Voting: September 2005 Book of the Month

[Ice]

Here are the September nominees:

Purple Hibiscus - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

A haunting tale of an Africa and an adolescence undergoing tremendous changes by a talented young Nigerian writer. Fifteen-year-old Kambili's world is circumscribed by the high walls of her family compound and the frangipani trees she can see from her bedroom window. Her wealthy Catholic father, although generous and well-respected in the community, is repressive and fanatically religious at home. Her life is lived under his shadow and regulated by schedules: prayer, sleep, study, and more prayer. She lives in fear of his violence and the words in her textbooks begin to turn to blood in front of her eyes. When Nigeria begins to fall apart under a military coup, Kambili's father, involved in mysterious ways with the unfolding political crisis, sends Kambili and her brother away to their aunt's. The house is noisy and full of laughter. Here she discovers love and a life -- dangerous and heathen -- beyond the confines of her father's authority. The visit will lift the silence from her world and, in time, reveal a terrible, bruising secret at the heart of her family life. This first novel is about the promise of freedom; about the blurred lines between the old gods and the new; between childhood and adulthood; between love and hatred. An extraordinary debut, Purple Hibiscus is a compelling novel which captures both a country and an adolescence at a time of tremendous change.
www.amazon.co.uk

The Pillars Of The Earth - Ken Follett

A story of passion and idealism, which describes a group of men and women in the Middle Ages whose destinies are fatefully linked with the building of a cathedral. In a country torn by civil war, two generations struggle to rise above their primitive circumstances and create something beautiful.
www.amazon.co.uk

253 - Geoff Ryman

A Bakerloo tube train with no-one standing and no empty seats can carry 252 passengers. The driver makes 253. Each one has a page devoted to them, divided into three sections - what they look like, what they are thinking and inside information - and some of them are going to die.
www.amazon.co.uk

OUT - Natsuo Kirino

In the Tokyo suburbs four women work the draining graveyard shift at a boxed-lunch factory. Burdened with chores and heavy debts and isolated from husbands and children, they all secretly dream of a way out of their dead-end lives. A young mother among them finally cracks and strangles her philandering, gambling husband then confesses her crime to Masako, the closest of her colleagues. For reasons of her own, Masako agrees to assist her friend and seeks the help of the other co-workers to dismember and dispose of the body. The body parts are discovered, the police start asking questions, but the women have far more dangerous enemies -a yakuza connected loan shark who discovers their secret and has a business proposition, and a ruthless nightclub owner the police are convinced is guilty of the murder. He has lost everything as a result of their crime and he is out for revenge. Out is a psychologically taut and unflinching foray into the darkest recesses of the human soul, an unsettling reminder that the desperate desire for freedom can make the most ordinary person do the unimaginable.
www.amazon.co.uk

The Innocent - Harlan Coben

Like Harlan Coben's other recent novels of suspense, The Innocent starts in the green suburbs of New Jersey and takes us off into the dark heart of the secrets and lies that often lie at the centre of American life. Matt has rebuilt his life after a brawl that left him serving four years hard time for manslaughter. He has clawed back some of the dreams of his young manhood--in particular, Olivia, the girl he met once, dreamed of and then found again. Now someone is sending him phone images of Olivia, in a blonde wig, with another man... Local cop Loren is trying to find out who smothered a teacher at the local convent, and why the dead nun had breast implants; over-the-hill stripper Kimmy is visited by the daughter of a long-dead friend...
www.amazon.co.uk

Money - Martin Amis

This is the story of John Self, consumer extraordinaire. Rolling around New York and London, he makes deals, spends wildly and does reckless movie-world business, all the while grabbing everything he can to sate his massive appetites: alcohol, tobacco, pills, pornography, a mountain of junk food and more. Ceaselessly inventive and thrillingly savage, this is a tale of life lived without restraint; of money, the terrible things it can do and the disasters it can precipitate.
www.amazon.co.uk

War of the Worlds - H.G. Wells

The night after a shooting star is seen streaking through the sky from Mars, a cylinder is discovered on Horsell Common in London. At first, naive locals approach the cylinder armed just with a white flag only to be quickly killed by an all-destroying heat-ray, as terrifying tentacled invaders emerge. Soon the whole of human civilisation is under threat, as powerful Martians build gigantic killing machines, destroy all in their path with black gas and burning rays, and feast on the warm blood of trapped, still-living human prey. The forces of the Earth, however, may prove harder to beat than they at first appear.
www.amazon.co.uk

The complete collection of fairytales and stories - Hans Christian Andersen

More than 156 of the great Dane's best-loved fairy tales.
www.amazon.co.uk

Cannery Row - John Steinbeck

This is a portrait of people on the margin of society, dependent on one another for both physical and emotional survival. Written in 1945 this book focuses on the acceptance of life as it is: both the exuberance of community and the loneliness of the individual.
www.amazon.co.uk

Candide - Voltaire

This tale begins with the hero, Candide, being expelled from the Westphalian castle of Baron Thunder-ten-tronckh for making love to the Baron's daughter, Cunegonde. So begins a series of disastrous misadventures on a fantastic odyssey for Candide, Cunegonde and Dr Pangloss.
www.amazon.co.uk

[MonkeyCatcher]

I voted for 253 by Geoff Ryman because it sounds the most interesting .

[ions]

Pillars of the Earth by Mr. Follett. I've been eager to read it for a little while now. Now I just have to hope it shows up in the used book store by September.

[Ronny]

I think I'm going to read 253 & Pillars of the Earth, but since I could only vote for one I put in for Pillars since it's been on my TBR list longer

[SFG75]

O.k., unless there is a late surge in participants, it looks as if Follett's book has it. Is there a time line for when to start reading this thing and what not? Sorry for the newbie questions-just clueless here. :o

[Ronny]

You can start reading whenever you like but then it may take awhile for the discussion to start up because some people will start later than others.

[jenn]

i voted pillars too. i've read it 3 times and it's one of my favs. it's a good excuse to read it again.

[pontalba]

Hi! I am new to this very friendly looking forum, and have not yet figured out everythings function yet, but am working on it.

I have read Ken Follett's Pillars of the Earth, but many years ago, so I voted for The War of the Worlds as I've just purchased the newest incarnation of the book with the original broadcast and script.

Pillars is a wonderful book though. Certainly worth a second or even third reading!

[Ell]

The Pillars of the Earth - Ken Follett