We are seven handsome and charming* guys who meet at a different restaurant every month or so, having read a book in common, and discuss whatever we want--generally the assigned book, but usually many other timely topics as well. We rotate the responsibility to suggest titles, but the group has the final say. Our book club rules: 1) Anything goes, fiction or nonfiction; 2) paperbacks are preferred; and 3) staying under 300 pages is desirable (N.B., we violate this one all the time). We rate all books and restaurants on a 5-point scale.

* All other adjectives were vetoed.

November 27, 2007

Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis (Heidi's)

We started at a new restaurant, Blackbird. But since they wouldn't seat us until all seven were present, we defected next door to Heidi's, which proved to be a great choice and an apt venue to celebrate our 10th anniversary as a book club. Our book-of-the-month, Babbitt, was universally praised as one of the best we have read. We noted Lewis' masterful evocation of the 1920s and American boosterism as well as the similarities to society today. We chose Cormac McCarthy's All the Pretty Horses as the next book, after considering the Cold War by John Lewis Gaddis and the Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright. Next meeting: February 4.