How's That Book Club Reading Coming Along, Huh?

Your Non-Exclusive Invitation From Jane Is Here! Plus a Morrissey Update

The inaugural AJPT Controversial Books Only Book Club gathering is coming right up on Sunday and you are all invited. I don't care if you are a paid AJPT subscriber or an unpaid one-time-only visitor or if you vow never in your lifetime to pay for anything I ever publish. Maybe you even want a refund from your Sassy magazine subscription circa 1988. I have never had fewer criteria for inviting people to my home.

The only stipulation is that you have to have some knowledge of our first book selection, Molly Jong-Fast’s How To Lose Your Mother. So mainly I just want to know how many bagels to order. Could you please RSVP to Corynne@anotherjaneprattthing.com for my address or the Zoom link? More discussion about the details and timing of the event is here in the introduction and comments to this post (this link is how I am avoiding saying again here the ungodly but church-like hour at which this gathering is being held).

Those of you who do come in person – or show up via Zoom, which is equally fun and fine, just no bagels - will get to see live my copy of the book that you have a glimpse of here taken on my phone the morning after the murder - I mean… OK let me explain…

Here is why my copy of Molly's book looks like this: I was reading the other night while eating chocolate ice cream and fell asleep over the book (not that it is boring!), tilting the container of ice cream onto the pages. (Does anyone eat it out of a bowl if you are not at a table with other people?) What I think is funniest from the stains it left is that you can see where I, upon waking and noticing, quickly used my hand to try to scoop the melted ice cream off the pages and back into the container.

My books don't always look like this, but you can always tell if I've read a book. I have pages dog-eared from every time I got distracted and had to hold my spot. Other pages are folded up from the bottom corners to remind me of specific lines I want to look at again. I might write things in the margins too.

So how is your book club reading going? And do you take good care of your things or do you invariably trash them like me? I've never been able to fully understand how some people’s clothing doesn't have stains or tears and how their shoes are pristinely unscuffed and still the shape they were in at the store rather than oddly stretched out. Tell me if you are that person or aren't. And how you manage it if you are.

Or do you avoid this issue, with your books at least, by reading e-books or listening to audiobooks? I space out too much for the audio book thing to work as well for me. I have to use that 15-second-rewind function constantly.

Anyway, ask me any questions below about Sunday that I may have forgotten to answer here and I will see you then! I have just 10 pages left and I'm saving them for the night before so they are fresh in my mind for our meet up. I have so much to say – and so much to hear from you, I can't wait!

Love forever,

Jane

PS: If you haven't been following along with the drama of whether commenter extraordinaire and cohost volunteer Alyssa could attend when we were planning to hold this on the 19th, the Morrissey concert was indeed canceled! You all knew it! I'll let her tell you more of that saga in the comments.