<p>Weve read classics, romances, mysteries, dramas and light-hearted fare, but our December selection is taking us into unknown territorya thriller. Please join us for our next book, Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson. </p>
<p>I could quote a number of reviews, but I think the most convincing comment is from SouthJerseyChessMom, who posted that her avid book-reading friend told her that if the house was on fire, she wouldnt leave it without Before I Go to Sleep. That sounds like a book worth reading! </p>
<p>This mesmerizing, skillfully written debut novel works on multiple levels. It is both an affecting portrait of the profound impact of a debilitating illness and a pulse-pounding thriller whose outcome no one could predict. - (Booklist [starred review])</p>
<p>I think this is a novel where the less said, the better (until discussion begins, of course). Please join us on December 1st, and until then, no spoilers allowed! :)</p>
<p>The Gold, New Blood, and Steel Dagger Awards were presented by The Crime Writers’ Association on October 7, 2011, in London. this book won the John Creasey New Blood Dagger award.</p>
<p>If I don’t participate in December, would somebody please smack me?</p>
<p>I read this book a couple of months ago and I loved it. I couldn’t wait until my MIL finished hers so we could talk. And yes, the less said the better.</p>
<p>Mary13, correct me if I’m wrong, but I think this is a CC book discussion first!
Worknprogress2 is willing to be “smacked” should she forget to participate.</p>
<p>I think Worknprogress2’s testimony is up there with my friend’s about grabbing the book if the house was on fire. </p>
<p>I’m feeling better about this selection- award winning, too!</p>
<p>I have started the book, and I like it so much that I was moved to look up reviews in the British press, since I couldn’t find the raves that I think the book deserves from reviewers on this side of the pond. (The book was first published in the UK.)</p>
<p>Here are two excerpts from a lovely review in The Guardian:</p>
<p>“A first novel by an NHS audiologist who wrote it in between shifts at London’s St Thomas’s Hospital, it’s exceptionally accomplished – like David Nicholls’s One Day, a brilliant example of how an unpromisingly high-concept idea can be transformed by skilful execution.”</p>
<p>"The structure is so dazzling it almost distracts you from the quality of the writing. No question, this is a very literary thriller. It reifies books as memory boxes, dispatches from the dead. It also has – and expects its readers to share – a delicate appreciation of the links between fabulation (that is, the writing of stories that violate readerly expectations) and confabulation (the creation of false memories and experiences by a damaged brain).</p>
<p>The most unnerving aspect of Before I Go to Sleep is the way it is rooted in the domestic, the suburban, the trivial. Forget whizz-bang futurism: it proceeds from ordinary life in tiny, terrifying steps, and is all the better for it. The Escher staircase has an oatmeal carpet."</p>
<p>NJCM, Thanks for that link. I posted it to my bookclub, which now numbers more than 100 people. Of course, not everyone comes each month, but many take the suggestions. I’m honest about saying I get my ideas from my on’line group.</p>
<p>And yes, I was tired the next day. I began to guess the ending 2/3 thru, and had to finish. Paris Wife is current reading.</p>
<p>^^Bookworm you have a book club with more than 100 people ? How does that work ?
NJTheaterMom- I’m taking everyone’s advice and not reading links until I’ve finished the book. Apparently, this is a book when knowing less is best.</p>
<p>SJCM, I have not, so far, read anything online or in any review that has given away the secret of the book. Possibly some of the Amazon reader reviews do (?), but I didn’t come across those particular ones when I glanced at them.</p>
<p>I’m now on p. 277 (out of 358), and while I think I know part of the solution to the mystery, I’m not sure. There are several mysterious threads in the story, and I am still in the dark about some of them.</p>
<p>The thing is pretty un-put-downable. I consider myself a slow reader, and I will have finished it in about three days. I plan to skim it again prior to our discussion.</p>
<p>Hope everybody else enjoys “Before I Go to Sleep” as much as I have been enjoying it. </p>
<p>I posted the above review to encourage new members/lurkers to give the book a try. I know I myself rely very heavily on reviews in respected periodicals to decide whether I want to read any given book.</p>
<p>I had Alan Hollinghurst’s “The Stranger’s Child” on my list of books to read, but I took it off recently, based on a review in the 10/17 issue of the New Yorker!</p>
<p>^ NJTheaterMom- I love this
“The thing is pretty un-put-downable.”
If that doesn’t encourage you, lurkers, out there to read this one what would?
Oh, those great reviews/ links NJTM posted!!!</p>
<p>Glad to know you like it so much. I’m reading Emma (Jane Austen) for the first time for a “food as thematic theme in literature class I’m taking”. It’s so much more readable than the first book we discussed last week- ** “A Debt To Pleasure”** by John Lanchester, an award winning book I would not recommend to anyone.
Emma is so refreshing after that one- thank goodness! </p>
<p>All these posts are making me very excited to read ** Before I Go To Sleep**</p>
<p>Well, now I have one of those bookworm conundrums. I just downloaded the book and I’m dying to read it right now. OTOH, last time, I carefully timed it so that I finished reading the day before the discussion began, and that really helped me to keep up. What to do, what to do… :rolleyes:</p>
<p>SJCM – Emma is my favorite Jane Austen. Enjoy!</p>
<p>SJCM, Emma is one of my favorite Jane Austen’s. I like the movie version with Gweneth Paltrow (sp?), but not the British version (that Emma looks 35 at least).</p>
<p>I’ve posted this before, but my book club is at the public library. I went looking for a bookclub at our library, and they were about to eliminate funding for the librarians to lead the group. The new library was about to open near me. I was scared to take on this responsibility at first, but by now its fun. My group meets in the evening, and the other group during the day. We have a beautiful space. People often come early to chat, but the bookclub stays focussed. Because the selections are listed in newspaper, certain books bring in people with specific interests. We’ve invited guests, local authors, and have had authors talk to us thru phone/internet.</p>