I’m working my way through the list, checking them all out, and I thought I’d post what I was determining as I looked. I hope anyone who has made a suggestion that I can’t use won’t take this the wrong way – I’m very grateful for all the suggestions, and most of them sound very interesting, so I wanted you to know that I am taking each of them seriously and looking at how they’d fit. Unfortunately, some are just not quite workable for my group. Programming a bookclub is a lot of fun – but there are a lot of aspects of choosing the books that I would never have imagined before I took it on!
Schultz & Peanuts sounds fascinating, but it’s really just too long. Most my members don’t check the future schedule, and by the time I post the event, they have less than a month to read the book, and anything over 500 pages is just too much.
The Glass Castle sounds like it has possibilities, though it might be a little less ‘whole life’ than what I’m looking for. It’s also under heavy reserve at the libary – which demonstrates that it’s probably pretty good, but will be a problem for my members. I’ll keep an eye on the reserves though, and if they go down significantly when the on order copies come in, that might be a workable choice.
The Autobiography of Malcolm X is very short, which is nice, but he is pretty much an American figure. It’s also iffy on library availability – they have lots of copies, but they’re heavily reserved.
West with the Night seems like a great prospect. It’s short, female-focused, it’s not focused on America, there aren’t a ton of copies in the library but they’re all actually in the library, so it shouldn’t be hard for people to put holds on them.
Geisha: A Life seems like a good choice, as well. The majority of the women in my group are likely to have read, or at least heard a great deal about Memoirs of a Geisha, so there’s be good opportunity for discussion there.
An Unquiet Mind sounds interesting, but is perhaps a little too interesting – all the library copies are out and there are additional holds.
Beatrix Potter: A Life in Nature is just too long, unfortunately. And still seems to be only in hardcover so would be expensive for my members who buy their books.
Wishful Drinking has the same hold problem at my library as yours – way too many. Must be good, though!
As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised as a Girl sounds really interesting – and very available. The gender twist is neat, as well. Plus, the Canadian angle is great.
Decca sounds structurally interesting, but very long and it’s very expensive, so it wouldn’t work for our group.
Red China Blues sounds like a great possibility. It’s short, female, Canadian, and available. Plus, Jan Wong is a person most of our group will have heard of, but she’s not so super-famous that they’ll know all about her.
Road from Coorain also sounds like a possibility. She ends up working in America, but she’s not an obviously American figure and it doesn’t seem like an obviously American story. Availability looks pretty good in the library.
Fun Home, I’ll put on my list of potential graphic novels since that’s another category I’d like to include for the group. I’d rather do a straight prose biography for biography month, but that still sounds interesting. It’s got iffy library availability, though – it seems that people really like this book. So much so, that they never, ever give it back. Over a third of the library’s copies are marked missing! I wonder if it’s like The Alchemist which, when we read it, I had to get the bookstore to get it down off a high shelf because so many people steal it.
Somebody: The Reckless Life and Remarkable Career of Marlon Brando sounds like it could be pretty interesting. Meets the general criteria, though. Yeah, he’s American, but his movies are well known in Canada.
The Color of Water sounds interesting. It’s obviously a male author, but it sounds like the focus is on his mother, so that’s good. It’s solidly available, and the culture / racial situation sounds like good fodder for discussions.
Another bookclub that many of my regular members are in has already read Persepolis.
Obscure and American is likely to be okay – I was mostly trying to avoid Presidents and Civil War heroes and such, who are really primarily of interest because they’ve played some role in American history.
So far my leading contenders are West with the Night, As Nature Made Him, and Red China Blues – they both sound absolutely fascinating. Jan Wong’s localness is definitely a plus, and the gender identity issues in As Nature Made Him would be great for discussion. On the other hand West with the Night definitely piqued my interest.