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 20 August 2020

The Garden of the Finzi-Continis — Giorgio Bassani

Book cover for The Garden of the Finzi-Continis by Giorgio Bassani The Garden of the Finzi-Continis in the South Manchester, Chorlton, Cheadle, Fallowfield, Burnage, Levenshulme, Heaton Moor, Heaton Mersey, Heaton Norris, Heaton Chapel, Northenden, and Didsbury book group “Even in a city as small as Ferrara, you can manage, if you like, to disappear for years and years, one from another, living side by side like the dead.”

The haunting, elegiac story of an aristocratic Jewish family moving imperceptibly towards its doom in the last summers of the thirties as Mussolini comes to power.

This week's book is The Garden of the Finzi-Continis by Giorgio Bassani and we'll not be meeting at The Fletcher Moss on William Street in Didsbury but will be meeting online — contact us for details.

Thursday 6 August 2020

Cold Comfort Farm — Stella Gibbons

Book cover for Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons Cold Comfort Farm in the South Manchester, Chorlton, Cheadle, Fallowfield, Burnage, Levenshulme, Heaton Moor, Heaton Mersey, Heaton Norris, Heaton Chapel, Northenden, and Didsbury book group“Nay ... I saw something nasty in the woodshed,” said Aunt Ada Doom, fretfully moving her great head from side to side. “’Twas a burnin’ noonday ... sixty-nine years ago. And me no bigger than a titty-wren. And I saw something na—”

When the sukebind was in bud the orphaned Flora Poste, expensively, athletically and lengthily educated, descended on her relatives at Cold Comfort Farm. There were plenty of them – Judith, alone in her grief; Amos, called by God; Seth, smouldering with sex; Elfine, who needed a little polish; Urk; Rennet; Harkaway; Caraway etc; and, of course, Great Aunt Ada Doom ...

And Flora felt it incumbent upon her to bring order into chaos.

This week's book is Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons and we'll not be meeting at The Fletcher Moss on William Street in Didsbury but will be meeting online — contact us for details.