November and December

There were just four of us in November and not one of us had finished the book. Why? Were we all just being slackers? Were we all just swamped with our lives and had not time to read? Some of both, I suspect, but primarily it was because Stacy Schiff's The Witches is one slow (ok, very, very slow) read. The long list of characters at the beginning should be a good clue that this one's going to be trouble to keep up with but all of us agreed that Schiff had put together her research in such a way that it made it even more difficult to wade through. Linda had tried listening to the audiobook and felt like she got more out of it that way. Lisa has since finished the book by going the audiobook route and agrees that the narrator does a terrific job of making the book feel more interesting and alive.

We spent some time talking about what had really caused all of the trouble that lead to a community killing so many people and we were all amazed that so few people even voiced the notion that a group of teenaged girls might be lying. The idea that so many people could get sucked into the frenzy, and the ways that it was impossible to disagree with the consensus because they always had a response that invalidated contradictory ideas, were of interest to us. Ultimately, we all found the book interesting but wish it had been less muddled, formatted differently, so that it was a more enjoyable reading experience. We would not recommend this book for book clubs unless your book club is looking for a real challenge.

It was our first time meeting at Nancy's house and she outdid herself with delicious food and drink, even finding ways to tie in all of the goodies to the book.

In December we talked about The Wife, The Maid, and the Mistress. For about fifteen minutes total. It wasn't because those of us who had read the book didn't enjoy it; we did. But we had a bigger group and about half of us hadn't read the book. Makes it tough to keep on subject. Also, because there were members we hadn't seen in a while, we got off track catching up. We had a visitor and we're not sure yet if we scared her off our not!

Those of us who did read the book, felt like Ariel Lawhon had done a great job of immersing readers in the time and setting of the book. Because the book moves back and forth in time and place, when, in the end, Lawhon reveals that the wife, the maid, and the mistress might have been in cahoots, so to speak, it was hard for us to figure out how and when, exactly, that fit into everything else. Lisa was excited to find Shelby, Iowa show up in the book; Shelby is the very small town in Iowa where her mom grew up. Always a good way to help a reader connect to a book. We would recommend this book for book clubs, especially if your members will read the books!