The first meeting of the Dogs with Bagels book club was a success! We started off with a Facebook live video so that my friend could participate from Thailand. It was my first time ever doing Facebook live and I really liked it! My friend is about a third through Dogs with Bagels and has some serious issues with some of the characters. No surprise there! Maria and L are both immature and both make all kinds of mistakes. Of course, the question that keeps coming up is: Is it autobiographical? The answer to that is maybe, but not really. There’s a little bit of me in several of the characters. In tonight’s discussion I realized that in some ways the one I mostly identify with is Rachelle, because I tend to be responsible and when I was younger I was frequently exasperated by the lack of forethought and basic life skills of most people my age.
Anyway, I loved the Facebook live video, and I decided to do another one next month. And guess what? I’ll actually be in NYC, so I’ll be able to do it from there! So excited!
After the Facebook live video there was an in-person book club meeting as well. There we discussed one of my favorite books of all times, Duplicate Keys, by Jane Smiley, which, like Dogs with Bagels is a NYC book, and also a book that deals with issues such as friendship, codependence, and learning to stand on one’s own.
And, if you’re curious to learn more, here’s the account of a book club I participated in in the past, also a list of discussion questions for Dogs with Bagels I came up with a few years ago.
Also, for a blast from the past, check out Homeless in Borrowed Heels, an old blog post I made in order to introduce readers to the first chapter of the book.
