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Getting Started
Most
book clubs start informally when a few friends, neighbors, or
co-workers get together to discuss a mutual interest in reading. You
can start a group with as few as 6, but probably not more than 12,
people agreeing to meet at a specific date and time. For your first
meeting, you might want to meet here at Parkplace Books, and have one
of our staff members suggest some titles and help you go over the
ground rules. Remember - there is no "wrong" way to structure your
group. The books you choose can be as diverse as each of your group's
members, and how your group works will depend on the reasons you have
for coming together.
To set up your group you will want to:
1.
Determine how often you will meet - most groups meet on a regular
monthly basis, sometimes taking a month off during the summer when
people are gone on vacation.
2. Determine where you will meet -
the round-robin system of visiting each member's home in turn works
well, so that hosting duties are fairly distributed.
3. Pick your
books for several months in advance - many groups pick a year at a
time. This will save time at each meeting, and will allow fast readers
to read ahead. You might want to pick books around a particular theme
(prize winners, English women writers, Northwest, etc.), or simply pick
a group of books that lend themselves to good discussion.
Enhancing the Discussion
By
setting a few goals and agreeing to a few simple procedural rules, your
group can have good, rewarding discussions with equal participation of
all members.
1. Pick books with discussion in mind. Not all good
books lend themselves to much discussion - mysteries can be fun to
read, but the restrictions of the genre mean that there cannot be many
differing points of view. Literary fiction works best - you should
choose books that can be interpreted in different ways, or have
multiple themes.
2. Set aside a specific time for socializing - the
first 15 minutes of each meeting can catch everyone up on families,
vacations, etc., coffee can be poured and cookies served, and then
everyone should be ready to talk about just the book.
3. To help
keep things on track, you might want to designate a moderator - perhaps
the host of the meeting - who steps in when the discussion strays too
far from the book.
4. To stimulate the discussion you might want
to have one member bring information about the author, samples of
reviews, etc., to act as a starting point. If each member jots down one
question while reading the book, you will have lots of material to
discuss.
5. Asking "why" questions will deepen your discussion.
Why did the author use this character? Why was this scene important?
Remember that a book is the conscious creation of the author:
discovering the author's intentions will open up new avenues of thought
for you.
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