It’s Smart Bitches Book Club selection time! As I mentioned earlier this month, we’re going to be alternating Movie Matinee selections with Book Club selections this year. And the Smart Bitches Book Club will be a mix of new and older titles so as to increase the likelihood that the books we’re discussing will be in your local library.
Our February selection: To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han!
This YA romance was published in 2014, and it’s appeared on many recommendation lists since then. Here’s the cover copy:
What if all the crushes you ever had found out how you felt about them…all at once?
Sixteen-year-old Lara Jean Song keeps her love letters in a hatbox her mother gave her. They aren’t love letters that anyone else wrote for her; these are ones she’s written. One for every boy she’s ever loved—five in all. When she writes, she pours out her heart and soul and says all the things she would never say in real life, because her letters are for her eyes only. Until the day her secret letters are mailed, and suddenly, Lara Jean’s love life goes from imaginary to out of control.
I have heard a number of people suggest that it helps to write letters you never send to process emotions. Now I’m going to paranoid even thinking about writing a letter, let alone five.
I hope whether you’ve already read this book or been curious about it, you’ll give it a try!
To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before ( A | BN | K | G | AB | Au | WorldCat ) is available at all vendors. And, given that it was a bestseller, it should be available at most libraries! It’s also currently on sale for $2.99!
Join us Monday February 27 at 8:30pm ET for our live book club chat! We’ll all be here in a live text window talking about the book and our experiences with it. And if you remember the book club chats from prior years, you’ll know we bring beverages and the silliness increases as the discussion goes on.
Happy reading – and see you on the 27th!
I haven´t read this. I found the second one at my library (my library has a very good track record of having the second book of a series which I pick up unknowingly or not and then when I realise there’s a first I search the catalogue only to find out that they don’t have the first – it’s infuriating).
I loved this book! I stayed up and finished it in one night and immediately started the next. I think my favorite thing was really Lara Jean’s relationship with her sisters, her characterization, and that sense of her maturing over the book. I liked the romance too, but I found it refreshing that Lara Jean was so into “girly” things and a bit naive. And I say that as an only child who was never into “girly stuff.”
Checked it out zealously and just realised I can’t participate because of my European timezone
I bought this on sale ages ago
I’ve read this one and it’s sequel, then looked up the author. She’s done an interview on a site called Dramabeans, which does reviews and recaps and reports news of all the happenings in the world of Korean entertainment and I was not at all surprised when the bloggers said the book read like a k-drama because it did! It’s a very cute setup that involves contract dating and the usual love triangle shenanigans.
@Lizzie R: Not to make excuses for your library, but I can share with you some of the reasons why your library may not have the first book in a series. (I’m a librarian who used to be in charge of adult fiction/genre fiction for my public library system, so I’ve lived this quandary.)
Often, especially with new authors, the first book in a series doesn’t break into the standard book review sources that librarians use to select for their collections. The series may not receive review notice until later in the series. The first book may not be available through library vendors (we have expensive contracts with them, frequently including processing in the price) by the time we learn about it. Or perhaps the first book made it into the collection, but has since disappeared (lost, overdue, damaged, etc.).
What you can do: request it by title. Mention that it is the first book in a series, how you found out about it, and who it might appeal to. Patron suggestions carry weight, trust me. We want to please you. And we want to add titles that patrons assure us will be read. Most often, it will be purchased if at all possible. Sometimes, though, we have to choose between buying a new, popular title and buying an older series title because the funds don’t go far enough to purchase both.
You can also check with your public library’s collection development manager to see if they would accept a donated copy. Some do, under certain conditions. It doesn’t hurt to ask. Then, if you are so inclined, you can purchase it, read it, and then donate it.
I hope this helps empower library patrons who want to see their favorites represented in their library collections.
Cheers!
Hm… Interesting premise… Wondering whether I should get this for my almost fourteen-year-old. @Nancy C, thanks for the very helpful insight and suggestions about library acquisitions!
OH MY GOD! I just finished this. It made me so happy. Bless you, Bitches, bless you.
I just finished this book and can’t wait to read the next one.