Book club fun!

In keeping with the Oz theme on the blog…. it’s the movie’s 80th this year…and I’ve chosen this book to kick off our Book Club.

Let’s get a virtual book club going! For now, I’ll keep it simple. Here’s the book I’ll be reading. Finding Dorothy by Elizabeth Letts.

Here’s how the book club will work. I’ll post questions and thoughts to this post, modifying it as I read the book. In the comments section, we can keep track of our discussions and answers to the questions I include.

For our first selection, I thought this book would be great since it fits in perfectly with our theme of late, The Wizard of Oz. Here are some posts explaining why this movie and series of books have become such a theme in the reading/viewing life of our family. Firstly, I believe in following up on and encouraging what your children are already showing an interest in exploring. Secondly, I think Oz has some beautiful life lessons in it and it’s been a joy to explore them.  Lastly, I figure that once you get going on a theme, you might as well explore all its avenues.

To participate, just comment below. We might be few, but we’ll be mighty!

I’ll be adding to this post regularly, so be sure to check it out regularly…. let’s say once a week on Tuesdays!

Book Club notes and Thoughts

Part 1: The beginning

Well, I haven’t read as much as I would have liked, but I am pleasantly surprised. This book captured my attention and I find myself interested in the goings on of Old Hollywood, a topic and period of American history that I was really not interested in at all before starting this book. I am thoroughly enjoying ‘following around’ all these famous characters from the ’30’s Hollywood Studio era.

I also really love the fact that as readers we are being guided by Frank Baum’s widow. Before my children became obsessed with Oz, I am embarrassed to say that I didn’t know much about The Wizard of Oz other than I had seen the movie a few dozen times as a kid and that it was a book before it was a movie. I didn’t know who wrote it. I didn’t know anything about the interesting life of F. Baum, or the many lessons his life story teaches us about perseverance and trusting oneself.

Now that I’m fully immersed in all things Oz, I am learning more about the history behind the movie and about the books; my daughter and I are currently working our way through the novels. So, if like me you had no idea….this book brings you into several worlds at once: Baum’s world through his widow, 1930’s Hollywood under the studio system, and the back story of this most- beloved cinematographic classic.

I can’t wait to see what happens next, so next week I’ll try to answer some of the first questions from the online book-club guide provided by the author. After reading her intro/invitation letter, the link to the PDF is below. In the meantime, I’ll also be exploring some of the other Oz related content from Elizabeth Lett’s website.