Poughkeepsie Book Club Forums

Nominations time!

Since this is for our October book club, let's aim for a spooky Halloween theme for this book.

The crucial pieces of information we want are:

1. Title and Author
2. Description
3. Length
4. Hardcover only?
5. Top Amazon review value and average review value
6. Availability in local libraries


Also, to try to select books that are more appropriate to the book club, we could use information such as:

* Availability of discussion guides
* Existence of other book clubs that read the book
* The title appears on college reading lists


These new items are aimed at trying to get books that lend themselves to discussion. If we all read the greatest book in the world but it's so straightforward that the only thing we can think to say about it at the meeting is that we all agree it's the greatest book in the world, that's rather lame. We would just like to put the "book" back in "Book Club" a bit.

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War
Max Brooks

352 pages, available in paperback

library has about 20 copies - some checked out but lots available

top review 5 out of 5 stars, average review is 4.5 stars

Brooks, the author of the determinedly straight-faced parody The Zombie Survival Guide (2003), returns in all seriousness to the zombie theme for his second outing, a future history in the style of Theodore Judson's Fitzpatrick's War. Brooks tells the story of the world's desperate battle against the zombie threat with a series of first-person accounts "as told to the author" by various characters around the world. A Chinese doctor encounters one of the earliest zombie cases at a time when the Chinese government is ruthlessly suppressing any information about the outbreak that will soon spread across the globe. The tale then follows the outbreak via testimony of smugglers, intelligence officials, military personnel and many others who struggle to defeat the zombie menace. Despite its implausible premise and choppy delivery, the novel is surprisingly hard to put down. The subtle, and not so subtle, jabs at various contemporary politicians and policies are an added bonus. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

_________________
Daniela - or the cat lady of New Paltz

Surprise, surprise, "World War Z" wins! Just in time for Halloween.

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-Stephanie

"If I'm going to have delusions, I may as well go for the really satisfying ones."