A normally wonderful book club meeting was made perfect by a visit from Lisa Alvarez and Andrew Tonkovich, the editors of Orange County: A Literary Field Guide.
This is a great anthology whether you live in Orange County or somewhere else in the world. But if you do happen to live here, or have lived here, or plan to live here, it is essential reading. Lisa Alvarez and Andrew Tonkovich have done a wonderful job collecting stories, poems, and essays that make the region and it’s history come alive.
To be a thinking person living in Orange County is to both hate it and love it and that comes through in the book. Orange County can seem soulless and empty, filled with traffic and endless tract homes but somehow we come to love it, feel safe here, and know it is home. Reading stories about home written by people who lived here was a thrill.

We forgot to dress in drag and leathers so we stripped down for the t-shirt contest last night. Here’s a rare photo from the normally camera-shy book club in honor of our 10th Aniversary. A few more photos here.
https://scd8418.smugmug.com/Events/Friends/Book-Club-2016/

Samantha Dunn visited again in April and then wrote an article about us that appeared on the front page of the Orange County Register. It was our 15 minutes of fame. We had a bit of a snafu with the Register’s photographer who appeared at Scott’ beach place (the originally planned venue) so we took our own photos got a photographic credit in the story. Thanks to Samantha for paying attention to a bunch of old book nuts. You can read the entire article here.
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/book-609799-club-says.html

Samantha Dunn, author of “Faith in Carlos Gomez” and “Failing Paris” made the trek to Fullerton (Don’s place) to hang out with the book club yesterday. In addition to her books, Samantha is a writer for the OC Register. We learned a bit about her life and craft between mojitos, wine and good food.

We met Samantha through an introduction from our friend Hector Tobar. She’s threatened to write a story about us for the Register so we were on our best behavior and wore clean shirts.

Samantha told us a bit about come of her works in progress so we’re hoping she finds the time to finish them so we can invite her back.

Thanks as always to Vicki for preparing an awesome meal and making us laugh.

A group of great male thinkers based in Fullerton, California dedicated to reading books of great importance and having monthly discussions of tremendous consequence.

John invited Hector Tobar, author of the Barbarian Nurseries, to come out to my place to discuss his book with us . We had a great time chatting about the book we read and the book he has coming out next year (about the Chilean miners).
Hector posted the following on FB the next day “I’ve done a few book clubs since ‘The Barbarian Nurseries’ came out. Always interesting: especially when the moms start debating whether they like my character Maureen. But last night I went to a home in Fullerton and met up with a book club made up entirely of dads. They made some great food, served up some excellent sangria and sopes (just like in the party in my novel!). And, as my character Araceli would have liked, I made a point of showing up fashionably late. Cool discussion followed, especially since one of the dads was named Scott (like the dad in my novel) and has 3 kids and works in a software company (like my fictional Scott!). Nice when reality is like the stuff you make up.”

Now we can attest that Hector is a great story-teller both in print and in person. It was an honor that he’d make the long pilgrimage to the hinterlands of Fullerton to join us wine, laughs, and good conversation.
“Barbarian Nurseries” is Winner of the California Book Award for Fiction and A Los Angeles Times Bestseller.