Fall 2011 - Coming to a University Near You!!!
Summer 2011: Meeting Schedule
Monday, May 23rd 2011
Featured Text: The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson
Location: SU070A (Club Room)
Monday, June 6th 2011
Featured Text: The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein
Location: SU070A (Club Room)
Featured Text: The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson
Location: SU070A (Club Room)
Monday, June 6th 2011
Featured Text: The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein
Location: SU070A (Club Room)
Guidelines to choosing a book for this year's discussion!
COMING SOON! Our texts are chosen by our members in a Book Ballet Selection process; each member nominates two texts - one from both the "Classical" and "Contemporary" categories. The executive will review the nominated texts and choose those that they believe will generate the most discussion. When nominating your texts, take into consideration length, content and availability.
LENGTH: Maximum of 100,000 words (approx.) Generally, most novel selections range between around 60,000 - 80,000 words*.
> POOR SELECTION: Margaret Mitchel's Gone With the Wind (a great book, but it's simply too long)
> GOOD SELECTION: Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar (Word Count: 69,632)
*Many members have asked me why we don't evaluate based on page numbers. Page numbers are an inaccurate, and often misleading measure of a book's length. Many popular novels have word count statistics on www.amazon.com. Just select a novel that has "Look Inside" on its cover, scroll down to "Text Stats", and you'll be able to view the word count. Regrettably, not all novels are posted on Amazon with this feature, in which case you'll have to compare it to something of similar reading length that is listed. Check out this example of William Golding's Lord of the Flies.
CONTENT: Choose a text that poses questions, instigates controversy, pushes buttons, poses philosophical queries, evaluates unique subject matter, fairly easy to read for contemporary audiences, etc.
> POOR SELECTION: Fracis Bacon's essay, The Proficience and Prominence of Learning (17th Century prose is not necessarily "bad", but it is a difficult sell for many readers)
> GOOD SELECTION: Almost anything, really (with the exception of choose your own adventure novels, harlequin romances . . . )
AVAILABILITY: Choose a text that can be ordered in by our members without costing a fortune.
> POOR SELECTION: C. Wallace's Why I'm Awesome, and How You Can Be Almost as Awesome Too! (never heard of it? Well, it hasn't exactly been published yet . . . )
> GOOD SELECTION: F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby (widely studied in American English classes, in continuous print, cheap Puffin Classics Edition)
LENGTH: Maximum of 100,000 words (approx.) Generally, most novel selections range between around 60,000 - 80,000 words*.
> POOR SELECTION: Margaret Mitchel's Gone With the Wind (a great book, but it's simply too long)
> GOOD SELECTION: Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar (Word Count: 69,632)
*Many members have asked me why we don't evaluate based on page numbers. Page numbers are an inaccurate, and often misleading measure of a book's length. Many popular novels have word count statistics on www.amazon.com. Just select a novel that has "Look Inside" on its cover, scroll down to "Text Stats", and you'll be able to view the word count. Regrettably, not all novels are posted on Amazon with this feature, in which case you'll have to compare it to something of similar reading length that is listed. Check out this example of William Golding's Lord of the Flies.
CONTENT: Choose a text that poses questions, instigates controversy, pushes buttons, poses philosophical queries, evaluates unique subject matter, fairly easy to read for contemporary audiences, etc.
> POOR SELECTION: Fracis Bacon's essay, The Proficience and Prominence of Learning (17th Century prose is not necessarily "bad", but it is a difficult sell for many readers)
> GOOD SELECTION: Almost anything, really (with the exception of choose your own adventure novels, harlequin romances . . . )
AVAILABILITY: Choose a text that can be ordered in by our members without costing a fortune.
> POOR SELECTION: C. Wallace's Why I'm Awesome, and How You Can Be Almost as Awesome Too! (never heard of it? Well, it hasn't exactly been published yet . . . )
> GOOD SELECTION: F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby (widely studied in American English classes, in continuous print, cheap Puffin Classics Edition)
