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June Readalong: Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum

At War Through the Generations, Anna and I have chosen to read Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum for our June read-a-long.

We hope you will join us for discussions each Friday starting June 9.

About the book:

For fifty years, Anna Schlemmer has refused to talk about her life in Germany during World War II. Her daughter, Trudy, was only three when she and her mother were liberated by an American soldier and went to live with him in Minnesota. Trudy’s sole evidence of the past is an old photograph: a family portrait showing Anna, Trudy, and a Nazi officer. Trudy, now a professor of German history, begins investigating the past and finally unearths the heartbreaking truth of her mother’s life. Those Who Save Us is a profound exploration of what we endure to survive and the legacy of shame.

Discussions will be held every Friday as follows, and as always, we encourage you to share your thoughts and even pose your own questions.

June 9: Discussion of Prologue – Chapter 15

June 16: Discussion of Chapters 16-29

June 23: Discussion of Chapters 30-45

June 30: Discussion of Chapters 46 – End

We look forward to reading what sounds to be a fantastic book, and hope you will join us!

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

Source: Public Library
Hardcover, 530 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr is a sweeping tale of World War II from the perspective of a German, Werner, and a French blind girl, Marie-Laure. Werner is a smart, young German boy who lives in an orphanage, while Marie-Laure is a young girl who goes blind and lives with her father in Paris. Both have faced some hardships, but both remain hopeful that life can be beautiful. Told from both perspectives as the war takes hold of Europe, Doerr creates a tale that is carefully woven together and tethered to the myth of the Sea of Flames, a diamond that some say is cursed and others say can provide miracles to those who possess it.

Doerr does an excellent job of not only creating characters on both sides of the war with compelling stories, but also ensuring that there is a light of hope in each story to keep readers going. While the subject of WWII has become fodder for a number of novelists, very few will tell the story from the perspective of a young man swept up into the military because he dreams of a better life and learning that he cannot get in the orphanage. Readers will see a well crafted novel full of dynamic characters and symbolism, but they also will see that men and women on both sides of the war are not that different from each other and that the politics of the time is what drove the violence and indecency.

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr won the Pulitzer Prize and for good reason. It’s a must read for those who love historical fiction and are looking for a detailed take on lives on both sides of the war.

RATING: Quatrain

If you missed our read-a-long in March at War Through the Generations, check it out.

Readalong:

Week 1
Week 2
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5
Week 6

New Authors Challenge

Discussion of Ulysses by James Joyce Week #2

Today is the online discussion of Part 2 of James Joyce’s Ulysses, but alas I may have bitten off more than I can chew in the last two months. I’m about 200 pgs. into the book, and I am going to finish it.

For the good news: Ti has finished the entire book! Kudos!

Please check out her Part 2 discussion post here.

Join us anytime today on Twitter and follow and tag with #ulyssesRAL2017

Discussion of Ulysses by James Joyce Week #1

Feel free to sign up here.

As you may have guessed, today’s the day for our Twitter discussion of part one of Ulysses by James Joyce! Part one has three episodes as Ti gathered in her reading and research.

From Wikipedia:

 

Join us anytime today on Twitter and follow and tag with #ulyssesRAL2017

February-March Read-a-Long: Ulysses by James Joyce

I’ve read a great many classics, but Joyce was an author I never read in college. I’m not sure if I just didn’t pick the right classes or my teachers shied away from him. I’m eager to get to my bucket list classics, and Ulysses was at the top of the list, just ahead of Joyce’s Dubliners.

Ti from Book Chatter and I are hosting a read-a-long for James Joyce’s Ulysses Feb. 1, 2017, to March 17, 2017.

This is a big boy at about 800 pages, but we’re going to read it in three parts and discuss via Twitter using #ulyssesRAL2017. We’d love for you to join us!

The second part is the longest, so you’ll have a longer period of time to read that section!

If you’ve read it before, we’d love to have you join the discussion too!

Here’s the informal schedule:

Discussion of part 1 on Feb. 10
Discussion of part 2 on March 10
Discussion of part 3 on March 17

Grab the button and join us Feb. 10 for part one on Twitter #ulyssesRAL2017

Sign-up so we know who to look for: