Pettina Gappah

The Book of Memory : Not a great success, a couple of us liked it  a, couple more in parts  and a couple not at all. Still it adds to list of Zimbabwean fiction and has interesting elements  but we didn't buy into the denouement

Svetlana Alexievich - Chronobyl Prayer

the writer and journalist - and Nobel laureate- records monologues of those who suffered from the effects of Chernobyl. Moving, harrowing , shocking    and -some of us thought, a bit repetitive although Bloke D objects to the use of  'repetitive' .

Italo Calvino - If on a Winters Night a Stranger

Clever- perhaps too clever for some. What is a novel / what is it to be a reader? Divided the group.Worth it- it is short

Don delilo White Noise

Some great and funny moments,  but does it hang together as novel?

J-P Sartre Nausea

An interesting companion to  the Camus we read recently,
Split the group ,  but plenty to discuss .

I was Jack Mortimor Alexander Lernet-Holena

A strange  almost post-Modern  little book.  Not bad

Tim Dee -- Four Fields

The lyrical  , pensive style  becomes ,after a few pages  tedious , flowery and too deliberate. Stop trying to be  writer  and  keep it simple.  A good  idea  over-written.

William Wordsworth - The Prelude ( part one)

We struggled and some of us made it.  They must have been more used to reading long poems in those days  . Some interesting ideas once you unpick them
We are better for it

The Outsider (or The Stranger) -- Albert Camus

One of the stand-out greats. Simply written but complex ideas and moral questions. A good read , we all agreed.