Books 'n Bars recap @ High Life Lounge (Des Moines, IA)

I cannot believe we just completed the fifth month of Books 'n Bars and are now beginning the sixth month - holy-freakin-cow time is fllyyyying!

(ugh, everytime I say that I feel approximately 84 years old).

Aaaanyway, we met on Sunday night to discuss The Murderer's Daughters by Randy Susan Meyers at High Life Lounge in downtown Des Moines, Iowa.

For those of you that may be a little new to ALPITC, Books 'n Bars is a book club I started over the summer for anyone that is interested in reading some good books, having a discussion about said good books and checking out a new bar in the Des Moines area. We meet once a month and always at a new place. At each meeting we have spent approximately 90 minutes-2 hours eating dinner, having a couple drinks and enjoying each others company.

We chose the novelty bar, High Life Lounge this month because A. It's cheap, B. It's awesome and C. Why not?! It's fun!

High Life Lounge looks like your grandparents basement in the 70s with orange shag carpet, worn in leather booths and chairs with old fashioned 70s decor everywhere. They serve beers like PBR and, of course, Miller High Life. They serve food like goulash and tuna casserole, and they're particularly known for their bacon wrapped tator tots. Yes, bacon wrapped! They were even featured on Man vs. Food a couple years ago. Every time I go there I get the cheeseburger with tator tots that costs $2.99. No, I am not kidding, it is really that cheap!

Ok, on to the book!

Everyone was a pretty big fan of the book and liked it a lot. I, however, was not. I did not realize I was such a critical reader, but I think as I am getting older I am becoming much more critical of writing styles and novel development.

Before you think I hated it, let me tell you what I did like! (Because there were things I liked!) I liked how the book started out dramatic right away. From page one there was drama and action, so it really pulled me in, which is something I really need an author to do to keep me interested. I also liked the plot of the story. It was interesting and I thought it was very realistic. So many children grow up with domestic abuse and have lifelong issues with their parents that are very real. I could see some people that are in that position struggle to read through this book and re-live the issues that Lulu and Merry go through.

What I didn't like about the book was how slow it was in the middle. I think it took over a week to read this, which is strange for a book of this genre and length for me. For about half of the book nothing happened! The first quarter and the last quarter of the book held all of the action, and I think that I need more of that kind of intensity to keep me intrigued. I also didn't like that the mother's character wasn't developed a bit more. She was only in the book for the first chapter or so and we hardly learned anything about her before she died. It would have been nice if the family had been developed a little more and we could have gotten to know them.

Overall I give the book 3 out of 5 stars. I would still absolutely recommend this book though. I was the only one in the group that wasn't particularly impressed, which is kind of an oddity, so there is a good chance you would still like it!

Let me know if you read it!!

For the month of October we are reading Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. I am a little nervous because I have had friends that hated that book and then I have met others that gush about it... guess we'll see!