Date: 18 December 2016
Location: Reynolds & Linda
After a long, warm summer and fall, we all were looking forward to some cooler weather, which brings up the old adage, “Be careful what you ask for!”. In fact it was down right cold as the Bookers made our annual trek to the wilds of north Madison county for our usual December meeting at Reynolds and Linda’s home. Needless to say, the outside cold was more than offset by the warmth and companionship of our friendly gathering.
Our book this month was actually a short story by Agatha Christie, “The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding”. Christie, who is probably the best-selling author in the entire world, virtually created the so-called cozy mystery genre, and in this story she had her famous Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot, solve the mystery and recover a precious stolen ruby, which had been hidden in the Christmas pudding. This is certainly not the best of Christie’s works–it did not even have a murder, which is very unusual–but it was a comfortable, easy read and ideal for the Christmas season.
As is often the case, we actually spent very little time talking about the story. Over the years we have generally followed an unwritten rule and eschewed sensitive political discussions. We do not all share the same political leanings, and at our ages a heated political debate is unlikely to accomplish anything, except possibly get people upset. This meeting was a rare exception, presumably because of the recent Presidential election. I think most of us were unhappy, or at least uneasy, about the results of the race, and we all felt comfortable discussing the issues and presenting suggestions on how to fix the problems we face. It was a very congenial discussion with some reasonable ideas–now we just need to get someone to listen.
— Bob