Books where nothing happens, and other things we silent book clubbers love

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“I love books where nothing happens!”

… and all the silent book club members shimmering in another magical zoom gathering smiled and nodded knowingly. We readers know, don’t we?

We also love to ensure our reading is close at hand, whether we’re home or going afar. When the email notifications for our latest meeting went out, one of the first replies was from longtime group stalwart Catherine D. She revealed that she was sending her message while on vacation in Italy. She said she wouldn’t be able to zoom in for the meeting, but would be reading in solidarity while on a train during the meeting time. She also revealed that, even after lots of good advice from a recent in-person in-the-park silent book club gathering at which she’d received lots of good advice on which books to pack for her trip … well, she still had to purchase more books when she reached her destination. Isn’t that always the way? She sent us a digital postcard – shared on the zoom meeting, of course – of her in front of The Almost Corner Bookshop in Trastevere, Rome. We love everything about this.

Silent book club member Catherine in front of the Almost Corner Bookshop in Rome

We also clearly love carrying our books with us wherever we go – to the beach, for example, or to a shaded spot in the backyard. (How perfect that an Eastern Comma butterfly perched on one of our readers’ chairs in the backyard in a small post-zoom meeting gathering.)

Beth holds up When God Was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman while at the beach

Eastern Comma butterfly sitting on the back of a chair

Most movingly, the images of people who value books carrying them to keep the books safe, to preserve books, to share books with others, emerged as an interesting motif in our discussions today. In 1937 Nanking in The Library of Legends by Janie Chang, the protagonist and her university classmates and professors carry the eponymous books 1,000 miles to safety in China’s western provinces when their city is bombed. In 1930s Appalachia, a traveling librarian in The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson rides by mule to bring books and periodicals to isolated rural Kentuckians. Although she was not conventionally literate herself, medieval wife, mother, and mystic Margery Kempe convinced those who could write to tell her story in what is considered the earliest autobiography written in the English language. Her voice from the early 1400s is carried to us today in book form.

Text from autobiography of Margery Kempe

THE FIRE OF LOVE
fig. 1 Add. MS 61823, f. 43v. Reproduced with the permission of the British Library.
In figure 1 Margery’s first experience of ‘þe fyer of loue’ (88/32) is boldly noted with a stylised drawing of flames, and a Latin gloss: ‘ignis diuini amoris … so s[eint] {or scilicet?} R[ichard] [of] Hampall’.

We love to share our book discoveries and challenges, and carry them to you here.

Kathryn E's stack of recent reading, with a squirrel calendar set to July 30th

Vicki's stack of recent reading, with Jake the beagle-basset under the desk

As always, our latest combined book list – this one is immense! – gathers the recent reading of many of our members, whether they attended the meeting in question or not. When I send out meeting notifications to the group, I get swift and diligent replies back and whether or not someone is joining the meeting, they regularly send their recent reading.

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). Any title on any of our group’s lists means that at least one (often more) readers have given that title some consideration. That is enough, to my mind, to say that another reader reading our reports and lists might consider it, too. Is that an out-and-out recommendation? Not necessarily, but it means a title has been given attention and thought, and that always counts for a lot.

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. Here are the latest:

  • President Barack Obama’s annual summer reading and music lists are always eagerly anticipated.
  • This year’s Booker Prize longlist includes titles already familiar to our silent book club group, along with new titles to challenge and delight.
  • Recommend Me a Book is an intriguing web site that helps you find new books to read without first judging the them by their covers. It offers up the first pages of novels without bias, and reveals the author and title if you indicate you’re interested. Even if you already have great sources of book recommendations – like, say, a really awesome silent book club group – you are likely to become obsessed with this site.
  • Learn more here and here about the Almost Corner Bookshop in Trastevere, Rome, which our silent book club friend visited recently.

Our previous silent book club reports (for online and in-person meetings) and book lists are always available for you to enjoy and get some reading inspiration right here.

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 or modified schedules, many are running virtual meetings in different formats, and some are carefully running in-person gatherings again. Please feel free to contact me for more information about our club and its offerings.

Be sure to carry good reading with you, wherever you go!

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