What does it mean?  Does it set a [...]]]> Being a collector of trivia and the minutia of details that might not interest everyone, I began taking note when I noticed books and book discussion groups were being mentioned more and more in some of the popular fiction I’ve read over the past six months or so.

What does it mean?  Does it set a novel to a certain place in time?  Does it date the novel, and give it less appeal, or perhaps a quainter feeling, years in the future?  Is the author giving his/her contemporary novel more credence by tying it to another work?

Here are some of the bits I’ve noticed … Have you seen this too?  Will you notice it more, now that I’ve pointed it out?  What do you think of the trend?  Does it have to mean anything?

p. 218 of Tan Linesby J. J. Salem: “Nearby was Renee Zellwegger, eating alone and deeply engrossed in a book – David Halbertstam’s The Coldest Winter: America and the Korean War.”

Nick Hornby’s A Long Way Down had a few mentions:

• p 93 (Martin’s chapter) “A few years ago, Cindy joined one of those dreadful reading groups, where unhappy, repressed middle-class lesbians talk for five minutes about some novel they don’t understand, and then spend the rest of the evening moaning about how dreadful men are.”
• p 29 (JJ) “I read the fuck out of every book I can get my hands on.  I like Faulkner and Dickens and Vonnegut and Brendan Behan and Dylan Thomas.  Earlier that week – Christmas Day, to be precise – I’d finished Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates, which is a totally awesome novel.  I was actually going to jump with a copy, not only because it would have been kinda cool, and would’ve added a little mystique to my death, but because it might have been a good way of getting more people to read it.”
• p 188 (Jess) – “You need confidence to go into small places with regular customers – small bookshops and small music shops and small restaurants and cafes.  I’m happiest in the Virgin Megastores and Borders and Starbucks and PizzaExpress, where no one gives a shit, and no one knows who you are.  My mum and dad are always going on about how soulless those places are, and I’m like, Der.  That’s the point.”
• “The book group thing was JJ’s idea.  He said people do it a lot in America, read books and talk about them; Martin reckoned it was becoming fashionable here, too, but I’d never heard of it, so it can’t be that fashionable, or I’d have read about it in Dazed and Confused.”

Cheryl Jarvis’ The Necklace devoted several paragraphs to the group’s reaction to a reading list:

Jonell … gave the group a reading list and their first assignment: Affluenza by three men no one had heard of.  Jonell liked context.  “If we’re going to talk about the necklace … this book will give us a frame of reference, make us more knowledgeable and effective.”

Mary … was [an] avid reader of literary fiction.  She had no interest in self-help books.  If I’d wanted a book club … I would’ve joined one.  In fact, the group’s reaction to the reading assignment was like the greeting card headlined “Bad Girls Book Club,” where half the group doesn’t read the book and the other half doesn’t even show up.

Patti wasn’t in the habit of reading self-help books either.  She liked escape novels and crime fiction … she was a member of the Good Girls Book club; she read the book.

And I picked this out from Ann Patchett’s Run (p 153): “He had her suitcase, a quilted bag containing a toothbrush and a nightgown, underwear and extra sweaters, a copy of The Magic Mountain that she was reading for a course called Twentieth-Century Classics in Translation.”

Another Patchett novel, Bel Canto, had a scene involving two captives in a hostage situation:

…Gen stopped and spoke to Simon Thibault, who was stretched across a nearby sofa reading One Hundred Years of Solitude in Spanish.

“This will take me forever,” Thibault said to Gen in French.  “Maybe a hundred years.  At least I know I have the time.”

“Who knew that being kidnapped was so much like attending university?” Gen said.

Thibault laughed and turned a page. …

From Jennie Shortridge’s Love and Biology at the Center of the Universe:

Parker gave Mira a CD of Mozart sonatas, the new Andre Barrett book of short stories, delicate earrings made of sea glass, and the softest sweater she’d ever touched.

“How do you always know just what to get me?” she’d asked …

So, wondering about things like this is what keeps me busy … and gives me the patience to answer my kids when they ask “why is the sky blue?” or “where does the snow go when it melts?”

I had high hopes for The Necklace by Cheryl Jarvis; the subtitle, “thirteen women and the experiment that transformed their lives,” intrigued me; I expected a tale of sharing, altruism, philanthropy and [...]]]>

I had high hopes for The Necklace by Cheryl Jarvis; the subtitle, “thirteen women and the experiment that transformed their lives,” intrigued me; I expected a tale of sharing, altruism, philanthropy and friendship.  Instead, I felt overwhelmed by portraits of entitled women who felt good about themselves because they let someone else wear (whether for ten minutes or a day) the necklace.

The book is divided into fourteen chapters, the first thirteen each focus on one of the “Women of Jewelia” (Jewelia, pronounced “Julia”, is the name they’ve bestowed on this 15.24-carat $37,000 necklace).  Jarvis assigns each woman a personality trait: the visionary, the shopper, the loner, the adventurer, etc., then proceeds to expound on that trait and explain how the woman works herself and her personality into the group.  The fourteenth chapter, The Experiment, summarizes the time the women have spent with the necklace (so far; it’s expected to be passed down through generations), and the lessons they’ve learned along the way.

Priscilla Van Gundy, the wife of the jewelry store owner, has been labeled the loner.  Tom Van Gundy saw the energy and positive spirits of the women when they were in his shop negotiating for Jewelia; he agreed to sell it for a low-margin price on the condition that his wife be one of the group.  A few months after joining, Priscilla has already been transformed by her relationship with the women, she says:

I am so grateful to be part of your group.  I feel so happy when I’m with you.  You have inspired me with your warmth, your acceptance, your joy, the camaraderie you have with one another, the way you embrace life, the way you listen to one another without criticism, the way you have welcomed me into your lives.  I now know the meaning of the word inspire.  It means ‘to breathe.’  You have breathed life into me.  Thank you.

Within a year of forming, the group thought to use Jewelia to benefit the community, holding fundraisers for several causes, including The Coalition to End Family Violence.  Jarvis points out that in less than 18 months after buying Jewelia, they had raised more money than it cost to purchase the necklace, and:

Astonished by the ease with which thirteen women working together could make an impact, the group found a direction:  grassroots philanthropy in the community, where the women knew the needs and could see the results.

What distracts from the goodness of the philanthropy is the author’s insistence on describing the women as privileged, and focusing on their looks and their surroundings.  Phrases like “with her blond hair, deep tan, flat sandals and short, floral skirt, she epitomized the ‘California casual’ look”, “Maggie … displayed the hard body of a thirty-year-old … had opted for eyelid surgery and a face-lift”, and “… her clothes hang loosely, the result of a recent holistic diet.  From her highlighted hair to her pedicured feet, her look is polished and put together …” make the “Women of Jewelia” seem more like quasi-celebrities than a cohesive unit that has found a way to rise above their differences to work together for a common good.

In my rating system on LibraryThing, loosely-based on Netflix rating verbiage, I give this book 2.5 stars, that’s mid-way between “just OK” (2 stars) and “liked it” (3 stars).  To complete the picture, 1 star is “didn’t like it”, 4 star represents “really liked it” and a 5-star rating indicates “loved it!”  I definitely like the idea of this experiment; had the focus been more on the fund-raising inspired by Jewelia and the friendships that developed (instead of descriptions of the women’s physical appearance and their homes!), it would have been a better book.

Kath at Books Books and Reviews had a more positive take on the book, read her review here.  You might want to also read LisaLynne’s review at Minds Alive on the Shelves.

The Necklace:  Thirteen Women and the Experiment that Transformed Their Lives will be published by Ballantine Books on September 9.  Click here to order from amazon.com; click here to order from your local IndieBound retailer.