Vote closed: the L&L Bookclub choice for November

Literature & Writing L&L Book Club
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It’s the first day of September, which here in the Northern Hemisphere makes me think of autumn and the fast-approaching prospect of a long, cold winter. Given the current, worsening energy crisis in the UK, the spectre looms of dark, bitter evenings with entire families huddled around a candle for warmth, Dickensian-style. (Spoiler alert… a Dickens title is coming up in December. No prizes for guessing which one!) How can the shivering populace pass the time, when the heating thermostat has been turned right down, and the electricity supply has failed or been cut off? Perhaps pairing a good read with a board game might fit the bill? This month, our poll for November’s book choice consists of books that have inspired modern board games.

Which of these do you fancy reading in Book Club in November, after reading Bram Stoker’s Dracula this month, and Émile Zola’s The Fortune of the Rougons (La Fortune des Rougon) in October? Please cast your vote in our poll:

0 voters

The result will be announced early in October, to allow plenty of time for you to acquire and read the selected title before our discussion in November.

Of course, as this is a Book Club, there is no need whatsoever to play any of the games, or even to think about the games! (Although I’ve actually played one of them before: Michael Strogoff is a pacy race sort of thing, with quite a lot of the flavour and plot of the novel, if you happen to have read the book first. And I quite like the sound of The Road to Canterbury.) The main thing is to choose the title that you want to read.

Do feel free to suggest other books for us to read together — either reply to this message, or send me a PM. We’ll keep a list, and over the months ahead we’ll consider adding such suggestions to future book-choice polls.

When making a book suggestion, please remember that we will be reading books that are in the public domain in the UK and EU, where copyright laws protect work until 70 years after the author’s death.

All the best,
Astrid

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There are just a few days left in which to vote for our Book Club choice for discussion in November. Robinson Crusoe is currently in the lead, with slight interest in Michael Strogoff and The Canterbury Tales, and (so far) none at all for The Scarlet Pimpernel. Which of these titles would you like to read? Let us know in our poll.

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And the winner is… Robinson Crusoe, by Daniel Defoe (published in 1719, not 1718 as I appear to have mistyped in our poll last month). We’ll be discussing this book in November, so there is plenty of time to get hold of a copy and start reading.