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Last month my book club met at my house where we had the opportunity to have some snacks and discuss All The Broken Things by Kathryn Kuitenbruwer. To say the least, WE LOVED IT. We had a great evening that included ‘circus’ or ‘carnie’ treats. I love to go all out when I host and keep the food in tune with the book.
The best part was when we connected with the author on Twitter and she joined in our discussion. One of the other book club members (and book reviewer extraordinaire (@KatherineKrige) had contacted her a while back and let her know that she had written a book review and that we were planning to have a book club discussion. As Twitter is our friend, I hopped on the day of our book club and asked Ms. Kuitenbrouwer if we could have 15 minutes of her time. She was gracious enough to agree and we had a marvellous discussion about All the Broken Things.
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Starting our #bookclub for #allthebrokenthings @KKuitenbrouwer pic.twitter.com/h5XjVg9889
— Margarita Ibbott (@DownshiftingPRO) March 31, 2014
To say the least, she had a very engaged and enthusiastic group holding on to her every tweet. It is nice to see that when an author is on twitter that she actually engages with her fans! You have to love social media for that!
Below is the book review written by @KaleGarden:
All The Broken Things by Kathryn Kuitenbruwer was this month’s book club selections for my book club. All The Broken Things was hot off the presses, and therefore no one in the club had read it previously. This allowed all of us to dive into it without any pre-conceived ideas (generally, most selections have been pre-read by the individual recommending the selection). Soon after we all started All The Broken Things, our club’s Facebook page filled with “I LOVE this book” exclamations from the club members.
Kuitenbruwer’s novel is a beautifully told story of a newly immigrated Vietnamese family in 1980’s Toronto who escaped their war-town country with one haunting reminder of their recent past – the youngest child, named Orange, is severely disfigured due to pre-natal exposure to Agent Orange. The main character is Bo, the teenage older brother to Orange, who loves to fight and is recruited by Gerry, to become involved with bear wrestling at small town carnivals.
The manner in which Kuitenbruwer intertwines the story of Bo with his community, the members of the carnivals side-show and memories of his past, draws the reader in quickly and easily. Kuitenbruwer skilfully develops the characters to be relatable and intriguing. What impressed me the most was the tightness of the storyline – Kuitenbruwer strategically placed these characters to move the story along in a natural pace while imitating the strangeness of real life.
Kuitenbruwer’s All The Broken Things explores the themes of possibility, hope, opportunity, trust and loyalty through the perspective of a young man who discovering and figuring out his place in the world. Kuitenbruwer illustrates how Bo is tittering on the edge of youth and his naivety is slipping away. This quote from the novel is just one example of how Kuitenbruwer illustrates Bo’s growing awareness “He would have to take care of his mother and of Orange. He would have take care of Orange for his whole life. He shuddered at the sudden image of the doctor saying how Orange’s life expectancy was short, and that smug look that crossed his face. It was dishonourable to hit a doctor, but Bo wishes he could go back in time and smack him.” (p.197)
My book club is made up of a group of amazing women, who have different views and genre preferences. I really love spending time with and connect with these women. I also love the opportunity to read the books recommend by the diverse members and the books I wouldn’t typically be drawn to read.
I have not read a lot of books with an animal as a major character, so I am not sure I would have picked up All The Broken Things up at the local book store. As I became immersed in the story, I quickly realized All The Broken Things is about a bear and a boy, and a family and a carnival, but most of all, All The Broken Things is a story about love.
Keeping to the carnie theme I served mini pogos or caramel popcorn.
We also had mini-donuts as here in Ontario they have these mini deep fried donuts at just about every fair and carnival.
Pop Shoppe was what you could get when I was a kid. So I search far and wide to provide that pop in a bottle nostalgic feel.
Book Rating from @DownshiftingPRO: 4 out of 5 Stars
Disclosure: Every member of my book club received a copy of All the Broken Things from the generous people at Random House Canada. All book reviews are the opinions of each individual and all photos are the copyright of DownshiftingPRO. No other compensation was received. We would like to thank Random House Canada and @KKuitenbrouwer for their time. We are fans!
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I am convinced I really must must must read this now. Sounds captivating. I love your table set up by the way.
I’m really impressed that you reached out to the author to connect with your book club on Twitter – and that she did! I’d love to suggest that with my group, but I think I’m the only one who uses Twitter (and only one other is even on Facebook – can you imagine?).
Janet: We also connected with the author of The Winter Palace (great read) and she connected with us on skype. It was great. I would definitely suggest you contact her. I like that book better then her most recent one. I wrote a book review on both though.