Category Archives: Fiction

Jack of Diamonds

Posted on by

jack-of-diamonds

Jack of Diamonds – Bryce Courtenay

Abstract

Born and raised in a poor, working-class family in Toronto, Jack Spayd is the son of an unhappy marriage. But when he is given a harmonica as a young boy, he discovers a talent for music that will change his life forever. After being taken under the wing of ‘Miss Frostbite’, the owner of a local jazz club, Jack becomes a gifted musician, playing piano and harmonica. After the death of his mother, he travels to Las Vegas and finds work in the clubs there, but is increasingly drawn to gambling. He earns a reputation as a good player, which brings him to the attention of the mafia. Jack wants to join the professional circuit, and to do that he needs serious money behind him.

Group Comments

Book could have been condensed. The book started of very interesting and you didn’t want to put it down.
Some thought provoking sentences, a bit too much violence. Much laughter re the parrot – called ‘Jack of Diamonds’. All were happy he wasn’t killed.
Large volume – was difficult to hold, but typical Bryce Courtenay; would make a great television drama.
Some American slang language was difficult. Very graphic sexual descriptions.
Jack is somewhat a coming of age story!
Overall everyone read it but there have been better ones.

Read by

The Last Thursday Book Group

Time and Time Again

Posted on by

9780593073575Time and Time Again
Ben Elton

Abstract
It’s the 1st of June 1914 and Hugh Stanton, ex-soldier and celebrated adventurer is quite literally the loneliest man on earth. No one he has ever known or loved has been born yet. Perhaps now they never will be.
Stanton knows that a great and terrible war is coming. A collective suicidal madness that will destroy European civilization and bring misery to millions in the century to come. He knows this because, for him, that century is already history.
Somehow he must change that history. He must prevent the war. A war that will begin with a single bullet. But can a single bullet truly corrupt an entire century? And, if so, could another single bullet save it? Continue reading →

Gray Mountain

Posted on by

gray-mountain

Gray Mountain 

John Grisham

Abstract

The Great Recession of 2008 left many young professionals out of work. Promising careers were suddenly ended as banks, hedge funds, and law firms engaged in mass lay-offs and brutal belt tightening. Samantha Kofer was a third year associate at Scully & Pershing, New York City’s largest law firm. Two weeks after Lehman Brothers collapsed, she lost her job, her security, and her future. A week later she was working as an unpaid intern in a legal aid clinic deep in small town Appalachia. There, for the first time in her career, she was confronted with real clients with real problems. She also stumbled across secrets that should have remained buried deep in the mountains forever.

 

Comments

Another gripping tale from bestselling author John Grisham!
Samantha loses her job at a top law firm in New York, so she accepts an unpaid internship at a legal aid clinic in small town Appalachia. Her life is in peril as she helps a local attorney furtively uncover the sinister world of coal mining and its devastation on the landscape and environment and its health impact on the community.
Samantha is forced to adopt daily challenges, stretching her boundaries beyond her own expectations as she comes face to face with Appalachia’s overbearing mining community.

Read by Preetha