While it was certainly Auchincloss' work, this one just did not do it for me.....mildly interesting......a bunch of intriguing characters - New York Society as seen through narrator Christopher's life from childhood to late middle age and his constant connection with his mother's Book Class......but the glimmers of true interest were brief. I've read a ton of his books, and like most of them very much. It just did not really go anywhere.....no regrets.....a quick read..... ( )

The book class by Louis Auchincloss
Book about 12 women of NY. They meet monthly for the book club, and more.
Lots of drama from the queens as the book goes through their stages of life in NY.
I received this book from National Library Service for my BARD (Braille Audio Reading Device). ( )

Aa friend of mine once remarked succinctly that all of Louis Auchincloss' books were really the same work. There is much truth to that. That is not necessarily a bad thing, if it means that you write with technical skill, and write about what you know. But it can be a really bummer if your life is, after all, pretty dull -- which is about the kindest thing lone can say about the upper-bourgeois ladies in this opus. ( )

Christopher, the narrator of The Book Class, relates his memories of the members of his mother's sixty-year-long book club. He begins by claiming that "women are intellectually and intuitively superior to men," and the stories about the various women he relates illustrate that superiority. Auchincloss's writing is fine, and he invokes well the world of these (mostly) upper-class New York women of the early and mid-twentieth century, but ultimately the novel didn't quite hold together for me. I found my attention wandering often, perhaps because what placed these women together in one novel was a theme rather than a strong narrative drive. ( )