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Library Reading Groups in Portsmouth

crazywriter — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 06:33:52 CST

Reading has been called the ‘lone voyage’, solitary and private, but for many of us the impulse to share is powerful. We meet every 4 weeks to discuss a shared reading experience, to widen our reading choices and enjoy books together.

There are 8 library based adult reading groups in Portsmouth and the books are supplied by the Library Service.Suggestions of in-print, paperback books are always welcomed.

All members of each group are encouraged, without pressure, to contribute ideas, reactions, to pose questions and give opinions. Anyone is welcome to comment on the books we are currently reading in Portsmouth.

Our Book List

Each reading group member is invited to review the book they are reading for the benefit of other readers around the world. To see a full list of the books we will be enjoying and reviewing, please take a look at our Reading Group book list.

Join us...

If you would like to join one of our reading groups, or would like further information please email libraries@portsmouthcc.gov.uk or call us on 023 9268 8057.

Independent Reading Groups

If you don't want to join a library based group, you are more than welcome to start your own. For help and advice with this, please contact Jenny Bond on 023 9268 8044 or email libraries@portsmouthcc.gov.uk

What are we currently reading?

Group Contact Details	Author and Title	Cover Art
Central Library Daytime Group Wednesdays 10 - 11.30am Contact: Clare Forsyth 023 9268 8044	The unbearable lightness of being
Central Library Evening Group Tuesdays 6.30 - 8pm Contact: Gail Brown 023 9268 8044	A short history of tractors in Ukranian by Marina Lewycka and
Beddow Library Daytime Group Thursdays 10 - 11.30am Contact: Lindy Elliott 023 9268 8058	And when did you last see your father by Blake Morrison
Beddow Library Evening Group Mondays 6.30 - 8pm Contact: Jackie Painting 023 9268 8041	My sister's keeper by Jodi Picoult
Cosham Library Evening Group Thursdays 6.30 - 8pm Contact: Pat Garrett 023 9268 8054	The view from Castle Rock by Alice Munro
John Pounds Library Daytime Group Thursdays 9.45 am -11.15 am Contact: Cheryl Missing 023 9229 7072	Shadow of the wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Elm Grove Library Teenreaders Group Wednesdays 5 - 6pm Contact: Dave Percival 07951 341092	Novels by Kate Cann
Wetherspoon's Reading Group Wednesdays 6.30 - 7.30pm Contact: Dave Percival 07951 341092	The Traitor Game by B R Collins
Kingston Prison Book Group Third Thursday of every month Contact: Wendy-May Jacobs, Prison Librarian, Tel: 023 92688258 This is of necessity a closed group!	The Secret River by Kate Grenville

Reading Group Book List

crazywriter — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 04:08:17 CST

Portsmouth Library Service has over 90 book sets that are available for reading groups in the local area to use and enjoy. To take a closer look at our collection, please use the book title links below. Each page has a synopsis and perhaps reviews from the reading groups themselves.

Our mission is to challenge your comfortable reading choices and our book sets are a mixture of 19th and 20th century classics as well as contemporary novels and narrative non-fiction. Titles are suggested by reading group members and staff, and then the group facilitators decide which books will be best for encouraging debate and discussion. Generally speaking we select mainstream titles in paperback. Quite often they have won, or been shortlisted for an award. We occasionally choose books to tie in with a literary event or author visit.

If you would like to suggest a book you think would make a good reading group selection, please start a thread below.

A prayer Owen Meany by John Irving

A short history of tractors in Ukranian by Marina Lewycka

A town like Alice by Nevil Shute

Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood

And when did you last see your father? by Blake Morrison

Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

Birthdays by Heidi Pitlor

Bitter sweets by Roopa Farooki

Bone people by Keri Hulme

Book of Revelation by Rupert Thomson

Brighton rock by Graham Greene

Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith

Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons

Comrade Jim by Jim Riordan

Daughter of fortune by Isabel Allende

Day by A L Kennedy

Deafening by Frances Itani

Elegance of hedgehog by Muriel Barbery

English harem by Anthony McCarten

English passengers by Matthew Kneale

Family matters by Rohinton Mistry

Fingersmith by Sarah Waters

Fragrant Harbour by John Lanchester

Gardens of water by Alan Drew

Gig by Simon Armitage

Grass is singing by Doris Lessing

Guernica by Dave Boling

Guernsey literary and potato peel society by Helen Shaffer

Happenstance by Carole Shields

Hard way by Lee Child

Hawksmoor by Peter Ackroyd

Heart of the matter by Graham Greene

Highest tide by Jim Lynch

History of love by Nicole Krauss

House on the Strand by Daphne Du Maurier

Howling miller by Arto Paasilinna

I capture the castle by Dodie Smith

If nobody speaks of remarkable things by Jon McGregor

Julius Winsome by Gerard Donovan

Kingdom by the sea by Paul Theroux

Kite runner by Khaled Hosseini

Labyrinth by Kate Mosse

Lightning Keeper by Starling Lawrence

Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle

Love in the time of cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

Me and Emma by Elizabeth Flock

Memoirs of a geisha by Arthur Golden

Miss Garnet's angel by Salley Vickers

Miss Pettigrew lives for a day by Winifred Watson

Moon tiger by Penelope Lively

My sister's keeper by Jodi Picoult

Name of the rose by Umberto Eco

Night Watch by Sarah Waters

Ninth life of Louis Drax by Liz Jensen

Notes on a scandal by Zoe Heller

Number one ladies detective by Alexander McCall Smith

Only boy for me by Gil McNeil

Perfume by Patrick Suskind

Persuasion by Jane Austen

Plain Truth by Jodi Picoult

Portrait of the artist as a young man by James Joyce

Promise of happiness by Justin Cartwright

Reader by Bernard Schlink

Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi

Red tent by Anita Diamant

Regeneration by Pat Barker

Rendezvous and other stories by Daphne Du Maurier

Requiem for the East by Andrei Makine

Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates

Road by Cormac McCarthy

Road Home by Rose Tremain

Rough Music by Patrick Gale

Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay

Saturday by Ian McEwan

Scottsboro by Ellen Feldman

Sea by John Banville

Secret history by Donna Tartt

Secret river by Kate Grenville

Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry

Seventh Sacrament by David Hewson

Shack, The by William P. Young

Shadow dance by Angela Carter

Shadow of the wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Small island by Andrea Levy

Spies by Michael Frayn

Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky

Summer book by Tove Jansson

Super-Cannes by JG Ballard

Suspicions of Mr Whicher by Kate Summerscale

Temples of delight by Barbara Trapido

Tenderness of wolves by Stef Penney

This time of dying by Reina James

Three men in a boat by Jerome K. Jerome

To kill a mockingbird, by Harper Lee

Unbearable lightness of being by Milan Kundera

View from Castle Rock by Alice Munro

Vanishing act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O'Farrell

We need to talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver

What I loved by Siri Hustevedt

Yacoubian building by Alaa Al Aswany

When leaving a review, please be careful not to write a plot spoiler. If this is unavoidable, mention the world 'spoiler' in the subject line.

Miss Pettigrew lives for a day by Winifred Watson

crazywriter — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 09:59:56 CST

Miss Pettigrew, an approaching-middle-age governess, was accustomed to a household of unruly English children.When her employment agency sends her to the wrong address, her life takes an unexpected turn. The alluring nightclub singer, Delysia LaFosse, becomes her new employer, and Miss Pettigrew encounters a kind of glamor that she had only met before at the movies. Over the course of a single day, both women are changed forever.

The Book Case: Book Reviews and more

portsmouthlibraries — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 10:52:56 CST

Who we are

The Book Case is Portsmouth Library Service's website for readers, guiding you through the overwhelming choice of what to read next and inviting you to share your reading experiences through reviews and recommendations.

Please add your comments below and share your book thoughts and suggestions with the rest of the reading community.

Who can contribute and how?

Everyone can contribute to this wiki by leaving comments at the bottom of any page, in order to share your views and thoughts.

However, if you want to get more involved by creating and maintaining new pages for The Book Case, please let us know be clicking on the Join this Wiki button. Sign up, and then click on the Apply to be a Writer button.

If you have a passion for Science Fiction and Fantasy, or if you want to share your love of the Crime genre, you can create your own pages with all the support you need. For further information on the editorial process, please navigate to the So you want to be a writer? page. We look forward to hearing from you!

We would also love to support local creative writers. Sign up and then apply to be a writer if you want the opportunity to share news and views or even work with your readers.

What's new on The Book Case?

Would you like to join a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender reading group in the Portsmouth area? If you would like to join this new group, please contact Clare on 023 9268 8064 or email libraries@portsmouthcc.gov.uk.
Kingston Prison Library reading group have joined us. Read some of their book reviews on The Book Case
The Man Booker prize has been won by Hilary Mantel's 'Wolf Hall' A review of another shortlisted title by one of our members is below.

"The little stranger is set in post-war England. The protagonist, Dr Faraday, is a GP and confirmed bachelor. The centre of his life used to be a grand stately home, Hundreds Hall, where his mother worked as a servant. This estate has now fallen on hard times and the once wealthy family now lives in near poverty, grubbing a living through their farm. The sharp contrast between the family's straitened circumstances and their semi-opulent surroundings (albeit now very much in disrepair) is played out through much of the novel and the reader even manages to feel sorry for them.
Faraday enters their lives again unexpectedly when he's called to attend to a medical call-out there. What he finds is upsetting for him when he bears in mind his rather more glamorous memories of the place. Mrs Ayres, the widowed lady of the house, is well groomed yet deluded, Roddy (the heir to the crumbling estate) suffers from 'nerves' and his sister Caroline is frumpy, sensible and plain with no chance of marrying a catch.
As he inveigles his way into their lives, becoming increasingly indispensable, a ghost story soon emerges. A phantom 'something' is plaguing Roddy, literally driving him mad. Hundreds house is haunted and the family are keen to find an explanation. The ultra-rational Faraday soon becomes an annoyance to the reader as his refusal to accept what's staring him in the face has you screaming in frustration at the pages. The atmosphere is spooky, yet understated. You soon come to understand you can't trust Faraday's narration of events, his assumptions (that you initially accept) are cleverly turned on their head later into the novel when you realise just what a twit he really is.
For fans of Sarah Waters, this book is a treat. It's also an insightful look into a period of social upheaval in Britain."

Browse sections

So far, on this site we have:

Information on prize winning titles to help guide your reading choices
Book news
Book reviews and recommendations. We have book reviews on a theme, plus general suggestions from other readers
Gossip on what library reading groups in Portsmouth are currently reading, including a full list of our past, present and future reading adventures, with reviews
digestivereader's reviews on her page Ladies who lunch
Local author, Mark Radford's page on his latest thriller writing
Details of author visits to Portsmouth Libraries
A link to the teen readers wiki
Useful web links to other decent websites that promote reading exploration
Details on how you can contact us

For a full overview of everything we have to offer, take a look at our sitemap.

Disclaimer

Portsmouth City Council takes no responsibility for the content or security of any external site or third party advertising, whether accessed via this site or otherwise.

Before using this wiki, please read our Conditions of Use.

Reporting Abuse

Portsmouth City Council take your online safety very seriously. If you find any content on this wiki disturbing or inappropriate, or receive a message from somebody that is threatening, abusive or suspicious, please report it immediately to portsmouthlibraries or email libraries@portsmouthcc.gov.uk

For further help and advice, please navigate to the Report Abuse page

Hard way by Lee Child

crazywriter — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 03:17:44 CST

Late at night in a New York cafe, Jack Reacher orders coffee in a cup made of foam, not china. So ha can move at a moment's ntoice. He owns nothing, carries less. He has never met a woman who said no. Or a case he couldn't solve.
But now reacher faces a new case so disturbing that the truth eludes him. He has to sweat the details and work the clues. Doing it the hard way.
Until what started on a busy New York street explodes three thousand miles away, in the sleepy English countryside. With Reacher striding alone in the shadows. Armed and dangerous. (Text taken from back cover of novel).

Contact Us

portsmouthlibraries — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 06:59:49 CDT

Site Administrators: Patricia Garrett, Jackie Painting, Lindy Elliott, Clare Forsyth and Dave Percival

Writers: Martin Cox, Joyce Waghorn, Mark Radford

Portsmouth Library Service
Norrish Central Library
Guildhall Square
Portsmouth
Hampshire
PO1 2DX
United Kingdom

Telephone: +44 (0) 23 9281 9311
Fax: +44 (0) 23 9283 9855

Email: libraries@portsmouthcc.gov.uk

Scottsboro by Ellen Feldman

crazywriter — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 08:43:19 CDT

Alabama, 1931. A posse stops a freight train and arrests nine black youths. Their crime: fighting with white boys. Then two white girls emerge from another freight car, and within seconds the cry of rape goes up. One of the girls sticks to her story. The other changes her tune, again and again. A young journalist, whose only connection to the incident is her overheated social conscience, fights to save the nine youths from the electric chair, redeem the girl who repents her lie, and make amends for her own past.

Stirring racism, sexism, and anti-Semitism into an explosive brew, Scottsboro is a novel of a shocking injustice that reverberated around the world.

'A fine novel . . . Anyone who wants to appreciate the scale of the miracle that a black man has been elected president of the United States should sit down with Scottsboro' Lionel Shriver (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk)

Gardens of water by Alan Drew

crazywriter — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 08:40:33 CDT

Turkey, 1999. A devastating earthquake brings Istanbul crumbling to the ground, ripping apart the fragile stability of Sinan's world. His family home becomes a makeshift tent in a camp run by Western missionaries whom he stubbornly distrusts, and he soon finds himself struggling to protect his family's honour and values. As he becomes a helpless witness to his daughter's dangerous infatuation with a young American, Sinan takes a series of drastic decisions with unforeseeable consequences. Cultures clash, political and religious tensions mount, and Sinan's actions spiral into a powerful and heartbreaking conclusion. (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk).

Elegance of the hedgehog by Muriel Barbery

crazywriter — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 08:36:14 CDT

Renee is the concierge of a grand Parisian apartment building, home to members of the great and the good. Over the years she has maintained her carefully constructed persona as someone reliable but totally uncultivated, in keeping, she feels, with society s expectations of what a concierge should be. But beneath this façade lies the real Renée: passionate about culture and the arts, and more knowledgeable in many ways than her employers with their outwardly successful but emotionally void lives. Down in her lodge, apart from weekly visits by her one friend Manuela, Renée lives resigned to her lonely lot with only her cat for company. Meanwhile, several floors up, twelve-year-old Paloma Josse is determined to avoid the pampered and vacuous future laid out for her, and decides to end her life on her thirteenth birthday. But unknown to them both, the sudden death of one of their privileged neighbours will dramatically alter their lives forever. (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk)

Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay

crazywriter — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 08:15:50 CDT

Paris, July 1942: Sarah, a ten year-old Jewish girl, is arrested by the French police in the middle of the night, along with her mother and father. Desperate to protect her younger brother, she locks him in a cupboard and promises to come back for him as soon as she can.

Paris, May 2002: Julia Jarmond, an American journalist, is asked to write about the 60th anniversary of the Vel’ d’Hiv’—the infamous day in 1942 when French police rounded up thousands of Jewish men, women and children, in order to send them to concentration camps. Sarah's Key is the poignant story of two families, forever linked and haunted by one of the darkest days in France’s past. In this emotionally intense, page-turning novel, Tatiana de Rosnay reveals the guilt brought on by long-buried secrets and the damage that the truth can inflict when they finally come unravelled. (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk)

Comrade Jim by Jim Riordan

crazywriter — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 06:58:23 CDT

The true and remarkable story of the English double agent who ended up playing for Spartak Moscow. Like many working class children growing up in the war, the young Jim Riordan would fantasise his way out of his devastated surroundings with dreams of Wembley and FA Cup glory for his local team, Portsmouth FC. Spartak Moscow, the team he would end up playing for, wasn't even on his radar. Taught Russian and trained as a spy in the same institution that nurtured the likes of Alan Bennett and Michael Frayn, he was posted to Berlin as part of his National Service to listen in on Soviet military communiques. But, unbeknownst to his seniors, he began mixing with Russian servicemen, mostly through informal kick-abouts, and the passion of these idealistic young men would cultivate his interest in Russian culture, and especially communism, until it blossomed into a full-grown love affair. From the shambolic outfit that was the British Communist Party in the 1950s, to Cold War Moscow at its coldest, to his friendship with the Cambridge Five and meetings with Brezhnev and Gregarin, and his eventual debut in front of 50,000 Spartak fans at the Lenin Stadium, 'Comrade Jim' is the remarkable true story of the only Englishman to have played -- and survived -- Russian league football, told with grace, humour and lashings of vodka. An incredible journey of an ordinary man living through extraordinary times. (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk).

Gig: The life and times of a rock star fantasist by Simon Armitage

crazywriter — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 06:28:49 CDT

A poet is a rock star without the sex’n’drugs, or the rock’n’roll. But that never stopped Simon Armitage dreaming, and in Gig, he explores how music and the muse intertwine in work and in life. Crammed with stories, anecdotes, jokes, absurdities, the odd informal homily, pitfalls and pratfalls (not all the author’s own), Yorkshire life and death, Gig is about the dream and reality of what you are, and what you might have been. (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk)

Plain Truth by Jodi Picoult

crazywriter — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 05:48:21 CDT

The discovery of a dead infant in an Amish barn shakes Lancaster County to its core. But the police investigation leads to a more shocking disclosure: circumstantial evidence suggests that eighteen-year-old Katie Fisher, an unmarried Amish woman believed to be the newborn's mother, took the child's life.
When Ellie Hathaway, a disillusioned big city attorney, comes to Paradise, Pennsylvania, to defend Katie, two cultures collide and, for the first time in her high profile career, Ellie faces a system of justice very different from her own. Delving deep into the world of those who live 'plain', Ellie must find a way to reach Katie on her terms.
As she unravels a tangled murder case, Ellie also looks deep within to confront her own fears and desires when a man from her past comes back into her life. (Text taken from Amzon.co.uk)

General Book Reviews

portsmouthlibraries — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 05:55:29 CDT

This page is all about you and the books that you love. If you want to suggest a fabulous read to other book lovers around the world here's the place to shout about it.

You can review your book by leaving a comment below. Please be careful not to write a plot spoiler. If this is unavoidable, mention the word 'spoiler' in the subject line.

Books reviewed so far

Man Booker Prize for Fiction

portsmouthlibraries — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 05:45:58 CDT

The 2009 Man Booker Prize shortlist has been announced with the winner receiving their award in October. The 2008 winner was 'The White Tiger' by debut novelist Aravind Adiga.

The Man Booker prize is an award for the very best fiction book of the year. It is now in its thirty ninth year. The prize aims to reward the the best novel of the year written by a citizen of the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland.

Take a look at the 2009 shortlist, which includes new and more well known authors. Perhaps you've read one of the books and would like to let others know what you thought about it. Or perhaps you are looking for inspiration on what to read next.

Title	Cover
The children's book by A S Byatt
Summertime by J M Coetzee
The quickening maze by Adam Foulds
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
The glass room by Simon Mawer
The little stranger by Sarah Waters

View from Castle Rock by Alice Munro

crazywriter — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 11:46:17 CDT

On a clear day, you could see 'America' from Edinburgh's Castle Rock - or so said Alice Munro's great-great-great-grandfather, James Laidlaw, when he had drink taken. Then, in 1818, Laidlaw left the parish of 'no advantages', of banked Presbyterian emotions and uncanny tales - where, like his more famous cousin James Hogg, he was born and bred - and sailed to the new world with his family. This is the story of those shepherds from the Ettrick Valley and their descendants, among them the author herself. They were a Spartan lot, who kept to themselves; showing off was frowned on, and fear was commonplace, at least for females ...But opportunities present themselves for two strong-minded women in a ship's close quarters; a father dies, and a baby vanishes en route from Illinois to Canada; another story hints at incest; childhood is short and hazardous. This is family history where imperfect recollections blur into fiction, where the past shows through the present like the tracks of a glacier on a geological map. First love flowers under an apple tree while lust rears its head in a barn; a restless mother with ideas beyond her station declines painfully; a father farms fox fur and turkeys; a clever girl escapes to college and then into a hasty marriage. Beneath the ordinary landscape there's a different story - evocative, frightening, sexy, unexpected, gripping. Alice Munro tells it like no other. (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk).

Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry

crazywriter — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 11:36:14 CDT

Nearing her one-hundredth birthday, Roseanne McNulty faces an uncertain future, as the Roscommon Regional Mental hospital where she's spent the best part of her adult life prepares for closure. Over the weeks leading up to this upheaval, she talks often with her psychiatrist Dr. Grene, and their relationship intensifies and complicates. Told through their respective journals, the story that emerges is at once shocking and deeply beautiful. Refracted through the haze of memory and retelling, Roseanne's story becomes an alternative, secret history of Ireland's changing character and the story of a life blighted by terrible mistreatment and ignorance, and yet marked still by love and passion and hope. (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk).

Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates

crazywriter — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 11:28:34 CDT

Originally published in 1961 to great critical acclaim, Richard Yates's Revolutionary Road subsequently fell into obscurity in the UK, only to be rediscovered in a new edition published in 2001. Its rejuvenation is due in large part to its continuing emotional and moral resonance for an early 21st-century readership. April and Frank Wheeler are a young, ostensibly thriving couple living with their two children in a prosperous Connecticut suburb in the mid-1950s. However, like the characters in John Updike's similarly themed Couples, the self-assured exterior masks a creeping frustration at their inability to feel fulfilled or happy in their relationships or careers. Frank is mired in a well-paid but boring office job and April is a housewife still mourning the demise of her hoped-for acting career. Determined to identify themselves as superior to the mediocre sprawl of suburbanites who surround them, they decide to move to France where they will be better able to develop their true artistic sensibilities, free of the consumerist demands of capitalist America. However, as their relationship deteriorates into an endless cycle of squabbling, jealousy and recriminations, their trip and their dreams of self-fulfilment are thrown into jeopardy. Yates's incisive, moving and often very funny prose weaves a tale that is at once a fascinating period piece and a prescient anticipation of the way we live now. (Text taken from Amazon.co.uk).

Films Of Books

crazywriter — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 10:24:37 CDT

Welcome to the Films Of Books page! This page is dedicated to discussing films that are based on or have been inspired by books.
Here you can talk about whether you preferred the book to the film or vice versa, what you liked about the film version, whether you think the actors understood the characters you read, forthcoming film releases of favourite books and any other topics that you may wish. You can even use this page to talk about books you think should be made into films...

Shack, The by William P.Young

crazywriter — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 09:56:38 CDT

Mackenzie Allen Philips' youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation and evidence that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four years later in the midst of his great sadness, Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting him back to that shack for a weekend.
Against his better judgement he arrives at the shack on a wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare. What he finds there will change Mack's world forever.(Text taken from Amazon.co.uk).