Loot...and The Dog Who Wouldn't Be

Our October and November titles both touched on what is "truth"?   Should we lie?  Is there such thing as a good lie?As Farley Mowat once said: “I will take any liberty I want with the facts so long as I don’t trespass on the truth.”

LOOT by Jude Watson
We had a great discussion about the book Loot back in October.   The book's main characters are twins -- March and Jules who meet for the first time shortly after the death of their father, Alfie McQuinn, a skilled jewel thief.  They have a rocky start to their relationship and given their upbringing, do not trust each other.  But they do try to avenge their father's death and there are some likeable characters who help out along the way. 

Some book club members were not convinced of the authenticity of the characters -- they seemed like caricatures at times.  Everyone agreed the action was fast-paced but it was difficult to connect with March and Jules on an emotional level because they weren't fully fleshed out.  Where the plot was thin, the book made up for it with laughs and some great Alfie quotes!

We made jewelry as we talked -- paper beads fine enough that they just may have had appeal to a novice jewel thief!  We rolled beautiful patterned paper and discarded books into colourful beads, which we then strung on embroidery thread.  These necklaces do not take much time to make -- and just need a little patience, paper/discarded book pages, a pencil or souvlaki stick and glue or podge -- and some thread!
Some simple directions are here: http://www.wikihow.com/Make-Paper-Beads

THE DOG WHO WOULDN'T BE by Farley Mowat
We watched a short video interview by Sandra Martin of Farley Mowat on The Globe and Mail's website called "In His Own Words: The Life and Times of Farley Mowat".  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/acclaimed-canadian-author-farley-mowat-dead-at-92/article18511064/

This launched a discussion about creative non-fiction versus non-fiction.  Everyone enjoyed the humour in Mowat's The Dog Who Wouldn't Be -- many of us laughed out loud while reading the book.  But as it was supposed to be autobiographical, some of us were compelled to look at the dates given in the book, and to try to figure out how old Farley was at various points, but we realized that he was very loose with the historical timeline!  It all made sense when we watched this interview -- and coming to terms with what Farley deems the truth -- the emotional truth of an event or issue versus the factual truth.

Given the brilliant use of language in the book, we played a word definition game "Balderdash".  We had a lot of fun inventing meanings of words that are rarely used in everyday conversation!  It was fun to try to guess who made which definition up!  There were definitely some patterns based on our interests and tastes...Fun game!  And played with some very fun and creative mothers and daughters!

THE UNDERNEATH by Kathi Appelt is our January title -- we'll be meeting on January 21st, 7 - 8:30 pm.   Set in the Bayou, this Newbery Honor Book tells the story of loyalty and friendship between an old hound dog, a mama cat and her two kittens.  Look forward to discussing the horrible Gar-Face, mean owner of that sweet dog!

If you are looking for reading over the holidays, try one of the 2015 nominees for the Red Maple Award or White Pine Award -- follow the links to the books and borrow them while they are still in the library!  The book we read last spring The Unlikely Hero of Room 13B by Teresa Toten is a White Pine 2015 nominee!! Bravo!

See you in 2015!

Linda