VSDC Book Club

The Vegetarian Society of DC (VSDC) Book Club meets once each month, usually the last Wednesday at 7:30 pm at a vegetarian restaurant. We alternate between fiction and nonfiction. VSDC members and friends who have read at least half the book are welcome. For the location, at least two days before the meeting, leave a message for Beth on the vegline (202-362-VEGY, box 2), or with the contact form below, or via email to VSDC. For dates of upcoming meetings, see the VSDC events calendar. An RSVP is required to attend.

In 2007, the VSDC Book Club celebrates 15 years of great reading -- see the list below for our book selections and recommendations.

Choosing Books: Book club participants vote for two upcoming books at every other meeting -- one fiction and one nonfiction. Any book club member can nominate a book -- be prepared to participate in the discussion if it wins! We read books that are in paperback, in print, and under 400 pages. Plus, we read authors we haven't read (at least not in the past five years).
Buying Books: Politics and Prose Bookstore carries our selections in paperback. Look for them on the book club shelf (and get ideas about what other book groups are reading). Politics and Prose is located at 5015 Connecticut Avenue NW, near Nebraska Avenue, and they will mail books to you. Ask for the 20-percent book club discount.; Or, buy these books (or any books) by using this link to Barnes and Noble.com, and VSDC will receive a 5% donation for every book you buy.
Popular Meeting Places: Vegetable Garden Restaurant, at 11618 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD, near White Flint Metro station; Amma Vegetarian Kitchen (Georgetown), at 3291-A M St NW, Washington DC, near buses from Metro
Recommend?: At the end of each meeting, participants vote on whether they would recommend the book -- yes, no, or other. We started asking this question at the April 1993 meeting. Votes before then do not include everyone who participated in the discussion (and may include some who didn't). Note the self-selection -- people who do not like a book may be less likely to come to the meeting.

Book Selections

Years: 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008.

1992

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
February	Organizational Meeting
March	The State of the World	Brown	2	3	0
April	Watership Down	Adams	5	1	0
May	Beyond Beef	Rifkin	2	3	0
June	Vox	Baker	0	6	0
July	You Just Don't Understand: conversations between women and men	Tannen	4	1	1
August	Halfway Home	Monette	4	1	1
September	The Revolution Within	Steinem	0	3	1
October	Waiting to Exhale	McMillan	2	5	0
November	A Turn in the South	Naipaul	2	3	1
December	Scum	Singer	2	2	2

1993

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	How Can I Help?	Dass	3	4	0
February	A Thousand Acres	Smiley	6	0	0
March	A Return to Love	Williamson	0	5	1
April	Nice Work	Lodge	3	3	1
May	The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People	Covey	5	3	2
June	Damage	Hart	7	4	2
July	Healing and the Mind	Moyers	3	1	0
August	Like Water for Chocolate	Esquival	6	1	1
September	Earth in the Balance	Gore	4	1	0
October	Postcards	Proulx	2	1	0
November	Your Money or Your Life	Dominquez & Robin	4	2	0
December	Readings by Group

1994

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	Riding the Iron Rooster	Theroux	5	1	0
February	Love in the Time of Cholera	Garcia Marquez	4	0	0
March	Powershift	Toffler	2	2	1
April	Beloved	Morrison	6	0	0
May	Enzyme Nutrition	Howell	6	2	2
June	The Easy Way Out	McCauley	4	1	0
July	Ageless Body, Timeless Mind	Chopra	3	1	1
August	The Education of Little Tree	Carter	4	0	2
September	Defending the Devil	Nelson	8	0	0
October	The Great Gatsby	Fitzgerald	12	0	0
November	Animal Happiness	Hearne	0	8	0
December	The Measure of Our Success	Edelman	5	1	6

1995

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	Midnight's Children	Rushdie	0	1	3
February	The Things They Carried	O'Brien	9	0	0
March	The Shipping News	Proulx	6	2	2
April	The Myth of Male Power	Farrell	2	5	4
May	The Catcher in the Rye	Salinger	8	0	0
June	The Autobiography of a Face	Grealey	8	0	0
July	Monsignor Quixote	Green	2	3	2
August	Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil: A Savannah Story	Berendt	4	1	3
September	Crossing to Safety	Stegner	3	0	2
October	In an Antique Land	Ghosh	2	0	2
November	Ladder of Years	Tyler	2	3	1
December	Readings by Group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

1996

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	My Own Country	Verghese	4	0	2
February	The Garden of Eden	Hemingway	5	1	1
March	Making Movies	Lumet	5	0	0
April	The Love Letter	Schine	2	0	0
May	Emotional Intelligence	Goleman	1	1	1
June	Animal Dreams	Kingsolver	5	0	0
July	Between Heaven and Earth: A Guide to Chinese Medicine	Beinfield & Korngold	0	0	3
August	Pride and Prejudice	Austen	6	1	0
September	Jaguar: one man's battle to establish the world's first jaguar preserve	Rabinowitz	5	0	0
October	Tracks	Erdrich	0	0	3
November	Animal Liberation	Singer	6	0	0
December	Readings by group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

1997

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	The Wedding	Dorothy West	9	0	2
February	Paula	Isabel Allende	5	0	0
March	Paddy Clark Ha Ha Ha	Doyle	2	0	2
April	The Saturated Self: Dilemmas of Identity in Contemporary Life	Gergen	0	4	1
May	The Here and Now	Cohen	2	2	1
June	The Jew in the Lotus: A Poet's Rediscovery of Jewish Identity in Buddhist India	Kamenetz	3	2	2
July	Open Secrets	Munro	2	2	0
August	Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation	Kozol	6	0	0
September	Candida	Shaw	4	0	1
October	The Invisible Partners: how the male and female in each of us affects our relationships	Sanford	2	5	0
November	I Should Have Stayed Home: The Worst Trips of the Great American Writers	Rapoport & Castanera, editors	4	0	0
December	Readings by group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

1998

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	None to Accompany Me	Gordimer	2	0	4
February	The Snow Leopard	Matthiessen	1	4	2
March	True Story: A Comedy Novel	Maher	4	3	0
April	Spontaneous Healing	Weil	7	1	0
May	On the Road	Kerouac	8	0	0
June	Long Quiet Highway: Waking Up America	Goldberg	5	0	0
July	Martha Quest	Lessing	2	0	1
August	The Dreaded Comparison: Human and Animal Slavery	Spiegel	7	0	2
September	Enormous Changes at the Last Minute	Paley	1	3	1
October	The Starship and the Canoe	Brower	7	0	0
November	Food for the Gods	Berry	6	0	2
December	Readings by group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

1999

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	The God of Small Things	Arundhati Roy	2	1	3
February	Toxic Sludge is Good for You! Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry	John Stauber, Sheldon Rampton	11	0	0
March	Animal Husbandry	Laura Zigman	6	0	0
April	Cultivating the Mind of Love	Thich Nhat Hanh	3	2	3
May	Animal Farm	George Orwell	13	0	0
June	Desert Solitaire	Edward Abbey	4	2	4
July	The Dispossessed	Ursula LeGuin	5	2	1
August	The Call of Service: A Witness to Idealism	Robert Coles	3	2	2
September	How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents	Julia Alvarez	0	3	1
October	The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: a Hmong child, her American doctors, and the collision of two cultures	Anne Fadiman	5	2	1
November	A Cry for Self-Help	Jaqueline Girdner	0	3	2
December	Readings by group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

2000

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	The Rarest of the Rare	Diane Ackerman	5	0	0
February	Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone	J. K. Rowling	3	0	0
March	Thoughts Without a Thinker: psychotherapy from a Buddhist perspective	Mark Epstein	10	2	1
April	Women of Sand and Myrrh	Hanan Al-Shaykh	1	1	1
May	Stonewall	Martin Duberman	3	0	0
June	My Year of Meats	Ruth Ozeki	3	0	1
July	A Tribe Apart: A Journey into the Heart of American Adolescence	Patricia Hersch	6	0	1
August	The Hundred Secret Senses	Amy Tan	6	0	0
September	Waiting to Forget	Margaret Moorman	4	0	0
October	To Kill a Mockingbird	Harper Lee	9	0	0
November	The Orchid Thief	Susan Orlean	4	1	0
December	Readings by group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

2001

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	The Chosen	Chaim Potok	12	1	0
February	Through a Window	Jane Goodall	6	0	0
March	After the Blue	Russel Like	1	2	2
April	Sex on the Brain: the biological differences between men and women	Deborah Blum	1	1	1
May	Regeneration	Pat Barker	3	0	1
June	Rattling the Cage: Toward Legal Rights for Animals	Steven Wise	0	0	3
July	Waiting	Ha Jin	4	0	1
August	Into the Wild	Jon Krakauer	6	1	3
September	A Home at the End of the World	Michael Cunningham	4	0	0
October	How I Became Hettie Jones	Hettie Jones	5	0	0
November	Sunshine Rider: The First Vegetarian Western	Ric Lynden Hardman
December	Readings by group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

2002

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings	Maya Angelou	3	0	1
February	Me Talk Pretty One Day	David Sedaris	4	1	0
March	Girl with a Pearl Earring	Tracy Chavalier	1	0	1
April	Living Among Meat Eaters: The Vegetarian's Survival Handbook	Carol J. Adams	2	0	2
May	The Edible Woman	Margaret Atwood	2	2	1
June	The Parrot's Lament: and other true tales of animal intrigue, intelligence, and ingenuity	Eugene Linden	2	2	0
July	Blitzcat	Robert Westall	5	0	1
August	Fast Food Nation	Eric Schlosser	7	0	0
September	The Jungle	Upton Sinclair	3	0	0
October	The Battle for God	Karen Armstrong	0	0	3
November	Ishmael	Daniel Quinn	4	3	0
December	Readings by group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

2003

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	Ethics into Action: Henry Spira and the Animal Rights Movement	Peter Singer	6	0	0
February	Headlong: A Novel	Michael Frayn	1	0	1
March	The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World	Michael Pollan	5	0	0
April	Disgrace	J.M. Coetzee	7	1	0
May	The Tao of Pooh	Benjamin Hoff	11	0	0
June	Mrs. Dalloway	Virginia Woolf	5	1	1
July	The Wilderness World of John Muir	John Muir	6	0	0
August	The Nanny Diaries	Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus	4	1	1
September	All of One Peace, Essays on Nonviolence	Colman McCarthy	8	0	0
October	Interpreter of Maladies	Jhumpa Lahiri	8	0	0
November	Pilgrim at Tinker Creek	Annie Dillard	1	0	2
December	Readings by group: Share something up to 3 minutes long

2004

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	Old Books, Rare Friends: two literary sleuths and their shared passion	Leona Rostenberg, Madeleine Stern	4	1	0
February	River, Cross My Heart	Breena Clarke	5	1	1
March	Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America	Barbara Ehrenreich	8	0	1
April	The Red Pony	John Steinbeck	3	0	2
May	Globalization and Its Discontents	Joseph E. Stiglitz	7	2	1
June	How to be Good	Nick Hornby	9	1	1
July	Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things	William McDonough, Michael Braungart	4	0	0
August	Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress	Sijie Dai	5	1	0
September	Strange Fruit: The Biography of a Song	David Margolick	5	2	2
October	Tell Me a Riddle	Tillie Olsen	0	2	2
November	Wild Health: how animals keep themselves well and what we can learn from them	Cindy Engel	4	0	1
December	VSDC Holiday Party

2005

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	The Awakening	Kate Chopin	2	1	2
February	Silent Spring	Rachel Carson	7	0	0
March	West of the Jordan	Laila Halaby	2	2	1
April	Dominion	Matthew Scully	4	0	0
May	Nathan Coulter	Wendell Berry	0	2	0
June	Red Tails in Love: A Wildlife Drama in Central Park	Marie Winn	5	0	0
July	The Kite Runner	Khaled Hosseini	8	0	0
August	Among the Bears: Raising Orphaned Cubs in the Wild	Benjamin Kilham	1	2	0
September	Like Life: Stories	Lorrie Moore	0	2	2
October	The Tipping Point: how little things can make a big difference	Malcolm Gladwell	8	2	2
November	The Inn at Lake Devine	Elinor Lipman	8	0	1
December	VSDC Holiday Party

2006

			Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	Confessions of an Economic Hit Man	John Perkins	10	0	2
February	Rubyfruit Jungle	Rita Mae Brown	12	1	1
March	The Beak of the Finch: A Story of Evolution in Our Time	Jonathan Weiner	5	0	2
April	Lost in the City	Edward P. Jones	8	1	1
May	Bayou Farewell: the rich life and tragic death of Louisiana's cajun coast	Mike Tidwell	6	0	0
June	The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time	Mark Haddon	10	0	1
July	Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood	Marjane Satrapi	7	0	0
August	Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close	Jonathan Safran Foer	7	0	0
September	Banker to the Poor: micro-lending and the battle against world poverty	Muhammad Yunus	5	0	0
October	Sammy's Hill	Kristin Gore	2	0	2
November	Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books	Azar Nafisi	4	1	3
December	VSDC Holiday Events

2007

Month	Book		Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	The Jane Austen Book Club	Karen Jay Fowler	2	1	3
February	For the Prevention of Cruelty: the history and legacy of animal rights activism in the United States	Diane L. Beers	3	0	1
March	The Heidi Chronicles, Uncommon Women and Others, and Isn't It Romantic	Wendy Wasserstein	8	0	1
April	Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating	Jane Goodall	3	0	0
May	Slaughterhouse-Five	Kurt Vonnegut	9	0	1
June	Night	Elie Wiesel	7	0	0
July	Timbuktu	Paul Auster	5	0	1
August	The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature	Geoffrey Miller	2	1	0
September	Black Beauty	Anna Sewell	4	0	1
October	Voodoo Science: The Road from Foolishness to Fraud	Robert Park	5	0	0
November	Unsafe Harbor: A Rachel Porter Mystery	Jessica Speart	2	5	3

2008

Month	Book		Recommend?
Month	Title	Author	Yes	No	?
January	Pleasurable Kingdom	Jonathan Balcombe	9	0	0
February	Water for Elephants	Sara Gruen	3	0	0
March	Never Cry Wolf: Amazing True Story of Life Among Arctic Wolves	Farley Mowat	9	0	0
April	The Tempest	William Shakespeare	7	0	2
May	Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life	Barbara Kingsolver
June	A Long Fatal Love Chase	Louisa May Alcott
July	The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy: An Economist Examines the Markets, Power, and Politics of World Trade	Pietra Rivoli
August	Tales of the City	Armistead Maupin
September	How Starbucks Saved My Life	Michael Gates Gill

You can contact Beth, the book club coordinator, through VSDC or with the following form.