Silicon Valley Moms Group holds monthly online book clubs, featuring a range of topics and writing styles. Our bloggers do not write traditional book reviews, but instead use the books we read as inspiration for blog posts on our personal blogs that are about our own experiences. On the day of the book club, a summary post is published on one of the Silicon Valley Moms Group sites, as well as a lead-in post by one of our bloggers. The authors join in on the discussion as well, to give their perspectives on the various posts. We invite you to buy the books, read along with us and add your voice to the discussion. Happy reading!
Click here to view all Silicon Valley Moms Group book club posts.
If you are a publisher or author who is interested in providing a book for one of our book clubs, we would love to hear from you. Please scroll down to read the information for publishers and authors and send an email to info (at) svmoms dot com.
Upcoming Book Clubs:
November 2009 Book Club - Close Encounters of the Third Grade Kind by Phillip Done
About the Book - from the publisher Hatchett Group:
A twenty-year veteran of the classroom, elementary school teacher
Phillip Done takes readers through a lively and hilarious year in the
classroom. Starting with the relative calm before the storm of buying
school supplies and posting class lists, he shares the distinct
personalities of grades K-4, what he learned from two professional
trick or treating 8-year-old boys, the art of learning cursive and
letter-writing, how kindergartners try to trap leprechauns, and what
every child should experience before he or she grows up.
These
charming, sweet, and funny tales of Mr. Done's trials and triumphs as
an award-winning schoolteacher will touch readers' hearts and remind
them of the true joys of childhood. We all have that one special,
favorite grade school teacher whom we fondly remember throughout our
adult lives - and every teacher also has students whom they will never
forget. This is the perfect book for teachers, parents, and anyone else
who is looking for a lighthearted, nostalgic read.
Purchase your copy of Close Encounters of the Third Grade Kind by Phillip Done here.
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December 2009 Book Club - See Mom Run by Beth Feldman
About the Book - from the author's website:
Get ready for heartfelt belly laughs with a See Mom Run collection of essays by the nation’s most talented authors, mom bloggers, television producers, parenting experts, entrepreneurs, grandmothers and even a retired senator! From labor pains to potty disasters, weight gain, holiday mayhem, teen angst, empty nest syndrome, home renovations and even colonoscopy exams, See Mom Run is the perfect prescription for today’s harried parents.
With contributions from Role Mommy, Lost in Suburbia, Momma Said, Mom 101, Melissa Chapman, SVMoms Blog & Tech Mama, Single Mama NYC, Chef Druck, Self Made Mom, Simply Organized Online, Jenna McCarthy, Ciaran Blumenfeld, Suburban Jungle, Crafty Mama, Because I Said So, From Hip to Housewife, Twinfatuation, Modern Jewish Mom, Ex Marks the Spot, Yentasentiments, NYC Moms Blog, Janie Lam Meyers, Andrea Forstadt, Danielle Dardashti, Jeanne Muchnick, Lenore Stoller
Purchase your copy of See Mom Run by Beth Feldman here.
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Past Book Clubs have included:
October 2009 Book Club - This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper
Click here to join the Silicon Valley Moms Group book club discussion on This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper at New York City Moms Blog
About the book - from the author's website:
The death of Judd Foxman's father marks the first time that the entire
Foxman family-including Judd's mother, brothers, and sister-have been
together in years. Conspicuously absent: Judd's wife, Jen, whose
fourteen-month affair with Judd's radio-shock-jock boss has recently
become painfully public.
Simultaneously mourning the death of
his father and the demise of his marriage, Judd joins the rest of the
Foxmans as they reluctantly submit to their patriarch's dying request:
to spend the seven days following the funeral together. In the same
house. Like a family.
As the week quickly spins out of
control, longstanding grudges resurface, secrets are revealed, and old
passions reawakened. For Judd, it's a weeklong attempt to make sense of
the mess his life has become while trying in vain not to get sucked
into the regressive battles of his madly dysfunctional family. All of
which would be hard enough without the bomb Jen dropped the day Judd's
father died: She's pregnant.
This Is Where I Leave You is
Jonathan Tropper's most accomplished work to date, a riotously funny,
emotionally raw novel about love, marriage, divorce, family, and the
ties that bind-whether we like it or not.
Purchase your copy of This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper here.
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September 2009 Book Club - Do One Nice Thing by Debbie Tenzer
Click here to join the Silicon Valley Moms Group book club discussion on Do One Nice Thing by Debbie Tenzer at New Jersey Moms Blog
About the book - from the author's website:
A few years ago, Debbie Tenzer was feeling overwhelmed by all the
crises in the news. But rather than give in to despair, she thought,
Maybe I can’t solve our big problems, but I know I can do something.
She realized that helping doesn’t have to be difficult or expensive or
time-consuming. You can help simply by doing one nice thing. So that’s
what she vowed to do, one day a week. Not every day–she says she’s not
that nice–but once a week was a promise she could keep.
So she
started a website, DoOneNiceThing.com, and each week she posted an easy
way to help people around town or across the globe. Good news traveled
fast, and now Debbie is the leader of a worldwide kindness movement
with fellow Nice-o-holics in ninety countries. They’ve sent . . .
• cans of food to food banks and schools
• notebooks to soldiers who will give them to Afghan children
• gifts to foster children whose birthdays are overlooked
• and much more
Do One Nice Thing
has many new, easy ideas for small deeds that anyone can do (and
includes explicit information on how exactly to execute the ideas, so
you don’t have to go digging for information or resources). There’s
even a chapter of nice things you can do in minutes without leaving
your desk.
Join Debbie and her army of Nice-o-holics, and give
the world some help–and some hope. Best of all, the more help you give,
the more hopeful you’ll feel. And before you know it, you won’t be able
to stop.
Purchase your copy of Do One Nice Thing by Debbie Tenzer here.
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August 2009 Book Club - Birth Day by Mark Sloan
Click here to join the Silicon Valley Moms Group book club discussion on Birth Day by Mark Sloan at Chicago Moms Blog
About the book - from the publisher Random House:
I delivered twenty babies in the summer of 1977. I was hardly more
than a baby myself, just turned twenty-four and starting my third year
of medical school.”—from Birth Day
So began Mark
Sloan’s three-decades-long exploration of the wonders and oddities of
human childbirth. Pediatrician, husband, and father, the author has
attended nearly three thousand births since that long-ago summer,
encountering everything from routine deliveries to tense labor-room
dramas. In Birth Day, Sloan draws on his personal and professional
experience to weave the strands of memoir, history, science, and
culture into a fascinating—and often funny—tapestry of this fundamental
human passage.
Purchase your copy of Birth Day by Mark Sloan here.
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July 2009 Book Club - What Happened to the Girl I Married? by Michael Miller
Click here to join the Silicon Valley Moms Group book club discussion on What Happened to the Girl I Married? by Michael Miller at Silicon Valley Moms Blog About the book - from the author's website:
"What does she do all day?" That was the
question Miller and his corporate fraternity brothers often asked themselves
about their stay-at-home wives. Their ignorance about what seemed like
a simpler life at home shielded them from seeing or hearing the realities
of it. Embarking on a quest to find the girl he married - lost in that
life - Miller finds out the hard way just how very wrong they had been.
In What Happened to the Girl I Married?, Miller steps out of his corporate executive job and into his wife’s uncomfortable shoes at home. With no staff or administrative assistants to support him, Miller’s “ah hah moments” begin on day one and become more profound with each step down the path. Through his journey, Miller offers a new found appreciation for the tireless efforts of stay-at-home mothers and clues as to why women might lose themselves in the job. For the men they married, Miller lets them connect with his evolution through humor, man-isms and motivations for change that are hard to resist
www.whathappenedtothegirlimarried.com
Purchase your copy of What Happened to the Girl I Married? by Michael Miller here.
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June 2009 Book Club - Testimony by Anita Shreve
Click here to join the Silicon Valley Moms Group book club discussion on Testimony by Anita Shreve at DC Metro Moms Blog About the book - from the publisher Hachette Book Group:
At a
Writing with a pace and intensity surpassing even her own greatest work, Anita Shreve delivers in Testimony a gripping emotional drama with the impact of a thriller. No one more compellingly explores the dark impulses that sway the lives of seeming innocents, the needs and fears that drive ordinary men and women into intolerable dilemmas, and the ways in which our best intentions can lead to our worst transgressions.
Purchase your copy of Testimony by Anita Shreve here.
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May 2009 Book Club - Comfort Food by Kate Jacobs
Click here to join the Silicon Valley Moms Group book club discussion on Comfort Food by Kate Jacobs at Chicago Moms Blog
About the book - from the author's website:
A letter to readers from author Kate Jacobs: How wonderful it is to sit down at the table with friends and with family to share a good meal! Perhaps a bottle of wine. Certainly, in my case, a slice of rich chocolate cake. The power of food to bring people together is something so central to our lives that the very act of eating can provide not only physical nourishment but emotional sustenance as well. And to these special dishes – some are regional, some are cultural, some are simply cherished tastes since childhood – we give a name: comfort food.
The idea of comfort
food creates a sense we are slowing down, nurturing ourselves, and
enjoying a treat. And it is that type of good feeling I hope readers
experience when they pick up my novel Comfort Food. Taking a few
moments to curl up and savor a little bit of relaxation as they share
in the characters’ lives. Everyone I know in the real world feels as
though they are too busy with the day-to-day business of life: They
have, as the saying goes, a lot on their plate. So what do we do when
we don’t feel like eating what’s on our emotionally overloaded plates?
That’s the challenge facing Comfort Food’s Augusta “Gus” Simpson, a
host of a television cooking program with declining ratings and a
widowed mom to two complicated twentysomethings. And Gus’s life only
gets busier with the addition of her sweet but reclusive neighbor
Hannah, her bold new rival Carmen, her daughter’s jilted boyfriend
Troy, and handsome sous-chef Oliver. But there is also fun in new
challenges, and excitement. And as much as Gus would hate to admit it,
the changes in her life do spice things up.
What interests me
most, as a novelist, is sorting out relationships: how we yearn for
each other and yet drive each other crazy! And, with Comfort Food, the
action is once again in the city that I love – New York – with a bit of
a branching out into the ‘burbs of Westchester. And the focus is all
about food. You know, when I was in high school twenty years ago, I
never could have imagined late-afternoon phone calls to my best friends
asking, “What are you making for dinner tonight?” and really caring
about the answer. But for many, food has become an expression of love,
of skill, of creativity. Personally, I’m no chef. I’m a home cook who
loves carbs and delicate flavors. But I married a gastronomic
adventurer (masquerading as a computer guy) and, with my husband’s
influence, I have tried all sorts of spicier foods. Similarly, the
characters in Comfort Food dare each other – sometimes their
motivations are sweet, sometimes bitter – to savor the varied flavors
in each bite of life. Even an overloaded plate, it turns out, can be
filled with wonderful, nourishing tastes. I do hope you'll take a bite of Comfort Food.
Purchase your copy of Comfort Food by Kate Jacobs here.
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Other past book clubs have included:
- Much to Your Chagrin by Suzanne Guilette
- It Started with Pop-Tarts by Lori Hanson
- Who By Fire by Diana Spechler
- The White Trash Moms Handbook by Michelle Lamar
- Writing Motherhood by Lisa Garrigues
- The Vaccine Book by Dr. Robert W. Sears
- The Other Mother by Gwendolen Gross
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Information for publishers and authors
How Silicon Valley Moms Group book clubs work:
On
the day of the book club, we have a discussion around one lead-in blog
post written by one of Silicon Valley Moms Group's writers. See an
example here.
We also do a summary post, where we aggregate links to blog posts done
across the blogosphere by our many great writers on their personal
blogs. See an example of a summary post here.
What is the process:
What
we do is to distribute books to the writers who would like to receive a
book - we have about 350 writers at this point and need about 30-50
books minimum in order to get a really good book club going. We like to
have as many books available to our writers as would like them. The
writers have about a month to read the book and prepare a blog post
on their personal blogs that is not a strict review (although they can do a separate review
post o their personal blogs if they would like to), but instead is a post about the writer's
own experiences that is inspired by the book. What we can bring to an
author/publisher is not only exposure for the author not only on the
Silicon Valley Moms Group network of sites, but also on our writer's
personal blogs across the blogosphere. It is a way to tap into a large
network very easily and to have a very authentic book club discussion.
We ask that the writer be available on the day of the book club to
participate in the discussion via commenting on the blog posts both on
the Silicon Valley Moms Group sites and on our writers' personal blog
posts.
How to submit your book for consideration:
If
you are interested in having your book featured as a Silicon Valley
Moms Group book club choice, please contact us at info (at) svmoms dot
com. Thank you!
