The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah

This week our book club came together in force to discuss the novel The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah.  We really had a large group and a good discussion.  I believe that this month was the final meeting for the last holdouts of our summer residents, as well, so we say goodbye to them until next spring! Don't send us photos of warm sunshine and the beach, please! Well, maybe just a few...

The Great Alone is a novel set primarily in Alaska in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The story follows Cora and Ernt Allbright and their daughter Leni as they learn how to survive in the Alaskan wilderness.  It also follows their story as they cope with Ernt's Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and domestic abuse. The plot takes place over a period of approximately 12 years as Leni grows up and struggles to develop her own life. The book provides a remarkably vivid portrayal of life/survival in Alaska in the 1970s and a dark image of a family battling violence from within.

Our discussion group seemed to agree that the book provided an excellent perspective of life in Alaska in the 1970s. The remoteness, the hardship, and the weather were prominent features of the story while the PTSD and domestic abuse plot lines somehow seemed to play a more minor role. Indeed, during our discussion, the majority of the concepts discussed were focused more around Alaskan life and difficulties while the domestic abuse angle wasn't even raised until later in the period. While most members agreed that they liked the book, several commented  that they felt "let-down" by the ending because if seemed contrived and predictable. But, the general consensus was that if you wanted a book that provided an authentic image of life in Alaska 40 years ago, this is a great option.

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" (but it wasn't unanimous)
Rate the book 1-4 stars with 1 being the lowest rating:
3 stars (the ratings varied among the members from 2 stars to 4 stars)

Welcome & Kingdom of the Blind by Louise Penny

Welcome! We're excited to start on a new journey with a blog for our library book club! A few months ago we had a request from a patron that we create a way of sharing the discussion and general opinions of our Library Book Club with others. And the concept of the Perham Library's Book Club blog was conceived. We're hoping that we can make this page useful and interesting  to those wanting to follow our monthly book club and its ongoing selection of titles for discussion. We intend to make a post every month following our book club gathering to summarize the book and the general discussion. We'll also make periodic posts to share information on special book club activities or to collect reading suggestions, or to vote for items to be included on the upcoming reading list.  We're looking forward to hearing people's comments and suggestions, too.

As the inaugural post for this blog, I'm including some thoughts on the book that our group discussed last week:

Kingdom of the Blind is the 14^th novel by Louise Penny in the Three Pines/Armand Gamache mystery series.  It was a slight departure for our book club because we don’t often choose to discuss mystery or crime fiction. The book follows Chief Superintendent Armand  Gamache of the Surete du Quebec as he is coping with being suspended from his job for allowing a supply of opioid drugs to enter the country. The  dual story line starting with an odd bequest naming Gamache as an executor for the will of a complete stranger while at the same time, Gamache races to track down and retrieve the shipment of opioid drugs before they are introduced onto the streets.  

Our book club members’ primary comment regarding this book is that they found the book confusing (“like walking into someone else’s conversation”). While many of our book club members said that they enjoyed the vivid friendships, the underlying sense of integrity and the ingenuity of the story, they felt that the author assumed that all readers were already familiar with the series story lines and characters and therefore assumed that everyone would understand the backstory without explanation. It was agreed that many of our club members would probably have enjoyed the book more if they had read some of the earlier books in the series and a couple of the members said that they were planning to go back and read the series. On the other end of the spectrum, several people said that they weren’t interested because they thought the book had too many characters and too many twists and turns at the end of the novel. 

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?  
“NO” (unless you start at the beginning of the series)

Would we recommend this to a friend to read?
“YES” (but it is recommended to read the entire series and not start in the middle)

Rate the book 1-4 stars with 1 being the lowest rating:
2.75 stars (the ratings varied from 1 star to 4 stars)