The Melbourne Athenaeum Book Club

Ath book club July 2007

Arundhati Roy - The God of Small Things(Rating: 3)

This highly stylized novel tells the story of one very fractured family from the southernmost tip of India. Here is an unhappy family unhappy in its own way, and through flashbacks and flashforwards The God of Small Things unfolds the secrets of these characters’ unhappiness. First-time novelist Arundhati Roy twists and reshapes language to create an arresting, startling sort of precision. The average reader of mainstream fiction may have a tough time working through Roy’s prose, but those with a more literary bent to their usual fiction inclinations should find the initial struggle through the dense prose a worthy price for this lushly tragic tale…..

 Ath book club comments:

The Ath Bookclub agreed that The God of Small Things was quite difficult to read. Some members never finished the book, but those who did said that the end chapters made all the difference. The book is very sad and depressing; it makes you appreciate what you have. Roy’s style of writing is refreshing – a good writer can break the rules. The Ath Bookclub suggested that a novella lenght would have been a better format for this story.The Ath Bookclub recommends The God of Small Things to anyone who appreciates good language and is not depressed.

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Ath book club October 2007

Rosalie Ham – The Dressmaker (Rating: 3.5)

A remarkable tale of love, hate, and haute couture. Tilly Dunnage returns to her home town in country Victoria after twenty years away, armed with extraordinary dressmaking skills and tea chests full of exotic fabrics. The town’s women are transformed by her garments, but nothing can change their underlying malice…..

The Ath Book Club comments

The Ath Book Club was divided in two groups; those whose opinion was ‘easy to read, observant, well written, wonderful descriptive quality’ and those who described the book ‘depressing, bleak outlook, overdone storyline and pretentious. The Dressmaker describes how some people need to feel superior to cover their own inadequasies or gossip in order to feel belonging to a group. Ham charactises the worst of people.

The Dressmaker is suitable for schools, reading groups and anyone who enjoys good character descriptions with humour.

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Ath book club July 2007

Paul Torday – Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (Rating: 3.5)

Dr. Alfred Jones is a henpecked, slightly pompous middle-aged scientist at the National Centre for Fisheries Excellence in London when he is approached by a mysterious sheikh about an outlandish plan to introduce the sport of salmon fishing into the Yemen. Dr. Jones refuses, but the project, however scientifically absurd, catches the eye of British politicians, who pressure him to work on it. His diaries of the Yemen Salmon Project, from beginning to glorious, tragic end, form the narrative backbone of this novel; interspersed throughout are government memos, e-mails, letters, and interview transcripts that deftly capture the absurdity of bureaucratic dysfunction.
With a wickedly wonderful cast of characters—including a weasel-like spin doctor, a missing soldier and his intrepid fiancée, and Dr. Jones’s own devilish wife—Salmon Fishing in the Yemen is the whimsical story of an unlikely hero who discovers true love, finds himself first a pawn and then a victim of political spin, and learns to believe in the impossible……

 Ath book club comments:

Salmon fishing in the Yemen is “Yes Minister” type of political satire, that feels all too true picture also of today’s politics. Some book club members loved it and some didn’t like it at all. However, all members agreed that the book is about hope and believing in the impossible. Salmon fishing in the Yemen is written like a report mixing different media. Torday excellently depicts the different tones of each character.

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Ath book club September 2007

Kim Edwards - The Memory Keeper’s Daughter  (Rating 3.5)

On a winter night in 1964, Dr. David Henry is forced by a blizzard to deliver his own twins. His son, born first, is perfectly healthy. Yet when his daughter is born, he sees immediately that she has Down’s syndrome. Rationalizing it as a need to protect Norah, his wife, he makes a split second decision that will alter all of their lives forever. He asks his nurse to take the baby away to an institution and never to reveal the secret. But Caroline, the nurse, cannot leave the infant. Instead, she disappears into another city to raise the child herself. So begins this beautifully told story that unfolds over a quarter of a century in which these two families, ignorant of each other, are yet bound by David Henry’s fateful decision that long-ago winter night……

The Ath Book Club Comments

The Memory Keeper’s Daughter is a well written book, compelling and quick reading although disappointing towards the end. This is also a disturbing book for some readers but a good description of people that carry secrets and their effect in relationships. The story is told on several levels and it has some dark moments. There are several moral dilemmas in the story.

The Ath Book Club agreed that The Memory Keeper’s Daughter is an excellent book club book; some of the members loved it, some hated it and many were indifferent. The story starts well with lots of substance but goes on too long as the end is predictable and disappointing.

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Ath book club November 2007

Saskia Noort - The Dinner Club (Rating: 3) 

In a commuter village near Amsterdam, upwardly mobile couples have moved in to live the suburban dream – large houses, ostentatious wealth, room to move, safe streets for the children to play in, a village atmosphere. In reality husbands leave early in the morning, the community is closed and unwelcoming to newcomers, wives feel isolated and the beautiful homes aren’t quite enough. Karen and Marcel were inner-city dwellers, both working on their own creative careers and a very close couple. They thought they had the suburban dream but the reality is that Marcel is spending hours away from home and Karen is increasingly lonely and isolated. Searching for something, Karen finally forms a friendship with 4 other women, they meet regularly in the village, and with their husbands in tow, form “the Dinner Club”…..

The Ath Book Club comments

The Dinner Club is suitable for those who want light entertainment a la Desperate Housewifes. The book is contemporary depicting a group rather shallow people whose happiness is measured by things they own. If the book does have a message it would be ‘be careful what you wish for’ or ‘money doesn’t bring happiness’. There is a plot and that manages to keep the interest up to the end.

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