The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Classic City Readers April Selection:
Title: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Author: Douglas Adams
Year Published: 1979
Place on the top 100: 72
Awards Won:

From amazon.com: Join Douglas Adams's hapless hero Arthur Dent as he travels the galaxy with his intrepid pal Ford Prefect, getting into horrible messes and generally wreaking hilarious havoc. Dent is grabbed from Earth moments before a cosmic construction team obliterates the planet to build a freeway. You'll never read funnier science fiction; Adams is a master of intelligent satire, barbed wit, and comedic dialogue. The Hitchhiker's Guide is rich in comedic detail and thought-provoking situations and stands up to multiple reads. Required reading for science fiction fans, this book (and its follow-ups) is also sure to please fans of Monty Python, Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, and British sitcoms.


Discussion Leader: Jenika
Host: Liz
Meeting: Friday, May 29 @ 7pm

Three Cups of Tea

Classic City Readers April Selection:
Title: Three Cups of Tea
Author: Greg Mortenson
Year Published: 2006
Place on the top 100: "Our Choice" book
Awards Won: Includes Time Magazine Asia Book of The Year, People Magazine – Critics Choice, and Publisher’s Weekly – Starred Review.

The book describes Mortenson's transition from a mountain-climber to a humanitarian committed to reducing poverty and educating girls in Pakistan and Afghanistan. He did this by co-founding the "Central Asia Institute," which has built over 78 schools in the most remote areas of the countries

Discussion Meeting: Friday, April 24, 2009 @ 7pm
Host: Anna
Discussion Leader: Leasa

Publishing Meeting Results for April-July 2009

At our March meeting we decided that from now on, we will choose 3 books from the Top 100 list, and 1 book not on the list but that we believe should be/will become a classic. Here are the books we chose:

April: Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortenson ("our choice" book)
Discussion Leader: Leasa
Host: Anna
Meeting: Friday, April 24 @ 7pm

May: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
Discussion Leader: Jenika
Host: Liz
Meeting: Friday, May 29 @ 7pm

June: Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe
Discussion Leader: Anna
Host: Leasa
Meeting: Friday, June 19 @ 7pm

July: Sophie's Choice, by William Styron
Discussion Leader: Megan
Host: Nayely
Meeting: Friday, July 31 @ 7pm

Of Mice and Men

Classic City Readers March Selection:
Title: Of Mice and Men
Author: John Steinbeck
Year Published: 1937
Place on the top 100: 12
Awards Won: It was chosen as an official 'Book of the Month Club' title before it was even published; number 4 on the list of Most Challenged Books of 21st Century.

Two migrant field workers in California's Salinas Valley during the Great Depression—George Milton, an intelligent and cynical man, and Lennie Small, an ironically-named man of large stature and immense strength but limited mental abilities—come to a ranch near Soledad southeast of Salinas, California to "work up a stake." They hope to one day attain their shared dream of settling down on their own piece of land. Lennie's part of the dream, which he never tires of hearing George describe, is merely to tend to (and touch) soft rabbits on the farm. George protects Lennie at the beginning by telling him that if Lennie gets into trouble George won't let him "tend them rabbits." They are fleeing from their previous employment in Weed where they were run out of town after Lennie's love of stroking soft things resulted in an accusation of attempted rape when he touched a young woman's dress.

Discussion Meeting: Friday, March 20, 2009 @ 5:30pm
Host: Jenika
Discussion Leader: Nayely

Lady Chatterley's Lover

Classic City Readers February Selection:
Title: Lady Chatterley's Lover
Author: D.H. Lawrence
Year Published: 1928
Place on the top 100: 48
Awards Won:

The story concerns a young married woman, Constance (Lady Chatterley), whose upper-class husband, Clifford Chatterley, has been paralysed and rendered impotent. Her sexual frustration leads her into an affair with the gamekeeper, Oliver Mellors. This novel is about Constance's realisation that she cannot live with the mind alone; she must also be alive physically.


Discussion Meeting: Friday, February 27, 2009 @ 7:30pm
Host: Megan
Discussion Leader: Leasa

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

Classic City Readers January Selection:
Title: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Author: Ken Kesey
Year Published: 1962
Place on the top 100: 28
Awards Won: Included in the list of TIME Magazine's 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is set in an Oregon asylum, and serves as a study of the institutional process and the human mind. It was a direct product of Kesey's time working the graveyard shift as an orderly at a mental health facility in Menlo Park, California. Not only did he speak to the patients and witness the workings of the institution, he received electroconvulsive therapy and took psychoactive drugs (notably LSD, psilocybin, mescaline and DMT). From this, he became sympathetic toward the patients and from then on garnered enough information to write a book about mental illness and psychiatric health care and not be locked up himself.


Discussion Meeting: Friday, January 30, 2009 @ 7:30pm
Host: Cecilia
Discussion Leader: Liz

**Discussion notes coming soon!**

Lord of the Flies

Classic City Readers December Selection:
Title: Lord of the Flies
Author: William Golding
Year Published: 1954
Place on the top 100: 8
Awards Won: 1983 Nobel Prize in Literature



A plane crashes on a desert island. The only survivors are a group of British schoolboys. At first they revel in the freedom and celebrate the absence of grown-ups. Soon though, as the boys' fragile sense of order begins to collapse, their fears start to take on a sinister, primitive significance. Suddenly, the world of cricket, homework and adventure stories seems a long way away. The boys are faced with a more pressing reality — survival — and the appearance of a terrifying beast who haunts their dreams.

Discussion Meeting: Friday, December 12, 2008 @ 7:30pm
Host: Daniela
Discussion Leader: Lynda