Review of Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House

Shoot, I must have misplaced my paper with the rankings. Most people rated the book about a 7. Liz, I think, said 8. Melissa and Maria saw it as a precursor to other scary stories, like The Shining. Though, The Haunting of Hill House wasn't that scary. More spooky. Was the actual house the source of the evil? Ellyn says - you should never start a sentence with "no offense, but..." Also, one of her friends was snuggling with a "roof rat" in Florida. Leigh says Superior Oil was actually giving her a hard time about her energy consumption! Hmmph. Superior has gone downhill since they joined up with CKSmith. Ellyn likes Noar's, Liz likes something else - was it Mass Energy? You pay a yearly fee and they charge you 40 cents off the going rate? Michele says her mom and sister arrived safely at her house and will be staying for an undetermined amount of time. Melissa says Intel helps AMD with technology in order to help them stay in the market. (Tony's boss denies it.) Sorry if I forgot something. I like that roof rat story. I found the ratings. Michele-7 Maria - 7 Liz - 8 Leigh - 7 Ellyn - 6 Melissa - 7 Andrea - 7

February Title

Here's the title I selected for our February meeting: The Dogs of Babel by Carolyn Parkhurst. Happy Holidays!!! -Claudi M.

Sorry Michele! Spelled your name wrong.

Dec meeting recap

Book: Life Among Giants Ratings: Leigh-4 Nans-7 Liz-7.5/8 Michelle-6 Melissa-6 Lori-7 Claudi-6 Maria-hadn't read enough to rate Andrea-7 Ellyn-9 Jan book: Otherwise Normal People, by Aurelia Scott Everyone have a wonderul Christmas and New Year's. See you all in Feb.!

January 2014

 Leigh will be hosting to discuss her pick for January, Otherwise Normal People: Inside the Thorny World of Competitive Rose Gardening by Aurelia Scott.  

October Book Club

It was a pleasure to meet in Nans new house. Everyone was amazed that she'd unpacked so quickly and that her home was so inviting given that she'd only moved in a super short time.  The bar was set mighty high....

The food was delicious as usual. Apparently we all had a sweet tooth as well since all but one dish was sweet!

The book, Vampires, Vikings, and Mailmen was a challenging book to finish an the ratings reflected that fact. No names will be used to protect the innocent.

6.5 - liked it after she got into it after page 200
3 - higher if edited a bit more
2 - not finished reading
2.5 - Chief needed more dimension, Hard to follow story line
2 - The story telling was hampered by the poor editing and mechanics
4 - Entertaining for a guy - some things didn't make sense
4 - Thought there was too much detail on things that weren't needed and wanted more detail on characters
2 - nothing linked up - jumped around  - told us but didn't show us

Next up is Andrea with Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson.

December book is Life Among Giants by Bill Roorbach.

September book club book and a bonus

If you too want to make Glow in the Dark Jello, here is the link.

September's book will be The Last Town on Earth by Thomas Mullen. This is the one we will talk about.

Bonus  book is The Round House by Louise Erdrich. Good book and an excellent example of a strong voice for a character. This is just a good book I previewed.

~Michele