Read All About It!

Hello!  You might have heard us chattering about The Adventures of Augie March lately. We’ve got Augie on the brain because not only because it’s the selection for Fall 2011′s One Book, One Chicago program, but it’s also the monthly selection for Open Book Club!

Kevin, Open Books’ Store Manager, will be leading the discussion on this dense novel (600 pages) on Tuesday, October 11 at 6 p.m.  Prepare yourself by thinking about how you will answer these thought-provoking discussion questions:

3. Many of the regular people in Augie’s life are referred to in grandiose terms (Machiavellian, Caesar, Helen of Troy). Why does Augie/Bellow choose to refer to these characters in this way. What effect do these comparisons have on you as a reader?

Check out upcoming Open Book Club selections here!

The cover seen most around town.

Fall is upon us–which means it’s time for another round of Chicago Public Library’s One Books, One Chicago program.  This fall marks the literary celebration’s 10th anniversary and 21st book! (For a complete list, go HERE.)  The Open Book Club will be participating by designating its October 11 meeting to the latest selection, Chicagoan Saul Bellow’s 1953 novel The Adventures of Augie March.

The novel follows Depression-era Everyman (and perhaps anti-hero?), Augie March, as he grows up with his brothers and single mother, and meanders his way through a variety of jobs (many of them on the dark edges of society), women, and circumstance. In his 1953 New York Times review, Robert Gorham Davis gives us a starting point on how to relate to his character, as well as his connection to literary history:

“If this resistance to commitment, to identification, this alternation of involvement and detachment keeps Augie from having much substance as a person, it makes him an ideal observer, and a very typical one. From the beginning the anti-romantic, picaresque novel has been the history of such sharp-eyed, alienated individuals, without status, adrift in the great cities of post-Renaissance Europe. They had to survive by their wits, they saw life from beneath, and were quickly stripped of illusions.”

 

A dense tome at 600 pages, filled with his various encounters and begging us to ask, “Where is this all going…?” it could be considered an “unconventional choice for a community reading program” as admitted by the One Book, One Chicago blog.  But, they counterpoint, “it is in fact an ideal selection for a program aiming to bring people together around a book. You cannot read this book on your own. It begs for discussion.”

This pulp-y cover looks more fun!

We would love for you to make us a part of your Augie March community! The Book Club meets the second Tuesday of each month at 6 pm in a no-stress environment for casual conversation and Book Store staff lead discussion.  The events are Free and All are welcome. No monthly commitment required. For more info and a run down of the titles in the Club’s queue, click HERE.

September Open Book Club

This month we’re reading Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford’s Forgotten Jungle City by Greg Grandin.

In the late 1920s Henry Ford attempted to break the world’s European-run rubber monopoly by establishing an American-as-apple-pie foothold in the Brazilian rainforest where the Ford company could cultivate a rubber plantation. Though ambitious and well-funded, the project was ultimately a failure.

Join us as we discuss Ford’s attempt to export American culture and lifestyle to the Amazon river basin, how the company handled its disgruntled workers, what happened when they discovered that the land was infertile, and how Ford Motor Company eventually abandoned Fordlandia.

Tuesday, September 13

6 p.m.

FREE

Here is a list of questions we’ll use to prompt our discussion:

1.  What motivated Henry Ford to buy land in Brazil?  Did his intentions change over the years?  If so, how?

2.  How would things have been different if Ford hadn’t spurned “experts” and employed the likes of botanists, naturists, and soil experts instead of relying on this engineers to develop the rubber tree fields?

3.  Do you think Fordlandia would have been different if Ford hadn’t attempted to create a utopic mini-America and instill American values and lifestyle on the locals?

4. Akin to the Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, this story portrays the jungle as a savage world that is impenetrable and immune to modernity.  Do you think this experiement would have failed regardless of there Fordlandia was established?  Was failure inevitable?

5.  Do you think Fordlandia failed more as a commercial enterprise or as a civilizing mission?

Images from Fordlandia

In August, Open Book Club will be discussing Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, a zany tale of the blundering of the Armageddon.  Featuring an angel, a demon, an 11-year-old Antichrist, and a doomsaying witch, Good Omens is a fun-to-read book filled with unmistakably British humor.

To get our conversation started, Lizzy, our fabulous Bookstore Coordinator put together a few questions:

1.) How do you view the treatment of traditional Christianity in this book, particularly in regards to the characters Aziraphale, Crowley, and Adam? What, in your opinion, is the relationship of free will and “God’s ineffable plan” in the events of the book?

2.) What are your thoughts on the recurring theme that no angel or demon could even think up the horrible things humans do to each other or the wonderful things they do to help each other? How do you see the role of humanity in the book vs. the role of the supernatural?

3.) Do you find a message in this book? If so, what? Do you think its satire works as intended?

4.) In your opinion, would this novel work better if viewed as a “political” novel (as books with religious themes tend to be viewed, currently), or if viewed as a humorous novel that happens to satirize religion? In what ways does the humor add and detract from its message?

5.) How do you view the roles of Agnes Nutter and Anathema? Do their prophecies fit in to the satire or are they merely there as a deus ex machina? What about the roles of other secondary characters? (Newt, Shadwell, Madame Tracy, The Chattering Order of St. Beryl, etc.)

6.) Are you familiar with Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s other work? Do you think that as co-writers they were able to fit the novel together seamlessly, or did you notice the different writing styles?

7.) Did you know the Witch-finder General was a real thing in England????

Join Open Book Club for the Good Omens discussion on Tuesday, August 9 at 6 pm in the Open Books store.  For more information on the Open Book Club and for a complete list of books we’ve selected, click here!

Have you been looking for a place to share musings on your latest novel? Are you interested in meeting more people in Chicago’s literary community? Are you curious to hear others opine on their recent reads? Fabulous — welcome to the Open Book Club!

Open Book Club will meet on second Tuesdays of the month beginning in July 2011.  Join us for our first meeting on Tuesday, July 12 at 6 p.m. where we’ll discuss The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot.  (For a full schedule of books we’ve selected for 2011-2012, please click here.)

“Doctors took her cells without asking. Those cells never died. They launched a medical revolution and a multi-million dollar industry. More than twenty years later, her children found out.  Their lives would never be the same.”

Here are a few questions on The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks that we’ll explore at our meeting:

– How big of a role does race truly play in this story?  Does the Lacks family believe they would have been informed and received compensation if Henrietta had been white?  Does Skloot?