Books, booklovers and the delicious questions they pose

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Our latest silent book club meeting once again pushed the boundaries of what we define as “east end Toronto”. We have our splendid bookish stalwarts from Jersey City, New Jersey and Pontypridd, Wales, attendees and contributors throughout the pandemic we now cannot imagine not being part of this group.

Today, they were joined by a first-time visitor from Paris, France. Inspired by the silent book club concept, he was initially disappointed to discover that France was silentbookclubless when he checked the Silent Book Club international chapters map. However, he has hastened to fill that void with not one, but two groups: English-Speaking and en ligne (français). Both groups have already met, and we asked their leader to report back on how it unfolds.

Today’s bookish bounty was generous and diverse, as always, sparking some intriguing questions we need a whole other meeting to explore.

  • When a book features a preternaturally gifted artist, particularly musicians, is it the case that they have always made a deal with the devil?
  • If a book is not speaking to you, the reader, should you stop reading it and move on to something else?
    This question and variations on it come up periodically in our and, I imagine, many book clubs. It’s a complex and agree-to-disagree kind of question, with contentions that “life is too short” as valid as “but what if you miss something?” and so on. I sometimes use the verb “abandon” instead of “stop reading”, but really, I’m not editorializing about my own stance on this question.
  • So, if we agree to disagree on abandoning books, is there a set point at which one gives a book a chance? One of our readers has a 50-page rule, although she admits to applying that rule flexibly at times.
  • And, as we agree to disagree on abandoning books, what is the rule for audiobooks? Some set number of hours of listening?
  • And, are the criteria for abandoning audiobooks different than for print books? One key distinguisher that comes up regularly with our readers who are particular audiobook fans and aficionados is the critical role of the narrator (whether it is the author, an actor or voice professional, or a cast) in making or breaking the book’s readability.
  • We have so many amazing ways to find books, from groups like this and lots of online resources and places to interact, to Little Free Library boxes and more. So, isn’t it even more amazing when … a book finds us, just when we need it most?

Silent book club members Jenn and Sven's books

Silent book club member Catherine from Jersey City shows park installation featuring poems

Silent book club member Sue reads Anne Sexton poetry collection

Silent book club member Vicki, on screen, with her books piled next to her computer

Squizzey the squirrel shows off silent book club member Kathryn's books

East end Toronto silent book club zoom screen

Here is our group’s latest combined book list. As I’ve mentioned before, each list reflects the reading of many of our members, whether or not they attended the meeting. The titles featured in each of our reports encompass print and digital versions of books, along with audiobooks.

I’m regularly asked if our group recommends specific books. My answer? 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 encouragement, I’d say, for other readers reading our reports and lists to consider it, too. Is that a recommendation? It might be, but not exactly or necessarily. It always means, though, that a title has been given attention and thought by our readers, which counts for a lot.

Here are some additional book-related articles, resources, news, recommendations and more. These items and tidbits are often companions to books on the list, or are inspired or offered by our members and/or come up during our discussions and chat.

Our previous reports and book lists are always available to inform, delight, inspire and add to your tbr pile … 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.

Are you asking questions prompted by your books? Or are your books asking you questions? Don’t be afraid to ask, and don’t hesitate to answer.

Preparing for the darker nights with reading that will light our way

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Have I mentioned that the east end Toronto silent book club is very fortunate to have a sister silent book club group in midtown Toronto? Yes I have, but it bears repeating. (Here is founder Beth Gordon’s story about how it got started.

Midtown always was a short subway ride away from east end Toronto pre-pandemic, and they’re still close at hand via zoom. Here is their latest combined reading list, from a meeting just a few days ago.

Diana's trusty reading companion, Carmela

Anne-Louise's reading choice, This Accident of Being Lost by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson

Sue R's next pile of reading

Me, on my computer screen, getting ready for the sbc zoom meeting with my books stacked next to the computer

As the midtown and east end Toronto readers would all recommend: find your cozy spot, find your cuddly reading companion, and enjoy your reading or seek out some of ours!

It’s OK to be a mood reader

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… and when you’re in a mood reading patch, a silent book club group is perfect to see you through!

Here’s part of what independent book review web site and podcast Book Riot has to say about what it means to be a mood reader:

“A mood reader is a person who reads according to their mood. This means that their feelings and emotions often dictate what they’ll read. If they’re feeling happy and want to bask in that happiness, they choose a book or genre that will tie in with that feeling. If they’re feeling upset or angry, they may opt for a heart wrenching period drama or a dystopian thriller. The books could serve to expand an emotion or to comfort the reader. Either way, a mood reader selects and reads books based on how they are feeling at any given moment.”

One could argue that mood reading is even more complicated and granular than that. Feeling upset or angry, a mood reader might then opt for the cheery read, and avoid the subject matter or tone that deepens an unhappy feeling. Feeling distracted, not so much tone as simplicity of expression might be the only way to sustain any kind of reading. Perhaps an intense combination of factors might cause the mood reader to abandon reading altogether – we’ve explored the whole loss and regaining of one’s reading mojo throughout the pandemic.

At any rate, one of our readers made this very confession during today’s meeting. She said she had at least four books on the go currently, each differently suited to how focused, energetic, happy (or not) she was at any given time. Of course, characterizing what she said as a confession suggests that saying you’re a mood reader or in a mood reading phase is something to be ashamed of – which it is not! Our group of readers rallied round, more such so-called confessions emerged. The conclusion seemed to be that in fact, mood reading is realistically attuned to our different feelings and energy levels, as well as focus, environment (don’t you read differently on the subway than you do in your favourite reading chair?) and more. Having multiple books on the go, for all those different moods and settings, etc., etc.? Nothing to be worried about at all! And if you need more ideas for more books to fit all those moods? We’re here to help.

Without further ado, here is our latest combined book list. As I’ve mentioned before, each list reflects the reading of many of our members, whether or not they attended the meeting. The titles featured in each of our reports encompass print and digital versions of books, along with audiobooks.

I’m regularly asked if our group recommends specific books. My answer? 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 encouragement, I’d say, for other readers reading our reports and lists to consider it, too. Is that a recommendation? It might, but not exactly or necessarily. It always means, though, that a title has been given attention and thought by our readers, which counts for a lot.

Here are some additional book-related articles, resources, news, recommendations and more. These items and tidbits are often companions to books on the list, or are inspired or offered by our members and/or come up during our discussions and chat.

  • If you enjoyed Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz, there is a good chance you will also enjoy the new television series of the same name.
  • The Long Term Care Trilogy recently brought together actors, activists, authors, public figures and caregivers to perform readings of plays by Sophocles and Shakespeare as a catalyst for engaging diverse audiences – both in-person and on Zoom – in conversations about the challenges of caring for those our society has marginalized and left behind, especially elders. Presented by the Toronto Festival of Authors, it featured performances by Margaret Atwood, David Strathairn, The Rt. Hon. Adrienne Clarkson, Vanessa Sears, Jani Lauzon, Deena Aziz, Araya Mengesha, Evan Buliung, R.H. Thomson, Daren A. Herbert, Laura Condlln and a Chorus of Caregivers: Dee Hope, Michael Booth and Carol Lemen. It’s now past, but let’s be on the lookout for either a replay of the event, or new such presentations in future.
  • The Pursuit of Love is an excellent 3-part television miniseries based on the 1945 novel of the same name by Nancy Mitford.

Oh, and by the way … Happy 5th anniversary to our silent book club group! Here’s a report from the very first meeting.

Our previous reports and book lists are always available to inform, delight, inspire and add to your tbr pile … 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.

Sometimes our readers show up at our silent book club meetings to just listen, to gather reading inspiration when the reading energy or focus is flagging, and to be in very good bookish company. If you can’t join us to listen, we still hope these posts and lists help satisfy the many moods in which you might be reading or striving to read.

Love of books, beaming and caroming around the world

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Even the smallest of our zoom gatherings cast an intense glow as we gather from our reading chairs, home offices, bedrooms, cottages, condo balconies and more. Not only do they warm our very close here’s and now’s, but those beams carom around the world, bounce back and connect us in marvellous, often revelatory ways.

Here’s an example of that wonderful caroming effect from our latest meeting:

  1. Silent book club member in Wales describes and recommends The Bedlam Stacks by Natasha Pulley, a historical novel set in Peru.
  2. Silent book club member in Canada duly notes, obtains and reads recommended book, falls in love, pursues the author’s other works.
  3. Silent book club member in Canada remarks on amazing book to daughter, who responds “I’ve been telling you to read this!”
  4. Silent book club member in Canada recounts this during zoom meeting while …
  5. Silent book club member’s daughter is texting her from Peru …!
  6. Silent book club member in Wales, also on zoom call, is thoroughly delighted.
  7. Other silent book club members (and now you, reading this blog post, scanning down to the book list) add this book to their tbr lists.

Of course, the fact that the Silent Book Club movement boasts 300+ chapters around the world means that these moments of bookish connection are happening all over the globe. Because many of these clubs have gone from local to hybrid/online events, inviting booklovers to “visit” meetings in other countries, means the effect is blossoming everywhere – and readers, authors and publishers all benefit.

Silent book club member Anne-Louise's book choice

Silent book club member Dawn's book stack

Silent book club member Kathryn's book stack, with Squizzey in attendance

Silent book club member Vicki on screen, getting ready for zoom meeting, with book stack next to the computer

As always, our latest combined book list reflects the reading of many of our members, whether or not they attended the meeting. The titles featured in each of our reports encompass print and digital versions of books, along with audiobooks. 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 encouragement, I’d say, for other readers reading our reports and lists to consider it, too. Is that a recommendation? Not exactly or necessarily, but it means a title has been given attention and thought, which counts for a lot.

Here are some additional book-related articles, resources, news, recommendations and more. These items and tidbits are often companions to books on the list, or are inspired or offered by our members and/or come up during our discussions and chat.

Our previous reports and book lists are always available to inform, delight, inspire and to your tbr pile … 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.

Sending beams of book love your way, as always …

Talking (enthusing, rhapsodizing, giggling nervously) with The Small Machine Talks

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The Small Machine Talks is a lively and informative podcast about Canadian creators, those who write, publish and perform poetry and other literary and imaginative works. How generous and visionary of podcast creator and host Amanda Earl to consider the perspectives of those of us who read and consume what others create. I was so honoured (and also very nervous) to be invited for a warm chat with Amanda about silent book clubs and the joy of reading, sharing poetry discoveries on social media (with the #todayspoem hashtag) and more. I want to particularly thank my fellow silent book club readers and friends, who are inspirations in fueling the enthusiasm you’ll hear here in my voice.

Riffing off each other’s reading

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Our silent book club group’s collected reading, which we regularly share here, is not just lists of titles, author’s name, publishing information, reviews – although they’re still mighty fine lists we hope everyone is sparked by, inspired by and enjoys.

In its tidy, alphabetical arrangement, the list cannot convey all the intriguing interminglings and intertwined intimacies that our conversations lend it, but oh, they are there. That is the alchemy of our books, our readers and our wonderful interactions. Today’s meeting was no exception. One reader’s update flowed to the next reader’s, and recurring themes and connections emerged. Zoom might have its shortcomings, but it’s easy to see when everyone is smiling – some smiles tinged with surprise and unexpected realization – and nodding in agreement.

In that intoxicating conversational flow from book to book, from book experience to book experience, from insight to insight, here are some of the flashes that glinted off the waves.

  • As instructive and empowering as reading a respected book on how to make a marriage thrive, is coupling that with a comforting reread of Pride and Prejudice. In fact, don’t Elizabeth and Darcy offer an interesting model for constructive or productive fighting, perhaps?
  • One book club member observed that she’d ending reading a lot of romance and relationship books of late. Even more satisfying than how many of those books concluded, she remarked “I love watching relationships develop.”
  • Another member commented on how she slogged through but did not ultimately savour a book with an unlikeable main character. Isn’t it interesting, though, how we might appreciate the writer’s craft in creating an authentically unappealing or unsympathetic, but that same craft might alienate us from the book?
  • Revisiting books from our past can be a comforting return to old friends and familiar words. It can be a revelation, as we see and learn new things absorbing the same words at different ages, from different life vantage points. It can also be fraught, as words and how they are used are now interpreted differently, through different social, historical or other lenses. Breaking Bread with the Dead: A Reader’s Guide to a More Tranquil Mind by Alan Jacobs posits some challenging approaches to books from other eras, whether or not they are part of our personal past reading.
  • Reading aloud to a loved one is like your own personalized audiobook, isn’t it?

Delta the corgi poses with Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Silent book club member Vicki, getting ready for our zoom meeting, with her stack of books next to the computer

As I note with every report, our latest combined book list gathers the recent reading of many of our members, whether or not they attended the meeting. 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, which always counts for a lot.

Here are some additional book-related articles, resources, news, recommendations and more. These items and tidbits are often companions to books on the list, or are inspired or offered by our members and/or come up during our discussions and chat.

Our previous reports and book lists are always available to inform, delight and inspire … 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.

Wishing you reading that flows and riffs and ripples from one entrancing experience to the next …

Organized or spontaneous reading, or organizing the spontaneity of our reading – it’s all good

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The last time it happened, we wondered if it was a dream. Well, it happened again, so I guess it wasn’t a dream … but it was truly dreamy.

Once again, we made our way through The Great Escape bookstore, out the back door, through the urban oasis of a blooming pollinator garden, through the vine-draped entrance to the charming space where we once again realized absolute silent book club paradise. By the late summer afternoon light angling through the back garage doors, perfectly enhanced with a chandelier and fairy lights, with occasional visits from sweet store dog Scout, we settled into our chairs for an hour of peaceful reading – neighbours’ voices and nearby traffic just a pleasant hum in the background.

We followed that with an hour of just the right depth of discussion about the books we’ve been reading, the ones that have enchanted us and the ones that have perhaps disappointed us. That conversation segued into some reflections on how we all progress from one book to the next – sometimes checking off titles from some kind of list or some kind of organized map of subjects or authors we want to work our way through, and sometimes spontaneously and with no plan or preconceived notions at all.

Those of us who didn’t acquire a few books on the way in made sure to acquire a few on the way out. How many kinds of perfect was our return trip (not the last – the snow is not flying just yet) to bookish heaven?

Chairs set out in The Great Escape garage, awaiting readers. The Great Escape sign over the garage doors is covered with vines.

The vine draped entrance of The Great Escape garage

The silent book club group assembles in The Great Escape garage, with the back garage doors open and a chandelier and fairy lights overhead.

A silent book club member reads at The Great Escape garage.

A silent book club member reads at The Great Escape garage.

A silent book club member reads at The Great Escape garage.

A silent book club member reads at The Great Escape garage.

A silent book club member reads at The Great Escape garage.

Silent book club readers gather in The Great Escape garage to silently read.

The Great Escape bookstore dog Scout looks out the back garage doors as we read.

The poetry collection Intruder by Bardia Sinaee (House of Anansi Press) sits in my lap. My legs in black jeans and my feet in purple Fluevog sneakers are visible.

Silent book club member Catherine sits in a wooden chair reading Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff. Her bicycle is leaned up against the wooden wall of the garage in the background.

The Great Escape bookstore dog Scout sits on the rug amidst a group of silent book club readers in the garage.

Me, holding the book Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, standing in The Great Escape garage. The walls are wooden and rough hewn, decorated with dried flowers and lights. A colourful rug is rolled out on the floor. I have frizzy hair (of course) and am wearing black jeans, a black T-shirt from the Children's Book Bank, and purple Fluevog sneakers.

Here are the books we read and discussed at The Great Escape:

Again, we have additional book-related articles, resources, news, recommendations and more. These items and tidbits are often companions to books on the list, or are inspired or offered by our members and/or come up during our discussions and chat. Here are the latest:

Our previous reports 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.

Organized, spontaneous, organizedly spontaneous, spontaneously organized … however you approach it, keep enjoying your reading.

Reading with intent, whatever you’re reading

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Since the start of the pandemic, our silent book club group has met – mostly virtually, but in person when we could, safely and in glorious settings – twice a month. We’ve sustained that tempo for over two years now, and I think it’s safe to say that tempo has sustained many of us. Certainly, it has sustained us through the ups and downs of our reading, our focus and ability to read at all at times. Most of us are coming to the end of the summer reading happily and with intent, whatever we’re reading.

How wonderful that the same silent book club member who praised the virtues and delights of reading with intent also declared in the next breath, “All hail the beach read!” All assembled agreed with their own variations of “huzzah!” … as all kinds of reads have a home in a silent book club, as those who attend them and follow these reports well know.

Anne Louise's books, placed in a reading chair with trees in the background

Catherine, reading Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson, in Italy

Vicki's books on a table on the porch of her cottage bunkie

Our latest combined book list – which combines lists from many of our members, as well as titles discussed in two meetings in the month of August, so it is truly vast! – 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 prompt and generous replies back. Whether or not someone is joining the meeting, they regularly send their recent reading to share with the rest of the group and everyone who reads our blog posts.

And there is more combining going on, as 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, which always counts for a lot.

Along with this voluminous book list, we have lots more book-related articles, resources, news, recommendations and more. These items and tidbits are often companions to books on the list, or are inspired or offered by our members and/or come up during our discussions and chat. Here are the latest:

Our previous reports 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.

Give your reading the attention it deserves, and it will repay you richly.

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!

Comforting routines and rejuvenating surprises in our meetings and reading

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Another silent book club zoom meeting popped up last week and it was, as it always is, a warm and joyous thing. (Well, not too warm. In fact, it was also pretty cool.)

We’ve all developed coping mechanisms and methods of resilience to get through the particular demands and challenges of the last couple of years, haven’t we? We’ve often turned to the comfort of the predictable and familiar routines, leavened from time to time with measures of spontaneity and surprise.

That describes well how our silent book club group members have gathered, largely virtually, since early 2020. We settled pretty quickly and adaptably in a twice-monthly pattern: one predictably scheduled Saturday morning zoom (and occasional careful in-person) meeting, and one not-so-predictably anticipated weekday evening meeting, deemed a “pop-up” meeting only announced shortly before its date.

Not surprisingly, the more predictably scheduled meeting typically welcomes more attendees. The more spur-of-the-moment meeting, less so in terms of numbers, is decidedly not lesser in terms of liveliness and range of discussion. At our latest meeting, for example, my comments on the brisk essay/review The Worst Truth by John Metcalf (Biblioasis) has us all sharing thoughts on what constitutes a Canadian “classic” work, maybe even questioning what we previously revered.

The alternating rhythms of routine and surprise – in our meetings and our reading – have served us all well.

Me, on screen, getting ready for a silent book club zoom meeting, with my stack of books and a glass of wine next to the computer

Our latest combined book list gathers the recent reading of many of our members, whether they are in attendance or not. 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). As I observed in another recent report from our group, any title on any of our group’s lists means that at least one (often more) readers have given that title some consideration – and that is enough, to my mind, to say that another reader reading our reports and lists might consider it, too.

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:

  • Perhaps we’re a bit biased, but we think silent book club groups and meetings and reading lists are good for what ails you when you’re in a reading slump. But if you need a few more tips, here are some from the Washington Post.
  • Some of us did not know that cozy mysteries are a thing. Not only do we know that now, but we’re totally up on cozy mysteries by themes. You will be amazed!
  • In Natalie Haynes Stands Up for the Classics, the English writer, broadcaster, classicist, and comedian takes a fresh look at the ancient world, creating stand-up routines about figures from ancient Greece and Rome.

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 re-emerging carefully with in-person gatherings. Please feel free to contact me for more information about our club and its offerings.

May your reading afford you the perfect balance of routine and surprise, comfort and spontaneity you so desire!