Suggestions and poll for May-August 2008

[Elspeth]

Well, you don't have to join every group. This isn't a closed club that requires the members to read every book on the list. Some of the books will be older ones that can be bought second-hand or paperback, and you might find you aren't interested in all the books and won't want to take part in every discussion. Course, it'd be nice if people did join in as many of the discussions as possible, and I'm sure the group environment will make it pleasanter to read some books you might not otherwise have thought of reading. But there's no pressure one way or the other - it's entirely up to individual members whether they want to participate in any of the groups.

Also, the plan at the moment is to leave the threads open for further discussion after the book reading is over, so if you read the book later you're welcome to come along and post your opinions, and it might get the conversation started again.

[Russophile]

So did we decide on which book we were going to read for April? I have a Border's 30% off coupon burning a hole in my in-box!
(I was on vacation all last week so I think I missed something!)

[candygirl_68]

i would love to know too, because i surely will need to order it...

[Elspeth]

You ladies need to read the newsletter....

We're starting in May to give everyone a chance to get things up and running, and the May book will be King, Kaiser, Tsar. I think the June book will be the Princess Margaret biography, but that isn't set in rock yet.

[fee]

It would be rather helpful if we could get the list of books quite early. Sometimes shipping and handling takes forever. Actually most books that I order (Amazon market place, can't afford to break the bank with all those new editions) take an average of 4-6 weeks to arrive at my doorstep. (an occasional customs interest not counted in which case it virtually takes forever...) And then I have to read it... So six weeks in advance is not that much if you come to think of it.
And I soooooo very much love the idea to participate in a book club, I am looking very much forward to it....

[Elspeth]

Glad you're looking forward! This is something of an experiment, so don't be surprised if you see a few changes while we're trying to get things sorted.

Good point about book availability. We're trying to arrange the books for each period so the harder-to-find books are later in the list. The book for May is available either new or second-hand from Amazon, but the other books tentatively in the list for May through August might be a bit harder to find, which is why we put the easy one up first. We're tentatively scheduling the Princess Margaret book for June (Empress will have a full list in a short while); that book apparently can take several weeks to order from Amazon.com but is available for immediate shipment from Amazon.co.uk, and of course Amazon, half.com, and eBay, as well as sellers like abebooks and alibris, are good sources for second-hand books. We'll try to add suggestions for where to find the books if there look to be any problems.

As far as reading it - we hope you'll read it during the month it's scheduled for reading. Of course, it's fine if you want to read it beforehand and then reread it along with the group, but reading ahead of time isn't necessary.

[candygirl_68]

thanks for the link Elspeth! i didn't know it was in the newsletters...

[Elspeth]

Oh, you'd be surprised what you can find in the newsletter....

[HRH Kerry]

Just ordered my book from Amazon and I should get it by Thursday. Looking forward to the read and discussions.

[LadyCat]

I have also just ordered King Kaiser Tzar and it will arrive Monday or Tuesday of next week. If the book about Princess Margaret by Tim Heald is next on the list please give us a lot of notice - it takes about a month and a half for that one to arrive.

Thanks,
Cat

[Elspeth]

That will be our June book, but you might want to look into getting it from Amazon.co.uk, where it'll probably ship faster.

[Russophile]

Crap! The only one available at my Barnes and Noble is the hard bound they have to ship. The paperback isn't available until June 24!
I might have to take a trip to Powells!!

[norwegianne]

Originally Posted by Russophile

Crap! The only one available at my Barnes and Noble is the hard bound they have to ship. The paperback isn't available until June 24!
I might have to take a trip to Powells!!

Unless you are dedicated to owning the copy, you might consider checking out the public library and see if they have it, or can reserve it for you via inter-library loan. And then maybe buy the paperback if you want it in your permanent collection? Personally, I am going that route - because I want to participate in the discussion, but would rather have the paperback on my shelves in the long run.

[LadyCat]

I have the first two books on the way - I managed to find the Princess Margaret book used for less than $20 (including shipping) and it should arrive by month's end. Hopefully the "excellent" condition stated proves to be true. I've never bought used bocks on line before so this is unchartered waters for me.

I am curious to see what the 3rd book will be since we currently have a four-way tie. Lots of time yet for that tie to be broken I suppose.

Cat

[Elspeth]

We've got the list of books for May-August in this thread. I think some more votes came in after we'd made the decision based on the earlier votes. Also, one reason for this selection was that, in order to limit the number of suggested books to something workable, we're going to specify two or three topics for each six-month period and ask for book suggestions to stick to those topics. It so happens that some of the most popular books in this poll fell quite neatly into two topics, since there are two biographies of modern princesses (or unhappy princesses) and two books about royalty in the first world war.

Now that this set of books have been chosen, the poll is closed.

Sometime in the next couple of months, we'll be coming up some topics for the September - December books and asking for suggestions.

[candygirl_68]

the book club is one of the best ideas the admins ever had!

[Elspeth]

The admins didn't have this idea; it was ysbel's idea based on a conversation in the British forum with some members who were interested in a group read of a couple of books.

So you have ysbel to thank for this!

[HRH Kerry]

I received my book yesterday. I've only leafed through the pages to look at the pictures. I'll probably start reading next week.

[jcbcode99]

Mine is on order! I'm looking forward to the discussions we will have

[Avicenna]

Aristocracy and the Modern World by Ellis Wasson

A study of the traditional European ruling classe during the last two centuries ... the description of Amazon sounds interesting ... and it is easily available, not too expensive.