First Book Group Meeting

I can't not be in a book group. My friend Paige (in picture above) and I kept our ears open for a book group, but to no avail. So we decided to start our own and include our husbands. Why haven't we thought of this before, friends from Ft. Knox? The men really do bring a new perspective. Quite interesting, really. The first meeting of the Tisserand Cornelius book group was at our house last night.

So the first book we read was A.J. Jacobs' non-fiction book: The Year of Living Biblically. A. J. Jacobs is this man who is Jewish by birth, but was really raised with no religion to speak of. But when he becomes a father, he begins to wonder if he has missed a pivotal part of life by not having some religion to cling to, and sets out on a year of Biblical proportions. Literally.

Jacobs undertakes this project where he will follow the Bible as literally as possible for one year. In that year he meets with a board of Rabis and pastors to have his religious queries answered. He goes to the Creation Museum in Hebron, Kentucky, visits Jerusalem, and even checks out the hype involved with snake handling.

In addition to adhering to the Ten Commandments, he follows all the lesser known rules in the Old Testament about not cutting his hair, dressing all in white, and is careful not to mix the fibers in his clothes as the Bible mandates. Did I mention he and his family live in Manhattan?

Jacobs is an editor at Esquire Magazine and has a refreshing wit about him. For all of Jacobs' humour, he took this project very seriously, and the result is an informative, interesting read.

We've got our next book picked (Into The Land of Bones), and are on the prowl for more women AND men to join our group. More to come...