August Book
We will be reading the Booker winner The White Tiger: A Novel by Aravind Adiga for our August book.

I couldn't host the July meeting so Ros has stepped into the job. Have a great time.

JULY BOOK
We decided on Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates as the July book, which will be at my place on 26 July.
Apparently The Times voted Richard Yates as one of the best 100 writers in English from 1923 to the present. This book was written in 1961.
See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutionary_Road



The June book will be at Stellas, that's the Obama Dreams for my Father.

Clare excelled with the Plum Crumble cake today, but we didn't have much to say about Leave to Remain. Sue commented on how cursory our notes are getting recently and we have resolved to lift our game!

June Book
We decided on Barack Obama's Dreams of my Father. June meeting will be at Stella's. May meeting will be at Clare's.

Lovely day at Margaret's on Sunday, but we missed all the people on holidays.

Cheers to all.

May book - Leave to Remain - Abbas El Zein.
Abbas El Zein's latest book, Leave to Remain, is a memoir about growing up in civil-war Lebanon and migrating to the west. He is a featured writer at the Sydney Writers Festival. If you are planning your Festival trip, he is in a free group presentations: Lived Lives on May 21, 10 to 11am, and Conflict and Childhood, on May 23 1.30 to 2.30 SDC4. He is also free at Ashfield Library on May 21, 6.30-7.30, but you have to book on 97161810.

We had a good time discussing The Boat at Sue's place on Sunday and decided that the April bookgroup - The Elegance of the Hedgehog will be held at Margaret's place.

Congratulations to Pat on her new grandson.

April Book

Muriel Barbery: The Elegance of the Hedgehog

Interview: Christos Tsiolkas and Sophie Cunningham on The Slap.

http://www.themonthly.com.au/tm/node/1356

Jane's Cherry Cake

250g tin cherries drained
125 g dried apricots chopped
125 g dried figs chopped
125 g chopped nuts (walnuts, almonds or pecans)
150 g plain flour
2 ¼ tsp baking powder
165 g sugar
3 eggs
1 egg white
¼ cup vegetable oil
60 ml brandy
½ tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp almond extract

Combine cherries, apricots, figs, nuts, flour, baking pdr and half the sugar. Beat egg & egg whites with remaining sugar then stir in the oil, brandy, almond & vanilla extracts. Stir egg mixture into the fruit mixture. Bake in a lined & buttered tin @ 180 for 40 – 45 mins. Cool on a rack for 15 mins before turning out. Keeps up to 4 days in the fridge……………if you can resist eating it for that long!

Enjoy!

Jane

PS re February book group.
Looks like its a day trip book group, not a sleep over, in February at Moy's on the Central Coast.

March book

Title: The Boat

Author: Nam Le

Location: Sue Ellyard's house

I'm the fifth reserve through Hornsby library, which means I'll have to buy the book, I fear.

There's a transcript of a Peter Mares ABC interview at:

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/bookshow/stories/2008/2273652.htm

Blurb from Penguin is
The Boat will take you everywhere.
In 1979, Nam Le's family left Vietnam for Australia, an experience that inspires the first and last stories in The Boat. In between, however, Le's imagination lays claim to the world.
The Boat takes us from a tourist in Tehran to a teenage hit man in Columbia; from an aging New York artist to a boy coming of age in a small Victorian fishing town; from the city of Hiroshima just before the bomb is dropped to the haunting waste of the South China Sea in the wake of another war.
Each story uncovers a raw human truth. Each story is absorbing and fully realised as a novel. Together, the make up a collection of astonishing diversity and achievement.
'Nam Le is extraordinary, a writer who will be heard. The Boat will be read for as long as people read books. Its vision and its power are timeless.' - Mary Gaitskill
'Wonderful stories that snarl and pant cross our crazed world... and extraordinary performance. Nam Le is a heartbreaker, not easily forgotten.' - Junot Diaz
'A fearless new Australian voice that accepts no geographical limits; these are stories of leaping power and the most breathtaking grace and intimacy.' - Helen Garner

February book is Christos Tsiolkas The Slap, a bit of a door-stop of a book so get reading! Should make for interesting discussion at Moy's where the is the possibility of a sleepover meeting.

January book is Sebastian Barry's The Secret Scripture, which I can highly recommend. January meeting is at Jane's.