MPC's Book Club News

Author: Cathay Snyder
February 16, 2023

MPC's Book Club kicked off 2023 with a wonderful group discussing the classic, The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas.

As Terry Cornish summarized in a recap to the Club members: We had an assortment of readers who read the unabridged version, read an abridged version, or just couldn't get into the work at all! Partly because this classic tale of revenge was originally published in a serialized version in the 1840's, Dumas stretched it our to over 1,000 pages, with lots of historical background and subplots. The unabridged readers did enjoy the challenge; I compared it to reading Shakespeare, Chaucer, etc. We did appreciate the twists and turns as Dantes/The Count of Monte Cristo/several other aliases escaped the Chateau D'If and used his newly found treasure to exact appropriate revenge on his enemies and reward his allies. The rest of our reading year should be somewhat less challenging and perhaps even more enjoyable."

Thanks to recommendations from Judy Klebe and her daughter, we have our choices for the 2023 reading year scheduled! In the coming months we will be reading the following:

February: The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams

March: Dinners with Ruth: A Memoir on the Power of Friendships by Nina Totenberg

April: The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

May: Horse by Geraldine Brooks

June: The Christie Affair by Nina de Gramont

July: Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

August: The Fiancée by Kate White

September: The Stationary Shop by Marjan Kamali

October: West with Giraffes by Lynn Rutledge

November: This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel

MPC's Book Club meets in the Presbyterian Women's Conference Room on the fourth Tuesdays of each month, except for December.

Our next meeting will be on Tuesday, February 28 when we discuss this month's selection, The Dictionary of Lost Words. It is the debut novel of Australian writer, Pip Williams. The novel centers around a young girl, Esme, who begins to rescue words that are "lost" or not being considered for inclusion to the first Oxford English Dictionary being written by her father and a team of lexicographers in the early 1900's. Over time. Esme realizes that some words are considered more important than others and that words and meanings related to women's experiences are often unrecorded. She dedicates her life to the Oxford Dictionary while secretly collecting the words she has rescued for inclusion in The Dictionary of Lost Words. 

We hope you will consider joining us this month or perhaps another time this year if the selection piques your interest. Contact Terry Cornish, tjhe(at)aol(dot)com

 

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