MobileRead February 2011 Mobile Read Book Club Vote

[pilotbob]

Help up choose a book as the February 2011 eBook for the Mobile Read Book Club. The poll will be open for 5 days. We will start the discussion thread for this book on February 20th. Select from the following books.

[*]Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte [VioletVal, astrangerhere, Nyssa, mayoi]

Spoiler:

Charlotte Bronte’s classic novel Jane Eyre is narrated by the title character, an orphan who survives neglect and abuse to become a governess at the remote Thornfield Hall. She finds a kindred spirit in her employer, the mysterious and brooding Mr. Rochester, but he hides a terrible secret that threatens their chances of happiness. (Summary by Elizabeth Klett)

@ MobileRead - (Illustrated) Mobi/PRC & (Illustrated) LRF by HarryT | German ePub by J.U. | French LRF by Madam Broshkina | Inkmesh search | LibriVox audio

[*] Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë [John F, jenieliser, MsAstoria]

Spoiler:

Emily Brontë’s only novel, published in 1847 under the pseudonym Ellis Bell, tells the tale of the all-encompassing and passionate, yet thwarted, love between Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw, and how this unresolved passion eventually destroys them and many around them.

Now considered a classic of English literature, Wuthering Heights met with mixed reviews by critics when it first appeared, with many horrified by the stark depictions of mental and physical cruelty. Though Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre was originally considered the best of the Brontë sisters’ works, many subsequent critics of Wuthering Heights argued that its originality and achievement made it superior. (Summary by Wikipedia)

@ MobileRead ePub & LRF by HarryT | Inkmesh search | LibriVox audio

[*]Sons and Lovers by D.H. Lawrence [caleb72, Latinandgreek, lila55]

Spoiler:

A quote:"Sons and Lovers was the first modern portrayal of a phenomenon that later, thanks to Freud, became easily recognizable as the Oedipus complex. Never was a son more indentured to his mother's love and full of hatred for his father than Paul Morel, D.H. Lawrence's young protagonist. Never, that is, except perhaps Lawrence himself. In his 1913 novel he grappled with the discordant loves that haunted him all his life--for his spiritual childhood sweetheart, here called Miriam, and for his mother, whom he transformed into Mrs. Morel. It is, by Lawrence's own account, a book aimed at depicting this woman's grasp: "as her sons grow up she selects them as lovers--first the eldest, then the second. These sons are urged into life by their reciprocal love of their mother--urged on and on. But when they come to manhood, they can't love, because their mother is the strongest power in their lives."

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[*]Lady Chatterly's Lover by D.H. Lawrence [caleb72, doreenjoy, montsnmags]

Spoiler:

From one source:

"Lady Chatterley's Lover was banned for a time in both the UK and the US as pornographic. In the UK it was published in unexpurgated form in 1960 after an obscenity trial, where defense witnesses included E.M. Forster, Helen Gardner, and Richard Hoggart.

"Printed privately in Florence in 1928, it was not printed in the United Kingdom until 1960. Lawrence considered calling this book Tenderness at one time and made significant alterations to the original manuscript in order to make it palatable to readers. It has been published in three different versions."

And from the Wik:

"The publication of the book caused a scandal due to its explicit sex scenes, including previously banned four-letter words, and perhaps particularly because the lovers were a working-class male and an aristocratic female..."

This is an important novel, as both literature and social commentary.

@ MobileRead LRF by Dr. Drib - IMP by DaleDe | Inkmesh search

[*]Outlander by Diana Gabaldon [voodoo_pepperweb, inkyness, bjones6416]

Spoiler:

In Outlander , a 600-page time-travel romance, strong-willed and sensual Claire Randall leads a double life with a husband in one century, and a lover in another. Torn between fidelity and desire, she struggles to understand the pure intent of her heart. But don't let the number of pages and the Scottish dialect scare you. It's one of the fastest reads you'll have in your library. While on her … more »second honeymoon in the British Isles, Claire touches a boulder that hurls her back in time to the forbidden Castle Leoch with the MacKenzie clan. Not understanding the forces that brought her there, she becomes ensnared in life-threatening situations with a Scots warrior named James Fraser. But it isn't all spies and drudgery that she must endure. For amid her new surroundings and the terrors she faces, she is lured into love and passion like she's never known before. I was lame and sore in every muscle when I woke next morning. I shuffled to the privy closet, then to the wash basin. My innards felt like churned butter. It felt as though I had been beaten with a blunt object, I reflected, then thought that that was very near the truth. The blunt object in question was visible as I came back to bed, looking now relatively harmless. Its possessor [Jamie] woke as I sat next to him, and examined me with something that looked very much like male smugness." Gabaldon creates characters that you'll remember, laugh with, cry with, and cheer for long after you've finished the book. --Candy Paape Absorbing and heartwarming, this first novel lavishly evokes the land and lore of Scotland, quickening both with realistic characters and a feisty, likable heroine. English nurse Claire Beauchamp Randall and husband Frank take a second honeymoon in the Scottish Highlands in 1945. When Claire walks through a cleft stone in an ancient henge, she's somehow transported to 1743. She encounters Frank's evil ancestor, British captain Jonathan "Black Jack" Randall, and is adopted by another clan. Claire nurses young soldier James Fraser, a gallant, merry redhead, and the two begin a romance, seeing each other through many perilous, swashbuckling adventures involving Black Jack. Scenes of the Highlanders' daily life blend poignant emotions with Scottish wit and humor. Eventually Sassenach (outlander) Claire finds a chance to return to 1945, and must choose between distant memories of Frnak and her happy, uncomplicated existence with Jamie. Claire's resourcefulness and intelligent sensitivity make the love-conquers-all, happily-ever-after ending seem a just reward. Doubleday Book Club main selection, Literary Guild alternate. Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. (from Amazon.com)

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[*] The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro [lila55, John F, inkyness]

Spoiler:

Description: The novel's narrator, Stevens, is a perfect English butler who tries to give his narrow existence form and meaning through the self-effacing, almost mystical practice of his profession. In a career that spans the second World War, Stevens is oblivious of the real life that goes on around him -- oblivious, for instance, of the fact that his aristocrat employer is a Nazi sympathizer. Still, … more »there are even larger matters at stake in this heartbreaking, pitch-perfect novel -- namely, Stevens' own ability to allow some bit of life-affirming love into his tightly repressed existence. Greeted with high praise in England, where it seems certain to be shortlisted for the Booker Prize, Ishiguro's third novel (after An Artist of the Floating World ) is a tour de force-- both a compelling psychological study and a portrait of a vanished social order. Stevens, an elderly butler who has spent 30 years in the service of Lord Darlington, ruminates on the past and inadvertently slackens his rigid grip on his emotions to confront the central issues of his life. Glacially reserved, snobbish and humorless, Stevens has devoted his life to his concept of duty and responsibility, hoping to reach the pinnacle of his profession through totally selfless dedication and a ruthless suppression of sentiment. Having made a virtue of stoic dignity, he is proud of his impassive response to his father's death and his "correct" behavior with the spunky former housekeeper, Miss Kenton. Ishiguro builds Stevens's character with precisely controlled details, creating irony as the butler unwittingly reveals his pathetic self-deception. In the poignant denouement, Stevens belatedly realizes that he has wasted his life in blind service to a foolish man and that he has never discovered "the key to human warmth." While it is not likely to provoke the same shocks of recognition as it did in Britain, this insightful, often humorous and moving novel should significantly enhance Ishiguro's reputation here. Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. (from Amazon.com)

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[*]A Civil Campaign by Lois McMaster Bujold [pdurrant, pholy, doreenjoy]

Spoiler:

from Baen: Lord Miles Vorkosigan, youngest Imperial Auditor to be appointed by the Emperor since the Time of Isolation, has a problem all his new power can't solve: unrequited love for the beautiful Vor widow Ekaterin Vorsoisson. Ekaterin is violently allergic to marriage as a result of her first exposure. But as Miles learned from his late career in galactic covert ops, if a frontal assault won't do, go to subterfuge. He has a cunning plan . . .

Lord Mark Vorkosigan has a problem: his love for the sunny Kareen, daughter of Commodore Koudelka, has just become unrequited again. But if all his new money can't solve their dilemma, perhaps a judicious blending of science and entrepreneurial scheming might. He has a cunning plan . . .

@ Baen

[*]A Room With A View by E. M. Forster [montsnmags, Nyssa, bjones6416]

Spoiler:

This Edwardian social comedy explores love and prim propriety among an eccentric cast of characters assembled in an Italian pensione and in a corner of Surrey, England. A charming young English woman, Lucy Honeychurch, faints into the arms of a fellow Britisher when she witnesses a murder in a Florentine piazza. Attracted to this man, George Emerson--who is entirely unsuitable and whose father just may be a Socialist--Lucy is soon at war with the snobbery of her class and her own conflicting desires.
Back in England she is courted by a more acceptable, if stifling, suitor, and soon realizes she must make a startling decision that will decide the course of her future: she is forced to choose between convention and passion.
The enduring delight of this tale of romantic intrigue is rooted in Forster's colorful characters, including outrageous spinsters, pompous clergymen and outspoken patriots. Written in 1908, A Room With A View is one of E.M. Forster's earliest and most celebrated works.

@MobilRead ePub by weatherwax | Inkmesh search

[*]Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen [CO'Neil, VioletVal, Nyssa]

Spoiler:

A fully illustrated version of Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice". This is the fully proofed first-edition text of the book, with 24 full page illustrations by C.E.Brock added.

Plot summary from Amazon:

Pride and Prejudice has delighted generations of readers with its unforgettable cast of characters, carefully choreographed plot, and a hugely entertaining view of the world and its absurdities. With the arrival of eligible young men in their neighbourhood, the lives of Mr and Mrs Bennet and their five daughters are turned inside out and upside down. Pride encounters prejudice, upward-mobility confronts social disdain, and quick-wittedness challenges sagacity, as misconceptions and hasty judgements lead to heartache and scandal, but eventually to true understanding, self-knowledge, and love. In this supremely satisfying story, Jane Austen balances comedy with seriousness, and witty observation with profound insight. If Elizabeth Bennet returns again and again to her letter from Mr Darcy, readers of the novel are drawn even more irresistibly by its captivating wisdom.

Illustrations are used, with thanks, from http://www.mollands.net and http://www.solitary-elegance.com. Both these web sites are great resources for all fans of Jane Austen!

@ MobileRead (Illustrated) ePub & (Illustrated) LRF & (Illustrated) Mobi/PRC by HarryT


[*]The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway [sun surfer, lila55]

Spoiler:

The Sun Also Rises first appeared in 1926, and yet it's as fresh and clean and fine as it ever was, maybe finer. Hemingway's famously plain declarative sentences linger in the mind like poetry: "Brett was damned good-looking. She wore a slipover jersey sweater and a tweed skirt, and her hair was brushed back like a boy's. She started all that." His cast of thirtysomething dissolute expatriates-… more »-Brett and her drunken fiancé, Mike Campbell, the unhappy Princeton Jewish boxer Robert Cohn, the sardonic novelist Bill Gorton--are as familiar as the "cool crowd" we all once knew. No wonder this quintessential lost-generation novel has inspired several generations of imitators, in style as well as lifestyle. Jake Barnes, Hemingway's narrator with a mysterious war wound that has left him sexually incapable, is the heart and soul of the book. Brett, the beautiful, doomed English woman he adores, provides the glamour of natural chic and sexual unattainability. Alcohol and post-World War I anomie fuel the plot: weary of drinking and dancing in Paris cafés, the expatriate gang decamps for the Spanish town of Pamplona for the "wonderful nightmare" of a week-long fiesta. Brett, with fiancé and ex-lover Cohn in tow, breaks hearts all around until she falls, briefly, for the handsome teenage bullfighter Pedro Romero. "My God! he's a lovely boy," she tells Jake. "And how I would love to see him get into those clothes. He must use a shoe-horn." Whereupon the party disbands. But what's most shocking about the book is its lean, adjective-free style. The Sun Also Rises is Hemingway's masterpiece--one of them, anyway--and no matter how many times you've read it or how you feel about the manners and morals of the characters, you won't be able to resist its spell. This is a classic that really does live up to its reputation. --David Laskin The publisher is using these two perennial favorites to launch its new Scribner Paperback Fiction line. This edition of Paradise marks the 75th anniversary of the smash 1920 first novel that skyrocketed Fitzgerald to literary stardom at the ripe old age of 23. Several years later, The Sun (1926), Hemingway's own first novel, performed an identical service for him at age 26. The line will eventually include additional titles by these giants as well as works by Edith Wharton, Langston Hughes, and other greats. Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. (from Amazon.com)

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[Nyssa]

Quite an interesting collection. I've made my choice and am very interested to see the outcome!

[sun surfer]

It is interesting.

Though I nominated The Sun Also Rises, I am voting for A Room With A View. I'd love to read either one and both are on my long list of books to eventually read.

Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre are both amazing books, two of my favourites actually, but I've already read both of them in the last few years and I've also read Pride & Prejudice which is also very good. If any of those three end up being the choice, I'll be happy since they're all so good, but will refrain from joining the club for another month because I'm not big on re-reading them so soon.

Besides those three though, whichever selection is chosen I will try to read...as my first month being part of this, it will be fun to see what happens!

[montsnmags]

I agree - a very interesting poll. There're only two books on it I probably wouldn't read if they won (no, I'm not saying which ones ), so unless they "win" I guess I'll be participating this month. A very nice selection, people, thanks.

Cheers,
Marc

[wvcherrybomb]

So where does this book club take place? I've seen the voting before but never the discussion.

Does everyone just discuss the book as they're reading it or wait until they're done?

With the exception of two, I would read any on the list. Some don't sound too exciting by description, but I suspect there is more to them.

Outlander - I read a bit more than half before I just couldn't stand it anymore.
Sons and Lovers - Ummm ... not.

[edbro]

Originally Posted by wvcherrybomb

So where does this book club take place?

Coffee shop at the corner of 10th St. and Elm. Just pulling your leg!

Everyone reads the book on their own and an online discussion will start on the 20th of the month.

This is the link to January's Book Club discussion of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=117615

[SensualPoet]

There's little in the list I'd normally opt for ... I have read none of the titles (not even Sons and Lovers which turns up on so many English Lit classes). But I opted for A Room with a View because Forster's writing is so gorgeous, if melancholy.

[caleb72]

I'm completely torn between my three nominations.

I think "Sons and Lovers" might be a better read for me than "Lady Chatterley's Lover". However, I feel that the latter is probably a better match for the theme this month. Perhaps I pushed a bit too hard against the boundaries of the theme for "Sons and Lovers".

Alternatively, it's difficult to pass up the opportunity for a Hemmingway now that the opportunity has arisen. On the other hand, I would need to buy Hemmingway, whereas the others I alread have as Public Domain.

Maybe I'll dwell on it a little longer and make my decision at the last possible moment.

Regards
Caleb

[caleb72]

Actually - just looking at the votes so far, I don't think I would have a problem with "A Room with a View" either.

I was going to use my 3rd nomination for that, but it was already fully nominated.



Regards
Caleb

[issybird]

I nearly memorized a few of these in my adolescence, so I'm picking one that I've read, but not over and over. The only one I haven't read is the Bujold.

[doreenjoy]

The only ones I haven't read are Sons and Lovers and the Bujold. I love D.H. Lawrence so I wouldn't mind reading S&L. I'd happily re-read Lady Chatterly's Lover.

IMO some of the nominated titles don't qualify as romance, but no one asked me.

[JSWolf]

I'm wondering how anyone can vote for the author of one of the worst books ever written. E. M. Forster wrote A Passage to India. It was and is one of the worst books I've ever read. So reading another book by Forster would be akin to having cut one ear off and then going to cut the other off.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I'm wondering how anyone can vote for the author of one of the worst books ever written. E. M. Forster wrote A Passage to India. It was and is one of the worst books I've ever read. So reading another book by Forster would be akin to having cut one ear off and then going to cut the other off.

One of the worst books you've ever read, I'll take your word for it. One of the worst books ever written? There are a whole lot of bad books out there.

[doreenjoy]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I'm wondering how anyone can vote for the author of one of the worst books ever written. E. M. Forster wrote A Passage to India. It was and is one of the worst books I've ever read. So reading another book by Forster would be akin to having cut one ear off and then going to cut the other off.

I still think you need to start your own bookclub.

[Nyssa]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I'm wondering how anyone can vote for the author of one of the worst books ever written. E. M. Forster wrote A Passage to India. It was and is one of the worst books I've ever read. So reading another book by Forster would be akin to having cut one ear off and then going to cut the other off.

You are assuming that those who voted for it (or in my case 2nd a nomination for it) have read A Passage to India. I have not, in fact, I have not read any of Forster's books. I based my nomination on the information I read about the particular book in question, which is A Room With A View .