I think this is a novel her friend said changing Trigiani’s life and simultaneously

“I think this is a novel,” her friend said, changing Trigiani’s life and simultaneously catapulting her into the big time. Already a practising Catholic, she decided in her twenties that she was going to “investigate under every rock” and “live in the world with my emotions and not with a sense of reserve I’m not afraid of anything,” she adds. “I believe that you have to wake up every day with the expectation that you may not make it. And then when I went to write a book, I thought, what a great way to describe people, because that’s how I look at people.

When you come into a room,” she adds unnecessarily, “I read your face.”The face-reading was, she says, part of a wider spiritual search. “We’re a small community in which everyone knows each other,” she says, “and we meet once a month at different people’s houses. We all like seeing each other’s homes, and we always have food and drink. People make quiches and we have lots of crisps and peanuts and cakes. It’s mostly women,” she adds, “but when we did Master and Commander, we did get a few more men.”They may be a rarity, but there are men’s reading groups, too.

Robert Jackson, a teacher, says that his group started out of envy. “Our wives were pretty much all in book groups, and they were clearly having such a good time So we started our own and we love it We do talk about football, but the book comes first. We never discuss our marriages, our jobs or any aspect of our personal lives. Every Christmas, we have a get-together at a local restaurant where we vote on the books we’ve read over the previous 12 months. That,” he tells me with a rueful smile, “is very male, isn’t it?”While some groups are clearly a slender excuse for a tasty snack, a natter and a nice bottle of chardonnay, others take their reading very seriously indeed. “We’re all prolific readers anyway,” says Jo Minogue, a management consultant, “so we decided it would be a good idea to read literature from around the world. It’s been absolutely fascinating, but it can be a bit harrowing.