Sunday Brunch Club: Then We Came to the End

Our March / April 2013 selection was Joshua Ferris' Then We Came to the End.

It was not well received!

Synopsis
With an irresistibly casual writing style, Ferris makes readers a part of his fictional advertising agency from the moment we open the book. Through numerous impromptu conversations, colleagues come alive. We learn that Larry and Amber have had an affair, and that Amber is pregnant. We know that Chris Yop is panicking because he exchanged his office chair without permission, and that Joe Pope is universally despised because he got promoted and now everyone has to listen to him. No one likes Karen Woo because she's always trying to seem smarter than everyone else. And the head boss, Lynn, has cancer, but she doesn't want anyone to know. We understand that the agency is in trouble, and that the unstable Tom Mota is being laid off. We realize that anyone could be next. And we're dying to know what's going to happen.

Club Rating Details:
My rating: ****/5
HR's rating: */5
CC's rating: */5
Average Rating: 2/5

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Sunday Brunch Club: How to Be a Woman

Our January / February 2013 selection was Caitlan Moran's How to Be a Woman.

Synopsis
Though they have the vote and the Pill and haven't been burned as witches since 1727, life isn't exactly a stroll down the catwalk for modern women. They are beset by uncertainties and questions: Why are they supposed to get Brazilians? Why do bras hurt? Why the incessant talk about babies? And do men secretly hate them?

Caitlin Moran interweaves provocative observations on women's lives with laugh-out-loud funny scenes from her own, from the riot of adolescence to her development as a writer, wife, and mother. With rapier wit, Moran slices right to the truth—whether it's about the workplace, strip clubs, love, fat, abortion, popular entertainment, or children—to jump-start a new conversation about feminism. With humor, insight, and verve, How To Be a Woman lays bare the reasons female rights and empowerment are essential issues not only for women today but also for society itself.

Club Rating Details:
My rating: ****/5
HR's rating: ****/5
CC's rating: ***/5
Average Rating: 3.67/5 

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Sunday Brunch Club: Strength in What Remains

Our September/October 2012 selection was Strength in What Remainsby Tracy Kidder.


Synopsis:
Deo arrives in America from Burundi in search of a new life. Having survived a civil war and genocide, plagued by horrific dreams, he lands at JFK airport with two hundred dollars, no English, and no contacts. He ekes out a precarious existence delivering groceries, living in Central Park, and learning English by reading dictionaries in bookstores. Then Deo begins to meet the strangers who will change his life, pointing him eventually in the direction of Columbia University, medical school, and a life devoted to healing. Kidder breaks new ground in telling this unforgettable story as he travels with Deo back over a turbulent life in search of meaning and forgiveness.

An extraordinary writer, Tracy Kidder once again shows us what it means to be fully human by telling a story about the heroism inherent in ordinary people, a story about a life based on hope.

Club Rating Details:
My rating: ****/5
HR's rating: ****/5
CC's rating: ***/5
Average Rating: 3.67/5

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Sunday Brunch Club: A Little Stranger

Our August/September selection was A Little Stranger by Kate Pullinger.


Synopsis:
Fran has been happily married to Nick for twelve years, until a “little stranger” arrives in the form of a baby, and their lives are irrevocably changed. Louis has good health and a sweet nature, but Fran feels stifled with her old life merely a memory. So, one day, she simply walks away.




Club Rating Details:
My rating: **/5
HR's rating: ***/5
CC's rating: ***/5
Average Rating: 2.67/5

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Sunday Brunch Club: Geek Love

Our selection for June/July 2012 was Geek Love by Katherine Dunn.


Synopsis:
This is the story of the Binewskis, a carny family whose mater- and paterfamilias set out–with the help of amphetamine, arsenic, and radioisotopes–to breed their own exhibit of human oddities. There’s Arturo the Aquaboy, who has flippers for limbs and a megalomaniac ambition worthy of Genghis Khan . . . Iphy and Elly, the lissome Siamese twins . . . albino hunchback Oly, and the outwardly normal Chick, whose mysterious gifts make him the family’s most precious–and dangerous–asset.

As the Binewskis take their act across the backwaters of the U.S., inspiring fanatical devotion and murderous revulsion; as its members conduct their own Machiavellian version of sibling rivalry, Geek Love throws its sulfurous light on our notions of the freakish and the normal, the beautiful and the ugly, the holy and the obscene. Family values will never be the same.

Club Rating Details:
My rating: ****/5
HR's rating: *****/5
CC's rating: ****/5
Average Rating: 4.33/5

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Sunday Brunch Club: The Dovekeepers

Our May/June 2012 selection was The Dovekeepers by Alice Hoffman. This book inspired a very lively and rich discussion, which is still referenced now and again in other book discussions.

Synopsis:
Blends mythology, magic, archaeology and women. Traces four women, their path to the Masada massacre. In 70 CE, nine hundred Jews held out for months against armies of Romans on a mountain in the Judean desert, Masada. According to the ancient historian Josephus, two women and five children survived.

Four bold, resourceful, and sensuous women come to Masada by a different path. Yael’s mother died in childbirth, and her father never forgave her for that death. Revka, a village baker’s wife, watched the horrifically brutal murder of her daughter by Roman soldiers; she brings to Masada her twin grandsons, rendered mute by their own witness. Aziza is a warrior’s daughter, raised as a boy, a fearless rider and expert marksman, who finds passion with another soldier. Shirah is wise in the ways of ancient magic and medicine, a woman with uncanny insight and power. The four lives intersect in the desperate days of the siege, as the Romans draw near. All are dovekeepers, and all are also keeping secrets — about who they are, where they come from, who fathered them, and whom they love.

Club Rating Details:
My rating: ****/5
HR's rating: **/5
CC's rating: ****/5
Average Rating: 3.33/5

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Sunday Brunch Club: Coppermine

It was about this time last year that this particular club was resurrected in a parking lot after an awesome brunch. Hence, its christening as the "Sunday Brunch Club." We started out with the three original core members from years ago and have expanded to include two additional book loving members. It has been wonderful having this club up and running again, and hanging out with great people every couple of months to talk books!

Our first selection back in March/April 2012: Coppermine by Keith Ross Leckie.


Synopsis
The story begins when two missionaries disappear in the remote Arctic region known as the Coppermine. North West Mounted Police officer Jack Creed and Angituk, a young Copper Inuit interpreter, are sent on a year-long odyssey to investigate the fate of the lost priests. On the shores of the Arctic Ocean near the mouth of the Coppermine River, they discover their dismembered remains. Two Inuit hunters are tracked and apprehended, and the four begin an arduous journey to Edmonton, to bring the accused to justice.

Instructing the jury to "think like an Eskimo," the defence counsel sets out to prove the Inuit acted in self-defence. They hear how the hunters believed the priests were possessed by demons about to kill them, and how, acting on this belief, they killed the men and ate their livers. The jury finds them not guilty. The hunters become celebrities, a parade is held for them, they visit a movie theatre and an amusement park, and become guests of honour at socialite dinners. They are given new suits, fine cigars, and champagne. But Rome is outraged that the murderers of its martyred priests will go free. As secrets of Jack Creed's past in the trenches of Europe are revealed, Jack tries to save his two friends, and himself.

Club Rating Details:
My Rating: **/5
HR's Rating: **/5
CC's Rating: ****/5
Average Rating: 2.67/5

GoodReads Rating Details:


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