One of our favorite authors will be publishing a new book soon, and I wanted to share this interview with fans.  Fredrik Backman wrote A Man Called Ove and My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry--both of which our book group read and loved!  His newest book is Britt-Marie Was Here and continues the story of one of the primary characters in My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry.

We just wrapped up Fredrik Backman's My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry for our February pick.  We had chocolates and Auntie Carlene's cinnamon coffee loaf since I cannot make a decent cinnamon roll.  For most members, the book started off slowly, but once you got past the learning curve about the Land-of-Almost-Awake, the author really drew you into the story.  Overall, it was very favorably reviewed by the group, and we'd love to continue to read more by this author. (We read A Man Called Ove in 2015.)  Backman's particular sense of humor and pathos is endearing but still touches on things that really matter.  Here's a quote I feel conveys this well:

"It's difficult ending a fairy tale.  All tales have to end sometime, of course.  Some can't finish soon enough.  This one, for example, could feasibly have been rounded off and packed away long ago.  The problem is this whole issue of heroes at the ends of fairy tales, and how they are supposed to 'live happily to the end of their days.'  This gets tricky, from a narrative perspective, because the people who reach the end of their days must leave others who have to live out their days without them."

Our next book group will meet on March 28th at 3pm in the Turner Room. This is the Monday after Easter.  We will be discussing the novel, Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng.  Copies of the book are available at the library desk and the discussion sheets are available for pickup or online here.

We had a great start to 2016 with our discussion of our January 25th book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. The book group loved this book for several reasons--it was interesting, it had lots of information but well organized and relevant, and the author's dedication was key to the success of relating this complex subject.  Our refreshments included the famous Baltimore Berger cookies and grapes.

Our next book group meeting will be on Monday, February 29th (Leap Day!) at 3pm in the Turner Room.  Our book is My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry by Fredrik Backman.  Copies of the book are available for pickup at the library desk. The discussion sheets are available online or in the library.  Please join us!

Also--please note that the May 2016 meeting date has been corrected.  The LME Library will be closed on Monday, May 30 so we will be meeting a week earlier on Monday, May 23rd.  Sorry for any confusion!