This book was on the shortlist for the Man Booker Prize, which is always a great source for providing exciting and often challenging works to deliberate.
We are all Completely Beside Ourselves is a difficult book to talk or write about without making the 'big reveal' which occurs around page 72. Once you are 'in the know', the book takes on a different perspective and indeed subject matter. The author's approach is very clever, because based on the cover blurb you think you are exploring the relationships of your typical dysfunctional family but there is much more tackled in Karen Fowler's work. I'm not going to say much else about the book, except that the group talked about it, moved onto other topics but kept coming back to We are all Completely Beside Ourselves. Of course, our meetings aren't always linear in approach but it was difficult to park the conversation and move on - it was a thought provoking book.
Did it deserve its place on the Man Booker Prize shortlist? The prize is described as a literary prize awarded for the best original novel, written in the English language and publishing in the UK. To me the key word is 'original' and yes, Fowler has written an original piece of work.
Other books that we discussed:
Beloved by Toni Morrison
The Village by David Mamet
The Cazalet Chronicle by Elizabeth Jane Howard
The Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline
Influenced by one of the group's course reading, we talked about Maya Angelou and Toni Morrison, which led us to think about racism as a theme for the next title. Which is how we've ended up with Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet as the book for March.
Next time:
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
11th March 2015
