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April 30, 2006

Fifteenth Meeting - In Cold Blood

Our fifteenth meeting will be held at a member's house near Cambridge on Sunday 30th April, starting at 13:00.

Our book this month is In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

In-Cold-Blood.jpg

On November 15, 1959, in the small town of Holcomb, Kansas, four members of the Clutter family were savagely murdered by blasts from a shotgun held a few inches from their faces. There was no apparent motive for the crime, and there were almost no clues.

As Truman Capote reconstructs the murder and the investigation that led to the capture, trial, and execution of the killers, he generates both mesmerizing suspense and astonishing empathy. In Cold Blood is a work that transcends its moment, yielding poignant insights into the nature of American violence.

This is a true masterpiece of creative nonfiction. The images of this tale continue to resonate in our minds: 16-year-old Nancy Clutter teaching a friend how to bake a cherry pie, Dick Hickock's black '49 Chevrolet sedan, Perry Smith's Gibson guitar and his dreams of gold in a tropical paradise - the blood on the walls and the final "thud-snap" of the rope-broken necks.

"The best documentary account of an American crime ever written... The book chills the blood and exercises the intelligence... harrowing." — The New York Review of Books

Posted by nathan at 01:00 PM | Comments (0)

April 02, 2006

Fourteenth Meeting - The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas

Our early April choice was The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne.

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas

Berlin, 1942 - When Bruno returns home from school one day, he discovers that his belongings are being packed in crates. His father has received a promotion and the family must move from their home to a new house far away, where there is no one to play with, and nothing to do. A tall fence running alongside stretches as far as the eye can see and cuts him off from the strange people he can see in the distance. But Bruno longs to be an explorer and decides that there must be more to this desolate new place than meet the eye. While exploring his new environment, he meets another boy whose life and circumstances are very different to his own, and their meeting results in a friendship that has devastating consequences. (Synopsis from Amazon).

Andrew says, "This, like The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, started off as a Young Adult read, but I can see it becoming a cross-over success. As a relief from our recent long-reads, you'll be glad to know that this book is only around 200-250 pages".

Posted by nathan at 01:00 PM | Comments (0)