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Mon 3 Feb, 2003 11:19 pm
Order! Order! The first monthly A2K book group is now in session!
I have participated in a few book groups, and as a former English major who liked being an English major waaaaaaaaaay too much, I found that my carefully crafted questions usually were utterly ignored at the beginning of the discussion. People want to say what they think of the book, first. If I asked, "What was the significance of the color yellow?", they'd say, "Well, I think the way the author used yellow was really indicative of his general inability to understand women. I mean, the female characters were totally one-dimensional..." etc.
So -- I have lots of questions lined up, but to start, feel free to just give your initial responses to the book.
Mine, in a nutshell -- I saw a quote from Salman Rushdie somewhere that his life is "like a bad Rushdie novel." This is that novel.
I love Rushdie, I was disappointed with the book. He goes into the creative process at some length, and I think it was a genuine insight into how he usually writes books -- going back and carefully filling in backstory, closing the loops, adding layers of meaning. This book seemed to lack that polish, and be an earlier draft of a more promising book. The first chapter, which I read in the New Yorker and got me all excited about the book, does have that polish, and I think he spent a great deal of time on it. I wish he'd spent as much time on the rest.
That said, there are all kinds of themes -- 9/11, America, race, Gallileo/ Rushdie, etc., etc. -- that I really look forward to discussing in greater detail.
So -- what'd you think?
Oh god! Confession time! I am still reading - I keep getting side-tracked into other books, which is a sign that I am not riveted - however, when I get back to it I do enjoy it - it is full of so much STUFF and I like that in a book - I like moving from one little insight/observation to another - one bit of speculation/theory - like Bellow, I guess - must be the digressor in me.
Oh - I love the dolls!
(PS Soze - have you given the url of this thread in the other thread set up for this discussion? It was set up a while ago- then there is the "meanwhile" thread you set up....)
(So, who HAS read the book...? If you have not finished the book but have formed an opinion, that is cool, too.)
dlowan, yes, I love Rushdie's digressions and free-associations and allusions. I felt like that was part of the problem with this book, though -- in an Indian novel, he has an endless stream of allusions, but he seemed rather straitjacketed by the American idiom, and trying to keep within it.
Goodness - where are all our Furies? I am now in part 2 - off to bed to keep reading - I am enjoying his discourses on "the matter of the USA", and celebrity - a phenomenon I am at a loss to understand, while I feel its force - and I enjoyed his riff on the "post-modern/post-feminist" golden girl. The dolls are getting ever more intereesting.
Soze - if nobody else has posted soon it may be you and me - so DO post your discussion thoughts!!!
Well, I haven't quite finished it, so I've been madly falling asleep each night with it in my arms. Let's see, I'm to the point where he realizes not only is the girl Little Brain, but he is her papi. I fear that, as in so many otherwise good books, the author is going to resort to father-daughter incest. Geez. I hate it when an author can't figure out another way to pique our interests. The dolls as masks is v. interesting.
Meanwhile, I think the Furies theme is amazing and works much better than one would think, especially considering the historical day on which this was published, which was 9/11/01, right?
I have not decided who is killing the girls, but I have long suspected either Ms. Little Brain or her gang, they would surely have known the girls, right? And she is one of the Furies, at least that's what I'm thinking. Need to finish. Bye.
--Oh. I wonder, was there so little anger in Jay Gatsby that he was the opposite of these Furies? Should we be comparing these two books?
Urgh, I want to talk about plot points -- who killed the girls, Mila/ papi -- but don't want to give things away.
Anyone done yet? <big moist beseeching eyes>
I am so sorry...
not quite done and I'm leaving tomorrow so I won't be able to discuss it 'til Sunday. (Hopefully by then I'll have it finished.) I am trying! [size=7]but I fall asleep.[/size]
Goddess, Soze! I am SOOOOOO bad! I am in part three - and becoming more fascinated - despite the faults - I am reading soooo slowly at present - can't believe it - I seem to have one of those long, slow viruses, so my brain is dead by the end of the working day, and I am tending to fall asleep - but I will be there very soon, I promise!!!!
Yay!
I think I'm going to invite Gautam, too, since I know he read-it-but-didn't-like-it.
A side note -- we were initially talking about making the book club be a new book every month, and here we a week past "discussion date" for Fury... D'you think we should start talking about next month's book on the general thread, and/or whether we are going to have it every month at all (as opposed to every other month, say.) I love the idea and would be very sad if a disappointing first book scuttles the whole thing.
Hey guyz !! Thanks soz for inviting me here. Am afraid I have little to add to this discussion. I read Fury quite sometime ago when it came out in Hardback - what was it 2001 or so ? And a lot of water has flown under the bridge since then (read that as I have very bad short term memory and I have read far too many books since then, so I cant remember a damn think abt Fury except Prof Solanka and his little brain dolls and how he comes to NY and critizises almost every aspect of the city.....
I say let's start a discussion about the next book.
I also hope this will work - but I am not so sanguine after this beginning.... want me to do it, or would you like to?
Well, I'm really sorry, but my 19 year old daughter had a party while we were gone and she's put away my copy of Fury. Not only is that a disaster because I can't find it to finish reading, but also it is a library book! I've been busily searching all the likely "stuff" spots as well as all the bookcases. I have no idea where the book is, and neither does she. It will turn up, I hope, but it sure wasn't on the table where I left it when I came home from my weekend trip. Sigh.
Sigh.
No hurry, though -- at this point, I'm expecting that this thread will pick up in a few weeks or a month (or two) when various "Fury" finishers straggle in. (nimh mentioned that he was reading it too, for example.) And that's cool.
dlowan, sure, I'll go write something on the general thread.
Piffka, good luck finding the book!
I finished it!! I finished it!!! Pop up your discussion starters Soze!!!
Oh frabjous day, kallooh, kallay!!!
She chortled in her joy!!!
OK, Jack Rhinehart. Bothered me. Discuss.
Or -- meaning of names.
Or -- Rushdie as Gallileo.
Or -- what did you THINK? Your general impression of the book?
(jjorge slinks in guiltily...looks around...mutters to self:)
'You've had the da*n book for a month! When are you going to open it?
(Answers first self:)
'I'll start reading it tonight...I promise!'
(First self:)
'Yeh, I've heard that before...are you going to finish it before they turn out the lights here and all the others are checked out and moved away?'
(jjorge)
'Honest injun! I'll start tonight'
(sneaks back out)
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