The Queen's Gambit: Book Club Pick

The first rule of our book club is that you don't have to read the book to come to meetings. Our book club is more about the people than the pages. But, if you do read the book, you should certainly endeavor to read the right book. 

And I failed, by picking up Queen's Gambit by Elizabeth Freemantle, instead of the Walter Tevis novel. My first thought was "this is awful! when do they start playing chess?!" 

In my defense, I was on painkillers for a back injury at the time, and had the good sense to find the proper title before I got too deep into what is apparently a very popular book about the women who survived Henry VIII. 

< whoops

The Queen's Gambit

I don't have Netflix (and I don't even use a friend's password, not that I haven't been offered, wink, wink) and I really like books with pages, so I got to enjoy Walter Tevis's writing in my head. 

The author of The Hustler and The Color of Money was an English Lit professor at Ohio University before he died in 1984. So, he didn't get to find out just how much the world would love his story about a little girl who rocked the world of chess. 

And clearly, it spoke to folks. Chess sets flew off shelves during the pandemic. (Hopefully assorted combinations of Librium and cheap burgundy didn't become quite as popular.)

Spoiler Alert and Book Club Questions 

For what it's worth, The Queen's Gambit is fiction through and through, but as a good writer, Tevis was a stickler for accuracy in the (lengthy, well-paced) chess sequences - even though he was not a chess player.  (Pool was his game.)

For the record, girls can play chess. Vera Menchik, born in the USSR, moved to the UK and became the first women's World Champion in 1927. Coincidence? Maybe. Tevis's heroine was born in the USA. 

More Trivial Pursuit: 

• Although much of the story takes place in Kentucky, no sequences in the Netflix series were filmed in the state. Most scenes from the TV series were filmed in Germany.
• Mt. Sterling, KY, is a real town near Lexington and Hope Hill Youth Services, an organization that facilitates foster-to-adoption placements, has a facility there. Coincidence? Probably not. 
• Benny's character was probably based on Bobby Fischer. 

Speaking of Benny, was he a love interest, or just crazy about chess? Brief sex scenes aside, I couldn't make up my mind. 

And while I thoroughly enjoyed the book, I didn't see a lot of change from most of the characters. Jolene was a tough chick when we met her; I had no doubt she was going places. Mrs. Wheatley didn't seem to change - sadly, I hoped she'd grown a spine when her husband left, and she didn't really. On the other hand, she didn't completely fall apart, so there's that. And Mr. Wheatley didn't change either, other than becoming a bigger jerk. 

Mr. Shaibel -- gosh, I liked him. 

Of course I didn't like the ending -  almost never do - but I wonder, was the Netflix conclusion more satisfying? 

Next Up and Etc.

Our next club pick is Maybe I Should Talk to Someone. 

On a recent short vacation, I read Hope Never Dies. It was campy, campy, campy! Is there a word that means over-the-top campy? Because that's the word I should use. Also, I enjoyed the posthumously-published Michael Creighton title Dinosaur Teeth. Like The Queen's Gambit, it was fiction, but with a smattering of accurate, truthy details that kept me thinking, did this really happen?

~~~Til next time, reading friends ~~ 

Good Book Group Reading 2021

 WOW, it's been almost a year since our first book club meeting and we've had some fun and read some books. (Catch up on our 2020 titles here.) 

Book Club During Quarantine? Great Idea! 

Braver Than You Think helped us quench our mutual desire to travel, I think. I mean, sure she went all over and had great adventures, but she stayed in a lot of places without showers, so, you know, staying home in quarantine at least meant we had hot water most of the time. 

We also found out it's hard to get people together (there are 12 members in our group; that's a lot of schedules to coordinate!) and especially so when we decided that meeting outside was the best bet - and baby, it gets cold outside. We had a couple of "walky-talkies" where we met for short hikes, followed by hot beverages. I bought a new thermos for the occasion. It was totally worth it to see my friends, even if we could see our breath outside, too. 

Ann Patchett's The Dutch House was one of our last titles of 2020, as we decided to have a white elephant gift exchange instead of trying to schedule a meeting during the holidays. 

2021, Here We Come

So we took a page off Barack Obama's shelf, sort of, by grabbing Deacon King Kong from the former POTUS's list of "best" books of 2020, and, um, suffice to say we don't all share Mr. O's taste in novels. Lots of characters is one thing, lots of characters with lots and lots of nicknames is too much for my brain to keep straight. That said, boy did I love some of the author's dialog. 

Quotes from Deacon King Kong

"Your cheese done slid off your cracker." -- Hot Sausage, to Sportcoat, the almost-always inebriated main character, when Sport is making some (more) poor decisions. 

"Fibbling and twiddling" -- one way to waste time

And the more philosophical: 

"That's the thing when you get out and you're still breathing. Every day is a brand new world." -- The Elephant, but it could've easily been attributed to (Officer) Potts. 

Sex & Drugs & Rock n' Roll

Who doesn't love a little dose of lighthearted fiction focused on self-absorbed rock stars? Daisy Jones and the Six was a fun read, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. A Fleetwood Mac groupie card is not required to enjoy this one. 

What's Next? 

We have a few ideas, but if you want to share what you and your book club are reading this year, we'd love to hear from you.