What We Thought: The Memory of Running

Combined Book Club Potluck!

This evening’s Book Club meeting began with a hot and cold dish supper enjoyed by everyone.  Afternoon and Evening Book Club members look forward to the biennial event show casing tasty treats including vegetarian casseroles and home style favorites of chicken, spicy sausage and other tempting ingredients.

After dinner the group moved from the Community Room to the Library’s  front room for desserts; decorated cake, trifle, cookies, and even chocolates and a discussion of author Ron McLarty’s The Memory of Running. This book evoked strong reactions and opinions about family issues and the treatment of psychiatric disorders during the past fifty years.

 

All agreed that the author wrote a beautiful story about difficult subjects. There was enough humor to lighten up the overall sadness of the character’s lives. Familiar locations in Rhode Island enhanced the background of events as the characters moved through the highs and lows of life.

The story revolved around family and the love and devotion of parents and children as well as goodness radiating from all of them. The Memory of Running is a story of hope and resilience that exists throughout experience despite life’s trials.

This quote from one of the group inspired Book Club members and was a fitting conclusion to the evening’s program, “In a dog-eat-dog world Smithy wore Milk-Bone underwear.”

This Month's Selection: The Memory of Running by Ron McLarty

This month is the special Combined Book Club Potluck meeting, when Evening Readers and Afternoon Readers get together for supper and conversation. The Combined Book Club Potluck is Tuesday, August 20, at 6:00 p.m.

 

Bring a dish to share that night, or join us on the blog the next day!

 

This month's selection is The Memory of Running by Ron McLarty. Here's what some reviewers have said about this debut novel:

 

"Smithy is an American original, worthy of a place on the shelf just below your Hucks, your Holdens, your Yossarians." —Stephen King
"Endearing . . . it’s a ride worth taking." —USA Today
"In The Memory of Running, professional actor and long aspiring novelist Ron McLarty has invented a character so fully and elegantly defined that the book soars with originality and life." —San Francisco Chronicle
"Captivating . . . McLarty unspools passage after passage of devastating grace and melancholy, and his taciturn hero hooks himself to your heart." —Entertainment Weekly
"Riders who hop onto the back of Smithy Ide's bike and ride America with him will cherish the journey. I loved this sad, funny, life-affirming novel." —Wally Lamb

 

Click here to read an excerpt from The Memory of Running.

 

What We Thought: Rules of Civility by Amor Towles

The evening’s discussion of Rules of Civility by Amor Towles was highlighted with a lovely assortment of refreshments tied to the theme of 1930s-era entertaining. Members served themselves from an overflowing bowl of non-alcoholic mint green punch reminiscent of gin drinks which the characters drank liberally throughout the book. Cookies and bar nuts accompanied drinks and put everyone in a jolly mood.

 

After much discussion it was decided that the book more or less accurately presented the time period of the 1930s and the effects of the Great Depression on different levels of social classes. Choices made by the characters and results affecting them were a major theme. The choices varied depending on the circumstances and morality of characters and determined the courses of their lives. Some choices were well-considered, especially by Katie who enjoyed a contented and successful life. Others, like Tinker, learned the hard way what can happen when choice is made without conscience. Eve, the character with the most spunk, was adventurous and spontaneous. She was admired by most, but not a model of propriety for anybody.

 

Some lives and careers were cut short by ill-considered and quickly made decisions. Did Eve ever contact her parents after leaving New York for home? We decided that the author left it unknown so readers would think about it.

 

The author has written a sequel, a novella about Eve (Eve in Hollywood) after her character leaves the story, but no one was very interested. One member commented that she thought of Eve as Jean Harlow. Members were reminded of their own youthful adventures and contrasted them with the wild and carefree antics of those in the story. All of the members enjoyed hearing about high times at dances and nightclubs on and off the Cape. When asked who would recommend this book to a friend, all raised their hands. 

Favorite Quotes

“In our twenties, when there is still so much time ahead of us, time that seems ample for a hundred indecisions, for a hundred visions and revisions -- we draw a card, and we must decide right then and there whether to keep that card and discard the next, or discard the first card and keep the second. And before we know it, the deck has been played out and the decisions we have just made will shape our lives for decades to come.”

“How rich does one have to be to buy a very handsome man?”

From Rules of Civility by George Washington: “Never bring a fork to your mouth when you have a knife in your hand.”