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News Archive

The mystery begins in the Readers’ Room

Tilburg International Club Expat Book Clubreview by Anne Durand

8 Feb 2023. We met to discuss the book The Readers’ Room, by Antoine Laurain. It is a short book, translated from French (everyone agreed the translation was excellent!), with a lot of suspense. We discussed how the author’s greatest source of inspiration – fairytales – might show up in the story, mental health, artificial intelligence and how art/fiction can inspire or even foretell (!!) reality. Overall, we quite liked the book, although not everyone was convinced about the ending. 

The Book

Like many of Laurain’s novels, this book centers on an object: a book. More specifically, a manuscript from a mysterious author that arrives at the reader’s room of a Parisian publishing house.

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Book in Review: A New Twist on an Old Lesson

Tilburg International Club Expat Book Club

review by Anne van Oorschot

17 Jan 2022. “Your ability to change everything – including yourself – starts here” – ELIZABETH ZOTT

The Book

Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing. But it’s the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute take a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans, the lonely, brilliant, Nobel-prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with – of  all things – her mind. True chemistry results.

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Book Discussion Review: 100th Book Celebration!

Tilburg International Club Expat Book Clubreview by Katie Schweitzer & Anne van Oorschot

18 Oct 2022. When the Tilburg International Club came into being back in March 2008, the Book Discussion group was created as well. Our first meeting was well attended and our first book was Kafka on the Shore, by Haruki Murakami. While members to the group have come and gone, we are still going strong and recently read our 100th book!

For our 100th book we read The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow and gathered together to discuss it. Since 100 books is no small feat, we also had a party to celebrate!

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Book Discussion Review: The Liar’s Dictionary

TIC Book Discussion: The Liar's Dictionaryreview by Donna Brown

13 Sept 2022. We met to discuss the book, The Liar’s Dictionary, by Eley Williams, a young British professor and writer who grew up in a family immersed in words and dictionaries.

While not everyone enjoyed the book as a whole, it was the consensus that dictionaries must be fluid in nature, as words change in meaning over time. Also, imbedded in the story was the existence of mountweasels, or false words, as well as many metaphors, hyperboles, puns, turns of phrase.  This made for a clever and fun read.

The Book

Our book took place over a century in the fictitious Swansby’s Encycolpedic Dictionary of Words.  The  thread in the story in the late nineteenth century was told through the eyes of Mr. Winceworth, a man who (more…)

Book Club review: Island of Sea Women

review by Katie Schweitzer

9 Mar 2022. For our most recent book club we read The Island of Sea Women, by Lisa See. 

<– Watch the video to hear about the origins of The Island of Sea Women told by author Lisa See who visited us during our book club!

Check out our picture gallery!

The Book

It told the story of two friends set on an island of Korea called Jeju. The story was told specifically through the frame of the society’s focus on women as breadwinners through diving, and the tumultuous period in history for Korea in the 20 th  century.

Our Review

Everyone really enjoyed the book even though there were some difficult parts to read due to the traumatic events that took place.

However, the main highlight of the evening was that we were able to talk with the author herself because she joined our book club through a video call! She gave us some background on how she got interested in the topic of the haenyeo (women divers) and all the research she did to make the book a reality.

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Like Water for Chocolate: A Mix of Reality, Magic, and Supernatural

review by Lily Gonzalez

Tilburg International Club Expat Book Club

22 Nov 2022. It was my turn to make the book selection and when we were discussing about what would be nice to read, the conclusion was that 3 suspense/mystery books will be a nice shift. Then, when I was looking for the options, I also remembered that they wanted to read something “different”, “not too American” (because they have read a lot of those), so I decided to include an “extra” book that was popular in my country (México). Besides, in case they like the book, we could eventually also enjoy another “Tic Book Club-Movie” together. (more…)

#FBF Book Club review: “Educated, A Memoir”

On Monday, we will be meeting for our next book club; a gathering that sometimes has intense debates, but is always a lot of fun. For #FlashBackFriday, let’s take a look at a book club review from 2019.

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Review by Anne van Oorschot

19 Mar 2019. For our March book club gathering, after getting a warm drink, we settled around a crackling fireplace and with a tray of yummy snacks. While not everyone had finished the book, Educated, all agreed that it was a remarkable story and well written.
Tara was the youngest of 7 children and her childhood looked idylic on the surface – living on a breathtakingly beautiful mountain in rural Idaho with her own goats and horses. Her mother was a midwife and herbalist and Tara spent a lot of hours walking on the mountain, gathering rose hips and mullein flowers that her Mom could stew into tinctures.

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We know what “Too Loud A Solitude” feels like

Tilburg International Club Expat Book Club15 Mar 2021. by Essi Koskela. Our selection for book club this time was Too loud a solitude by Bohumil Hrabal, a mere 100 pages of quotable digression aimed to baffle the reader. This sentence from the book perhaps describes the best how Hrabal’s book should be read, “I pop a beautiful sentence into my mouth and suck it like a fruit drop, or I sip it like a liqueur until the thought dissolves in me like alcohol, infusing brain and heart and coursing on through the veins to the root of each blood vessel.” (more…)

Meet the Board! Mala Raman

Tilburg International Club Communications

Mala Raman, Communications & Outreach

Tilburg International Club has come a long way from its start in 2008.  Since we started the club, I’ve contributed invarious capacities on the Board and have enjoyed seeing the club from all different perspectives. I’m currently in the role of strengthening our online presence, supporting the growth of our membership base and developing sustainable business partnerships.

Our Online Presence

Our communications priority has always been to create a strong online awareness of our club, events, goals and attractive membership benefits through Facebook (feel free to visit now!), Twitter @tilintclub, Instagram @tilburg_international_club and, of course, our own Tilburg International Club website. We rely on our members, guests, sponsors and community leaders to help spread the word about what our club can offer internationals in Brabant. (more…)

Who runs the world? “Girl, Woman, Other”

Tilburg International Club Expat Book Club16 Feb 2021. by Estela Highet. I wish we could have had more time to discuss this very interesting book, it has plenty of different topics and they are very related to what the world has been going through lately.

World of Women

Feminism, racism, cultural differences, sex and many more topics in one single book. All this through the million characters and therefore million stories to be told from each of them – which also made it a bit difficult to read. The principal characters were (only) 11 black women and one non-binary living in the UK.

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