Conversation with Claudia Sjoberg

Claudia is a local (Vancouver) business owner, entrepreneur, community leader, and all round wonderful, fun and caring friend to many.

She is also a big reader and shared with me the long impressive list of books she's read with her book club -- but we also delved into some of the many more books she reads and enjoys beyond that list. We followed a list of questions to uncover what she likes and doesn't like and heard what she's come to know is important for her in reading, and the power of the story for all of us.

We looked for a couple of books we'd both enjoyed reading and settled on these two Canadian reads, the novel Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese and the memoir in essays, Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory by Sarah Polley.

Other books that came up in our discussion were:

Women Talking by Miriam Toews The Paying Guest by Sarah Watts The Alchemist by Paolo Coehlo The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield The Secret by Rhonda Byrne Books by Robert Galbraith (JK Rowling) -- the Cormoran Strike detective series Iona Whishaw Lane Winslow mystery series Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell Olive Kitteridge, Olive Again, My name is Lucy Barton and Oh William! by Elizabeth Strout Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace Miss Morgan’s Book Brigade by Janet Skeslien Charles Doppelgänger by Naomi Klein

Children’s books: Jumanji and The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg One Halloween Night by Mark Teague Norman the Doorman by Don Freeman