Thanks for tonight. A stalwart crew and I wanted to get this back to you so we can plan for the busy next two months. Thanks in advance to Joe of his comments.The Lost Book of the Grail was generally well received and as Joe noted ‘good but but great’ seems to have really summed up the wider club’s appreciation of the tome. I do think (and hope) that it was widely enjoyed and that the skilful weaving of time back and forth over 1000+ years of history was notable.
It was as Brian M summarised – an entertaining look at Christian ecclesiastical evolution. For those willing to suspend disbelief and let themselves into it, an entertaining and enjoyable read. The author was complimented on a being able to integrate a rich tapestry of factual (and semi-factual) content with an engaging story.
However, the characters were, for some, far too predictably stock and cast into a tale that was overly contrived. Being one of the slower to appreciate, I found it a tale well told and appreciated the twists. However, I do sense that the level of connivance drove some of our readers to distraction with characters that were inconsistently represented to accommodate the plot or represented inconsistently leading to readers losing the train of engagement and ultimately the plot.
The final marks for The Lost Book of the Grail reflected this reserved appreciation:
Brian C – 7.0, Declan – 7.0, Jim – 6.0, Mike – 6.5, Brian M – 7.0, Fergal – 5.0, Shawn – 8.0 and Joe – 7.0. An average of 6.69. Respectable. Good but not Great 😉
We entertained nominations for our next Non-Fiction read:
Jane Mayer: Dark Money – The Billionaires Who Gave rise to the US Right Wing (Brian C)
Jonathan Balcombe: What a Fish Knows (Declan)
Simon Garfield: Just My Type (Mike)
Hilary Rodham Clinton: What Happened? (Fergal)
Madeleine Bunting: Love of Country (Brian M)
And the winner and read for November is: Love of Country: A Hebridean Journey by Madeleine Bunting