Saturday, February 18, 2012

Next meeting: April 6!

Huge thanks to Kelley for getting the NPBC ball rolling again and letting us meet at her house yesterday to finally discuss Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. Basically, we all loved it.

(And a huge thanks to Kelley for making food!)

Our next book will be: A Year on Ladybug Farm by Donna Ball.

We will discuss it on Friday, April 6. Meeting place TBD (but probably Kelley's house again). If we do decide to meet at her house again, I'm suggesting a potluck or takeout or something so Kelley can relax.

Sorry I was MIA for a while. Having puppies in our house and Christmas knocked me off track. Looking forward to the book and our next meeting!

Happy reading!
~Kerrie

Friday, September 16, 2011

September Meeting!

Hello! I can't believe it's mid-September already! Did we have summer?

Let's plan our next meeting to discuss On the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. Click on the Google Spreadsheet HERE. Please put a check next to the days that will work for you. I included Thursday evenings this time since a few of you liked having that as an option last time.

Also, I really enjoyed meeting at Panera last time, as I think most everyone else did. It was quiet enough to talk, but not too quiet that WE had to be quiet, it was inexpensive and the food was ready quickly. So, let's meet at Panera again at the Landing in Renton this time.

Get directions HERE

Okay, let's pick a date! See you soon!
~Kerrie

PS: Take a look at the suggested titles on the right side of the page. I think a few people were interested in The Art of Racing in the Rain. Any other books to add to this list? Let's get some more on there and I will reinstate the voting option next week. Thanks!

Monday, June 20, 2011

Next Meeting

Hi everyone! There were quite a few of us at the movie last week. And, I think, most of us agreed the film was pretty good. Since there were a lot of us there, we went ahead and chose the next book (recommended as a light, good read by a new member who has read it), and decided to meet toward the end of September. That way, we can just get started reading it since most of us have busy summers.

The book: Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford.

From the author's Web site:

In the opening pages of Jamie Ford’s stunning debut novel, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, Henry Lee comes upon a crowd gathered outside the Panama Hotel, once the gateway to Seattle’s Japantown. It has been boarded up for decades, but now the new owner has made an incredible discovery: the belongings of Japanese families, left when they were rounded up and sent to internment camps during World War II. As Henry looks on, the owner opens a Japanese parasol.

This simple act takes old Henry Lee back to the 1940s, at the height of the war, when young Henry’s world is a jumble of confusion and excitement, and to his father, who is obsessed with the war in China and having Henry grow up American. While “scholarshipping” at the exclusive Rainier Elementary, where the white kids ignore him, Henry meets Keiko Okabe, a young Japanese American student. Amid the chaos of blackouts, curfews, and FBI raids, Henry and Keiko forge a bond of friendship–and innocent love–that transcends the long-standing prejudices of their Old World ancestors. And after Keiko and her family are swept up in the evacuations to the internment camps, she and Henry are left only with the hope that the war will end, and that their promise to each other will be kept.

Forty years later, Henry Lee is certain that the parasol belonged to Keiko. In the hotel’s dark dusty basement he begins looking for signs of the Okabe family’s belongings and for a long-lost object whose value he cannot begin to measure. Now a widower, Henry is still trying to find his voice–words that might explain the actions of his father; words that might bridge the gap between him and his modern, Chinese American son; words that might help him confront the choices he made many years ago.

Set during one of the most conflicted and volatile times in American history, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet is an extraordinary story of commitment and enduring hope. In Henry and Keiko, Jamie Ford has created an unforgettable duo whose story teaches us of the power of forgiveness and the human heart.

Saturday, May 21, 2011

Please Sign Up for NPBC Meeting and Movie


Trying to coordinate a time for book club and a movie is tough! Below is a link to a spreadsheet with a few dates listed on it. Please go to the spreadsheet, type your name in the name column and then put an X under the dates you are available to meet. Hopefully, this will help a little. Thanks!

Click here for Google spreadsheet

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Postponed Till May

I think there is like one person who can attend the NPBC meeting on April 29th and one person does not a club make (unless it's a club about being alone, I suppose). Let's postpone till mid-May. More info to come!

Friday, April 15, 2011

Oops!

So the 22nd is Good Friday. It's the start of Easter weekend. A holiday.

Let's reschedule for the 29th. More details to come.

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

The Plan for April

Just checking in to share the plan for April's book, Water for Elephants. The film comes out on April 22.

The plan is to meet on April 22 for dinner, then see the film afterward. But I won't know till we get closer to the date what the times for the showings will be or, of course, what theaters it will be playing at.

So stay tuned!

~Happy reading!
Kerrie