seoul siwa book club

bye bye

2009-06-09T17:02:00.000-07:00

We did have a nice rushed lunch at the Thai Orchid. The food was superb and so was the company.

I will try to transfer this blog to Roseann, so that she can keep up the blog on her own, with Uma's help.

thanks to all!

Last gathering before summer break

2009-05-31T23:08:00.002-07:00

RSVP to Jeanne! Important....

I just wanted to let you know that we have a reservation for our last Book Club meeting of the season on Tuesday, June 9 at the Thai Orchid restaurant in Itaewon. 12 Noon. (2nd floor across the street from the International Clinic)
We have a private room reserved, so will be able to have our discussion of the No 1 Detective agency as well as discussion and decisions on what books to read next year. Don't forget to bring your final book suggestions. Diane will send out a list to look over soon.

As is the nature of the meals in a Thai restaurant, everyone shares the dishes, so we will take the total food bill and divide it equally among everyone. We can ask that drinks be on a separate tab, so we can pay for our own, as some may want wine or beer, and others are happy with water or tea.

Please let me know if you plan to attend so we can have the table set accordingly. Hope to see you all there.

Roseann's home address

2009-05-10T17:19:00.000-07:00

Hope that you all have read this wonderful ***** book. (five star)
Book-club will be at my house on Tuesday at 1 PM. I live very close to the Hyatt hotel and I have about 4 spaces for parking. I will also have some light things to eat for lunch so come hungry, of course there will be lots of wine! Please send me a quick note if you can make it!

when: tuesday 12
time: 1:00 PM
where: Roseann's home

atonement from a tormented reader!

2009-05-06T16:37:00.000-07:00

Where: Roseann Rhoda's (her home is near PISHON restaurant by the HYATT, almost)
When: Tuesday, May 12, at 1:00 pm.

We will be discussing Ian McEwan's Atonement. We will also start considering book choices for next year. Please bring your recommendations (not more than two books per person). You should have already read the books you are recommending or have heard strong recommendations from reliable sources for these books. We will make the final selections for next year's books at our June meeting (the last meeting of the year in our book club). Remember that we strive for a variety of genres in nonfiction and fiction--classics, memoirs, biographies, novels, etc., as well as authors of different nationalities.

Looking for possible discussion questions about the book, I came across an excerpt from an interview with Ian McEwan about Atonement. Please consider McEwan's view of the purpose and the value of the Novel in light of your reading. This is an interesting point for us to consider as we near the end of this year's Book Club:

AUTHOR INTERVIEW

from www.whsmith.co.uk

Briony’s writing is seen as a way for her to exercise a level of control over her life. What do you personally consider to be the purpose of the Novel?
"I think, of all literary forms, and perhaps of all artistic forms, it is the most adept at showing us what it is like to be someone else. The novel is famously good at revealing, through various literary conventions, a train of thought, or a state of mind. You can live inside somebody else's head. Within one novel you can live inside many different people's heads, in a way that you of course cannot do in normal life. I think that quality of penetration into other consciousnesses lies at the heart of its moral quest. Knowing, or sensing what it's like to be someone else I think is at the foundations of morality. I don't think the novel is particularly good or interesting when it instructs us how to live, so I don't think of it as moral in that sense. But certainly when it shows us intimately, from the inside, other people, it then does extend our sensibilities. It is also, as form, very good at marking out that relationship between the individual and a society, or the working out of a relationship – the interpersonal is very much its subject. Atonement, in particular for me, has been about the description of a character, particularly Briony. I think she is perhaps my fullest invention, as a person - deeply flawed and yet I hope still sympathetic."

Finally, I am hoping that one of you will step forward as the next coordinator of the Book Club. I am leaving Seoul on June 20, so it's coming down to the wire. Remember, if I can do it, anyone can do it!

eat pray love or love myself!

2009-04-14T19:33:00.001-07:00

We did have an interesting gathering yesterday at Nazli's home. She did wake up, once again, at 4 am to prepares some tasty snacks and a BIG chocolate Cake.
Diane was missing and did have an informal book club. The book was, agreed by most of us,a memoir or a diary entry of Elizabeth Guilbert who was going through a divorce.

The rating: 2.8.

The next book will be Atonement by Ian McEwan , not Jane Austin.

Nazli's home address and Diane's message

2009-04-06T19:39:00.000-07:00

Our next Book Club meeting is on Tuesday, April 14, at 1:00 pm, at Nazli Moller's house.

We will be discussing Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love.

Also, we will be welcoming two new members: Sophie Mabru and Boyeon Kang!

Last month, we had an interesting discussion about The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón. Thank you, Jeanne, for hosting our March meeting!

For our April discussion, check out the following Washington Post article about Elizabeth Gilbert and the Eat, Pray, Love phenomenon:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/29/AR2009032902185.html?hpid=sec-artsliving

Looking forward to seeing you all at Nazlis. And please, let's all make a concerted effort to Think Spring, i.e., warmth, sunshine, green grass, flowers, warmth, no more coats, sunshine, etc.!

la sombra del viento - uppps- shadow of the wind

2009-03-18T16:29:00.001-07:00

Thanks Jeanne for the food and the hospitality.
This was one intense book club gathering. The group was reduced to 7 members, Doreen came and left like the wind. Then we did some book talk, lots of book talk and almost decided on the new book club somelier!
The rating on this book was one of the highest of all times, 4.9.
Next time we will meet at Nazli's April 14.
Thanks Roseann for the ride.

Jeanne's home address

2009-03-02T15:59:00.000-08:00

I am happy to host our book group next Tuesday (Mar 10). I live in Songbukdong right across from the Bugak Grocery.

Drive past City Hall toward the Palace.

Just a little farther is Bugak Grocery on your right.

If you have a driver who wants to call my driver for directions, his name is Mr. Shin at 010-2224-2871

See you Tuesday.
Jeanne

Shadow of the wind-Jeanne's home

2009-03-02T15:56:00.000-08:00

Our next Book Club meeting is on Tuesday, March 10, at 1:00 pm, at Jeanne Frasse's house in Songbukdong. We will be discussing Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón. Directions will be forthcoming.

Last month, we had a wonderful meeting at Raheleh's house. Not only did we have an excellent discussion about Emergency Sex and Other Desperate Measures, but we also got to wish Raheleh a happy birthday!!! Thank you, Raheleh for hosting us on your special day!

For our March discussion, consider the following questions:

1. Think about the title of the novel. What is "The Shadow of the Wind?" Where does Zafón refer to it and what does he use the image to illustrate?

2. Carlos Ruiz Zafón is a screenwriter as well as a novelist. Do you believe his work as a screenwriter has, in any way, influenced the novel?

Next month we will be welcoming a new member, Sophie Mabru. Our book will be Eat, Pray, Love.

Looking forward to seeing all of you at Jeanne's!

Emergency Sex: and other desperate measures

2009-02-23T20:34:00.001-08:00

For our February meeting we discussed the nonfiction expose of the United Nation’s peacekeeping efforts in the 1990s in Cambodia, Somalia, Haiti, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Liberia: Emergency Sex (and Other Desperate Measures): A True Story from Hell on Earth, by Kenneth Cain, Heidi Postlewait, and Andrew Thomson.

Everyone found the book to be interesting and heartbreaking. Members of our group were appalled at the UN’s mishandling of their international relief work We discussed the three authors’ unique perspectives as well as their motives in living and working in war-torn, dangerous countries. Overall, we were moved by the stories the writers shared of their attempts to make a difference in these desperate war zones. Their book provides an unflinching account of the modern day atrocities that have occurred in the last fifteen years and condemns the incompetency of the UN and the U.S government’s relief efforts..

The book rating : 3.0

from Diane

2009-02-16T15:50:00.001-08:00

Forgive me for not writing to you all sooner. Our next Book Club meeting is right around the corner--Raheleh and Adrian (!) will be hosting on Tuesday, February 10 at 1:00 pm. We will be discussing Nazli's recommendation, Emergency Sex and Other Desperate Measures: A True Story from Hell on Earth, by Cain, Postlewait, and Thomson. Directions will be forthcoming. Please RSVP to Raheleh soon: raheleh_gelpke@yahoo.com

So now it's on to nonfiction with Emergency Sex! I don't know about you, but I find that I am reading this book only at home. (I didn't want those folks at the dentist's office to get any weird ideas about me! ha!) I hope to see all of you on February 10th.

Happy (discreet) reading!

Suite Francaise

2009-02-04T18:45:00.001-08:00

Last month, we had a wonderful meeting at Karine's home (Thank you, Karine!) discussing Irene Nemirovsky's Suite Francaise. Most everyone was touched by Nemirovsky's beautitifully written two-part novel focusing on the French people's reaction to the German invasion and subsequent occupation of France. We had a thoughtful discussion delving into many aspects of the book: the author's incredible talent in writing a rich, clear-eyed account while actually experiencing such a catastrophe; Nemirovsky's plan for Suite Francaise to be her own War and Peace epic and whether the two-part novel she completed before her arrest stands on its own. (I believe most of us agreed that it does); Nemirovsky's own heartbreaking story and the book's improbable and amazing publication.

The book rating: 3.8 (one of the highest our discerning group has ever bestowed)

happy new year to all!

2009-01-18T22:39:00.000-08:00

Ox (Yin, 2nd Trine, Fixed Element Water): Dependable, calm, methodical, patient, hardworking, ambitious, conventional, steady, modest, logical, resolute, tenacious. Can be stubborn, narrow-minded, materialistic, rigid, demanding.

Korean New Year, commonly known as Seollal (Hangul: 설날; RR: Seollal; MR: Sǒllal), is the first day of the lunar Korean calendar. It is the most important of the traditional Korean holidays. It consists of a period of celebrations, starting on New Year's Day. The Korean New Year holidays lasts three days, and is considered a more important holiday than the solar New Year's Day. [1]

The term "Seollal" generally refers to Eum-nyeok Seollal (음력설날, lunar new year), also known as Gujeong (Hangul: 구정; Hanja: 舊正). Less commonly, "Seollal" also refers to Yang-nyeok Seollal (양력설날, solar new year), also known as Shinjeong (Hangul: 신정).

Korean New Year generally falls on the day of the second new moon after winter solstice, unless there is a very rare intercalary eleventh or twelfth month in the lead-up to the New Year. In such a case, the New Year falls on the day of the third new moon after the solstice (next occurrence will be 2033). Korean New Year is generally the same day as Mongolian New Year, Tibetan New Year, Chinese New Year and Vietnamese New Year.

From wikipedia

Irène Némirovsky 's Suite Francaise Discussion

2009-01-11T21:05:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year! I hope all of you had a festive, lovely holiday. I know that I did! Not only did I enjoy my son Paul's homecoming from college, but I also savored reading our January book Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky. I hope all of you are also engrossed in this moving novel. Once you finish the book, please go on to read the appendices and all end material. This makes the book all the more poignant for the reader and will be helpful for our discussion.

I am looking forward to seeing all of you on Jan. 13, and discussing Suite Française. Take care, and as always, happy reading!

1.
The novelist, who herself fled Paris on the eve of the Nazi invasion, wrote the book virtually while the occupation was happening, most likely making Suite Française the first work of fiction about World War II. How do you think she managed to write while she herself was in jeopardy? Do you think it was easier for her to capture the day-to-day realities of life under occupation? In what ways might the book have been different if she had survived and been able to write Suite Française years after the war?

2.
How does Suite Française compare to other World War Two novels you have read? How would you compare it to the great personal documents of the war (for example, those written by Anne Frank and Victor Klemperer), or to fiction?

happy new year!

2009-01-07T15:58:00.000-08:00

Wishing you all a good health and happy new year!

directions to Karine Texier

2009-01-07T15:10:00.000-08:00

If you come by public transport, come out of the subway exit 6 of the Seoul Nat'l University of Education (line 2 or 3) and walk up the street for 600 meters. Don't turn into the 1st entrance to Acrovista but walk a bit further up to the next traffic lights. There is the other entrance, between A house and B house, where I live.

If you drive, coming from Hannam bridge, go past New Core, leaving the big white Express Bus Terminal building on your right and over the junction. At this point, you can see Acrovista, way up the road. Keep driving, past Paris-Baguette, and Mr Pizza on the left. Go past the entrance into the Sampung Appartment. When you see the SK petrol station on the right and the Paris-croissant on the left, make sure you get in the far left lane, ready to turn into Acrovista at the next traffic lights. Park in the undergroung car park. You might have to leave an ID I'm afraid -security is a bit over the top!

Coming from Banpo bridge, turn left after the bridge towards Gangnam, going past the Gangnam St Mary's Hospital and the Marriot. Stay on the right lane. At the junction turn right and follow the directions given here above.

Book Club Members (Em, Karine, Nazli missing)

2008-12-03T16:05:00.000-08:00

Thanks Diane for the nice food you have prepared and the pretty Christmas decorations along with the nativities, Christmas Carrols....

Happy Holidays to all! Happy Hanukah, Happy Dwavali, Ramadan! We did learn a bit about other BIG holidays.

List of Poems

2008-12-03T15:53:00.000-08:00

List or our annual Poem reading and cookie exchange.

catherine smart (SHE WANTED TO BRING THE ONE SHE HAD PICKED WHEN SHE GOT MARRIED, THE A FAIRY ONE BUT DECIDED TO USE THIS OTHER ONE)
WE ARE MADE ONE WITH WHAT WE TOUCH AND SEE
Oscar Wilde (1854 –1900)

We are resolved into the supreme air,

We are made one with what we touch and see,

With our heart's blood each crimson sun is fair,

With our young lives each spring impassioned tree

Flames into green, the wildest beasts that range

The moor our kinsmen are, all life is one, and all is change.

With beat of systole and of diastole

One grand great life throbs through earth's giant heart,

And mighty waves of single Being roll

From nerveless germ to man, for we are part

Of every rock and bird and beast and hill,

One with the things that prey on us, and one with what we kill

One sacrament are consecrate, the earth

Not we alone hath passions hymeneal,

The yellow buttercups that shake for mirth

At daybreak know a pleasure not less real

Than we do, when in some fresh blossoming wood

We draw the spring into our hearts, and feel that life is good

Is the light vanished from our golden sun,

Or is this daedalfashioned earth less fair,

That we are nature's heritors, and one

With every pulse of life that beats the air?

Rather new suns across the sky shall pass,

New splendour come unto the flower, new glory to the grass.

And we two lovers shall not sit afar,

Critics of nature, but the joyous sea

Shall be our raiment, and the bearded star

Shoot arrows at our pleasure! We shall be

Part of the mighty universal whole,

And through all Aeons mix and mingle with the Kosmic Soul!.

We shall be notes in that great Symphony

Whose cadence circles through the rhythmic spheres,

And all the live World's throbbing heart shall be

One with our heart, the stealthy creeping years

Have lost their terrors now, we shall not die,

The Universe itself shall be our Immortality!.

roseann rhoda(SHE HAD DISCOVERED THAT POEMS ARE A WHOLE NEW WORLD)
LOSS AND GAIN
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

When I compare

What I have lost with what I have gained,

What I have missed with what attained,

Little room do I find for pride.

I am aware

How many days have been idly spent;

How like an arrow the good intent

Has fallen short or been turned aside.

But who shall dare

To measure loss and gain in this wise?

Defeat may be victory in disguise;

The lowest ebb is the turn of the tide.

nancy stevenson
OPEN THE DOOR
Cindy Keil

Find what's inside
Discover the richness
That you've tried to hide

You really do matter
Take time to care
Mine your life's treasure
Your wealth to be shared

Don't hide your bright light
Let it shine thru
Step into the open
It's time for you.

Don't stay in the shadows
It's time to breathe free
It's time to proclaim it
I'm free to be me!

No music is sweeter
It just can't be wrong
Than someone who chooses
To sing her own song

No one does it better
No need to look
You are the author
of your own book.

So write it and read it
Live your sweet harmony
Claim your won truth
Say-The author is me!

Marijke's Google Map

2008-11-09T20:45:00.001-08:00

You can see the photo and follow the "yellow big road".
See you all tomorrow.

A good landmark is the Capital Hotel. Coming from the Itaewon direction (past the Crown Hotel), then turn left at the lights. There's a new, big Starbucks then on your right hand. The Capital Hotel is then only about 50m further up the road. Our appartment building is on the same side of the street as the Capital Hotel only about 500m up the hill., on the corner of the 2nd street left (not counting the entrance to the Chung Hwa appartments)

Bram Stoker's Dracula Discussion

2008-10-29T16:17:00.000-07:00

We had a lively, interesting discussion of Bram Stoker's Dracula. Those who read it found they were pleasantly surprised by the frightening story as well as Stoker's writing--most of us said we wouldn't have read it had not been a Book Club book.

Next Book Club meeting will be at Marijke's house on Tuesday Nov. 11 at 1:00 pm. Our November book is The Last Chinese Chef by Nicole Mones. As I think you know, I will not be attending that meeting. I have asked Em Tsai, who chose the book, to lead the discussion. Please RSVP to Marijke soon by phone or e-mail.

December meeting will be our poetry/Christmas cookie exchange, which I will be hosting on Wednesday, December 3 at 1:00 pm. If you recall from last year, our December meeting is a delightful and festive occasion: we each bring a favorite poem to read aloud to the group as well as a plate of cookies to share. More details to follow!

Finally, I feel I must ask those of you who have not been coming to our meetings to decide if you have the time to continue with the group. I do have a waiting list of people who would love to join the Book Club. If you know that you will be missing meetings in the future, please consider giving up your spot so someone else can join.

THE SCORE WAS 3.8

By Diane VanKoughnett

Announcement

2008-10-01T22:43:00.002-07:00

A
For our discussion, please consider the following question:

1. Dracula relies on journal fragments, letters, and newspaper clippings to tell its story. Why might Stoker have chosen to narrate the story in this way?
2. Likewise, discuss the significance that many of the male protagonists are doctors (Dr. Seward) or men of science (Dr. Van Helsing). Why is this important to the story?

B
Also, Marijke, who will be the host of our November meeting, has asked to change the meeting from November 4, to November 11, so please change the date on your calendars.

SIWA Book Club: Member Directory

2008-10-01T22:28:00.002-07:00

Diane VanKoughnett (coordinator)
Yongsan-gu

Miren Ciganda-Apaolaza
Dongbu Ichon dong

Jeanne Frasse
Songbuk-dong

Raheleh Gelpke
Hanam-dong

Karine Gorham
Itaewon-dong

Marijke Heider
Dongbu Ichon dong

Doreen Jones
Hanam-dong

Uma Manikantan
Songbuk-dong

Nazli Moller
Hanam-dong

Roseann Rhoda
Itaewon-dong

Nancy Stevenson
Itaewon-dong

Valerie Valkenburgh
Gagnam-dong

Lily Joenoes van Bunnik

Karine Texier
Seocho-gu

ENGLEBY Sebastian Faulks

2008-09-22T17:23:00.001-07:00

“I must have stayed in London on the way, but I have no memory of it. My memory’s odd like that. I’m big on detail, but there are holes in the fabric.”

—Mike Engleby

For our September meeting, we discussed Engleby by British author Sebastian Faulks. With his use of the first person narrator, Faulks provides the reader with a fascinating and disturbing first-hand view of the story of Mike Engleby, a brilliant yet clearly odd Cambridge college student. And yes, he has a memory problem.

Most of the group agreed that Engleby was a well-written, darkly intriguing story with a sometimes uncomfortable insight into the British public school system and university days at Cambridge in the 1970s. Although some found the numerous British references to be somewhat unclear, overall the book was positively received and generated much discussion.

Other books by Sebastian Faulks include, Birdsong, Charlotte Gray, On Green Dolphin Street, and Faulks’ most recent book, Devil May Care, a James Bond novel written in the manner of Ian Fleming.

THE SCORE WAS 3.3

Doreen with Dracula

2008-09-22T17:15:00.000-07:00

Anyway directions to my house for the next meeting.

UN 63
1-225 Hannam -dong

If you are driving, come in to UN Village and turn right and take the one way system, keep going around and when you get to the playground at the top go straight ahead (so the playground is on your Left), keep going straight, after Koverhaus which is on the right, go around to the left, this is a very deep turn, keep going down the hill ,my house is the red brick wall, first house on the left, with the green and yellow number 109.

Parking isn't very easy, so if you see a space, just park.

On foot. Come into UN village and turn left, walk up the hill straight ahead, do not take any turns, the house is the on the right with the red brick wall after the Egyptian residence and guard hut (on your left)

Call me if you are lost.

SIWA Book Club I: Member Directory

2008-09-22T17:11:00.000-07:00

Diane VanKoughnett (coordinator) vanknett4@hotmail.com

02/793-4598 (home) 010-8687-7618 (mobile)

Yongsan

Miren Ciganda-Apaolaza telmomom@gmail.com

02/63924292(home) 01191454292(mobile)

Dongbingo dong

Jeanne Frasse jfrasse@mac.com

02/765-6675 (home) 010-5567-4890(mobile)

Songbuk-dong

Raheleh Gelpke raheleh_gelpke@yahoo.com

Karine Gorham k.texier@voila.fr

010-9001-7901 (mobile)

Gagnam

Marijke Heider marijke.heider@yahoo.com

Dongbing dong

Doreen Jones danielanddoreen@hotmailjavascript:void(0)
Publish Post.co.uk

02/749-1701 (home) 010-4732-2292 (mobile)

Hanam Dong

Uma Manikantan uma_manikantan@yahoo.com

02/744 5774 (home) 010- 3156 -1210 (mobile)

Songbuk dong

Nazli Moller mollernazli@hotmail.com

02/749-3696 (home) 010-9115-8713 (mobile)

Hanam dong

Roseann Rhoda rrhoda@mac.com

02/790-2122 (home) 010-9482-0089 (mobile)

Itaewon

Nancy Stevenson nstevenson@hotmail.com

02/796-4336 (home) 010-8769-2535 (mobile)

Itaewon

Em Tsai em.tsai@gmail.com

02/792-3240 (home) 010-2038-3240 (mobile)

Dongbingo dong

Valerie Valkenburgh vvalkenburgh@yahoo.fr

Gagnam

Lily Joenoes van Bunnik lilyjvb@gmail.com

Kyungmee Yoon kymyoon@hotmail.com

Mapo gu

Engleby

2008-08-26T11:53:00.000-07:00

We will be discussing Engelby by Sebastian Faulks. Please consider the following questions (from the Random House Reading Guide) as starting points for our discussion: (Don't worry--they don't give anything away.)

1. ‘I must have stayed in London on the way, but I have no memory of it. My memory’s odd like that. I’m big on detail, but there are holes in the fabric.’ (p.2) How important are the blanks in Mike Engleby's memory? Why do you think this is highlighted so early in the book?

2. Engleby is Faulks’ first novel in the first person narrative. Why do you think he chose tell the story from Engleby’s point of view rather than from the all-seeing third perspective?

Directions to Uma

2008-08-26T11:47:00.000-07:00

Date: September 10th 2nd
Where: Uma's home, 330-495 Sungbuk-dong, Sungbuk-gu
Time: 1:00 pm
Why: new boook "Engleby"

Here you can find the directions to UMA's new home. Again, we will need to find our ways through the streets of Songbuk dong. The map shows the directions so it should be fairly easy.

Make sure to RSVP to Uma soon by phone (she is stilll waiting for her internet), so she will know how many samosas to make (Ha!). You may also want to reply to Diane's email so she will also know how many of you plan to attend.

Driving Directions:
Coming from Samcheong tunnel, keep going straight.

After the first intersection, going straight, the road curves up and left.

On your right is a blue arrow sign 'Norwegian Ambassadors Residence'. Continue going straight and again you will see the same sign on your right.

At the second sign, turn into the right lane. There is a guard house next to the second sign. Our house (330-495) is the first one on the left. Parking is a bit tight in this lane!!

Address: 330-495 Sungbuk-dong, Sungbuk-gu
Phone : 02 744 5774
Handphone : 010- 3156 -1210

All The Pretty Horses

2008-08-24T21:07:00.000-07:00

The meeting took place at Nancy's on June 2nd.
We had a really interesting, thoughtful discussion of Cormac McCarthy's All the Pretty Horses.

The book garnered a rating of 4.5.

Book List for the New Term

2008-08-24T21:02:00.000-07:00

Sept. Engleby Sebastian Faulks (British)

Oct. Dracula Bram Stoker (Irish)

Nov. The Last Chinese Chef: A Novel Nicole Mones (American)

Dec. Poetry/Cookie Exchange

Jan. Suite Francaise Irene Nemirovsky (Russian)

Feb. Emergency Sex and Other Desperate Measures: A True Story From Hell On Earth Kenneth Cain, Heidi Postlewait, Andrew Thomson (American, American, New Zealander)

Mar. Shadow of the Wind Carlos Ruiz Zafon (Spanish)

April Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India, and Indonesia Elizabeth Gilbert (American)

May Atonement Ian McEwan (British)

June The Kalahari Typing School for Men Alexander McCall Smith (Botswana-born British)

Address To

2008-05-19T17:02:00.000-07:00

Date: June 2nd
Where: Nancy Stevenson
Time: 12:30 pm
Why: new boook "all the pretty horses"

"On the map there is a By The Way store, I am in the next building as you go down the little road on the right.
If coming by taxis ask to go to the Hyatt and follow the map.
If coming by subway exit in Itaewon and take a taxi to the Hyatt and follow the map.
If coming by car, the street infront of the apartment is very narrow. I suggest parking along the wall of the Hyatt."

nancy stevenson
202 bellagio villa
234-1 Itaewon -dong

Suggested Books for Next Year

2008-05-12T20:32:00.000-07:00

jeanne's

Here are some books that Deb Okray's group will be reading next year...suggestions from their group. Some looked quite interesting. I have Water for Elephant on tape and have gotten 1/2 way thru it.. not a lot of driving time here to get all the way so far...will take it with me for colorado driving.
I also have Eat Pray Love, but haven't started it, but hear its great. I did read Memory Keeper's Daughter..

count of Mortenson's incredible accomplishments in a region where Americans are often feared and hated. In pursuit of his goal, Mortenson has survived kidnapping, fatwas issued by enraged mullahs, repeated death threats, and wrenching separations from his wife and children. But his success speaks for itself. At last count, his Central Asia Institute had built fifty-five schools. Three Cups of Tea is at once an unforgettable adventure and the inspiring true story of how one man really is changing the world — one school at a time.

Water for Elephants
SARA GRUEN

An atmospheric, gritty, and compelling novel of star-crossed lovers, set in the circus world circa 1932, by the bestselling author of Riding Lessons.

When Jacob Jankowski, recently orphaned and suddenly adrift, jumps onto a passing train, he enters a world of freaks, grifters, and misfits, a second-rate circus struggling to survive during the Great Depression, making one-night stands in town after endless town. A veterinary student who almost earned his degree, Jacob is put in charge of caring for the circus menagerie. It is there that he meets Marlena, the beautiful young star of the equestrian act, who is married to August, the charismatic but twisted animal trainer. He also meets Rosie, an elephant who seems untrainable until he discovers a way to reach her.

Beautifully written, Water for Elephants is illuminated by a wonderful sense of time and place. It tells a story of a love between two people that overcomes incredible odds in a world in which even love is a luxury that few can afford.

The Memory Keeper’s Daughter
KIM EDWARDS

Award-winning writer Kim Edwards's The Memory Keeper's Daughter is a brilliantly crafted, completely riveting family drama that explores every mother's silent fear: what would happen if you lost your child, and she grew up without you?

On a winter night in 1964, Dr. David Henry is forced by a blizzard to deliver his own twins. His son, born first, is perfectly healthy. Yet when his daughter is born, he sees immediately that she has Down's syndrome. Rationalizing it as a need to protect Norah, his wife, he makes a split second decision that will alter of their lives forever. He asks his nurse to take the baby away to an institution and never to reveal the secret. But Caroline, the nurse, cannot leave the infant. Instead, she disappears into another city to raise the child herself. So begins this beautifully told story that unfolds over a quarter of a century — in which these two families, ignorant of each other, are yet bound by David Henry's fateful decision that long-ago winter night. Rich, compulsively readable, and deeply moving, The Memory Keeper's Daughter captures the way life takes unexpected turns, and how the mysterious ties that hold a family together help us survive the heartache that hold a occurs when long-buried secrets burst into the open. It is an astonishing tale of redemptive love.

A Fine Balance
ROHINTON MISTRY

With a compassionate realism and narrative sweep that recall the work of Charles Dickens, this magnificent novel captures all the cruelty and corruption, dignity and heroism, of India. The time is 1975. The place is an unnamed city by the sea. The government has just declared a State of Emergency, in whose upheavals four strangers--a spirited widow, a young student uprooted from his idyllic hill station, and two tailors who have fled the caste violence of their native village--will be thrust together, forced to share one cramped apartment and an uncertain future.

As the characters move from distrust to friendship and from friendship to love, A Fine Balance creates an enduring panorama of the human spirit in an inhuman state.

Eat Pray Love
ELIZABETH GILBERT

A celebrated writer's irresistible, candid, and eloquent account of her pursuit of worldly pleasure, spiritual devotion, and what she really wanted out of life.

Around the time Elizabeth Gilbert turned thirty, she went through an early-onslaught midlife crisis. She had everything an educated, ambitious American woman was supposed to want — a husband, a house, a successful career. But instead of feeling happy and fulfilled, she was consumed with panic, grief, and confusion. She went through a divorce, a crushing depression, another failed love, and the eradication of everything she ever thought she was supposed to be.

To recover from all this, Gilbert took a radical step. In order to give herself the time and space to find out who she really was and what she really wanted, she got rid of her belongings, quit her job, and undertook a yearlong journey around the world — all alone. Eat, Pray, Love is the absorbing chronicle of that year. Her aim was to visit three places where she could examine one aspect of her own nature set against the backdrop of a culture that has traditionally done that one thing very well. In Rome, she studied the art of pleasure, learning to speak Italian and gaining the twenty-three happiest pounds of her life. India was for the art of devotion, and with the help of a native guru and a surprisingly wise cowboy from Texas, she embarked on four uninterrupted months of spiritual exploration. In Bali, she studied the art of balance between worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence. She became the pupil of an elderly medicine man and also fell in love the best way — unexpectedly.

An intensely articulate and moving memoir of self-discovery, Eat, Pray, Love is about what can happen when you claim responsibility for your own contentment and stop trying to live in imitation of society's ideals. It is certain to touch anyone who has ever woken up to the unrelenting need for change.

My Hands Came Away Red
LISA MCKAY

'In this fast-paced, thought-provoking debut novel, McKay, a psychologist who works with humanitarian relief, explores injustice, religious reconciliation, suffering and faith through the eyes of an 18-year-old girl whose mission trip goes tragically awry. For Cori and a team of Christian teens, building a church in Indonesia sounds like a fun project. After an overly long prologue, McKay describes how they journey to the island of Seram and bond with the Indonesian villagers. However, even as they put the finishing touches on the newly built church, Muslim and Christian tensions flare, culminating in a horrific tragedy witnessed by Cori and her friends. They flee through the mountainous jungle, hoping to escape the escalating hostilities. McKay's carefully chosen words, devoid of unnecessary sentiment, lend power to her story. The external hardships the characters face on their trek are secondary to the internal struggles they battle over how a loving God could let terrible things happen; and why their sacrificial choice to give up a summer to help others would cost them more than they ever dreamed. While written from a Christian perspective, McKay gives an evenhanded treatment to Muslims, showing that violence and hatred transcend religious boundaries. This is one of Christian fiction's best novels of the year. (Sept.)' Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)' Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

Within weeks of arriving in Indonesia on a mission trip, religious conflicts flame to life with deadly results. The church building the team had constructed is in ashes and the group is stranded in a foreign land. One girls emotional quest to rediscover hope proves just as arduous as the physical journey home.

Half of a Yellow Sun
CHIMAMANDA NGOZI DICHIE
A masterly, haunting new novel from a writer heralded by the Washington Post Book World as 'the 21st-century daughter of Chinua Achebe,' Half of a Yellow Sun re-creates a seminal moment in modern African history: Biafra's impassioned struggle to establish an independent republic in Nigeria in the 1960s, and the chilling violence that followed.

With astonishing empathy and the effortless grace of a natural storyteller, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie weaves together the lives of three characters swept up in the turbulence of the decade. Thirteen-year-old Ugwu is employed as a houseboy for a university professor full of revolutionary zeal. Olanna is the professor's beautiful mistress, who has abandoned her life of privilege in Lagos for a dusty university town and the charisma of her new lover. And Richard is a shy young Englishman in thrall to Olanna's twin sister, an enigmatic figure who refuses to belong to anyone. As Nigerian troops advance and the three must run for their lives, their ideals are severely tested, as are their loyalties to one another.

Epic, ambitious, and triumphantly realized, Half of a Yellow Sun is a remarkable novel about moral responsibility, about the end of colonialism, about ethnic allegiances, about class and race — and the ways in which love can complicate them all. Adichie brilliantly evokes the promise and the devastating disappointments that marked this time and place, bringing us one of the most powerful, dramatic, and intensely emotional pictures of modern Africa that we have ever had.

miren's

The Club Dumas

ARTURO PEREZ REVERTE

Lucas Corso is a book detective, a mercenary hired to hunt down rare editions for wealthy and unscrupulous clients. When a well-known bibliophile is found hanged, leaving behind part of the original manuscript of Alexandre Dumas's The Three Musketeers, Corso is brought in to authenticate the fragment. He is soon drawn into a swirling plot involving devil worship, occult practices, and swashbuckling derring-do among a cast of characters bearing a suspicious resemblance to those of Dumas's masterpiece. Aided by a mysterious beauty named after a Conan Doyle heroine, Corso travels from Madrid to Toledo to Paris in pursuit of a sinister and seemingly omniscient killer.

Boy in the Striped Pajamas

JOHN BOYNE

The author describes this book as a fable, the name given to a simple story with a mesage to impart - like “Slow and steady wins the race.” But this book is not so simple, although written in a beautifully simple style. The cover blurb warns that it is best to start this story without knowing what it is about, and there is some wisdom in that. It is also a story whose whole point could be missed if you don’t know a bit of the background.
Bruno is a boy of nine (but the book is not for nine year olds) and he is taken away from his beautiful home in Berlin during World War II when his father is given a very important job. Now he must live in a lonely place with just his family. Yet Bruno is an explorer and one day he finds a fence and a friend.

Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches: The Riddles of Culture

MARVIN HARRIS

his book explains Marvin Harris' theory of "Cultural Materialism".
Basically societies will develop (mostly not consiously) ways of coping
with survival issues with taboos and other beliefs and behaviors which
may not seem to have a survival purpose at first glance. The examples from the books
title:

Cows - In India, cows provide a major source of farm labor,
milk, cooking fuel, etc. If you're short of food, eating your cow will
mean that you've lost one of your key supports.

Pigs - In the Middle
East, raising pigs is a much less than ideal use of a society's resource. So having a taboo against eating them means agriculture can focus on other
better choices for the climate. In the Pacific islands it's an ideal
environment for raising pigs and very efficient, hence pigs are
considered the preferred source of meat and rituals revolve around them.

Wars - When a population is
too dense for their current resources, war is more likely. Many different examples are included to point out the correlation. The wars
not only potentially annex new resources, but they also reduce the populations of both warring groups.

Witches - Reducing the number of
women kept the birth rate down to a more manageable level for the
resources available at the time.

All of these reasons are not
necessarily a conscious decision by the societies, but are explanations when looking from the outside. It can also assist in predicting consequences (although not specific ones) when the population density is not supported by the
resources a society has available.

Harris' theories have many in the field that agree as well as disagree with him.

karine's

The Memory Keeper's Daughter
KIM EDWARDS
Kafka on the shore
H.MURAKAMI
The Kalahari Typing School for Men
A MC CALL SMITH
The Women Warrior
MAXINE HONG KINGSTON
Siddharta
HERMAN HESS
The Curious Incident of...
M HADDON
Tales of a City
A MAUPIN

raheleh's

diane's

lily's

valerie's

announcements by diane II

2008-01-16T04:28:00.000-08:00

Consider the following thought-provoking questions taken from "A Totally Unauthorized Reading Group Guide to Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali" by Janice Harayda:

1. Some of the practices that Hirsi Ali describes, such as female circumcision, have had wide publicity in the U.S. and may have lost some of their shock value. How did Infidel affect your view of them?

2. Did Infidel change your views of any other events that have had extensive media coverage in the U.S., such as tensions in Western Europe between longtime residents and recent immigrants? How did it affect your views?

3. One of the themes of Infidel is the liberating power of books. Hirsi Ali says that at the Muslim Girls’ Secondary School in Nairobi, she read books like 1984, Wuthering Heights and Cry, the Beloved Country. “Later on there were sexy books: Valley of the Dolls, Barbara Cartland, Danielle Steele [sic]. All these books, even the trashy ones, carried with them ideas – races were equal, women were equal to men – and concepts of freedom, struggle, and adventure that were new to me.” [Page 69] Some people might say women aren’t equal in the novels like those of Susann and Steel – that the goal of their female characters is above all to get a man. Is Hirsi Ali is accurately characterizing any of those books or authors that you’ve read?

announcements by diane I

2008-01-16T04:27:00.000-08:00

Still Life with Rice Helie Lee March
Palace Walk Naguib Mahfouz April
Almost French Sarah Turnbull May
All the Pretty Horses Cormac McCarthy June

january 8, 2008

2008-01-07T23:40:00.000-08:00

Atendees at AMaryliss's home
Amarillys, Doree, Nizla, Marika,Kyungmee, Miren.
THE GREAT GATSBY Scott Fitzgerald SCORED 3.15

book selection

2008-01-07T18:11:00.002-08:00

FICTION
March Geraldine Brooks
The Other Boleyn Girl PHILLIPA GREGORY
A Painted House JOHN GRISHAM
A Thousand Splendid Suns KHALED HOSSEINI
The Road CORMAC MCCARTHY
The Alphabet Sisters: A Novel MONICA MCINERNEY
The Faraday Girls: A Novel MONICA MCINERNEY
Family Baggage: A Novel MONICA MCINERNEY
Atonement IAM MCEWAN
On Chesil Beach IAM MCEWAN
The Thirteenth Tale: A NovelDIANE SETTERFIELD
The Shadow of the Wind CARLOS RUIZ ZAFON
The Book Thief MARKUS ZUSAK

NON FICTION
Poetry by Billy Collins
Poetry of Carol Ann Duffy
Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman’s Search for Everything Across Italy, India an Indonesia Elizabeth Gilbert
Letters to Sam: A Grandfather’s Lessons on Love, Loss, and the Gifts of Love Daniel Gottlieb
Death Is Nothing At All Canon Henry Scott Holland
The Know-It-All: One Man’s Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World A.J. Jacobs
Good Poems Garrison Keillor
The Birth Order Book: Why You Are the Way You Are Kevin Leman
Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books Azar Nafisi
The Power of Now: A Guide to Spirtiual Enlightenment Eckhart Tolle

first comes one, then two

2007-12-10T23:07:00.000-08:00

This is the book club of Seoul.
The chef is Diane VanKoughnett.
This term we are reading:

1. THE PIANO TUNER by DANIEL MASON ( September)

2. THE TIPPING POINT by MALCOM GLADWELL (October)

3. DIGGING TO AMERICA by ANNE TYLER (November)

4. POETRY ( EACH ONE WILL BRING A POEM TO SHARE) ( December)

5. THE GREAT GATBY by F. SCOTT FITZGERALD ( January)

6. INFIDEL by AYAAN HIRSI ALI ( February)

7. STILL LIFE WITH RICE by HELIE LEE (March)

8. PALACE WALK by NAGUIB MAHFOUZ (April)

9. ALMOST FRENCH by SARAH TURNBULL ( May)

10. ALL THE PRETTY HORSES by CORMAC MCCARTHY (June)