Dear reader,

For those who joined us last week, welcome back and for the newcomers amongst you, thank you for signing up.

In these weekly Book Notes you’ll find plenty of material to help you examine the books we’ve discussed on the show, as well as extra reading and thoughts you’ve shared with us.

We’ve loved seeing your feedback and emails - do keep sending them. We’ve shared some of our favourite notes sent in by The Book Club community below, along with the scores you would have given Mrs Dalloway. Keep reading to find out the books we’ll cover next.

This week was quite something, as we introduced Dominic to the world of The Hunger Games. The episode also uncovered the alarming depths of Dominic’s addiction to The Apprentice.

When the idea for The Book Club was first broached, Dominic and I always envisaged it as a show that would cover a wide range of books and all manner of tastes, but also delve into not only the books themselves, but their cultural cachet. So long as there was a story worth unravelling on the page or behind it, we would endeavour to do so. It was, after all, born of a discussion about The Lord of the Rings. 

So, when we, and our producer Nicole, sat down to plot out our first batch of books we felt The Hunger Games had as much a right to be there as, say, East of Eden, with its heft and complexity. 

In part that was because Nicole and I had been teenagers when The Hunger Games franchise was at the height of its popularity, following the release of the movies, and so wanted to explore this former teen phenomenon, and find out how it read all these years later. But also because, as Dominic himself discovered, it’s a mightily thrilling read, based on a genuinely intriguing, if not entirely original, premise. 

And, of course, I felt it was about time we answered the question that had been hanging over The Book Club from the start: how would Dominic survive The Hunger Games? 

As usual, Rhiannon has put together our Book Notes below. We hope you’ll use them to shape your own reading. Make sure you send us feedback from your own book club discussions to [email protected] and do vote in our polls too.

Finally…I’d love to hear what you made of Dominic’s Effie Trinket impression.

Until next week,

Tabby

The propulsive plot of The Hunger Games is possibly its biggest strength - Tabby was keen to stress we shouldn’t underestimate the power of an enjoyable story.

Katniss Everdeen is the protagonist and narrator - but Dominic felt she was ‘generic’ and two-dimensional.

The key to good dystopian fiction is often the way it holds up a mirror and deepens our understanding of the present day. While set in a strange future, The Hunger Games very specifically reflects the 00s world it was written in, with the ongoing Iraq war, the rise of reality TV and the credit crunch looming.

Many school districts in the US have held votes on whether to ban The Hunger Games. It has become one of the most complained about titles in America with readers upset by the violence and claiming there’s an ‘occult/satanic’ perspective. Collins has admitted the concerns about violence were “not unreasonable”. “They are violent. It’s a war trilogy,” she has said.

From extreme displays of wealth to plastic surgery, Panem and the Capitol draw from extremely capitalistic ideas.

The book was adapted into a popular, multi-million pound film franchise featuring the actress Jennifer Lawrence.

It’s the oft-referenced line from Effie Trinket. Yet, given it’s said to a group of teens fighting to the death, really it says a lot about the Capitol and its approach to the games. What quote did you take away from The Hunger Games? Email us and let us know.

We know from our Instagram page that you have a lot of thoughts about what books Dominic and Tabby should cover. This section is your chance to shout about the book that’s changed your life or share burning thoughts about something you’ve read with other members of our The Book Club community.

Send us two or three sentences about why everyone should take your recommendation and we’ll feature as many as we can in future weeks. Let us know yours at [email protected] 

After it received a mild bashing from the pod as ‘thin’ and ‘watery’, we’re keen to hear from defenders of The Hunger Games. We’re also all ears on inventive ways you’d survive the games.

Is The Hunger Games a masterful critique of modern times or a derivative dystopian sketch? Tell us! And vote in our polls on the book below.

Thank you so much for all your lovely feedback on the newsletter and thoughtful emails about Mrs Dalloway. Here’s a sample of some of your emails.

Your Mrs Dalloway poll

Dominic and Tabby gave Mrs Dalloway 10 ‘Miss Kilman’s eclairs’ out of 10. The winning score from last week’s newsletter was also 10 - but 13% of you gave the book a 1 and 19% a score of 8.

The perfect book for massive snobs?

Owen, who we think it’s safe to say isn’t a fan of Woolf, sent us these thoughts on who he thinks would be the ideal reader for Mrs Dalloway. “I would share this book with people like Angel Clare from Tess of The D'Urbervilles, wealthy types who pose to be modern and progressive but are actually just massive snobs. They will find much to relate to in this inspiringly pointless book that Mrs Woolf has so painstakingly manufactured with all her inert and artificial genius.”

‘Women in a later stage of life’

We enjoyed this point of view from Sophie who writes: “One aspect I particularly enjoy about Mrs Dalloway is the fact that the eponymous heroine is what one could call ‘a women in a later stage of life’. Austen, the Brontës, even George Eliot, would have centred their novels around Clarissa's eighteen-year-old daughter Elizabeth, not Clarissa herself. Even today, novels with female protagonists which are older than say, forty, are quite rare. But this choice allows Virginia Woolf to introduce the motives of memories, longing for a past life or a life they never knew at all.”

Fosco fan club

Mary has been a fan of The Woman In White since she was nine, so felt she wanted to mount a defence of the book after being “a bit disappointed you didn’t give it a higher ranking”. “The major reasons you deducted points were for the rather dull romantic leads of Walter and Laura. While I quite agree they aren’t as captivating as Marian and the sublime villain Fosco and comic characters like Frederick Farlie, I’d argue that the colourlessness of Laura and Walter, particularly Walter, is actually a very deliberate choice by Collins,” she writes.

“One question I often think about is why Sir Percival makes my skin crawl, but I don’t hate Fosco as much. I think it’s because he’s the only person in the book who truly appreciates Marian and how magnificent she is,” Mary writes.

Flattery will get you everywhere

Thanks to Jesse, who says The Book Club converted their podcast-loathing fiancé, emailing in: “She loved it. The rapport and cordiality of Tabby and Dom. No talking over one another. Just a pleasant discussion about a book neither of us had read (The Woman in White) yet we were both fully engaged and enjoyed the episode. So kudos to Tabby and Dom (and the producers) for a great podcast.

“I'll close with some recommendations, featuring Tabby's favourite! Drunken 20th century male American writers! I love hard-boiled American Crime novels and would love to hear the British perspective on them.

“The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett and The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler. Both writers check off the Drunken American Male box and lived fascinating lives which would lead to a fascinating discussion.”

See you next week for a long hard look at The Picture of Dorian Gray!

The Book Club team