| Reading Dates for 2008 |
 |
| January |
|
| 9th, 2pm |
| Persephone Reading Group: Every Eye by Isobel English |
| This 1956 novel is about a girl growing up to what could have been unhappiness, but for her marriage to a carefree younger man.
As she travels south by train to Ibiza she surveys her past life and unravels a mystery. |
|
| 11th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 16th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Atonement by Ian McEwan |
| Atonement is set in 1935, when 13 year old Bryony Tallis is a girl on the cusp of womanhood. Based on events she sees
but doesn't quite understand, she becomes the reason an innocent man is convicted of a terrible crime. |
|
| 23rd, 7:00pm |
| Persephone Reading Group: Every Eye by Isobel English |
|
| 30th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Atonement by Ian McEwan |
|
| February |
|
| 6th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: The Lizard Cage by Karen Connelly |
| A grim and haunting read about the ultimate power of love in the most appalling of circumstances. Set in a Burmese prison
camp, a political prisoner is serving 20 years solitary confinement. Not for the faint-hearted. Winner of the Orange Prize
for New Writers 2007. |
|
| 8th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 20th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: The Lizard Cage by Karen Connelly |
|
28th February - 2nd March
Reader's Retreat
Broniwan, Rhyd Lewis, Llandyssul
|
|
| March |
|
| 5th, 2pm |
| Persephone Reading Group: They Knew Mr Knight by Dorothy Whipple |
| Having enjoyed Someone at a Distance so much, I am looking forward to another Whipple.
A Book Society Choice shortlisted for the Femina-Vie Heureusa prize, this straightforwardly told story is more subtle
than first appears. |
|
| 7th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 12th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Suite Française by Irene Nemirovsky |
| Irene Nemirovsky was a Ukrainian-born Jew living and writing in Paris. In 1940 she and her family left Paris ahead of the
invading German army. She spent two years completing two parts of a five part novel, before being arrested and sent to her
death at Auschwitz. |
|
| 12th, 7pm |
| Persephone Reading Group: They Knew Mr Knight by Dorothy Whipple |
|
| 19th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Suite FranÇaise by Irene Nemirovsky |
|
| April |
|
Sunday 6th 11am - 4pm
Reader's Day, Brook Cottage, Clungunford:
Boating for Beginners by Jeanette Winterson and
Not the End of the World by Geraldine McCaughrean - set against the backdrop of
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
|
|
| 9th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: An Amateur Marriage by Anne Tyler |
| A rich and compelling novel about a mismatched marriage and its consequences over three generations. The inimitable
Anne Tyler bears witness to the complex entanglements of family life in a wise, humorous and perceptive novel. |
|
| 11th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 23rd, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: An Amateur Marriage by Anne Tyler |
|
| May |
|
| 7th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie |
| This novel is about Africa, about moral responsibility, the end of colonialism, ethnic allegiances, class and race,
and about how love can complicate all these things. |
|
| 9th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 21st, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie |
|
Sunday 25th 11am - 4pm
Reader's Day, Brook Cottage, Clungunford:
a selection of books by Doris Lessing; to be chosen at previous Reader's Day |
|
| June |
|
| 4th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Mansfield Park by Jane Austen |
| Written between 1811 - 13, and published in 1814, it marks a return to writing for Austen after a break of some ten years. |
|
| 13th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 18th, 2pm |
| Persephone Reading Group: A Woman's Place 1910 - 75 by Ruth Adam |
| "The most readable review of twentieth century's women's lives yet written." |
|
| 18th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: : Mansfield Park by Jane Austen |
|
| 25th, 7pm |
| Persephone Reading Group: A Woman's Place 1910 - 75 by Ruth Adam |
|
| July |
|
| 2nd, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Their Eyes Were watching God by Zora Neale Hurston |
| A chance to revisit this classic of black American literature of which Alice Walker said "No book is more important to me
than this one." Considered one of the finest black novels of all time, this book is a celebration of black folk culture,
of love between equals, of a woman's self discovery. |
|
| 4th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 16th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Their Eyes Were watching God by Zora Neale Hurston |
|
| August |
|
| NO MEETINGS |
|
| September |
|
| 10th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai |
| Although it focuses on the fate of a few powerless individuals, Kiran Desai's extraordinary new novel manages to explore,
with intimacy and insight, just about every contemporary international issue: globalization, multiculturalism, economic
inequality, fundamentalism and terrorist violence. |
|
| 12th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 24th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai |
|
| October |
|
| 8th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Spies by Michael Frayn |
| Frayn's 2002 novel about two boys in wartime England, who believe one of their mother's to be a spy, is about how we as
children make sense of the adult world. |
|
| 8th, 7pm |
| Persephone Reading Group: Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson |
| If you haven't read this already, you're in for a treat! |
|
| 10th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 15th, 2pm |
| Persephone Reading Group: Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson |
|
| 15th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: Spies by Michael Frayn |
|
| November |
|
| 5th, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: The Wise Virgins by Leonard Woolf |
| It was on his honeymoon in 1912 that Leonard Woolf began writing his second (and final) novel. He was 31, newly returned from seven
years as a colonial administrator, and asking himself much the same questions as his hero. Helen Dunmore wrote in The Sunday Times:
'It's a passionate, cuttingly truthful story of a love affair between two people struggling against the prejudices of their time and place.
Woolf's writing is almost unbearably honest.' |
|
| 14th, 4:30pm |
| Children's Reading Group |
|
| 19th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: The Wise Virgins by Leonard Woolf |
|
| December |
|
| 3rd, 2pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson |
| A jolly murder mystery for Christmas, following the fortunes of Jackson Brodie whom we met first in Case Histories. |
|
| 10th, 7pm |
| Reading for Pleasure: One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson |
|
| 12th, 4:30pm - 6pm |
| Children's Reading Group Christmas Party |
|
