Book Events


How To Start A Virtual Book Club

During, and following, COVID many things that once were in person had to pivot to become virtual. And some of these things stayed that way, or opened up a new door with countless possibilities. One of these things was the transition of book clubs from gathering in person to online. This certainly presented challenges but also allowed people who maybe never have been to a book club to go from the comfort and safety of their own home, and meet some wonderful people from around the world.

I’m fortunate enough to be in a book club and actually run one with a wonderful group of men and women, primarily along the East Coast of the United States. It’s certainly not big, which is how I like it – kind of cozy and intimate like a real book club. But it afforded those older an ability to have a community during the trying times of COVID and also exposed me to some incredible pieces of literature and interesting perspectives.

During my time in the book club, co-moderating, and now running it, I’ve learnt a thing or two about how to successfully run a book club and wanted to pass on some tips and tricks if you wanted to start your own – either with strangers, you blog followers, or friends and family!

At a high level, this is what you need!

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Now to get into the down and dirty with a bit more information and examples of how I run it! 

1. Choose your platform to host it on wisely.

There’s a lot of great places out there that you can host on – I know there’s some in Discord for example. But for me personally, Facebook groups was the way to go. We needed it simple for those less technologically inclined and something which was accessible to many without needing to make a new account. If your group is older, or mixed, some of these fancy new apps and such may not work.

2. Decide if you will make administrative decisions or want the group to vote!

Some groups like to vote on everything. Others like to have the leaders make the choices. I personally enjoy doing a mix because it lets people be involved, but makes sure things get done. An example is, I will have people suggest monthly themes and I collect them all and then I choose what month they will occur on and try and get in as many as I can that were suggested! I’ve tried the collection of themes and having people vote on when they wanted it and let me tell you, it got messy. Sometimes as a moderator you need to just make decisions on your own.

3. Decide how many books you want to read and organize, organize, organize!

Some book groups read one book a quarter, some only a couple a year and others one a month. We are the latter so we get through a lot of book which is fantastic. But it means there is a lot of planning. How many books you want to read will determine how many themes you will need for the year. And this will also dictate when you need to be collecting and posting what people will be reading. You need to make sure to leave enough time to get the book – whether that be buying it or getting it from a library. Make sure you know what is happening when before you start.

If it’s friends it’s a little less informal and you can go with the flow, but if it’s strangers you want to put a good foot forward to have people engage and want to read the books.

4. Make Themes!

Themes are a great way to make sure that you have an array of books (you can see an example of what I do to the left). This is particularly important if you plan to try and read a lot of books. You can make your book club have a theme if that is your desire – so you are a classical book club, or a sci-fi book club. But, if you just want to read anything out there, start with making themes. Before January (or whenever your “new year” will start) it can be smart to know what your monthly themes will be.

How I’ve run mine is that end of November or early December I do a post in the Facebook group and ask my members for theme suggestions. Suggestions can be super specific or very general – but you want the themes to have enough clarity so people know what kind of book to suggest.

Once you collect all the theme suggestions, I’d recommend making executive decisions on what month will be when, and try and be logical! Maybe keep spooky themes to October, travel reads to the summer (or maybe the winter to escape the cold!)

5. Decide on your schedule.

You need to decide what is going to be happening when so people know what to expect. For example in my book club, during the month of January, the first of the month I post what our February theme is. People know what the theme is already because there’s a pinned post so they know what is up and coming and that is decided every year for the following year.

But, I’ll do a Facebook group post stating the theme for next month and asking for suggestions of books. I’ll usually leave that open for a week and choose the date I will accept suggestions until. Then on that date I collect everyone suggestions and do a poll! This allows members to vote on what they want to read – this will be open about a week too. Whatever has the most votes at the end wins! If two tie, then I’ll usually make an executive choice. By about the third week of a month, for this example in January, we’ll have our book for the month of February and we’ll post the winner!

The month of February is for reading and also choosing when we discuss the February book I recommend setting that in stone for your group if you can – i.e.: the first Sunday/the first Friday or a month we will meet to discuss. My group likes to be a bit more flexible so we vote on which of the first two weekends in the following month (so for this example, the following month is March) works best.

So for one book for one month, there’s about a 3 month timeline. It’s a lot of work and a lot of organizing but once it’s set and flowing, it’s worth it! That being said, you can simplify it absolutely! This is just how mine works, and sure it is complicated sometimes, but we have it down to a fine art after many years!

 

After that, you just have to have fun and be flexible! Book clubs should be a social time so it is entirely up to you how you want it to go. Having some structure can help it go smoothly, but if you want to just go with the flow then that is okay too! Just be open to some feedback to best suit it for your group! That being said, if you have a huge virtual book club then organization will be key!

Book clubs are a great way to be exposed to more books. I’ve definitely read books I’ve disliked or never would have read but ultimately I’ve enjoyed the process and community! Also with virtual it means you can possibly meet people from around the world. Starting small is great and growing your community from there is key!

 

Do you have any tips or tricks on how to run a virtual book club that I haven’t mentioned here? Feel free to share in the comments!

 


Banned Books Week 2022 [#FREETHEBOOK]

Like always, I’m a little bit late to the party (I’ll blame life and totally not being on-top of it) but this week, 18-24 September, is Banned Book Week.

This week is so incredibly important, although fighting and acknowledging banned books is a constant thing. Especially now.

PEN America, “a nonprofit organization that works to defend and celebrate free expression in the United States and worldwide through the advancement of literature and human rights” [Wikipedia], has recently done some amazing research on what is currently going on.

According to their research:

  • From July 2021 to June 2022, PEN America’s Index of School Book Bans lists 2,532 instances of individual books being banned, affecting 1,648 unique book titles.

  • The 1,648 titles are by 1,261 different authors, 290 illustrators, and 18 translators, impacting the literary, scholarly, and creative work of 1,553 people altogether.

The predominant reasons for them being banned are topics to do with LGBTQ+ and protagonists of color – not entirely shocking.

Fiction is primarily targeted as well with YA reads being the main focus.

I highly recommend checking out the really well written report from PEN America to learn a little more, by the numbers, about what is going on!

You can find some great things that YOU are able to do to fight against this. Every small action does matter, so please help in any way that you can.

Reading is so important and, since you are here, I would assume reading is important to you.

While book banning is a huge issue in the USA currently, it is something that happens worldwide and impacts people from all nations. So even if you are not US based, find what is happening locally and help out too!

To learn a little bit more about Book Banning, check out this great FAQ from PEN America!


Happy Birthday Agatha Christie!!

Happy Birthday Agatha Christie!! Today is her birthday, September 15.

The mother of the mystery novel, the creator of Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot, Death On The Nile, and the Mousetrap (the longest running play – ever) she is the best selling novelist of all time (Guinness Book of Records). In fact Agatha Christie only is out performed by the works of Shakespeare and the Bible. Quite an impressive accomplishment.

What is also worth noting is she was a very unsuccessful author – having 6 rejections for her first attempts. Until she created Hercule Poirot she got nowhere. Perseverance.

To celebrate her birthday the National Trust in England who maintains the Greenway, the home she summered and spent Christmases shared some photos of the home, and many more can be seen on the National Trust Greenway site.

 

 

Happy Birthday Agatha Christie!!

Source: National Trust

As the  holiday home for the Christie family the house and gardens gives a wonderful glimpse into the world they lived in – full of treasures and memorabilia of their lives. You can hear clips of Agatha speaking, walk the gardens, read ‘secret’ letters to her publisher and much more.

Agatha Christie may not be your ‘cup of tea’ but as the a writer of such immense stature she is worth dipping into and if you find yourself headed to England, or indeed are there already a visit to Greenway would be a great literary excursion.

With garden walks, (dogs are welcome), a book club and a writer-in-residence there is much to do. And what a great place to have afternoon tea!

Happy Birthday!!

 


Refugee Week @ Waterstones

With everything going on in the United States currently, I feel like this is an appropriate time that this event is happening (although it’s in the U.K.).

What is it?

“Launched in 1988, Refugee Week is a nationwide programme of events and activities that recognise the contribution of refugees to British society and the continuing importance of offering sanctuary to those in need. To mark Refugee Week, we’ve gathered together a range of reading that raises awareness of the experience of refugees, including thought-provoking true stories, original fiction and inspirational books for children.”

-From Waterstones

Definitely check out some of these books because they’ll give you a little peek into their lives and their experiences. An average person will never know what their lives are like and understanding what they go through can help you make informed decisions in your life and just give you a broader perspective.

Click here to see it all!

Refugee Week @ Waterstones


The Great American Read by PBS

So PBS is having this awesome thing where 100 books, which were chosen by the public, are going to be highlighted on PBS TV starting May 22, a.k.a. tomorrow (only just realized it’s tomorrow when I was typing this – summer puts you in a frozen time zone).

This is such a fantastic idea to highlight a bunch of books and promote reading. The list is absolutely fantastic (barring 50 Shades of Grey because I think whoever suggested that as a ‘great piece of literature’ needs to get their head checked).

You can find out all the important information here and there’s a Facebook group too where you can meet tons of other readers and chat about what’s going on. Just make sure you set the notifications correctly on Facebook otherwise you’ll be inundated with posts (as it have 10k+ or more members!). Let me know if you’re joining as you might just find me on there!

Don’t forget to watch tomorrow 8/7c on PBS.

the great american read