Hi Everyone,
Our book club met for our May meeting at Natilie’s North
Pizzeria. Those in attendance, Becky, Cheryl, Ginnie, Jody, Lori, Mary Beth,
and my-self, all agreed that the restaurant was a nice alternative to Panera
Bread for our discussion; less crowded and noisy. Also, the pizza was tasty and
the BYOB option was a bonus! We will definitely use Natilie’s North Pizzeria as
a location for future meetings.
As for our discussion of Fifty
Shades of Grey by E.L. James, our book club was in less agreement. The disturbing sexual content made reading for
some a conflict of morals. Others accepted the raunchy sex acts as simply a
part of a twisted plot and an addictive character. I freely admit that I was one of those who
could not wrap my mind around reading the pornographic material alluded to by
the Fifty Shades of Grey media-blitz.
Above all, when I heard the initial
reactions of members who had started the book, my decision not to read our May
pick was confirmed. We all know our limits, what we can and what we cannot
assimilate. I was comfortable with my decision not to expose myself to
something that would obviously cause me personal distress.
Few people are more open to learning about the world than
me; heck, I’ve spent most of my entire existence reading and learning. However,
at this point in my life, there are just certain things that I refuse to waste
my time understanding, and one of those things happens to be reading about the explicit
descriptions of perverted sex acts. Naturally, if the topic happens to unexpectedly
rear its twisted head in a novel I am reading, I’ll get through it; especially
if the content is teaching me about a cultural norm or a historical occurrence.
In fact, many of our book club titles have featured characters who either
willingly or unwillingly participated in deviant sexual acts – The Kite
Runner, Snow Flower and the Secret
Fan, The Blue Notebook, and I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings to name a few.
I’m concerned that the hype created over James’s novel is
going to trigger a profusion of copy cat books on a topic of which the
descriptive details of sexual addictions will reach even more disturbing
proportions. Just as Twilight
propagated a craze for the vampire genre, the popularity of Fifty Shades of Grey is already spawning
a market for what the media is labeling “Mommy Porn,” a product which certainly
will trickle into the hands of our teens and adolescents. Unfortunately, the
book is already on its way into film and like Twilight, it will undoubtedly produce such a rage that television
will be vying for a piece of the pie. So get ready, because “Mommy Porn” programs
will soon be competing for the prime time slots on our local cable channels!
This is my last thought on a book that I did not have the
moral resiliency to read. Tell me those who did read the book, what is the
difference between a book sold in an adult bookstore and Fifty Shades of Grey? Although I have never been inside such a slimy
establishment, I am not innocent of the reading material sold in a porn shop. Can
we not deduce that those individuals who buy the product inventory featured in
such places are not the same individuals who perform the acts described in Fifty Shades? With James’s novel on
department store book shelves, and future books like it, this clientele will be
able to shop more openly for their products because now Target and Walmart will
also be marketing for a share of the “Mommy Porn” gold mine. If I sound a bit
over-reactive, think about this: we are living in a country that not only
supports same sex marriages, legal and insurance supported abortions, but at
any time of day or night all one has to do to find porn is to click on their
computer and type in the least remotely related word to a sexual body part or
organ and hundreds of pornographic sites can be accessed within seconds. With
this in mind, it is for certain that soon we will be strolling shopping carts
around the “Mommy Porn” displays next to the Hallmark aisle!
Forgive my opinionated response; it certainly does not
reflect the opinions of others in our book club. So in moving on, I would also
like to go back a few months to our April meeting since I was neglectful in
writing a response to P.D. James’ title Death
Comes to Pemberley. Becky, Barb K., Cheryl, Ginnie, Lori, and my-self met
at Panera Bread to chat about this mystery. Again, I have to be honest; the Baroness of
Holland Park’s book does not make my list of 3-star ratings.
My main
disappointment in Death Comes to Pemberley
is how uninvolved I became with any of the characters. While a large portion of
the exposition was given to recalling the inspirational source for the book,
the classic novel Pride and Prejudice,
not much was given to leading the reader into an emotional affinity with the
now married Elizabeth and Darcy. I wanted to see passion in their marriage and
be a part of it, but nothing. They are about as staunch conservative as their
friends and families, there is no room for casual lovemaking (the traditional
kind; not Mommy Porn) in their lives of formalities. The book simply contained
no lasting qualities whatsoever. What was P.D. James trying to prove? Okay, the
language is succinct with its predecessor, I’ll give the baroness that much;
but enough with the copycat book trends! Are writers really running out of
original thoughts these days? Or is the dummying down of America finally
materializing in our literature along with that of our broadcasting media?
For June we are playing the book selection game a little
backwards. This time instead of reading a book before the movie premiers, we
have picked a book that was already adapted to film in 2003 and was nominated
for 3 Oscar’s. Girl with a Pearl Earring
by Tracy Chevalier takes us to the 17th century world of the Dutch
painter Johannes Vermeer. The story is resurrected from a collection of
Vermeer’s legal documents and from his haunting painting of “Girl with a Pearl
Earring.” I’m crossing my fingers on this one and abstaining from premature
evaluations.
We are planning on combining our June book club with Butler
Symphony’s garden tour which is scheduled for Saturday, June 16. Our group will
meet at 9:30 A.M. at the Element Café on Main Street for a quick coffee and
pastry before driving to the garden sites. Tickets for the tour can be purchased
for $15 presale at Smith’s Florist, the Butler Symphony office on Main Street,
and at Meridian Station in Meridian. Check out the following website for more
details:
Hope to see as many of you as can make it on June 16.
Yours in reading,
Tammy
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