Bibliofemme Bookclub An Irish Bookclub

January 10, 2012

The Last King of Scotland by Giles Foden

Filed under: Bookclub Books,Historical Fiction — The Historian @ 3:07 pm
lastking
Title: The Last King of Scotland Author: Giles Foden Genre: Historical Fiction Publisher: Vintage Books Release Date: 1999 Pages: 335
Meeting: 5th July 2007

As a child I devoured every book within reach, many of which, I probably shouldn’t have been reading! One of those books, which I read when I was about 10, was about the terrible reign of Ugandan President Idi Amin, complete with photos of his victims. It was a book that haunted me for a long time and, since then, I’ve had an interest

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The Icarus Girl by Helen Oyeyemi

Filed under: Bookclub Books,General Fiction — The Connoisseur @ 3:07 pm
icarusgirl
Title: The Icarus Girl Author: Helen Oyeyemi Genre: Fiction Publisher: Anchor Release Date: 2006 Pages: 337

Jessamy "Jess" Harrison, a racially-mixed child, is growing up feeling that she is caught between two different worlds, until she is sent to visit relatives in Nigeria, where she comes face to face with a mysterious new friend.

Meeting: 6th May 2006

 Without much time to look for this month’s bookclub book, I was relying on the Irish Times Saturday

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The Fountain Overflows by Rebecca West

Filed under: Bookclub Books,General Fiction — The Connoisseur @ 3:07 pm
fountainoverflows
Title: The Fountain Overflows Author: Rebecca West Genre: Fiction Publisher: New York Review of Books Release Date: 1956 Pages: 408

The author re-imagines her own childhood in this witty, often troubling autobiographical novel that follows the lives of members of the Aubrey family from the perspective of Rose, one of four siblings. Original.

Meeting: 13th October 2007

After a lot of research including scouring the recommendations in the Sunday papers and reviewing the ‘top’ lists in the Guardian

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Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells

Filed under: Bookclub Books,General Fiction — Femmes @ 3:07 pm
yay
Title: Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Author: Rebecca Wells Genre: Fiction Publisher: Harper Perennial Release Date: 2004-12-07 Pages: 400 Meeting: Friday 19th July 2002

When Siddalee Walker, eldest daughter of Vivi Abbott Walker (Ya-Ya extraordinaire – part Scarlett, part Katharine Hepburn, part Tallulah) is interviewed about a hit play she has directed, her mother is described as a ‘tap-dancing child abuser’. Enraged, Vivi disowns Sidda – devastating her daughter who postpones her wedding

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The Weight of Water by Anita Shreve

Filed under: Bookclub Books,General Fiction — Femmes @ 3:07 pm
weightofwater
Title: The Weight of Water Author: Anita Shreve Genre: Fiction Publisher: Back Bay Books Release Date: 2004 Pages: 288 Meeting: Friday 1st November 2002

The Weight of Water is beautifully written but leaves many frustrating questions unanswered. A contemporary story about two couples and a child in a sailboat off the coast of New Hampshire is intertwined with the tale of a 19th century double murder which took place on a nearby island.

Told from two perspectives – a photographer investigating

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The Vagina Monologues – Eve Ensler

Filed under: Bookclub Books,Biography — The Techie @ 3:07 pm
vaginamonologues
Title: The Vagina Monologues Author: Eve Ensler Genre: Biography Publisher: Villard Books Release Date: 2007 Pages: 222 Meeting: Thursday 7th August 2003

I chose this book because I had heard so much about the play from various different friends, I was disappointed that I missed it and thought; well I’ll buy the book. The feedback I’d got in relation to the play included, “it made me laugh, and it made my cry”. I also thought that Ensler had done something incredibly brave

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Tatty by Christine Dwyer Hickey

Filed under: Bookclub Books,Irish — The Techie @ 3:07 pm
tatty
Title: Tatty Author: Christine Dwyer Hickey Genre: Fiction, Irish Publisher: Vintage Books Release Date: 2006 Pages: 205 Meeting: Friday 26th March 2004

When I read the press release for Tatty I was intrigued. I had heard of Dwyer-Hickey before but had never read anything by her, so the following lines written by Colum McCann really grabbed me:

‘A bare, lyrical story of a Dublin childhood that will rank among the very best of Irish books this year. It’s not easy to make writing seem this simple. Like all good stories, it never judges itself, and so it remains open, charming, dignified, even when the subject matter drifts towards the harrowing. A really fine book, evocative of a not-so-distant past.’

Of course the fact that she’s Irish and female was just an added bonus.

This is a very hard review to write as it is difficult to put in words exactly

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The Shadow of the Sun: My African Life by Ryszard Kapuscinski

Filed under: Bookclub Books,General Fiction — The Techie @ 3:07 pm
shadowofsun
Title: The Shadow of the Sun Author: Ryszard Kapuscinski, Klara Glowczewska, Genre: Biography & Autobiography Publisher: Penguin UK Release Date: 2002-03-28 Pages: 336 Meeting: Friday 19th November 2004

I chose this book for two particular reasons. I liked the idea of reading a Polish author (the majority of our authors being, Irish, English or American) and the book itself was recommended to me.

The Shadow of the Sun is a hard book to categorise. It’s not quite a biography and it isn’t really a travel book, so the only way I can describe

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For Whom The Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway

Filed under: Bookclub Books,Classics — Femmes @ 3:07 pm
belltolls
Title: For Whom the Bell Tolls Author: Ernest Hemingway Genre: Classics Publisher: Scribner Release Date: 1995-07-01 Pages: 480 Meeting: 20th March 2006

Hemmingway left a stunning impression on me as a child with his simple and breathtaking novel The Old Man and the Sea. In fact, coming a sharp second to The Red Pony by Steinbeck, I fondly remember The Old Man and the Sea as the next novel to turn my head forever towards a life and love of reading. Revisiting Steinbeck years later turned out to be

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Fillums by Hugh Leonard

Filed under: Bookclub Books,Irish — The DJ @ 3:07 pm
fillums
Title: Fillums Author: Hugh Leonard Genre: General Fiction, Irish Publisher: Methuen Pub Limited Release Date: 2005 Pages: 240  Meeting: Wednesday 23rd June 2004

His newspaper columns and literary output hint that Hugh Leonard, real and imaginary, is an avuncular raconteur. His stories of people and places, of secrets and rites of passage happen in small Irish towns or anonymous Dublin suburbs. ‘Fillums’ begins, handily enough, with a trailer. In it, an aging playwright worried about his literary

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