The 'baby of the group' is 83: How a Pacific Palisades book club remains unbreakable - BERITAJA

The members of Becky’s Book Club successful Pacific Palisades couldn’t guidelines “Play It arsenic It Lays.” Snakes, freeways, difficult men and Didion’s quiet brutality bent successful the aerial for illustration the oppressive power of this unusually lukewarm outpouring day. At their feet, a regal Airedale terrier named Phoebe lounges, looking arsenic though she belongs successful an lipid painting.

“If I had publication this book earlier coming to Los Angeles, I would person ne'er come,” says Raymee Olin Weiman, 1 of the members of the book club. She’s a spirited talker who yet concedes a compliment to Didion. “I did not for illustration it, but I was compelled to publication it, because the penning is truthful brilliant.”

Becky Nedelman, an 85-year-old who organizes the book club, agrees. “To me, Maria is erstwhile you thrust by an accident, and you don’t want to look, but you do,” she says of Didion’s aimless and troubled protagonist.

Amy Silverberg, the book nine provider (who is besides a Times contributor and friend of this reporter) had warned the group the period anterior that they mightiness shudder astatine the unnerving novel. When she walked successful the door, they confirmed Silverberg’s fears, instantly airing their displeasure. “You are to blame,” she tells them pinch a smile. “I want to reiterate that.”

For each their grievances pinch Didion’s fiction, the women’s lives carnivore a striking resemblance to Didion’s own. Some of the women successful the book nine are older than the precocious writer Joan Didion, who would person been 91. A fewer of them are successful their 90s, prevention for Gail Heltzer — “the babe of the group,” arsenic she’s called — who is 83.

The book nine comprises aged friends who person been gathering to talk lit for complete 25 years. Long-standing book clubs successful Los Angeles are a rarity — galore occurrence retired owed to dwindling interest, scheduling conflicts and waning enthusiasm. That hasn’t been the lawsuit for Becky’s Book Club, which still sparks lively statement astatine each meeting.

The gathering, which takes spot successful the women’s homes, has endured done each shape of their lives — marriages, motherhood, moreover illness.

Nancy de Brier and Barbara Smith stock a laughter during their book nine meeting.

(Ariana Drehsler / For The Times)

“The only measurement we’ve mislaid members, unfortunately, has been by passing distant aliases moving away,” says Becky Nedelman.

Today, they meet astatine Emily Lawrence’s home, wherever she has prepared peanut food cookies and an elaborate food committee for the occasion.

With each passing year, the sentimental worth only swells.

“The longer it goes on, the much important we go to 1 another. We’re the property wherever we occasionally suffer friends; we suffer husbands — tons of america have. So, this is very important,” says Nancy deBrier, 1 of the members. The group credits the book club’s enduring occurrence to its organizer, Becky Nedelman.

Nedelman has assembled the book nine complete the decades, inviting women from different parts of her life, including finance clubs and Planned Parenthood organizing on pinch precocious schoolhouse classmates. In the end, she chose members who were superior about books.

Host Emily Lawrence pinch her transcript of Joan Didion’s “Play It arsenic It Lays.”

(Ariana Drehsler / For The Times)

“We wanted to beryllium pinch a group of women who were really readers. We didn’t travel to talk about recipes aliases kids and grandkids, but we really wanted to attraction connected the book,” says Nedelman.

Since June 2001, the group has publication 252 books together, maintaining a elaborate grounds of each book. The group mostly sounds modern literature, but erstwhile a year, they tackle a classical — aliases “a downer,” arsenic they’ve travel to telephone them.

“Apeirogon” by Colum McCann and “The Correspondent” by Virginia Evans guidelines retired to them arsenic peculiarly engaging. They publication “Anna Karenina” and “Crime and Punishment,” an acquisition they work together was challenging but rewarding. Their commentary is astute and heartfelt, moreover erstwhile it’s critical. “Are immoderate of the classics fun?” asks Harriet Eilber.

What makes a book nine tally truthful smoothly for complete 2 decades? Gail Heltzer attributes it to the group’s open-mindedness and inherent chemistry. “Everybody is consenting to publication a wide assortment of books connected different subjects. We don’t cull immoderate ideas,” says Heltzer. “Everybody has opinions and is highly respectful, and everyone leaves smarter.”

The book nine has encouraged the women to reconnect pinch reference later successful life. DeBrier, who has a master’s grade and practiced law, explains that reference has been a gift passim her life. “My reference life post-college was truthful overmuch much absorbing successful galore ways,” she says. “You’ll find that that’s the bully point about life, right? It’s very enriching to support reading.”

“Their open-mindedness astatine their property is really inspiring to me,” says Silverberg. “I dream to person that open-mindedness successful my 80s and 90s. What is simply a amended way for open-mindedness than to read?”

To guarantee the book nine runs efficiently pinch riveting discussions, the women person enlisted the thief of Literary Affairs — an L.A.-based institution that offers facilitators astatine complete 50 book clubs successful L.A. The facilitators often person exceptional literate resumes; galore are novelists and clasp PhDs successful literature. Silverberg, the provider of Becky’s Book Club, is besides a novelist and comedian and has worked for Literary Affairs for 5 years. Last year, her debut novel, “First Time, Long Time,” was released — and the book nine attended her book motorboat astatine Skylight Books successful Los Feliz to connection support.

“Whether they for illustration the book aliases not, they’re ever consenting to move the page,” says Silverberg of the group. She enjoys the hr and a half she spends discussing lit pinch them. “They make maine deliberation about a book differently, and I admit that. They fto maine reason pinch them. I’m ever connected the broadside of the book.”

The book nine has been gathering together for complete 25 years and has publication much than 250 books.

(Ariana Drehsler / For The Times)

During today’s discussion, Silverberg bravely makes a lawsuit for “Play It arsenic It Lays.” The women look backmost astatine her pinch sullen but intrigued faces. Silverberg sounds a transition of the caller to the group. Her sound is ray but insistent. “She’s truthful astatine the mercy of the men successful her life,” says Silverberg.

“That was the ‘60s,” retorts Weiman. In spite of their first resistance, Didion’s penning pulls buried recollections to the surface. At times, the novels operation up memories from the women’s lives, prompting poignant, often susceptible discussions. DeBrier reflects connected her ain acquisition of motherhood successful the 1960s. “I was having a babe — I didn’t cognize what existential meant,” she remarks.

Later, the women stock memories connected the 1960s sociopolitical issues of commencement control, homosexuality and the Vietnam War. They support that they had a hopefulness that contrasts pinch Didion’s protagonist.

“Despite really bad things were successful the mediate of the war, I did not see everything bleak,” says Heltzer. “I knew that we were going to support trying and the group were going to thief move the nation.”

The speech shifts into a broader reflection connected womanhood.

“I ever had a free mindset about what I wanted to do. Until my 20s, erstwhile I sewage married, I didn’t recognize I had choices successful my marriage,” reflects Weiman. She feels Didion’s caller urges women to reconnect pinch themselves, utilizing protagonist Maria arsenic a cautionary tale. “What she did past was a gift to each women — successful penning this novel.”

At the extremity of the book club, the women break into convivial chatter. They hover about the cheeseboard and cookies. Emily Lawrence showcases her postulation of first-edition William Carlos Williams poetry. She has a increasing postulation of books that she would for illustration to donate to the Palisades branch library, which was destroyed successful the 2025 fires. With Lawrence’s donations, her purpose is for the Palisades to statesman to bask caller stories, caller characters and caller beginnings successful the aftermath of disaster. Perhaps evoking an oft-quoted Didion quote: “We show ourselves stories successful bid to live. We unrecorded wholly by the belief of a communicative statement upon disparate images, the shifting phantasmagoria, which is our existent experience.”

Connors is simply a writer surviving successful Los Angeles. She hosts the literate reference arena Unreliable Narrators astatine Nico’s Wines successful Atwater Village each month.