Our latest silent book club meeting report is introduced by one of our founding members, Kathy McCormick. Not only does she have great bookish thoughts to share, but she’s right in keeping with seasonal themes!

“I guess there are never enough books”
– John Steinbeck

I have been a lifelong introvert who also happens to be shy and suffers from fairly acute social anxiety. Not a great combination for living a large life out in the big wide world. Books have been a comfort to me since early childhood as I learned to navigate life in a world that expected much more from me socially than I would ever be able to give.

I freely admit to riding the social coattails of my much more outgoing and gregarious spouse for the past three decades. When she first came home and mentioned that one of our neighbours (the lovely @bookgaga) had invited us to join a local chapter of the Silent Book Club I have to admit my first thought was “no, of course not”. But once I found out that the meetings would be held at a local establishment and we could read whatever we wanted, well, I was finally willing to take the plunge. And readers, it has become a highly valued thing to me, with many new friendships resulting. I have been inspired to try books I would never have considered before and have appreciated insights and perspectives of the group. They are kind and considerate of every type of written word.

At this time of year, as the days grow shorter and we approach the winter months, my reading always turns toward the spooky, creepy and macabre. I love the Hallowe’en season. I have always been intrigued by the concept of things that exist outside of material reality. I have never understood the peculiarly western obsession with a materialistic worldview which dismissed anything that could not be measured, tested, documented and experimented on. I feel deeply my ancestral roots from island nations steeped in the lore of faeries and banshees, pagans and witches. Give me a good ghost story and I am happy any time of day (though will confess to having slept with the lights on more than once in my life). I am not too fussy about genre but there must be an otherworldly aspect to the stories. No slasher flicks or serial killers: human monsters do not interest me. Give me vampires, zombies, unknown creatures, chain rattling ghosts or books sent flying from shelves by unseen hands. The shadow seen out of the corner of your eye; that strange light in the sky; those footsteps heard overhead when you are home alone … yikes, I’m getting scared now, let me turn on all the lights …

Wait, did you hear that? … WHAT IS THAT!

May your reading and friendships light your way through the coming dark months …

Don’t be afraid to dive into our latest combined reading list! The titles featured in each of our reports combine print and digital versions of books, along with audiobooks (which are indicated separately, with narrator/performer information where possible).

• His Very Best – Jimmy Carter, A Life by Jonathan Alter
• Willodeen by Katherine Applegate
• The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam
• Eating India: An Odyssey into the Food and Culture of the Land of Spices by Chitrita Banerji
• World Engines: Creator by Stephen Baxter
• Hour of the Witch by Chris Bohjalian (audiobook)
• An Image in the Lake by Gail Bowen
• Mother Courage and Her Children by Bertolt Brecht and David Hare
• Nomadland by Jessica Bruder
• How to Be Happy Though Human by Kate Camp
• When I Grow Up I Want to be a List of Further Possibilities by Chen Chen
• Mary B by Katherine J. Chen
• Life and Death in Shanghai by Nien Cheng
• The Body in Question by Jill Ciment
• Don’t Look Down by Hilary Davidson
• Burnt Sugar by Avni Doshi
• What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad
• Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life by Nir Eyal
• On the Proper Use of Stars by Dominique Fortier, translated by Sheila Fischman
• Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller
• Five Little Indians by Michelle Good
• The Forgetting Time by Sharon Guskin
• Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi, narrated by Dominic Hoffman (audiobook)
• The Apollo Murders by Chris Hadfield
• Present Moment, Wonderful Moment by Thich Nhat Hanh
• The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah, narrated by Julia Whelan (audiobook)
• The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris (audiobook)
• Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right by Arlie Russell Hochschild
• Field Study: Meditations on a Year at the Herbarium by Helen Humphreys
• Sisters by Daisy Johnson
• You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson
• goodbye, already by Ryanne Kap
• The Shining by Stephen King
• Indians on Vacation by Thomas King
• Finna by Nate Marshall
• The Geometry of Holding Hands by Alexander McCall Smith, narrated by Davina Porter (audiobook)
• Flesh and Blood by Stephen McGann
• The Portable Veblen by Elizabeth McKenzie
• Shaheen Bagh: A Graphic Recollection by Ita Mehrotra
• The Fortune Men by Nadifa Mohamed
• Friend of My Youth by Alice Munro, narrated by Beth Fowler (audiobook)
• The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa (audiobook)
• A Thousand Beginnings and Endings, edited by Ellen Oh
• The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
• There Are More Beautiful Things than Beyonce by Morgan Parker
• State of Terror by Louise Penny and Hillary Clinton
• Em and the Big Hoom by Jerry Pinto
• Do the Work by Steven Pressfield
• Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice
• As For Me and My House by Sinclair Ross
• The Kindness by Polly Samson, narrated by Sandra Duncan (audiobook)
• A Theatre for Dreamers by Polly Samson (audiobook)
• Flower Net by Lisa See, narrated by Elaina Erika Davis (audiobook)
• Grave’s End by William Shaw
• Poison for Breakfast by Lemony Snicket
• Fight Night by Miriam Toews, narrated by Miriam & Georgia Toews (audiobook)
• Taste: My Life Through Food by Stanley Tucci
• Winter into August by Guy Vanderhaeghe (audiobook)
• Unreconciled by Jesse Wente
• Free by Lea Ypi
• Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu, narrated by Joel de la Fuente (audiobook)
• Ten Lessons for a Post-Pandemic World by Fareed Zakaria

More book-related articles, resources, news, recommendations and more are often inspired or offered by our members and/or come up during our discussions and chat, including:

• No debate. As this group proves meeting after meeting, audiobooks are part of a well-balanced reading diet.
• Some of us silent book club friends went on a poetry adventure recently, when poetry purveyor extraordinaire knife fork book held an amazing open house for its new east end Toronto retail presence at Great Escape bookstore, and launched some new poetry collections and chapbooks with readings in a lovely space.



• Present Moment Wonderful Moment by Thich Nhat Hanh offers mindfulness verses for daily living.
• Enjoy a podcast episode from the Poetry Foundation with poet Chen Chen (including interview and selected poetry reading).
• Check out these selected highlights and audio guide online features for the New York Public Library exhibition treasures.
• Need some last-minute literary costume inspirations?
• This replay of Jaspreet Singh’s moving reading from his memoir My Mother, My Translator is definitely worth a listen.
• Author Hallie Rubenfold offers insights into the connections between the drama series Harlots, The Harris’s List of Covent Garden Ladies and her book
• The Covent Garden Ladies.

Our previous silent book club meeting reports (online and in-person incarnations) and book lists are always available for your enjoyment and edification – find them all here. New discoveries, old favourites and more – we guarantee there’s something amongst our reports that will keep your reading appetite fueled.

You can also check out links to articles, interviews and more here – some with San Francisco-based Silent Book Club founders Guinevere de La Mare and Laura Gluhanich, and some with us here in east end Toronto.

Learn more about silent book clubs via Guinevere and Laura’s Silent Book Club web site. You can find information on meetings happening around the world and close to where you live. Some clubs are currently on hiatus, but many are running virtual meetings in different formats, and some are re-emerging carefully with in-person gatherings. Please feel free to contact me for more information about our club and its offerings.

Stay safe and stay well, and let treasured books continue to light your way!