The Girl in Building C by Marilyn Barnes

 

Our March selection was The Girl in Building C, by Marilyn Barnes, with The Night Watchman, by Louise Erdrich, up next for April's pick. It was a fantastic turnout this month~ thank you to everyone who was able to attend! 

As previously mentioned and promised, we have officially collected the last of the book nominations for this next year's reading list~ they are currently being sorted and organized, and will be distributed very soon! We'll be e-mailing a copy out to our members, along with offering paper copies at the front desk of the library if anyone should prefer that format. Voting takes place at our next book club meeting on April 13th, when we discuss The Night Watchman. Can't make April's meeting? No sweat! Susan will be posting a link on the library's website for online voting, and you can also call or stop into the library with your votes as well! Remember, this year we're requiring that each member cast at least one vote for each of the 5 required categories (Mystery, Minnesota Author, Memoir, Classics, and Juvenile/Young Adult), leaving the remaining six votes open to your liking! Let us know below if you have any questions!

On to the book!

In October 1943, sixteen-year-old Marilyn Barnes was told that her recent bout of pneumonia was in fact tuberculosis. She entered Ah-gwah-ching State Sanatorium at Walker, Minnesota, for what she thought would be a short stay. In January, her tuberculosis spread, and she nearly died. Her recovery required many months of bed rest and medical care.

Marilyn loved to write, and the story of her three-year residency at the sanatorium is preserved in hundreds of letters that she mailed back home to her parents, who could visit her only occasionally and whom she missed terribly. The letters functioned as a diary in which Marilyn articulately and candidly recorded her reactions to roommates, medical treatments, Native American nurses, and boredom. She also offers readers the singular perspective of a bed-bound teenager, gossiping about boys, requesting pretty new pajamas, and enjoying Friday evening popcorn parties with other patients.

Selections from this cache of letters are woven into an informative narrative that explores the practices and culture of a mid-century tuberculosis sanatorium and fills in long-forgotten details gleaned from recent conversations with Marilyn, who "graduated" from the sanatorium and went on to lead a full, productive life. 

This book, more than any other I can readily recall, offered an exceptional avenue for personal testimony among our members. How beguiling to hear the different shared stories, feelings, and lasting impacts left on the families touched by tuberculosis. It was noted that while Marilyn's personal chronicle of her time in a sanitarium had an incredibly positive and lighthearted spin on it, that certainly wasn't the case for everyone who resided at these institutions.

Overall as a group, we liked Marilyn. We liked her positive attitude and her cheerful, innocent demeanor. We marveled at how she coped so well for so long, with few visits from her family, while being bedridden the vast majority of the time. On the other hand, it was also almost unanimous that while we appreciated her youth, and thought the idea of basing a book largely off of personal correspondence was a neat idea, the book got boring and tedious after awhile. It would have been a nice additional component to the read if more of the letters from her family had been shared, or some form of their testimony as to how well they were handling Marilyn's stay so far from home, could have somehow been conveyed. Also, it was agreed that an added chapter to the end of the book about what life was like for Marilyn and her family when she returned home would have been a good way to round out her story and experience in the minds of the readers. 

We found this title a fast, easy read. Despite it becoming a bit humdrum for most, we can also say we had an especially good conversation surrounding it. We learned more about each other, and how differently a health crisis looks from the early 1940's to today. 

Do you know anyone who has personally been effected by tuberculosis? If so, was their experience similar to Marilyn's? Let us know below!

 

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