October 2006

Special Offers and Offerings

It's been a very busy month as last month we hosted festivities to celebrate the 10th anniversary of The Book Report Network with a party at Ruby Foo's in New York City. You can see pictures from this very special evening here. 
 
I also spent a lovely evening last week chatting with Arianna Huffington, whose new book, On Becoming Fearless, struck a real chord with me. As we were talking I realized that this would be a perfect book for groups to discuss, so we wrote a guide and got it posted on the site. For the record, the book is not about politics, but rather on how to empower yourself by overcoming fear, which can be debilitating and toxic. The more we talked, the more we thought how much groups would enjoy the opportunity to talk to Arianna about being fearless. Her schedule is going to allow for her to do chats with ten groups, so if you are interested be sure your group is registered with us by October 13th. (If you already registered, there is no need to register again.) Besides this offer, we have FIVE other great offers for registered groups to win this month --- chats and book giveaways among them. See more details below.
 
Our book club interview this month is with Madeline Lennon of "Reading Between the Wines - The Oxford Edition" from Oxford, CT. If you would like your group to be interviewed, please click here. If you are a librarian who would like to be interviewed, please click here. If you are a bookseller who would like to be interviewed, please click here.
 
I am looking forward to the movie adaptation of Little Children by Tom Perrotta, which opens in New York and L.A. this weekend and "goes wide" (love that term) on the 20th. Here's the scoop -- the movie has a different ending. So read, then watch (maybe with your group) and then let us know which you liked better!
 
This month's guides have me making notes for my reading list. There's a terrific range to our new selections, which are sure to keep your pen and paper handy as you read on.

Last month we heard about a new writing contest, The Sobol Award. It's open to unpublished and unagented fiction writers, and, ultimately, cash prizes of $100,000, $25,000, and $10,000, as well as literary representation will be awarded to the winners. Entries will be accepted through December 31, 2006. See more information later in this newsletter or go to www.sobolaward.com.

This month our Newsletter Contest Prize is 20 copies of For One More Day by Mitch Albom. The winner will be randomly chosen from the list of newsletter subscribers in the month the contest runs. If you're already a subscriber, you're already entered to win!
 
I am looking forward to a three-day weekend this weekend. Hail Columbus! Hail a holiday that does not involve a special meal! Have a great month. Happy reading with your group, and for the kid in all of us, Happy Halloweeen.

Carol Fitzgerald ([email protected])
 

FOR ONE MORE DAY by Mitch Albom

"Every family is a ghost story..."

Mitch Albom mesmerized readers around the world with his number one New York Times bestsellers, The Five People You Meet in Heaven and Tuesdays with Morrie. Now he returns with a beautiful, haunting novel about the family we love and the chances we miss.

For One More Day is the story of a mother and a son, and a relationship that covers a lifetime and beyond. It explores the question: What would you do if you could spend one more day with a lost loved one?

Click here to read our guide for For One More Day.

SPECIAL TOPICS IN CALAMITY PHYSICS by Marisha Pessl

Click here to read our guide for Special Topics in Calamity Physics.

WHEN MADELINE WAS YOUNG by Jane Hamilton

Jane Hamilton, award-winning author of The Book of Ruth and A Map of the World, is back in top form with a richly textured novel about a tragic accident and its effects on two generations of a family.

When Aaron Maciver's beautiful young wife, Madeline, suffers brain damage in a bike accident, she is left with the intellectual powers of a six-year-old. In the years that follow, Aaron and his second wife care for Madeline with deep tenderness and devotion as they raise two children of their own.

-Click here to enter a contest to win a phone-in to your book group from Jane Hamilton.

Click here to read the guide for When Madeline Was Young.

THE USES OF ENCHANTMENT by Heidi Julavits

The Uses of Enchantment weaves a spell in which the reader sees how the extraordinary power of a young woman's sexuality, and the desire to wield it, have a devastating effect on all involved. The riveting cat-and-mouse power games between doctor and patient, and between abductor and abductee, are gradually, dreamily revealed, along with the truth about what actually happened in 1985.

Heidi Julavits is in full command of her considerable gifts and has crafted a dazzling narrative sure to garner her further acclaim as one of the best novelists working today.

LOVE AND LOUIS XIV by Antonia Fraser

The self-proclaimed Sun King, Louis XIV ruled over the most glorious and extravagant court in seventeenth-century Europe. Now, Antonia Fraser goes behind the well-known tales of Louis's accomplishments and follies, exploring in riveting detail his intimate relationships with women.

With consummate skill, Antonia Fraser weaves insights into the nature of women's religious lives --- as well as such practical matters as contraception --- into her magnificent, sweeping portrait of the king, his court, and his ladies.

Click here to read our guide for Love and Louis XIV.

KABBALAH: A Love Story by Lawrence Kushner

Hidden within the binding of an ancient text that has been passed down through the ages lies the answer to one of the heart's eternal questions. When the text falls into the hands of Rabbi Kalman Stern, he has no idea that his lonely life of intellectual pursuits is about to change once he opens the book. Soon afterward, he meets astronomer Isabel Benveniste, a woman of science who stirs his soul as no woman has for many years. But Kalman has much to learn before he can unlock his heart and let true love into his life. The key lies in the mysterious document he finds inside the Zohar, the master text of the Kabbalah.

Click here to read our guide for Kabbalah: A Love Story.

THE SENSE OF PAPER by Taylor Holden

Charlotte "Charlie" Hudson was once a star journalist covering war-torn countries and witnessing things that should never be seen. Now Charlie is trying to escape the ghosts that haunt her and her failed marriage by writing a book on the history of paper --- a subject that has always fascinated her --- and famed artist J.M.W. Turner. Her research introduces her to Sir Alan Matheson, a brilliant artist and acclaimed Turner scholar who has ghosts and secrets of his own. Charlie quickly falls under Alan's seductive spell. Aroused by his sensuality and drawn inexorably into the vortex of his troubled past, she will come face-to-face with a shocking betraya --- and ever nearer to a danger she doesn't even suspect exists.

Click here to read our guide for The Sense of Paper.

VERTIGO by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

The picture of Victorian domestic perfection, Emma Smith is an ideal daughter, wife, and mother. However, gliding down marble halls to dinner parties eventually proves empty for Emma and one New Year's Eve, in pursuit of becoming a "better" person, Emma resolves to have an affect on society. At her novelist husband's suggestion she begins to write to Chance Woods, a man incarcerated at the local prison for the murder of his wife.

What begins as an innocent correspondence takes a startling and darkly erotic turn as Chance becomes an obsession for Emma; an obsession which will have momentous repercussions on Emma's entire world.

FIRE WITH FIRE by Allan Kahane

After Jake Burke's wife and daughter die in a terrorist attack on U.S. soil, his life has but one purpose: revenge. Accompanied by his assistant, Miranda, Jake uses his vast wealth and resources to track the lone surviving bomber to EGYPT --- to hunt him down and kill him. But Jake's involvement is just beginning. Jake and Miranda are abducted by rogue intelligence agents running a bold operation that combats terrorism with tactics government agencies cold never use: take the fight to the countries that nurture terrorists. Jake has just killed the man they'd planned to use to penetrate the Popular Islamic Jihad. They extend an invitation to Jake, but it's a one-way street: Join them, fund them, and don't look back. These men fight Fire with Fire.

-Click here to view the BookTrailer for Fire with Fire.

 

THE RIVER OF DOUBT by Candice Millard

A national bestseller that won coast-to-coast praise, The River of Doubt sets the stage with Roosevelt's stinging election defeat in 1912, a humiliation that would spur him to accept an invitation to South America. He soon spun the invitation into an elaborate plan to travel one of the planet's most dangerous rivers, which snakes through one of the planet's most dangerous jungles. Roosevelt and his men would face innumerable hardships, and not everyone on the team would survive. Cannibals, disease, and starvation were but a few of the threats, against a landscape where the flora and fauna were by turns gorgeous and nightmarish. Combining the suspense of Into Thin Air with the rich history of a presidential biography, The River of Doubt makes for an exhilarating journey.

Special Offers for Registered Book Groups --- SIX Special Offers

This month we have the following SIX very special opportunities for Book Groups that have registered with us by Friday, October 13th.

Book Giveaway and Author Chat --- The Angels of Morgan Hill by Donna VanLiere: Three groups will win the opportunity to chat with Donna VanLiere and receive 12 copies of The Angels of Morgan Hill for their group.

More about The Angels of Morgan Hill:
From Donna VanLiere --- the author of the beloved Christmas Hope series --- comes a moving novel of faith, family, and destiny.

The Angels of Morgan Hill is filled with unforgettable characters who show us the ways and means of the heart and prove that even in the darkest hours, we are never truly alone.

Book Giveaway --- Before I Wake by Dee Henderson: 10 groups will win 12 copies of Before I Wake for their group.

More about Before I Wake:
The Sheriff of Justice, Illinois is hunting a killer. Women visiting town are being murdered, tourists in nice hotels, money still in their billfolds, jewelry still on the dresser. Quiet kills --- they go to sleep and never awaken. The Sheriff is not pleased to find the new detective in town, Rae Gabriella, working a case on behalf of one of the victims' families. She's staying in the same hotel where one of the women died, and her looks suggest she could be the next victim.

Book Giveaway and Author Chat --- Best Friends by Martha Moody: 10 groups will win the opportunity to chat with Martha Moody and receive 12 copies of Best Friends for their group.

More about Best Friends:
"You'll definitely see elements of yourself and your girlfriends in this terrific novel," is how Redbook described Best Friends --- which may explain why this first novel from an unknown author has been quietly building to a surprising hardcover success. It's the kind of book that is shared among friends, an instantly familiar and emotionally immediate story of two women who become college roommates, confidantes, and friends for life.

Book Giveaway and Author Chat --- Happiness Sold Separately by Lolly Winston: 20 groups will win the opportunity to chat with Lolly Winston and receive 12 copies of Happiness Sold Separately.

More about Happiness Sold Separately:
Elinor Mackey has always done the right things in the right order-college, law school, career, marriage-but now everything's going wrong. After two painful years of trying, Elinor has learned that she can't have children. All the doctors can tell her is that it's probably because of her age. As she turns forty, she withdraws into an interior world of heartbreak.

Book Giveaway and Author Chat --- Arianna Huffington, author of On Becoming Fearless: 10 groups will win the chance to chat with Arianna Huffington and receive 12 copies of On Becoming Fearless for their group.

More about On Becoming Fearless:
It's hard to believe that Arianna Huffington --- bestselling author, Internet entrepreneur, journalist, mother, and one-time California gubernatorial candidate --- is not fearless by nature. But as she reveals in On Becoming Fearless, she has learned to overcome the fears that have at every step threatened to impede not only her professional success but also her personal wellbeing.

Book Giveaway and Author Chat --- Piece of Work by Laura Zigman: 20 groups will win the opportunity to chat with Laura Zigman and receive 12 copies of Piece of Work for their group.

More about Piece of Work:
Toddlers, Julia remembered hearing someone say, were like big tyrants of tiny countries. Demanding, insatiably needy, and all ego and id, her son was still by far the best boss she'd ever had.

From bestselling author Laura Zigman comes a novel about failure and success, comebacks, and one nasty piece of work.

Click here to register your group.

Guides Now Available

The following guides are now available on ReadingGroupGuides.com:

After This by Alice McDermott
All Mortal Flesh by Julia Spencer-Fleming
Angels of Morgan Hill by Donna VanLiere
At First Sight by Nicholas Sparks
Before I Go by Riley Weston
Breadfruit by Celestine Vaite
The Days of Summer by Jill Barnett
Echo Park by Michael Connelly
Farther Than I Meant To Go, Longer Than I Meant To Stay by Tiffany L. Warren
Fire with Fire by Allan Kahane
For One More Day by Mitch Albom
The Fugitive Wife by Peter C. Brown
The Guy Not Taken by Jennifer Weiner
Happiness Sold Separately by Lolly Winston
Helen of Troy by Margaret George
The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
Kabbalah: A Love Story by Lawrence Kushner
Love and Louis XIV by Antonia Fraser
Lucy by Ellen Feldman
Magic Time by Doug Marlette
On Becoming Fearless.... by Arianna Huffington
The Only Best Place by Carolyne Aarsen
Piece of Work by Laura Zigman
The River of Doubt by Candice Millard
River's Edge by Marie Bostwick
The Snow Fox by Susan Fromberg Schaeffer
Special Topics In Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl
The Sense of Paper by Taylor Holden
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
The Uses of Enchantment by Heidi Julavits
Vertigo by Lauren Baratz-Logsted
The Vote by Sybil Downing
When Madeline Was Young by Jane Hamilton
The World to Come by Dara Horn

The following Christian Guide is now available:

Before I Wake by Dee Henderson

Please note that these titles, for which we already had guides when they appeared in hardcover, are now available (or coming soon) in paperback:

Best Friends by Martha Moody
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
Julie & Julia by Julie Powell
Widow of the South by Robert Hicks
 

Does your group ever read multiple books for a single discussion?
 
-Yes
-No, but this is a good idea.
-No


 

A new writing contest, The Sobol Award, has been announced. Open to unpublished and unagented fiction writers, the Sobol has a committee of readers who will evaluate each of the manuscripts submitted, offer editorial feedback and, ultimately, award cash prizes of $100,000, $25,000, and $10,000, as well as literary representation to the winners. Entries will be accepted through December 31, 2006. Sobol provides all contestants with a reader's report on the main strengths and weaknesses of their manuscripts and each one is evaluated by multiple readers and the top-ranking entries are passed on to a panel of distinguished judges, who select the winning manuscripts. Interested in learning more? Go to www.sobolaward.com.