Reading books has always been my favorite pasttime. I like reading all kinds of books and can't wait to read Best Sellers (which aren't always my favorites). When I was growing up in the 40s, during WWII, books were not always available. I remember receiving "At the Back of the North Wind" when I was in the 5th or 6th grade. I had wanted one of the Bobsey Twins books or a Nancy Drew mystery. Mother ordered it from Sears Roebuck and they substituted the North Wind book. I read it but it was not my favorite. She felt bad that I did not get the books I wanted that Christmas.
When I was in the 6th grade, our little country school started a library. It was housed in my classroom and I was in charge of it. I checked out books for people to read. I got to read the new books first! My favorite was "Doctor Doolittle" and I wrote a play from that story and our class presented it. I read every book in the library that year.
In the early 50's, The bookmobile stopped in our community. This was great in the summer when we wanted books to read. We didn't have TV to occupy our time back then. Nobody had TV. Had not even heard about TV!
So it's fitting that I belong to a book club. We meet once a month and review the book we selected for that month. We meet at a local coffeehouse where we can purchase a cup of latte or delicious coffee to drink while we discuss the book of the month. It's a come if you can sort of club. We don't count anybody absent. Many of our group travel and can't always be there. Last month one member was on a cruise in Europe and another in Ireland. They usually attend if they are at home.
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Our book selection for Nov. was "Hotel at the corner of Bitter and Sweet" - and a good book it was. While it was fiction, it was based on real facts. It portrayed the situation during WWII when the Japanese were interned in camps in the northwest. I learned so much from reading this book. One of my favorites this year was a book published several years ago, "The Power of One". And most recently, "Sarah's Key".
I am usually reading more than one book at the time. I keep one by my bed and sometimes read if I go to bed early (do this a lot in the winter). I have a Kindle and love to read when we're on trips. It has a little night light that really magnifies the print when needed. I usually order used books from Amazon for about 1/3 the price of regular books, and order paperbacks. We don't have room to put any more books on our shelves so I read them and pass them on to others to read. We all do that in our book club. Plus we give the librarian our book list when we make a new one (about twice a year) and she makes sure at least one copy of our selected books is in the library.
We read "Water for Elephants" last spring and when the movie was released, our book club members car-pooled to a nearby theater (don't have one here in Elba) for a matinée showing of the movie. It was so much fun watching the characters come to life. Some were not at all as we had imagined but the movie followed the story, until the ending and they changed that!
