Hap­py Hol­i­days, Book Club­bers!

What a won­der­ful year for the Lit­er­ary Guild of Mt. Pleas­ant, y’all!

As we get ready to head into the new mil­len­ni­um, I think we can all look back and say that our 12th year was tru­ly the best one yet for our book club. Who knows what the future will bring, but as you spend time with your loved ones this hol­i­day sea­son I hope you enjoy reflect­ing on all the great books we read in 1999. And if you don’t mind, and have the time, may this lit­tle poem help you rewind!

We learned a lot this past year
About hor­ror, ter­ror, mur­der, fear.
We learned about There­sa Knorr, a real bad moth­er,
And also we learned a lot about each oth­er.

Jhanteigh Kupi­hea turned out to be a good talk­er
On Philip Carlo’s book, The Night Stalk­er.
We had a won­der­ful dis­cus­sion of And Nev­er Let Her Go
Con­duct­ed by our own Nicole De Jack­mo.

Using dia­grams and pic­tures, artist Andie Reid
Made us won­der whose child was the real Bad Seed.
And after two years of ask­ing by Kate McGuire
We’re all glad we final­ly read Inter­view with the Vam­pire,

Although we will admit Mon­e­ka Hewlett caused us all angi­na
By insist­ing we read Bas­tard out of Car­oli­na.
Rick Chillot summed up our Octo­ber book best,
When he said, “Nobody’s per­fect, but at least we aren’t Fred or Rose­mary West.”

Then Julia, Kat, and Ann Hen­drix, our sis­ters three,
Had a lot to say about The Killer Inside Me.
As the last cen­tu­ry scur­ries away,
We real­ly musn’t for­get to say

Thank you, also, to Amy J. Schnei­der, our favorite gram­mar­i­an,
And let’s not for­get Becky Sprat­ford, num­ber one librar­i­an.
Of course, behind every woman there’s a man, usu­al­ly some­where
park­ing the car or ask­ing why there isn’t any rice on the table, and

sev­er­al in par­tic­u­lar went above and beyond this year, so big hugs to Joshua Bilmes, Adam Gold­worm, Jason Reku­lak, Brett Cohen, and Doo­gie Horner for all their sup­port, and for stay­ing out of the way when book club descend­ed on their hous­es like a bar­bar­ian horde.

We couldn’t have fin­ished all these books with­out you, fel­las!

Let’s also not for­get some of the won­der­ful peo­ple who pro­vid­ed spe­cial snacks this year like David Bor­genicht, John McGurk, Mary Ellen Wil­son, Jane Mor­ley, Mandy Dunn Samp­son, Christi­na Schillaci, Megan DiPasquale, Kate Brown, and Mol­ly Mur­phy.

And final­ly, a big thank you to the Lit­er­ary Guild of Greater Charleston, who have been a part of my life for as long as I can remem­ber: Suzy Barr, Helen Cooke, Eva Fitzger­ald, Kit­ty How­ell, Croft Lane, Lucille Keller, Cathy Holmes, Valerie Papadopou­los, Stephanie Hunt, Nan­cy Fox, Ellen Gow­er, and, of course, Shirley Hen­drix. May you all keep on read­ing for many years to come!

See you on the oth­er side of Y2K!