South Manchester Book Group

We're a friendly and open reading group, and we share a love of books and discussing them with other people. We meet every fortnight, but you don't have to come to them all. It's dead simple; choose a book you like the sound of, read it (or even part of it) beforehand and turn up with a few ideas and money for beer / wine / flirtinis. It's very informal, and we're quite a friendly bunch.

We meet at a pub in Didsbury around 8 pm. We can usually be found on the table with the books and flirtinis.

We've become rather popular recently so unfortunately aren't accepting new members just at the moment. But please drop us a line on the Contact Us form and we'll add you to our mailing list.

Our reading list, past, present, and future, appears here and a short version of what we’re reading next is here.

Thursday 22 March 2018

A Place Called Winter — Patrick Gale

Book cover for Patrick Gale's A Place Called Winter in the South Manchester, Chorlton, and Didsbury book groupA shy but privileged elder son, Harry Cane has followed convention at every step. Even the beginnings of an illicit, dangerous affair do little to shake the foundations of his muted existence — until the shock of discovery and the threat of arrest force him to abandon his wife and child and sign up for emigration to Canada. Remote and unforgiving, his allotted homestead in a place called Winter is a world away from the golden suburbs of turn-of-the-century Edwardian England. And yet it is here, isolated in a seemingly harsh landscape, under the threat of war and madness that the fight for survival will reveal in Harry an inner strength and capacity for love beyond anything he has ever known before.

This week's book is Patrick Gale's A Place Called Winter and we'll be meeting at The Fletcher Moss on William Street in Didsbury.

Thursday 8 March 2018

Obasan — Joy Kogawa

Book cover for Joy Kogawa's Obasan in the South Manchester, Chorlton, and Didsbury book groupThe Government makes paper airplanes out of our lives and flies us out the windows. Some people return home. Some do not. War they all say, is war, and some people survive.

Obasan is narrated by Naomi, a sheltered and pampered child who is five years old when her life is drastically changed by the events at Pearl Harbor and the Second World War. As a Japanese Canadian, Naomi is separated from her parents, persecuted and eventually placed in an internment camp during the second world war.

This week's book is Joy Kogawa's Obasan and we'll be meeting at The Fletcher Moss on William Street in Didsbury.