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The book I'd like to read this month is "Shades of Grey" by Jasper Fforde. This is not the "50 Shades of Grey" that everybody makes fun of. This is the first book in a new series by the author of the "Thursday Next" series.

Part social satire, part romance, part revolutionary thriller, Shades of Grey tells of a battle against overwhelming odds. In a society where the ability to see the higher end of the color spectrum denotes a better social standing, Eddie Russet belongs to the low-level House of Red and can see his own color—but no other. The sky, the grass, and everything in between are all just shades of grey, and must be colorized by artificial means. ... ... -Amazon.com

So in a world where color reigns supreme, a good-guy cop starts to realize that the world he knows may not be the world as it really is. Sounds a bit like the Phillip K. Dick stories that have become... ahem... enjoyable theatrical thrillers. The "color=prestige" idea is intriguing, and I imagine Fforde manages to work it into the plot in some very cool ways.

What do you think?

I think that we'd be pushing too hard if we started with a really heavy book for this book club, so may I present: Relic, by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. Take equal parts Jurassic Park and Alien, and set in the Museum of Natural History, and that'd be a pretty close estimation. I really enjoyed this book, but I can never find anyone else who's read it, and I'd like to spread the love.

"Blindness" by Jose Saramago

http://www.amazon.com/Blindness-Harvest-Book-Jose-Saramago/dp/0156007754

Saramago is a Portuguese author who won the Noble prize for literature in 1998 for his "parables sustained by imagination, compassion and irony". In Blindness, a city is hit by an unexplainable epidemic of sight loss. The story explores the implications of wide-spread sickness on a community, and serves as a metaphor to a society increasingly blinded to its own actions.

I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest "Thief of Time" by Terry Pratchett.

Why? I feel that the first book ANY book club should read should be comedy. Yes, comedy.

Thief of Time is one of the Discworld novels, and details the (mis)adventures of several original characters, while tossing in some well known characters to the series. It's a great start to getting used to Terry Pratchett, and besides, COMEDY. How often do the main villains in a series get killed because they eat?

Okay, Amazon's little works:
"

Everybody wants more time, which is why on Discworld only the experts can manage it -- the venerable Monks of History who store it and pump it from where it's wasted, like underwater (how much time does a codfish really need?), to places like cities, where busy denizens lament, "Oh where does the time go?"

While everyone always talks about slowing down, one young horologist is about to do the unthinkable. He's going to stop. Well, stop time that is, by building the world's first truly accurate clock. Which means esteemed History Monk Lu-Tze and his apprentice Lobsang Ludd have to put on some speed to stop the timepiece before it starts. For if the Perfect Clock starts ticking, Time -- as we know it -- will end. And then the trouble will really begin..."

My suggestion is Geek Love by Katherine Dunn. It's fiction, here's a link.

I'm suggesting this novel because it combines being funny and terrifying. It's about a family of American Carnies. Not a happy ending, though.
I hate to diss my own suggestion, but this book actually might have too many strong responses for a book club's first novel. Still, I'm throwing it out there.

The Devil in the White City is coming up in my reading queue. I'd love to have a group to discuss it with.

Review from Amazon:
>Author Erik Larson imbues the incredible events surrounding the 1893 Chicago World's Fair with such drama that readers may find themselves checking the book's categorization to be sure that The Devil in the White City is not, in fact, a highly imaginative novel. Larson tells the stories of two men: Daniel H. Burnham, the architect responsible for the fair's construction, and H.H. Holmes, a serial killer masquerading as a charming doctor. Burnham's challenge was immense. In a short period of time, he was forced to overcome the death of his partner and numerous other obstacles to construct the famous "White City" around which the fair was built. His efforts to complete the project, and the fair's incredible success, are skillfully related along with entertaining appearances by such notables as Buffalo Bill Cody, Susan B. Anthony, and Thomas Edison. The activities of the sinister Dr. Holmes, who is believed to be responsible for scores of murders around the time of the fair, are equally remarkable. He devised and erected the World's Fair Hotel, complete with crematorium and gas chamber, near the fairgrounds and used the event as well as his own charismatic personality to lure victims. Combining the stories of an architect and a killer in one book, mostly in alternating chapters, seems like an odd choice but it works. The magical appeal and horrifying dark side of 19th-century Chicago are both revealed through Larson's skillful writing. --John Moe