Great African Reads discussion

So... as you all know, Algeria is the focus of next month's reading, and based on members' votes the shared book is

Tahar Djaout's The Last Summer of Reason: A Novel.

I hope that everybody who is interested in reading this book together, will be able to get a copy from somewhere.

Do we need to have some discussion/agreement how we go about it, i.e. having a deadline or something like that? what are people's thoughts? how do they normally like to do the book club thing?

Generally, a new edition of a work of fiction will not result in any changes or differences in the text itself. A new *translation* probably will. Does anyone know if The Last Summer of Reason was written in French or English?

I notice that the 2007 edition (from Bison Books) includes a foreword by the Nigerian Wole Soyinka, so I'll probably try to get that one, because he's an author I'm interested in.

And I'll echo Wendy's earlier post -- I haven't participated in PWB discussions because I read it 8 years ago. My memory is too foggy to discuss it, but I do know I loved it! In fact, I mean to re-read it at some point. Just couldn't do so this past month. But I'm looking forward to joining in for the Algerian selection! And I think this is a great idea, to read our way through the continent. :)

Katy G.

The books looks realy good -- and the back story is interesting too. I just ordered a copy off Amazon and can't wait to get started on it! Thank you for getting this organized -- I am looking forward to making my way from Algeria to Zimbabwe :-)

I was going to say something along the lines of what Katy said...that the actual text of a novel shouldn't change between editions.

i've been mulling the deadline idea and i think it's least complicated to just set a deadline for having read the book...people will catch up, i'm sure.

is the plan to set the deadline for the end of the month and have two discussion threads? one with spoilers and one that we open up once everyone is done reading (for more in depth discussion)?

please, if anyone has ideas about good, constructive, organized ways to conduct these discussions, present them! we are making this up as we go along....

Katy, re. your question about the translation of the book - yes, it was first published in French and then translated into English. My understanding is that the 2007 edition has only been edited in the sense that it now has a foreword by Wole Soyinka but since the translator remains the same, I would be very surprised to find the main text to be different. In any case, that would have to be indicated somewhere.

And I can only echo Marieke's comments about us making this up as we go - we do!!! if anybody has ideas, suggestions etc. on how to go about the book club, do let us know!! :)

I'm new, so not sure what's been done before, but perhaps a certain minimum "waiting period" between announcement of title and posting comments? I like to have a few days to form my own opinions before reading others' comments. Of course, I could just wait to read posts too

shall we wait til, say, mid-month then before we start discussing book club books? i think what might help is to vote on a book earlier, say in the third week of the month, so that people who are interested in sharing a book can organise their copy? and then we start discussing from mid-month onwards??

i think that sounds like a good idea...

and i like your new avatar, green!

yes, dates are a great idea, greeny!! ;) the earlier the better, probably (still haven't got my copy for "Last summer..."), that way you (and everybody else, of course) might actually get your copy in time! (btw, have you got your poisonwood bible by now? are you still going to read it?? would love to discuss if you want to).

so we need to get organise for december then!! i was wondering if people perhaps wanted to read just one book over december/january? just thinking that with christmas and holidays, people may not have much time for reading... i'll start posting a list with books on angola then. :)