ReadingGroupGuides.com

Virginia Beach Virginia

ReadingGroupGuides.com interviews special reading groups around the world, spotlighting a different group each month. We hope that you enjoy reading about their experiences and might find some new ideas to try with your group. If you belong to a group that you think should be spotlighted, click here to send.

This month's interview is with the Nofellahs Novellas, a lively group that enjoys each others' company as much as they like the books they read! Many thanks to Karen Reidelbach for sharing her group with us.

Q. Tell us a little something about your group.
A. We're called the Nofellahs Novellas, and we've been meeting since the fall of 1994.

Q. Tell us about your membership-who is in your group? What are your members like?
A. There's not enough variety, that's for sure! We are not Ya-Yas. We have 11 members, all women, aged 34 to 64-ish. We each bring an unusual aspect to the club that we've all come to depend on. 'Our differences are what make us strong' is what we got out of Stones from the River and I think that's true of our club.

One member said, "Before this book club, the only books I'd ever read came off the revolving rack at Phar-Morr."

We have members we can count on to do certain things at meetings such as those who will always:

* read aloud and make us sit up and notice the beautiful language in a section. She can make our hearts stop and take our breath away with her words.

* note unrealistic female anatomy descriptions, such as the 'upturned nipples' on a 40-year-old woman in The Horse Whisperer

* write down the funny things that we said that night

* tell us how a single person would interpret the book differently

* give us the 60s perspective ("I used to live in a commune once")

* be the devil's advocate when everyone is agreeing

* correctly pronounce words and authors' names for us

We live in a transient area and have lost our foreign members. Three have moved back to Europe. The military has moved other members out of the area. We take turns inviting new members, keeping our total around 11.

Q. Tell us about your meetings. How often do you get together?
A. We meet the last Monday of each month except November and December--we combine that into one early December meeting. Each member takes a turn hostessing the meeting.

We tried meeting with the local independent bookstore's club one month. A comment made there has stuck in our minds, "I read a few chapters then dropped Social Blunders in the trash compactor." We had all enjoyed the book even though most of them panned it. The experience really made us appreciate our little group.

We tried going to a restaurant but the long table was not conducive to discussion. We did a pot luck once and ate VERY well but, again, the long table splits the group into at least two discussions, if not more. Seems like we were messing with a good thing by trying out other venues.

Q. So does food play any part in your group? Do you eat at your meetings?
A. Boy do we! Some hostesses really go all out to match the food to the book. When we read Snow Falling on Cedars, we had strawberries. We ate a curried meal after reading Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children. Spices were used to decorate the table when we read Mistress of Spices.

A few of us have gone through the same transition of having book club at our house--the first time, you totally panic and CLEAN for a week, prepare a gourmet spread. The second time, you clean for a few days, and have some special delicacies. After that, you clean the day of book club and prepare easy, familiar foods. We always eat very well and drink a few bottles of wine.

Q. What are your meetings like? Who leads the discussion? Do you use reading group guides?
A. We just all talk at once! Some hostesses prepare for the meeting by collecting information on the author or getting the book guide. We've found Amazon.com's reviews to be very helpful too. Book guides are only used when the things get slow, if at all.

When the discussion lulls, we like to cast the book with popular actors. That raises some of the funniest contradictions in how we read the book. (And then there was Plainsong, where there was next to NO physical description of the characters, yet we KNEW them so well!)

Q. What kind of books do you read and how do you choose them?
A. We seem to like women's novels --- strong women characters in family situations. Have we enjoyed anything that wasn't? Clancy doesn't seem to appeal to us. We tired of southern gothic quickly and don't want to read any more books about alcoholism and child abuse, which seems to have ruled out most of Oprah's books.

The hostess chooses the book for her house but we try to plan a few months ahead so we can get copies of the book. Also, we want to know ahead of time if there is a book that others don't want to read so we can change it.

Q. Please share with us some of your best, or most memorable, discussions.
A. Our discussions about World War II end up being the most interesting. Our Stones from the River discussion really made me deal with Nazi Germany so much more than any history class! We could feel the mood of the people, wondering how aware they were of what was going on around them. The English Patient brought up something we'd never considered--how easy it was to drop the hydrogen bomb on an Asian city, rather than in Europe where people looked more like we do. Strong emotions about what was right and wrong power these discussions. Remains of the Day had us take a look at WW2 from across the channel and then Snow Falling on Cedars had us dealing with its affects in America. Corelli's Mandolin was another book making us take a second look at the war.

Corelli's Mandolin also had us comparing Greek gods to the character's lives. We looked at that book on so many levels that the discussion lasted late into the night. I Was Amelia Earhart was such a simple short book, yet we had so many different interpretations of the ending--what a great discussion!

Love in the Time of Cholera will always remind us of asparagus's contribution to the smell of urine!

There was a poignant moment in discussing One True Thing when so many members shared stories about losing their mothers to cancer.

We all enjoyed bashing The Horse Whisperer. There were so many ways to bash that book that it kept the conversation flying!

This is our top 5 favorite list. We plan to re-vote every few years. (This idea was garnered from this website!)

1. Corelli's Mandolin
2. Shipping News
3. Stones from the River
4. To Kill a Mockingbird
5. (tie) Snow Falling on Cedars
5. (tie) The English Patient

One fun meeting we had the week of Halloween. We read Love, Loss, and What I Wore. It's a simple book about what the author wore at different ages but it ends up making you rethink your whole life. We then brought a picture or outfit to the meeting and shared a story about why that outfit was significant to who we are. We should've written our own books with the stories told that night!

Q. How do you keep things fun?
A. Wine. We tend to walk in the door and say, "I gotta have my glass of wine!"

Q. Do you have any advice for other groups?
A. We have a composition notebook to keep ideas and everyone's current e-mail addresses and phone numbers. The book keeps track of whose turn it is to hostess and keeps a running list of all the books we've read. We pass the book each month, essentially allowing each member to be president for her month. No one person wants to be in charge so we share the responsibility.

Also, in a perfect world, I'd read the book before picking it. And when a book gets panned by the group, don't take it personally. Be strong enough to say, "I didn't like it."

Challenge your group to read some classics. It seems like so many books we've read (Fall of the Sparrow, The Good Husband) have mentioned books that everyone should know to be able to discuss literature, and yet many of us are lacking in these classics. We try to mix some in with current selections.

Also, mix up your genres. There are so many good books out there to read--don't limit it to fiction.

Q. Do you have any horror stories, amusing anecdotes, or other special tales to tell?
A. Let me start out by saying that none of these make us sound especially literate...or genteel.

* Ann asked for some more wine at Lynn's house. Lynn would not open a new bottle for just one person so she asked if there was anyone else who was going to drink some. Lynn will not live this moment down!

* Lucy called Mary to tell her why we had to move the meeting to another woman's house. Mary heard "We had to move the meeting because of my daughter's headlights" What? Mary puzzled. Had Lucy's daughter developed breasts overnight? No, it turned out that she had head lice. We certainly weren't going to have the meeting there!

The previous night, Norris had accidentally showed up on the wrong night and found the family sitting around with mayonnaise in their hair, trying to get rid of the lice. Norris witnessed the daughter, mayonnaised, rollerblading around the house.

* Because of book club, I know that "I Want to Walk with Jesus" needs to be played at Ann's funeral. She's depending on us to remember; she knows her husband won't know.

* Elizabeth used to enter the hostess' home and immediately ask for the bathroom, until we noticed.

* Ann's favorite quote to tell at book club is something she saw on Oprah. Someone complained about having to go back and reread Toni Morrison's book to understand it. Maya Angelou said, "But that's what reading IS!"

ReadingGroupGuides.com interviews special reading groups around the world, spotlighting a different group each month. We hope that you enjoy reading about their experiences and might find some new ideas to try with your group. If you belong to a group that you think should be spotlighted, click here to send.