Monthly Archives: March 2020

Booklovers in a dangerous time

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We need not recount here how the world – truly and literally the world – has changed. We’re all affected by it and living it. We’re struggling with fear and uncertainty and frustration, and we’re drawing on reserves of determination and courage and even good humour that we perhaps didn’t even know we possessed. When those reserves run low, one of the things we celebrated in the old world that can still replenish our spirits in this new world is a good, inspiring, comforting, diverting book.

As where we could go and what we could do narrowed down more and more each day, our silent book club membership kept in touch by phone and email. We devised a plan that scaled to what we could still safely and reasonably do to keep our book club tradition and its vital connections alive:

1. For this weekend’s silent book club double header, we asked everyone to read in spirit for an hour at the times at which we would have started in person: 10 am on Saturday and 11 am on Sunday.

2. For the Saturday meeting, those of us within walking distance of Press, the book / record / coffee shop where we normally hold our meetings, would meet (exercising proper social distancing) outside the shop at 9:30 am. One by one, we went in the shop to purchase our usual beverages and pastries, as well as some books. (I ended up buying out the remaining day-old scones. One does what one must.) In our email correspondence with club members, we encouraged everyone to drop by on Saturday or Sunday to support Press with purchases, if possible.

Press on the Danforth

Silent book club member on the Danforth

Silent book club member on the Danforth

Silent book club member on the Danforth

Silent book club member on the Danforth

Silent book club member on the Danforth

3. Following the Saturday in spirit reading, we convened online at 11 am to discuss our recent and current reading. One of our members is a facilitator by profession, and she elegantly steered us through the session. She made sure everyone felt comfortable with this technological solution, and steered the meeting so everyone had time to talk about their reading and then we had time to generally chat, in relaxed and genial fashion. It felt as close as I think it could feel to being around our usual table at Press, which was inexpressibly wonderful. I suspect I’m going to fall asleep tonight with the image of that Brady’s Bunch-esque screenful of dear bookish friends before my eyes.

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After our last meeting at Press, I asked a favour of our members to provide a few words on what the silent book club means to them. The intent was to use those words as the introductions to future meeting reports, so these reports open with more of the voices of our group than just me all the darned time.

Todd went above and beyond a few words, with a blog post that made my heart glow when I first read it, and makes me kind of teary-eyed now. This hits hardest:

“The atmosphere is lovely. It isn’t just reminding me of childhood Sustained Silent Reading time at school, I am noticing it is something that I rarely get to experience these days: the experience of sharing comfortable silence with others. Very often with friends and family there’s a sense that if we’re together there must be a conversation happening. This is most definitely not the case here. I’m happy to be in the room with others but I’m also happy to simply be able to read and share space with them.”

Read Todd’s complete, wonderful blog post here.

Todd at silent book club meeting

I will open future reports with other members’ thoughts on their silent book club experiences. There will be future reports because we will meet again, one way or another.

Without further ado, here is this month’s book list, combined of books shared during our virtual session and contributed by members via email.

Selected books lined up

As always, you can catch up on our previous silent book club meeting reports and book lists here.

We’re pleased and honoured to have been interviewed about the silent book club concept and how to start a club of one’s own. You can check out links to articles, CBC Radio 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.

Under the current circumstances, this text I put at the end of each silent book club report isn’t entirely applicable, but I’m going to repeat it with optimism anyhow:
If you’ve so far enjoyed the silent book club experience virtually, are you tempted to experience it firsthand? 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. If you’re interested in starting your own silent book club or are in the Toronto area and perhaps interested in checking ours out, check out the resources on the Silent Book Club web site, or please feel free to contact me for more information.

We will wait until we can again fling open our doors, venture out and gather in our communities. A silent book club meeting with friends and neighbours, held at and in support of a local business exemplifies exactly the kinds of freedoms we are foregoing now to get through these unsettled and unsettling times … and is where we’re all going to want to be when we get through this. Read well where you are now, be well and let books buoy your spirits and make the time pass swiftly.

Music For Tigers, by Michelle Kadarusman

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kadarusman-music-for-tigersYoung aspiring musician Louisa isn’t sure about the phrase “fair dinkum” when she visits from Canada and hears her Australian uncle use it in the early days of her visit with him at a camp in the wilds of Tasmania. The phrase signifies not only approval but a warm vote of confidence. It can be applied to many aspects of Governor General’s award nominated author Michelle Kadarusman’s third middle grade novel, Music For Tigers.

Kadarusman weaves beautifully themes and issues such as environmental fragility and protection, understanding and respecting neurodiversity differences, reverence for family and history and more into an engaging and at times suspenseful storyline. Louisa’s initial reluctance about being sent to the family’s remote settlement in Tasmania for the summer gives way to affection for her uncle and neighbours as she learns about their involvement in the preservation of a rare, presumed extinct species of marsupial. Louisa, Uncle Ruff, Mel, who runs a nearby Eco Lodge and her son Colin are all fully realized characters with frailties and charms. Louisa’s ancestors and offstage Canadian family members round out the story with additional insights and emotional underpinnings.

Michelle Kadarusman orchestrates it all with compassion and storytelling verve. Music For Tigers is uniquely good and genuine, truly “fair dinkum” …!

Thank you to Pajama Press and Michelle Kadarusman for providing a review copy of Music For Tigers.