Summer of Reading - #2 Community-wide Books

The idea of everyone reading the same book and then coming together to discuss and share is quite popular in multiple areas – colleges and universities, communities, and on a smaller level, local book clubs.        

One Book/One University -  One current trend is for colleges and universities to select a book that is either assigned to all incoming freshmen to read over the summer or one book that will be read across campus during the year.    If you are a freshman and have been assigned to read the book before arriving on campus you should consider the following:

• READ THE BOOK!  Do not wait until you arrive on campus.  You will not have time.
• There may be discussion groups scheduled during orientation.   Think ahead about what ideas or insights you learned from the book and how you might share these.
• During the fall semester you may be expected to make connections to the book in some of your classes.
• Often speakers and events are scheduled around the book and theme.   Be sure to attend the events, especially if you have a chance to hear the author. 

One Book/One Community

• The library system where I live has these programs two or three times year.  The books are available to borrow through the library and there are facilitated discussions at each branch.  I have read many books I might not normally have read and met very interesting people through these programs.

Formal and Informal Book Groups

I currently facilitate three groups – two formal groups through the library and one with my friends. Again, these are ways to expand your reading and talk about books and ideas with other people.   Some tips are:

• Stay on topic.
• Avoid side-bar conversations.
• Be open to ideas that are different from your own.
• Do not dominate the conversation.   It is important that everyone get a chance to talk.
• In a more formal group it is the responsibility of the facilitator to make sure these things happen.   In an informal group with friends it is everyone’s responsibility.

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For more specific learning strategies and a continuation of reading strategies over the summer, follow my other blog, www.StudytoSucceed.blogspot.com.   Also look at my book, First Semester Success: Learning Strategies and Motivation for Your First Semester (or Any Semester) of College, available at amazon.com, wordassociation.com and barnesandnoble.com.  Click on the upper right link.

Still Alice, by Lisa Genova

Characters

Dr. Alice Howland John – husband – cancer researcher Anna – daughter (Charlie – husband) Tom – son Lydia – younger daughter Alice’s family: Mother and sister killed in auto accident Father – alcoholic or Alzheimer’s Disease Cathy, Mary and Dan – support group Dan – grad student

For Discussion:

NOTE:  Page numbers refer to paperback edition

1. When she accepted the diagnosis of Alzheimer's, she thought about what she really wanted from life and was surprised to see that there was nothing on her list that was job related.  Did that surprise you?   What would be on your list?
2. What was your reaction about Alice’s fixation on Lydia going to college?  Could you understand her reasoning?  Did you think she should give in or continue to offer that option? 
3. What did you think of John’s paying for Lydia’s acting classes without telling Alice?
4. In the chapter “April 2004,” Lydia said she notice something wrong with Alice for about a year, but no one else in the family did.  Why do you think Lydia noticed something was wrong?
5. Discuss Lydia being able to connect with Alice through acting and that Alice was able to understand more through Lydia’s actions than words.
6. In the “June 2004” chapter when Alice and John were consulting with Dr. Davis, the neurologist, the doctor and John had different opinions about which would be the best treatment for Alice, the Amylix trial or IVIg therapy.  What did you think Alice should have done?
7. In the “July 2004” chapter Alice was swimming in the ocean and reflected that, “she might very well not remember this night in the morning, but in this moment, she didn’t feel desperate.  She felt alive and happy.”   What can we learn from this?
8. Alice treasured her mother’s butterfly necklace but stopped saving it for special occasions.  Part of the meaning of the necklace was that, “just because their (the butterflies) lives were short didn’t mean they were tragic” (May 2004 chapter).    What does this idea mean to you?
9. What scene do you still remember?  Here are some of my favorites:

a.       When she sat in her classroom and thought she was the student instead of the professor

b.       Alice not recognizing Lydia as the actress in the play. 

c.       No one sat beside Alice in the department meetings.

d.       During the study presentation at the meeting Alice made a very observant point that helped the student.  But then later she made it again.

10. Consider the dilemma between Alice and John: Alice wants him to take a sabbatical year and stay home with her but John wants to move to New York and take the exciting job offer that he feels he will never get again.  Can you see both sides?  How would you have solved this problem? 
11. Were you able to sympathize with John and understand his point of view?   Could you understand John’s point on page 235 when he said he did not think he would be able to stay home and watch her deteriorate day after day?  
12. Do you think Alice’s sense of self-awareness made a difference in the way she reacted to the disease?  If yes, how?
13. What did you think of the ending?  Is it realistic?  What do you think happens after the novel ends?
14. If there was a chance of a genetic disease in your family, would you want to know if you carried the gene?  Why or why not?
15. Did this novel give you any new insights into Alzheimer’s disease? 
16. Did you like the novel?  What was your reading experience?

*****
First Semester Success: Learning Strategies and Motivation for Your First Semester (or Any Semester)of College, by Dr. Arden B. Hamer, is available at amazon.com, wordassociation.com and barnesandnoble.com.   Click on the upper right link.

Love in the Time of Cholera, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Characters

Fermina Daza Larenzo Daza -father – accused of illegal activities after death Escolastica – aunt Fermina Sanchez – mother – deceased Hildebranda Sanchez – cousin Dr. Juvenal Urbino Urbino children: Dr. Marco Aurelio Urbino Daza - son Ofelia - daughter Florentino Ariza Transito Ariza – mother Pius V Loayza - father Don Leo XII Loayza – uncle

Sister Franca de la Luz – Superior of the Academy of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Affairs with Florentino: Rosalba – on ship Widow Nazaret Ausencia Santander Sara Noriega Olimpia Zuleta – murdered by husband when affair discovered America Vicuna – relative under Florentino’s care, seduced by him, suicide Leona Cassiani – job at River Company of the Caribbean (RCC) – became Uncle Leo XII’s personal assistant Lucrecia del Real del Obispo – Fermina’s friend, rumored to have an affair with Juvenal Miss Barbara Lunch – Doctor of Theology, affair with Juvenal

For Discussion:

NOTE: Page numbers refer to the paperback edition.

1. When Dr. Urbino returned from medical school to his home in the Caribbean, he had a difficult time adjusting to the pace of life, but, “…at last he gave in to the spell of habit” (page 108).   When is habit good and when can it be bad?  
2. On the other hand, Dr. Urbino “was in conflict with everything” at the hospital, but especially the “lack of sanitation in the city” (page 108).   This resulted in the first outbreak of cholera.   How important was cholera in the novel?
3. Florentino was responsible for his relative, America Vicuna, and yet he seemed unmoved when she committed suicide.  How much is he to blame for her academic difficulties and then death?
4. Why did Fermina end the relationship with Florentino so suddenly?
5. Was it realistic that Florentino would continue to love Fermina throughout his entire life and never marry?

6. When Fermina and Florentino connected late in life, Fermina’s two children had different views of their relationship.   Her son saw it as, “a healthy affection between two lonely old people” but her daughter thought is “a vice-ridden form of secret concubinage” (page 322).    Were you able to understand each’s child’s point of view?  What did you think?
7. Florentino believed that, “human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but that life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves” (page 165).  What examples did you see of rebirth in the novel?  In your life?
8. Why did we need to know so much about Florentino’s intestinal difficulties?  What did that add to the novel?
9. What major topics were addressed by the novel: unrequited love, marriage, widowhood, sexual freedom, aging, love between seniors?  Any others?  What topics did you think the author addressed realistically or not so realistically?
10. On page 256 the author, through Florentino, addressed aging in men vs. women.  He thought that as men aged, “…they seemed more dignified with their first grey hairs…” but that “…their withered wives had to clutch at their arms…”   He then went on, “A few years later, however, the husbands fell without warning down the precipice of a humiliating aging in body and soul…”   How did you feel reading these thoughts?   Are they accurate?
11. According to the New York Times Book Review, June 10, 2018, this book was the “summer’s must-read” book in 1988.   Why do you think it was so popular?
12. Did you learn anything or gain any new insights from this novel?
13. What did you think about the ending?

*****
First Semester Success: Learning Strategies and Motivation for Your First Semester (or Any Semester) of College, by Dr. Arden B. Hamer, is available at amazon.com, wordassociation.com and barnesandnoble.com.   Click on the upper right link.

Summer of Reading: #1 Why Read?

NOTE:  This is an entry I posted on my other blog, www.StudytoSucceed.blogspot.com, but it also relates to this blog about reading.

The blogs this summer will focus on my favorite subject, reading, starting with independent reading (choosing on your own what to read) and moving through all aspects, ending with reading and learning from textbooks.

 So, why should you read?  What are the benefits?

There are multiple benefits to independent reading, not the least of which are entertainment, escape, learning, enlightenment, and pure joy.  There are so many types of books it is impossible to list them all, but there is something for everyone no matter what your interests, profession, etc.

While reading is mainly a solitary activity, it can be social when talking about a book in a group.  There are an amazing number of book groups – no one really knows how many as most of them are a group of people who decide to get together on their own to discuss books.   When my friends group met at a local restaurant there were two other groups meeting at the same time!

Besides the endless reasons to read listed above, there are two specific benefits:

• Increasing or maintaining your power of concentration: Many people think that all of the time we spend on our electronic devices is lowering our ability to concentrate for an extended period of time.  See Nicholas Carr’s book, The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brain, for further information.  By reading without interruption you are keeping your power of concentration strong.
• Gaining empathy:  When we read about someone else’s experiences and feelings from their perspective we are better able to understand how they feel and can transfer that awareness to our everyday lives.  (Schwanenflugel & Knapp. (2016). The Psychology of Reading. New York, NY: The Guilford Press.)

Whatever type of books you like, hopefully you will have time this summer to read for the pure pleasure of reading!

The next blog will address the popular program on college campuses, One Book-One College, how the books are used, and some strategies for reading.

Consider voting for your favorite book this summer at The Great American Read, sponsored by PBS.  My vote went to The Book Thief, by Marcus Zusack.