This month, we’re so pleased to have silent book club member Lori Schuett introduce our latest blog post. Lori joined our group just a few short months ago, but it already feels like she’s been with us as long as our tbr piles are tall!

After a 30-year career teaching English and Communications at both high school and college level, retirement was a welcome new beginning 24 years ago.

Teaching literature to impressionable minds requires patience and dissection skills, to name a few, along with a sense of humour and openness to some rather unusual opinions at times.

I was not sure reading was an activity at the top of the list for leisure with my new found freedom but books have been a significant part of my life since learning to read at a very early age.

I did not want to join a book club to read and discuss books with subject matter of no appeal to me no matter what the critics said, but I do love to share ideas and be with people. However I wanted to read about themes that spoke to me. There lay the challenge – how to find them! Yes, there are bestseller lists and friend recommendations, author interviews – but not enough personal insights to guide me to find the “perfect” read. I cannot begin to tally how many books I have read to page 30 and closed it at that point as it was just not for me – an exhausting pastime, I must say – and I was also missing meeting up with other readers.

A few months ago I was scrolling, looking for books, of course, and came across a site called the Silent Book Club. So do members sit around and read the same book silently at their meeting and then discuss it, I wondered?

My search led me to the East End Toronto Silent Book Club that I learned is just one of nearly 1000 SBC’s internationally.

To my delight as I live in Peterborough, they meet once monthly on Saturday mornings on Zoom. In person follows at a local Toronto coffee shop for those who can attend (how I wish!)

I contacted the facilitator, who is a delight and makes everyone feel so welcome, listening carefully to each member’s book comments, and decided to give it a go. I look forward to our monthly get-togethers and really enjoy the new friends I have made. Here’s the best part: I don’t have to read a specific book. Each person presents a short insightful summary of a book or books they have read during the past month while our moderator records the titles. There is opportunity to ask a few questions and after the meeting the titles are added to a huge ongoing file of books mentioned from all of the meetings.

Then it is time to read alone, together.

SBC checks all my boxes: a wealth of books to explore, lovely friendly people, and great conversation. Now I just need more time – and years – to delve into all of the books on my ever growing list!

Every title on our group’s lists means that at least one (but usually more) readers have given that title thoughtful consideration. Does that mean every work on our lists is expressly recommended? Not exactly or necessarily. Inclusion on this list always means that our readers have devoted time and attention to a title – and that, dear readers, means a great good deal.

• The Elephant Whisperer by Lawrence Anthony with Graham Spence, narrated by Simon Vance (audiobook)
• Bunny by Mona Awad
• Dark Ride by Lou Berney
• Crosses in the Sky: Jean de Brébeuf and the Destruction of Huronia by Mark Bourrie
• Burial of Ghosts by Ann Cleeves
• Dark Matter by Blake Crouch
• Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton, narrated by Stig Wemyss (audiobook)
• Queen Victoria’s Book of Spells – An Anthology of Gaslamp Fantasy, edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling
• Shakespeare: The Man Who Pays the Rent by Judi Dench and Brendan O’Hea
• The White Album by Joan Didion
• Ask the Dust by John Fante
• In the Hour of War: Poems from Ukraine, edited by Carolyn Forche and Ilya Kaminsky
• The Diary of Anne Frank
• Diva by Daisy Goodwin
• Shadow Life by Hiromi Goto
• A Great Country by Shilpi Somaya Gowda, narrated by Vikas Adam (audiobook)
• The Vaster Wilds by Lauren Groff, narrated by January LaVoy (audiobook)
• Bury the Lead by Kate Hilton and Elizabeth Renzetti
• ink earl by Susan Holbrook
• Close to Death by Anthony Horowitz
• Denison Avenue by Daniel Innes & Christina Wong (audiobook)
• The Summer Book by Tove Janssen
• Pet Sematary by Stephen King
• Demon of Unrest by Erik Larson
• Northerny by Dawn Macdonald
• The Art of Floating by Melanie Marttila
• The Road Years by Rick Mercer (audiobook)
• The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
• Wind Breaker Volumes 1-5 by Satoru Nii
• The Third Policeman by Flann O’Brien
• Poetry pamphlets from Opaat (One poem at a time) Press
• Blood by Tyler Pennock
• The Phoenix Crown by Kate Quinn and Janie Chang
• Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones
• Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe
• Empire of Pain by Patrick Radden Keefe
• The Caretaker by Ron Rash
• The Paris Novel by Ruth Reichl
• Lilith by Eric Rickstead
• What We Buried by Robert Rotenberg
• On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder
• The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne
• Reasons to be Cheerful by Nina Stibbe
• The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
• Summer of My Amazing Luck by Miriam Toews, narrated by Amy Rutherford (audiobook)
• The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese (audiobook)
• The Orphans of Mersea House by Marty Wingate, narrated by Henrietta Meire (audiobook)
• Blackwater Falls by Ausma Zehanat Khan, narrated by Farida Pasha (audiobook)

How about some extra book-related articles, resources, news and recommendations? 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.

• Looks like there’s something for everyone in the New York Public Library staff’s Summer 2024 Picks for Adults.
• Those who complete all of the National Book Foundation’s Summer Reading Adventures qualify for bookish prizes!
• 49th Shelf’s July Summer Reading List is “carefully curated for summer vibes and something for every kind of reader” – check it out!

You can always find and immerse yourself in our group’s previous reports and book lists 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 the worldwide phenomenon of silent book clubs via Guinevere and Laura’s Silent Book Club web site. Last fall, they welcomed their 500th chapter … and with breathtaking momentum, they are now boasting 1,000 chapters!!! (There were around 60 chapters when we joined as the first Toronto chapter in 2017.) You can find information on meetings happening around the world and close to where you live. Every club is a different size, format (in-person, virtual or combinations) and vibe, so contact a club’s organizers beforehand if you have any questions or preferences. Please feel free to contact me for more information about our club and its offerings.

Wishing y’all alone together silent reading time (plus not-so-silent bookish conversation!) that is endlessly rich and rewarding.