know some of you just got your copy.

I hope all of this makes sense.  If you have questions, suggestions, or concerns, please PM me and I’ll get back with ASAP!

Carry on, book dragons!

~Stephanie