RWPS Men's Book Group

- Loved the way that the shells falling on the masonry caused all sorts of problems, when they fell on the earth was best, kind of showing the trappings of civilisation

- The only role of women was to go mad with boredom

- Rank hypocrisy of the the system in which their embroiled

- None of the Indian characters are very developed. This was discussed at length because it denies them a voice and an opinion about what is going on around them

- It really struck me that this was the pomposity of the colonialists

- Why isn’t Ballard better known?

- Victorians putting so much emphasis on the machines they build, exemplified by the World Fair

- The auction of the food was brilliant

- Fleury killing someone is the unbelievable part of the book

- Trenchant critique of colonialism portraying the the characters as being woefully shirt-sighted about the situation they’re in. Putting a spear through the omnipotent

- Discussion about UK versus US humour, Monty Python versus The Office (US), a comment about how in Animal House, John Belushi smashing the guitar of some wannabe musician who’s wowing the girls show the difference: in the US Belushi’s the hero, in the UK it’s the guitarist

- Wanted to ask the author about why things happened the way that they did

- Notable difference between the 70’s (when the book was written) and (say) 1985 when Haneef Kureshi’s “Buddha of Suburbia” was written. It feels like a world of difference between the two world views — the difference between seeing Indians as “other” as compared to a part of society

- Watching the colonial oppressors getting their just desserts

Saturday, 2 October 2021

“The Mothers” by Brit Bennett (September 1, 2021)

We’re back in lockdown again so that means we’re back on Zoom.

While I didn’t mind book, for one of the first times I wasn’t able to finish it due to pressing work commitments. I got about halfway through. It didn’t help that we’d gone into lockdown again and the book is a challenging read, the protagonist has an abortion and her mother commits suicide before we’re twenty pages in.

Matt made a very good point that really challenged the consistency of the book’s world: the protagonist’s boyfriend who has got the young woman pregnant borrows the money from her parents for the abortion. He found that very difficult to imagine and I tend to agree.

Without having finished the book it doesn’t seem fair to write much more.

We have a slightly longer book next month, J.G. Farrell’s The Siege of Krishnapur. Hopefully we’ll be back at The All Nations but I suspect it will probably be Zoom again, see you on October 6 in any case.