#99 - Pure - Andrew Miller (Choice: Alex) (Venue: Boro Bistro, Borough High Street)

Date: October 29, 2015
Present: Alex, Shubha, Gill C, Nic

The food was great, the staff had top knots, the book was well received, generally, but there's always one, eh?!.

"Pleasing" - Nic
"Really enjoyed this one" - Sabine
"Good read" - Gill C
"No!! Wordy & ponderous" - Jen

#98 - The Martian - Andy Weir (Choice: Gill F) (Venue: Polpo at Ape and Bird)

Date: September 16, 2015
Present: Jen, Gill F, Gill C, Sabine, Nic, Doris

A very well accepted book choice and very well accepted fennel meatballs, amongst other goodies, which included frito misto and little pizzas - much better than the Spud-u-like with which we were threatened in advance.

Generally, the book was exciting, though there was a little too much science for some.

"Loved this. Fave so far" - Jen (so we know how she's voting at Chrsitmas)
"Enjoyed the first half despite not being into sci-fi" - Sabine
"Felt like it was always going to be made into a film" - Gill C

#97 - An Officer and a Spy - Robert Harris (Choice: Jen) (No Meeting)

Date: July 2015
Present: None

Not our finest year for meetings but, perhaps, Jen's finest year for book choice - as witness the comments below:

"Excellent" - Nic
"Love it. Interesting historical 'faction'." - Jen
"Great" - Sabine
"Very Interesting story" - Gill C

#96 Enormity of the Tragedy - Quim Monzo (Choice: Jane) (No meeting)

Date: June
Present: None

Another meeting fail, this time for a book fail (though we never let a bad book, alone, come between us and dinner and drinks!).

Comments:
"Ugh" - Nic
"Weird" - Sabine
"Dreadful" - Jen

It seems Gill C couldn't even find words!

#95 - The Girl on the Train - Paula Hawkins (Choice: Gill C) (Venue: Booking Bar and Restaurant, St Pancras)

Date: 28th May 2015
Present: Jen, Sabine, Gill C, Nic

The food was enjoyable and the live piano act was loud. So loud, Gill asked them to turn him down! Others will have to work hard if they fancy picking up "most appropriate venue" this year though.

Comments, collected latterly:
"Compelling" - Nic
"Ok but not as good as Gone Girl" - Sabine
"Much better than the film" - Gill C
"Kept me turning pages" - Jen

#94 - Americanah - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Choice: Sabine) (No meeting)

Date: May 2015
Present: None

One of many meeting fails this year but that in no way reflected the reception for the book.

"Good" Nic
"Good" Gill C
"Thought provoking. V interesting observations on difference" Jen

#93 - Dissolution - CJ Sansom (Choice: Doris) (Venue: ?)

Date: March 2015
Present: Sabine, Gill F, Doris and Jen?

So many details lost in the mists of time but this was when an unofficial book group favorite became an official choice so success was assured. Comments gathered subsequently:

"Great" - me
"Loved it and read all the others" - Sabine
"Brilliant" - Gill
"Yay!" - Jen

#92 - Not that kind of Girl - Lena Dunham (Choice: Shubha) (Venue: Mishkin's Covent Garden)

Date: February 25, 2015
Present: Jane, Sabine, Jen, Gill F, Gill C, Shubha and Doris

I missed what seems destined to win "Best attended" award of the year and, sadly, the ensuing discussion. Comments gathered subsequently:

"Argh!" - Nic
"Ugh" - Sabine
"No, thank you" - Gill C
"Yuck" Jen

I'd be interested to hear about the food.

#91 - Shantaram - Gregory David Roberts (Choice: Nic) (Venue: Salt 'n' Pepper, Leicester Square)

Date: January 20, 2015
Present: Shubha, Jen, Gill C, Gill F (first outing!), Nic

The second meeting for the book that keeps on giving ... and giving.

It was long but enjoyable with, I thought, a hint of the "Count of Monte Cristo" in the episodic nature and Lin's uncanny ability to demonstrate a new skill whenever occasion called. Other comments:
"Enjoyed it" - Sabine
"Nah! Really? Shaggy dog story" - Gill C
"Enjoyable if far-fetched and too long" - Jen

The food was pretty good and they gave us all free bangles.

Christmas 2014

So the much anticipated results of the 2014 boOkSCARS are finally here. It has taken 2 months for me to collate, count, recount, double check, triple check and post these results (and it didn't help that I lost the sheet with the results written down on for a month!), but here they are:

Booker of the Year (Best Book) - I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Blooper of the Year (Worst Book) - Memories of my Melancholy Whores

Best Discussion - Gate of Angels

Most Disappointing Book of Promise - Westwood & Memories of my Melancholy Whores

Biggest Improver - Shantaram

Most Apt Venue of the Year - Lowndes Bar & Kitchen at the Jumeirah Lowndes (Westwood)

Best Venue of the Year (Food) - Shantaram (Roti Chai)

Best Moment (Yay!) - Northern Lights (Polar bears in armour and witch romances!)

Best Moment (Eek!) - The Ocean at the End of the Lane (A witch burrowing into foot!)

Best Nice Character (Male) - Iorek Byrnison (Northern Lights)

Best Nice Character (Female) - The Hempstock Women (The Ocean at the End of the Lane)

Best Bad Character (Male) - Gerard Challis (Westwood)

Best Bad Character (Female) - Mrs. Coulter (Northern Lights)

Worst Food - B Bar (The Ocean at the End of the Lane)

Dishonourable Mention (Blooper of Bloopers) - Spring Snow (Still)

Honourable Mention (Booker of Bookers) - To be decided

#90 - Northern Lights: His Dark Materials - Philip Pulman (No meeting)

Date: November, 13, 1024

Apologies: All

In what became the tradition for this year, we failed to meet.  So, we finally discussed this book during the annual Booker Voting (the results will be with you soon, courtesy of Mark) at our Christmas meeting and it was good to have this in reserve as we couldn't really discuss Shantaram because we hadn't finished it or, in some cases, remembered to start it.  (But we never name and shame here, do we Jen?!).  Or, in some cases, bothered to try it. (Ahem, I hate to criticise someone who travels 5,500 miles to come to an LGAG meeting!)

In consensus, Northern Lights was a bit of a romp, a classic "goodies versus baddies" but with some subtlety that many adult books can miss - Lord Asriel's good / bad status, for example, being a bit of an enigma for a long time.  We felt the characters were vibrant and well-drawn - which will be backed up by the voting results - and sometimes cartoon like.  We likened Mrs Coulter to Cruella de Vil, for example.

Generally, well enjoyed.  We'll let Clem come back next year!

#89 - The Ocean at the End of the Lane - Neil Gaiman (Choice: Mark) (Venue: Bbar, Victoria)

October 9, 2014 

Present: Nic, Carl, Mark, Sabine, Gill 

Despite the torrential rain through which we'd each run, lost and alone, in the desolate carnage that is Victoria mid-revamp, great burgers, crispy sweet potato fries and decent red wine meant a most enjoyable evening was had by all.

We raised a glass to Carl's return and to the poor South African miner in whose memory we gathered at this "South African" restaurant that didn't seem to have any South African specialities except Biltong and animal-hide chairs. 

Some of us felt trapped in one of those old time-travel-type paradoxes when, at the end of the novel, we discovered our protagonist had been back to the same place many times and never remembered his trips.  Why then, we wondered, was he able to remember and write down this one?  The question went unanswered but, nonetheless, we enjoyed the adult fairy-tale nature of the book, rocked through it at pace and almost unanimously agreed that The Omen is a truly great book.  Well, we've never felt constrained to discuss just one book. 

#88 - Westwood - Stella Gibbons (Choice: Jen) (Venue: Lowndes Bar & Kitchen at the Jumeirah Lowndes)

September 4, 2014 

Present: Jen, Sabine, Gill, Doris, Shubha, Nic, Clem, Mark

I hadn't finished this novel when we had dinner, indeed, had barely started, so I didn't realise at the time how incredibly apt it was that we were eating in an hotel "miles away at the back of nowhere near Hyde Park". Look's like Jen's abandoned attempts to win Book of the Year and, instead, set her hat at Most Apt Venue of the Year!  

Likely to be our best turn out of the year, we each enjoyed the walk through glamorous Knightsbridge more than we enjoyed the book but that hardly dampened our spirits.  We didn't love either the book or the restaurant but we didn't hate them either - they just weren't exciting.  Those who'd reached the end of the novel found the sudden introduction of religion jarring although, by the time I read that far, perhaps forewarned, I didn't have the same experience.  Otherwise the reviews consistently rang with words like "gentle" (kind version) and "dull" (less kind).  

#87 - Memories of My Melancholy Whores - Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Choice: Jane) (Venue: Wahaca, Wardour Street)

Date: July 21, 2014

Present: Nic, Gill, Jane, Shubha, Jen

Jane is a GGM super-fan having devoured everything he wrote and loved this as much (almost) as everything else.  Jen and I loved One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera so were looking forward to this.

Generally, this seemed to be considered a little less accessible, a little less "fantastic" than other of his novels and it was, therefore, a little harder to cope with the unacceptable sexual relationship between child and old man.  Of course, everything has to be placed in a context and the age of consent has varied over time and still varies between societies with the increasing age of consent at odds with natural fertility.  But it is a  complex and difficult topic, as was the subject matter of the book.  Did we imagine the writing was a little less lyrical (albeit hard to make the judgment in a translation) or was it because we were battling a distaste for the subject matter?

An interesting but not entirely enjoyable novel - however we'd all read more by GGM.

#86 - The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt (Choice: Gill) (No Meeting)

Apologies: All

The decision was taken to combine this one with the next meeting for Jane's book.

We were mostly Donna Tartt "fans" in as much as that's possible for an author with such a small output and so we'd been eagerly awaiting this book.

In the end though, Jane "liked" this, Gill loved the sense of obsession with an object and we all found the ending a little dissonant.  None of us really like the lead character.  Jen, like me, was confused about what was happening when.  The novel appeared to be post-9/11 yet the narrator, now in his late 20s had an iPod when we was 13 - which means the novel was being written in the near-future, yet without other futuristic elements.

Unfortunately, the general consensus seems to be that The Secret History is so outstanding a novel that it is very hard not to compare subsequent novels unfavourably.  Had I read The Little Friend first, I would have thought it fantastic and then The Secret History even better - the other way around though, The Little Friend became a disappointment.  Had I read this first, I may not have bothered with the others, which would have been a tragedy.

#85 - Life After Life - Kate Atkinson (Choice: Sabine) (No meeting)

Apologies: All

And so the run of poor attendance continues for the year.

The book however was almost universally liked (by those who've subsequently had chance to comment).

Jen found it very Kate Atkinson and did not enjoy the vehicle, whilst appreciating it was clever.  However, this was the closest we have got to criticism.  The said, I loved, loved, loved it so, it is likely that, had Shubha read it, she would have been a very vocal critic!  Given my review, I don't believe she's rushing off to buy it.

Unless something spectacular comes along in the next couple of months, this one will get my vote for book of the year!

#84 - Harvest - Jim Crace (Choice: Doris) (Venue: Waterloo Bar and Kitchen)

Date: May 1, 2014

Present: Gill, Sabine, Nic

A return trip to the Waterloo Bar and Kitchen - we were last here for If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things - still a long term favourite of mine.

At the time of meeting, I hadn't finished (read much of) the book so was unable to comment beyond the fact that I was not enjoying it.  Sabine and Gill greatly enhanced the literary level of the discussion however so I learned it was a reversed creation myth, with an established world and order being destroyed in seven days.

All very clever but we didn't much like it.

#83 - I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings - Maya Angelou (Choice: Shubha) (No meeting)

Apologies: All

The now familiar book group polarity: Shubha "loved, loved, loved it"; I sound it "dreadfully dull".

When we, finally, gathered and discussed this, it became clear that I was alone in finding this a rather pedestrian telling (and then this ... and then that ... and then ...)  of a tragic but too common childhood of a certain time.  However, to coin and bastardise a phrase, I am clearly on the wrong side of literature here because Clinton and Obama as well as Farrell, Crew, Banerjee, Mason and Buckley all disagree with me.

#82 - The Gate of Angels - Penelope Fitzgerald (Choice: Nic) (Venue: The Old Shades, Whitehall)

Date: February 20, 2014

Present: Nic, Jane, Sabine, Jen, Gill

We welcomed Sabine to the fold in a cosy, authentic feeling pub which knew little about  Bearnaise sauce and whose habit of opening the wine away from the table did little to endear Jane although I maintain it is rather quaint and a remarkably untouristy watering hole so close to Trafalgar Square.

Jane found this novel inaccessible and (like the pub) dated.  For Jen it was a non-story, a little like a French film but "kind of nice".  I was disappointed, hoping to uncover a lost old gem like The Tortoise and The Hare but instead uncovering a dated non-story ... oops.  There was a melancholy sense of foreboding about the (name unremembered) girl, a sense, from the start of the book, that she couldn't have a happy story, a sense which the vague ending (it can't be called a conclusion) did nothing to dispel.

No prizes for me this year.  (Unless it is the blooper - yikes.)

#81 - Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch (Choice: Mark) (No meeting)

Present: No one

Apologies: All

In an ominous glimpse into the book group year, our meeting for this one failed to get off the ground.  

However, we have subsequently gathered that the book was well received by all as a simple but enjoyable read.  It is not a work of great literary merit but it was wacky, fun and locally-inspired and the "Met bits" were endorsed by our resident expert, Jen, as feeling very true (which is only a little bit worrying).