I have not been to this particular local book club yet but they have a great idea for discussions; book wars. Brilliant. Paraphrased as below.
Read books by authors who were also rivals and compare the works.
A pair that springs to mind is Faulkner vs. Hemingway.
Faulkner: "He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary."
Hemingway: "Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words? He thinks I don't know the ten-dollar words. I know them all right. But there are older and simpler and better words, and those are the ones I use."
Or Mario Vargas Llosa vs. Gabriel Garcia Marquez? The former once punched the latter in the face, and no one quite knows why (http://www.mentalflos...)
Any other ideas for rivalries?Killer idea. Hope they go through with it.