Book Club Divergence and The Gone Away World

Last summer I was driving along listening to NPR, when librarian Nancy Pearl came on to talk about her book list for the summer. Tangential sidebar alert: I later found out that Nancy Pearl has a cool community site called Book Lust and has her own action figure that actually has a 'shushing' motion when you press a button in her back. Must... have... Nancy.... Pearl... action ..... figure!

Back to original topic - our librarian extraordinaire recommended a book called The Gone Away World by Nick Harkaway (who is, as another sidebar, the son of prolific spy novel writer, John LeCarre).

She said, "I can't really tell you about this book without giving away a big twist. It's about a post apocalyptic world, oh no, that's too much information!"

I was hooked. A book with such a twist that even a couple of words are too much?! I'm in? I'm driving to the bookstore right now. And, I did (the library actually).

I read the book, suggested it to book club (with much the same gleeful intro as Nancy Pearl) and then read it again with the BC, just so I could see if I could predict the twist while reading now that I knew what it was. I was super psyched to talk about this book. I loved it! I thought it was brilliant!

And Book Club hated it! I don't think I've ever wanted to cry at BC, but that night I think I did have a tear or two well up. How could they dislike it so much? Where have my beloved BC and I diverged? Frankly, I took their dislike personally for about 20 minutes. Then I got over it.

While we've disagreed before, it's never been one person loving and the others intensely disliking. A book club first. In fact, Sue, Tess, and Craig did not finish the book. Dale only finished because she loves me and Nikolai was trapped on an island somewhere and would have read a VCR manual.

However, I am redeemed because my husband is reading The Gone Away World right now. In our 12 years together I've really never seen him read a book - he's a computer dude. He's glued! He looks up from the pages and tells me the crazy thing that just happened with glee on his face. He now knows the twist!

Finally! Someone I can talk about this book with who loves it as much as me. I have to admit I am experiencing some relief that my book radar is not completely dysfunctional.

While I'm not going to tell you what the story of this book is about, I will tell you that everything is important and comes together in the end. And on my second read I looked up every word I didn't know. Since some of this book is quite along the science fiction genre, I wasn't sure if the author was making up words, but lo and behold, all words are real and used well and appropriately. Carlos has the benefit of my annotated version - lucky dog.

Have you read this book? I'm wondering what other folks think. Are you in the Catherine and Carlos love it camp, or the most of BC yuck camp?

Do me a favor and read it and then let me know. And, Nancy Pearl action figures are appreciated.