Book Club Gone Wild!

I recently read My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult for my book club. A great book, I highly recommend it! It's about a young girl whose older sister has a rare form of lukemia. She was conceived for the sole purpose of donating her umbilical cord blood to her sister for treatment. And as she grew up, she donated platelets and bone marrow. As the book opens, she is now 13 years old and her sister needs a kidney. The chapters switch between narrators so you can hear the voices of the 13 year old, her mother, her father, etc. The voice of the mother was the most gripping for me because her story starts when her oldest daughter is 2 years old and she is first diagnosed with lukemia. As the mother of a 2 year old, I sobbed. My husband can attest to my tears - he found it very amusing, especially since I was only 30 pages into the book.

I should also tell you about my book club. It's called "Book Club Gone Wild." I wasn't part of the book club in the beginning, but here's how the story goes: Originally, the book club was a regular book club, mostly consisting of residents' wives. Within this book club was a group of ladies that tended to be a bit unruly, a bit wild, and not so serious about the books. Their unruliness became a bit of a problem and the group of offenders was asked to leave the book club. So they banded together and started their own book club: Book Club Gone Wild. Reading the book is purely optional; Bringing an appetizer, dessert or alcohol is mandatory. We gather together and eat for about 45 minutes, discuss the book for 15 minutes, and then talk about anything and everything under the sun for another hour or so. Last year it truly was a wild book club. But as some of the original members have moved away, it seems that the mood is starting to be a bit less wild. I didn't actually get to go to book club this month because my child care plans fell through, but I hope I can make it next month. The book is The Mermaid Chair and I hope to pick it up at the library this week.