March 19 Meeting. A big welcome to Kit Kennedy and her open mic experience.

Betty's List Bookclub is very excited to once again have Kit Kennedy and her stable of outstanding readers organizing an open mic night experience for us. If you are a writer, please feel free to bring a short excerpt of your novel, or a compelling poem, or a bit of memoir to share.

See you there!
Cynthia K

March/April Calendar

Here's what I know so far about the March/April Calendar. As soon as the facilitators send me the details of their meetings, I will post them here.

Enjoy your reading. Cynthia K


Rebel Readers
Next book is The Famished Road by Ben Okri
March 19 at 6:30 at a Member's House
April Book is March by Geraldine Brooks
This group is complete

Tuesday Evening Book Nuts
Next book is The Tea House Fire by Ellis Avery
April 1 at 6:30 at Duboce Park Cafe
This group welcomes new members...just read the book and turn up!

Can't Fail Group
Next book is Lolita in Tehran
April 20 at noon at a member's house
May book is A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle
This group is complete

Discovery Group
Next book is Senator's Wife by Sue Miller
April 17 meeting at 7:00 at a Members House
This group is complete

Discovery Group 2
Next book is The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon
April 9 meeting at 6:30 at a Member's House
May book is Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follet
This group is looking for 1 or 2 more members (contact me at BookSavvy@aol.com if you would like to join)

Book Goddesses
Next Book is More Like Wrestling by Danyel Smith
March 30 meeting at 4 pm at a member's house
April Book is The Bean Treas by Barbara Kingsolver

New East Bay Group
Next Book is Tall Grass by Sandra Dallas
March 18 meeting is at 6:30 at a Members house
Contact me at BookSavvy@aol.com if you would like to be in this new group.

Huge Thanks to Lucy Bledsoe....Great Reading!

A huge thanks to Lucy Bledsoe for her terrific reading from her new book Apple. And thanks to the members of the Betty's List Book Club for the great turnout. Rachel Herbert and her wonderful staff take such superb care of us!


Lucy Bledsoe reads from her novel Apple.


Lucy Bledsoe enjoying Betty Sullivan's Introduction.



Dr. Betty Sullivan among the daffodils.


Full house at the Duboce Park Cafe.


Jen and Heather enjoy Lucy's reading.


Lucy Bledsoe reads for the Betty's List Book Club


Lucy's friend from High School~


Guess which one is the Birthday Girl?


Lucy Bledsoe, author of Apple, with Betty's List Book Club Co-chair, and author of Book Savvy, Cynthia Lee Katona.

Valentine's Day Febraury 14 The Perfect Gift

Happy Valentine's Day to all my favorite readers. Give the gift of books and passionate conversation this Valentine's day...I'll be delighted to inscribe something sexy in a copy of Book Savvy for your favorite reader. Enjoy.
Cynthia K

February 20 Featured Speaker Lucy Jane Bledsoe

Lucy Jane Bledsoe is a novelist and science writer. When she's not writing, she's sea kayaking in Alaska, backpacking in the Rockies, or backcountry skiing in the Sierras. When she's not kayaking, hiking, or skiing, she's reading.

Bledsoe's newest novel, BITING THE APPLE, came out in Fall 2007. She is the author of three other novels: SWEAT: STORIES AND A NOVELLA, WORKING PARTS, and THIS WILD SILENCE. She is also the author of five novels for children: THE BIG BIKE RACE, TRACKS IN THE SNOW (winner of the Parents Choice Gold Award), COUGAR CANYON, HOOP GIRLZ (one of BOOKLIST'S "Top Ten Youth Sports Books" for 2002), and THE ANTARCTIC SCOOP. Her novels have been translated into Japanese, Spanish, and German, and her stories into Dutch and Chinese.

Her fiction has won a California Arts Council Individual Fellowship in Literature, an American Library Association Award for Literature, and has been a three-time finalist for the Lambda Literary Award. She's also won a PEN Syndicated Fiction Award, a National Endowment for the Humanities Youthgrant, a Barbara Deming Memorial Money for Women grant, a Puffin Foundation grant, and two National Science Foundation Artists & Writers in Antarctica Fellowships.

Looking forward to seeing you all at the Duboce Park Cafe at 6:30 sharp on February 20!
Cynthia K

January 16 Ellis Avery Featured Speaker!

Betty's List Book Club welcomes Ellis Avery as the tenth in our series of outstanding readers and and speakers. The event starts promptly at 6:30, and we encourage you to come early and get a bite to eat and a glass of wine at Rachel Herbert's wonderful Duboce Park Cafe.

"Saturated with color and detail; [Avery] manages to make nineteenth-century Japan both accessible and exotic, infusing her story with a sense of dignified calm...[A] deeply engrossing, multifaceted work." The Boston Globe

"Ellis Avery studied tea ceremony for several years, so it makes sense that the ritual dominates her first novel." Entertainment Weekly.

"Ellis Avery's book The Teahouse Fire is the most perfect evocation of Japanese Tea Culture to ever arrive on Western Shores. A well-written, gripping story of extreme subtlety." Cynthia Lee Katona, Author of Book Savvy.

Save the date...see you there.
Cynthia K

Huge Thanks to Elana Dykewoman...Great Reading!

A huge thanks to Elana Dykewoman for her terrific reading from her work-in-progress, Risk, and her many other fine books. And thanks to the members of the Betty's List Book Club for the huge turnout. Rachel Herbert and her wonderful staff take such superb care of us!


Dr. Betty Sullivan presides over her famous Door Prizes.


Helping Betty pick the winners.


Elana Dykewoman reads for the Betty's List Book Club.


A toast to Betty's List readers.


Winnie listens intently among the tulips.


Elana's rapt community of listeners.


Lee, Kathy and Ginny watching Elana read.


Elana and Betty's Group readers.


Elana Dykewoman, author of Pale Fire, and Cynthia Lee Katona, Betty's List Book Club Co-chair, and author of Book Savvy.

Stay tuned for information about our January Speaker!