Bailey's/Orange Women's Fiction Group discussion

We have not had many nominations recently, so instead of a new thread every month we will have an open one. All nominations will be added to the list of monthly books.

If we have already read them I will add a priority flag to the existing discussion.

If we have no new nominations I will use some of the books which have been nominated and voted for in previous months, but never won.
There are three books which have been nominated three times:
A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore (received 3, 2 and 4 votes)
The Innocents by Francesca Segal (received 3, 2 and 2 votes)
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt (received 2, 3 and 1 votes)
These will be the reserve books for any months when there are no nominations left in this thread.

just for clarification (because i can be a dumb-dumb sometimes, sorry!):

the nomination thread will now be one continuous thread, rather than a new thread each month.

when you say 'All nominations will be added to the list of monthly books." do you mean added to the list of books to be featured in any given month's poll?

will the monthly reads still continue to have their own dedicated discussion space?

thanks!

apologies for my absence over the last good while. i am hoping to be able to participate a bit more here in the coming months.

Don't apologise, I obviously didn't make it clear enough.

This will be a continuous thread and all books nominated will eventually become monthly reads. If we have several nominations then we will still have polls as before, but the 'losing' books will be carried forward to the following months and will not have to be nominated again.
I would like to try this until the next long list is published. If it doesn't work we will have a rethink then.

The monthly reads will continue to have their own discussion threads / spaces each month.

ohhh, okay. so, i think i am still unclear. sorry.

if more than one book is nominated, we will have a poll to decided on a read. if not, the lone nominated book automatically becomes the featured read.

any book featured in a poll that does not win moves forward to future polls.

will you cap the # of books in a poll? just thinking ahead of a couple of books keep moving forward each poll, it could get large, eventually.

monthly reads are an interesting beast in book groups, and i have seen them handled in so many different ways. i hope you land on a method that is easiest/most comfortable for you guys as moderators. i know it can be like herding cats sometimes. heh!! (speaking generally, and with humour. not trying to be a meanie!!)

:)

Jennifer wrote: "if more than one book is nominated, we will have a poll to decided on a read. if not, the lone nominated book automatically becomes the featured read."
Yes. We have had a few months recently where only one book is nominated and it has become the monthly read. I think it is better to have a choice and carrying the previous nominations forward will give us that.

Jennifer wrote: "will you cap the # of books in a poll? just thinking ahead of a couple of books keep moving forward each poll, it could get large, eventually."
We will see how it goes for a few months. I'm not setting a limit at the moment, but you have pinpointed a possible problem for the future.

P.S. Herding cats is easy, offer them food!

thank you so much for those helpful clarifications, Val! :)

The October book of the month will be The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt.

A Gate at the Stairs and The Innocents will go into the November poll with any new nominations.

There are no new nominations and it seems a bit pointless to have another vote between just those two books, so we will read A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore in November and The Innocents by Francesca Segal in December.

Val wrote: "There are no new nominations and it seems a bit pointless to have another vote between just those two books..."

oh -- so are we supposed to make nominations at any time now?

i had not realized nominations were opened for november. (though i think your plan is a good one for the remainder of the year.)

You can make nominations at any time, yes.
We will just have this one thread instead of a different one each month and nominations will roll on from month to month.
If you want to nominate something now I can quickly change the two for November and December.

no, no worries at all. i had just misunderstood, so assumed - within this one thread - there would still be prompts for nominations at certain times. sorry about that! :)

We could do with a few books for early 2017, before the next long list is announced, so here is a prompt for nominations.

I'll nominate
I'm hoping to get back into the swing of reading more in 2017

Penny wrote: "I'm hoping to get back into the swing of reading more in 2017"

I'm hoping to do much better with my Bailey's Shortlist challenge in 2017 than I did in 2016. I only managed 7 so far this year.

Lagullande wrote: "I'm hoping to do much better with my Bailey's Shortlist challenge in 2017 than I did in 2016. I only managed 7 so far t..."
Do you have any lined up Lagullande?
Would you like to nominate any of them for a monthly read, or are they all ones the group has already read?

Penny wrote: "I'll nominate "
This will be our January 2017 Book of the Month.

We still need nominations for February and March. (After that there will be a new long list, so we can nominate from it.)

Val wrote: "Lagullande wrote: "I'm hoping to do much better with my Bailey's Shortlist challenge in 2017 than I did in 2016. I only managed 7 so far t..."
Do you have any lined up Lagullande?
Would you like to nominate any of them for a monthly read..."

How about Burnt Shadows, from the 2009 shortlist? It looks as though three group members who have already read it gave it 5 stars, and one (cough, that was you, Val, cough) gave it 4.

Burnt Shadows will be our February Book of the Month.

Val wrote: "Burnt Shadows will be our February Book of the Month."

That was easy! Thanks, Val :-)

So, who's up for nominating the March book?

Penny wrote: "I'll nominate
I'm hoping to get back into the swing of reading more in 2017"

I just read My Name Is Lucy Barton. Very short, easy read but packed with emotion. This is the first Elizabeth Strout book I've read.

if we still need nominations how about going all the way back to the first year with Anne Tyler's

it was rated as the best book of that year by the New York Times.

We have a space for it in March, Penny.

Then we will get the new long list to pick from.

Just a reminder, in case anyone did not get the invitation:
The vote for our April book is open.

It is between all the novels on this year's long list.

Our next two books will be the joint vote winners:

The Gustav Sonata by Rose Tremain in April and

Little Deaths by Emma Flint in May.

Great! I bought The Gustav Sonata because I heard such wonderful things about it - so will certainly be joining in the read for April.

Little Deaths is another one I really wanted to read (have e-book) so yay! will join in for May too.

Really any from the list would have been great - such a great list this year!

The June book will be whichever one wins the prize this year, so we will have to wait for the announcement.
Neither of our poll winners made the short list, so it will not be either of those.

We now have our June book of the month, but we need nominations for July and the rest of the year.
They can be your favourites from this year's list or any from earlier years, if we have not already read them as a group.

We don't have a nomination for July yet.
Does anyone have a book they are eager to read?

I like the look of and a family member is about to start some research into tuberculosis so it has been a topic of conversation in our house!

Val - seems you've been busy and have already read quite a few!

Thanks Penny. Our July book of the month will be The Dark Circle by Linda Grant.
I have read that one and the author has clearly done a lot of research into tuberculosis, so I imagine there will be a few more conversations about it in your house.

The next nomination will be for August.

Are there any nominations for August?
Would people prefer a month off to catch up on any previous month's books?

Have we read The Essex Serpent yet? I just bought my copy and I'm eager to read. I'd be fine with waiting until September to start that one, though, if folks are reading something else.

We haven't read it as a group Amanda, so it can be our next book.

Not sure if other people have to wait quite a while to get books - is there any merit in planning our reads further in advance? Maybe like the next 3 months - in batches or something?
any thoughts?

We have sometimes and it does help with library reservations to know what we will be reading in advance.
If anyone has any nominations for future reads then you can nominate them as early as you like, and then we can have more notice of the books we will be reading.

Penny wrote: "... is there any merit in planning our reads further in advance? Maybe like the next 3 months - in batches or something?
any thoughts?"

i would find this very useful. thank you, penny and val!

Here are some previously nominated or voted for books from recent years. Please add to them.

Nominated from the 2015 long list, but not read yet:
The Table of Less Valued Knights by Marie Phillips
After Before by Jemma Wayne

Most votes from the 2016 list after those we have already read:
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

Most votes from the 2017 list after those we have already read:
The Lonely Hearts Hotel by Heather O'Neill

I like the idea of choosing at least one winner from the past for every 3 months and then I keep looking at some of the lesser known books from years back too
so a few to start some ideas
from 1996

from 1997

from 1998

from 1999

from the winners listings
2011




I am happy also with any of the ones you listed too Val. I think you have probably read more overall than I have. I am curious to pick ones that I have never heard of !!

Does anyone have a burning desire for a particular book in the next 3 months?
Anyone want to add to the discussion?

I would definitely benefit from knowing further in advance what the books coming up are.

I have read the last 7 group read books, but haven't aways commented as I haven't been too impressed with several of them and felt I was just getting too grumpy!

Going forward (hate that phrase!), I will aim to read along with any shortlisters, but probably won't be committing to any that only made it to the longlist.

How about having one past winner, one oldie and one recent book for the group of three?

Those four I listed are ones I picked from past nominations and are not all ones I really want to read or re-read, but I thought they deserved another chance in a vote. I am probably going to read the Arthurian legend one whether it wins a vote or not, because I haven't read it yet and because I am in the mood for a humorous book to offset some of the rather grim ones I have been reading recently.

Val wrote: "How about having one past winner, one oldie and one recent book for the group of three?"

Nobody has disagreed with that idea so far, so we will try it for the next three / six months. I will set some polls up at the weekend.

Please add any further nominations.

Just in case anyone did not get an invitation to vote in the polls, here are links to them:
https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/1...
https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/1...
https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/1...

I think that's a good plan - 1 old, 1 new and 1 winner over each 3 months and then we will know what's coming!

Lagullande wrote: "I have read the last 7 group read books, but haven't aways commented as I haven't been too impressed with several of them and felt I was just getting too grumpy!

Going forward (hate that phrase!),..."

I'm so glad you said that as I too have been feeling a bit 'grumpy' about some of the books. I haven't been thrilled for a while!!!!!
I know I am a harsh judge but even so. From the earlier lists I have read many books that were wonderful but more recently hardly any. here's fingers crossed for the upcoming ones.

Oh and please if you can comment even if you are not impressed - I would like to hear your thoughts.

Penny wrote: "Oh and please if you can comment even if you are not impressed - I would like to hear your thoughts."
I second that. It is often more interesting to know what someone didn't like about a book than when they rave about it.

Val wrote: "Penny wrote: "Oh and please if you can comment even if you are not impressed - I would like to hear your thoughts."
I second that. It is often more interesting to know what someone didn't like abou..."

Ok, will do my best. I often just have a gut feel, and struggle to turn that feeling into words. Often, if I wait long enough, someone else comments and I think "yes, that's just what I thought".

Our next three books will be:

The Tiger's Wife by Téa Obreht, which won the prize in 2011

The Lonely Hearts Hotel by Heather O'Neill from this year's list

Master Georgie by Beryl Bainbridge from the archive

Brilliant ! thanks Val

There is one more winner of the prize and two more archive novels which got some votes but not much enthusiasm for the recent ones, so I will find some more past nominations to add to the mix for the next set of three.
If anyone has anything they want to add from any year or in any category, please nominate it here. I will put the new polls up early in October to give members plenty of time to reserve library copies or search for cheap second-hand ones.