January OCFPL Book Club

Welcome back everyone!

This year we kicked off book club with Born a Crime by Trevor Noah. Trevor Noah is a South African comedian, writer, producer, political commentator, actor, and television hos, who is widely known for being on the Daily Show on Comedy Central. This is his story of his time growing up in South Africa during and after the apartheid era.

We enjoyed the stories of him being mischievous, clever but overall naughtiness as a child. His challenging nature and the way he narrates the story to intertwine the deeper issues with funny outtakes, shows how much he has overcome. You can definitely see the comic being form and molded as he was growing up. One thing that the members found fascinating was his ability and talent for learning languages. Using it as a tool for survival, to trick people, getting out of trouble, and overall to make connections with those who under normal circumstances would not have connected with due to him being a Colored person (one who is half black and half white) in South Africa.

Overall, we enjoyed this book and definitely recommend others to read it. There is talks that this book would be adapted for film, something we all agree we will be on the look out to watch.

Join us next month on Tuesday, February 18th at 6pm as we meet next to discuss The Bromance Book Club by Lyssa Kay Adams. We welcome all to read the book and drop in for the discussion. Hope to see you there.

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Ape House by Sara Gruen

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"Ready Player One" by Ernest Cline

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Tomorrow by Graham Swift

Swift won the Booker Prize for Last Orders back in 2004(?)...but I don't think he'll go 2 for 2 with Tomorrow , a quick read about a family with a dark secret. Paula Hook lies awake on the eve before her and her husband Mike divulge a long kept secret to their twin teenagers. The story centers around the history behind this secret and the rationale behind it. Truthfully, I was kind of annoyed for most of the book. The build up goes on and on for many pages with, like, no pay off whatsoever. The ideas in my mind were juicier than the real "truth" that was going to be told to her children. Though the prose is extremely well-written, I still kept saying to myself, "jesus, get to the point already"

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