December's (wait... is it really December already?!) book club selection was Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng, with Conversations with RBG by Jeffrey Rosen on deck for January. We continue to be enormously fortunate with book club meeting turnout~ please accept our continued thanks for carving out some time, in a quiet place in your homes, to meet and discuss each month's read safely. Some normalcy during these difficult times is o so welcomed!
To the book~
In Shaker Heights, a
placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned--from the
layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the
successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies
this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is
playing by the rules.
Enter Mia Warren--an enigmatic artist and
single mother--who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged
daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and
Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn
to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past
and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this
carefully ordered community.
This book was very well received by the group. Ng's writing style was complimented, along with a nod being made to her debut novel, Everything I Never Told You. It was said that the characters and the setting were believable and drafted well, while noting the book had a "Stepford Wives" kind of feel to it.
We discussed several pivotal elements to the book that were tricky to definitively conclude. For example, by surrendering May Ling to the fire station, did Bebe by default surrender her parental rights? Should May Ling/Mirabelle have been returned to Bebe, or stay in the care of the McCulloughs? There were cases made for both outcomes. In addition, was Mia's ultimate decision to keep the surrogate baby she carried acceptable? And if so, did it warrant uprooting and relocating every few months to stay untraceable? Would it have made any difference in the familial tensions between the Richardsons and the Warrens if the truth about Lexie's abortion had been revealed? The answers to these questions and more weren't unanimous, and weren't shared with conviction from those who weighed in on them. Rather, this book, and it's subsequent discussion, was a solid case of being able to fully recognize the circumstances surrounding these different characters, and their plot twists, while empathizing with both sides. It made for really good conversation, as can so often happen with subject matter with no clear constricting black and white lines.
In closing, the Hulu television miniseries "Little Fires Everywhere", based on the current novel, was mentioned as great supplemental material and definitely worth a look! Who's up for a book club movie night when we can be together again? I'll bring the popcorn!
At the end of every book club
discussion we ask three questions and track the average answers:
Would we
recommend this to another book club for discussion?
"YES"
Would we
recommend this to a friend to read?
"YES"
Rate the
book 1-4 stars with 1 being the lowest rating:
3 stars
