Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger

February 2025 Book Smash

Are you sick of all the phonies of the world? Fear not, so is Holden Caulfield and we’ll get rid of the phonies by reading Catcher In The Rye as our February Book Smash.

Our online meeting to discuss the book is on March 1st at 9am Pacific / 12pm Eastern / 8pm GMT for paid subscribers.

We’re writers and fans of novels coming together. We don’t like to read for intellectual stimulation, we read because our souls will combust if we don’t. We discuss the book as well as how it affects us, affects history, affects the stories we tell ourselves. We might not even talk about the book for part of the discussion, yet the energy of Catcher will still be in our conversation when you join us.

At 288 pages you can read 10 or 11 pages a day to finish the book before our Book Smash. If you haven’t finished the book, worry not, still join the meeting and look forward to finishing soon after. There are usually no spoilers as these aren’t mysteries we’re reading, these are cocktails of literature for the soul.

Everyone’s invited except for phonies, for February we have zero tolerance for phonies.

Remember we have Berlin Blues still in play for our January Book Smash and we meet on January 25 at 9am Pacific, so, join us for that if you want to get your feet wet as we have inhabited the soul of Herr Lehmann this month.

Tony, that sound like demon possession. Oh, it’s close. Reading these novels are esoteric, they get us in the heads of characters from other times and other places. For Berlin Blues it’s 1989 Berlin, for Catcher in the Rye it’s 1950 in New York City as we follow Holden Caulfield trying to make sense of this messy world after getting kicked out of school.

What’s all of this about? I mean everything, life, this spinning globe, the lovers who broke our hearts….the answer is in novels, the answers are there for the taking, we’re committed as readers and some of us as writers to figure it all out.

That’s the fun of this game. And that’s why we Book Smash.