Sharing the wealth
BOOK CLUBS OPEN UP A VARIETY OF LITERARY DOORS
It’s a Wednesday evening and the Towne Book Center in Collegeville is quiet. One woman is seated at a table near the store’s wine bar, absorbed in a book. Within a few minutes, several more women enter the store. They are all carrying the same book and, before long, they take too take seats near the wine bar and begin chatting.
The women have gathered for the Towne Book Center’s non-fiction book club—one of 13 book discussion groups that hold monthly meetings at the shop.
Among the members is Lenore
Tichnell, an engineer by trade. Tichnell belongs to two book clubs—the non-fiction group and a classics club that also meets at Towne Book Center.
“There’s a great social aspect to getting together with a group of people and discussing a book,” she said.
She holds up this month’s nonfiction selection, “Into the Raging Sea,” by Rachel Slade, a true tale of a container ship that disappeared in a hurricane in 2015.
“It wasn’t necessarily something I would choose myself, but it was really interesting,” Tichnell said.
And that gets to the crux of what keeps her coming to book clubs.
“I like breaking out of my comfort zone,” she said.
Tichnell isn’t the only member who participates in multiple book clubs. Fellow non-fiction member Emma Majewski belongs to three and heads up a fourth, the Rainbow Reads club. But Majewski doesn’t hold the record for participating in the most monthly book clubs. That title belongs to Janet Fitzpatrick—a member of seven book clubs, including five at Towne Book Center.
Book clubs are perfect outlets for voracious readers, she said.
“It’s a fun activity and you make a lot of friends in the pro
cess,” Fitzpatrick said.
The Growth of Organized Book Clubs
Book clubs are hardly a new phenomenon. At Phoenixville Library, the Phoenix Book Club has been meeting for over 22 years. Similarly, the Norristown Public Library has hosted a book club since 2000, and the Towne Book Center launched its first club 16 years ago.
But organized book clubs that meet in libraries, book stores and other public spaces are becoming more popular, according to Sarah Danforth, general manager of the Towne Book Center.
“When I started here five years ago there wasn’t an interest in having more book clubs,” she said.
Last year, Danforth attended a meeting of the New Atlantic Booksellers’ Association. While there, she learned about a book store in Washington D.C. that hosted 65 book clubs. At that time, Towne Book Center had only three clubs.
“I came back, and I wanted to start one,” she said. Not only did she introduce the nonfiction club, she suggested that her coworkers lead clubs, and invited customers to host their clubs at the store. Most of the clubs focus on a specific genre: poetry, young adult, science fiction, mystery, classics, LGBTQ, and more.
“The idea of organized book clubs is expanding,” Danforth said.
That shift is due, in part, to online forums and celebrity book clubs, like Reese Witherspoon’s Book Club.
“The book club is the physical manifestation of the social media that’s been building,” Danforth said. A Book & a Beverage Three years ago, Phoenixville Library Director of Adult Services Mark Pinto wanted to introduce an activity to engage millennials. To that end, one of his fellow librarians founded Books on Tap—a book club that meets at pubs and breweries in Phoenixville.
That club has been going strong ever since, drawing about 15 people each month, most in their 20s and 30s. Today, the group is led by volunteer Christine Shaffer. She’s found that meeting at a pub makes book club feel like night out.
“I think it makes it a lot more informal. It’s nice to eat and have drinks, and it’s more engaging that just going to a room at the library,” she said.
Pinto has found that people who attend the library’s three book clubs all have one thing in common.
“They are mainly people who are passionate about books,” he said. “They want to come together, share their thoughts and be exposed to books they might not think of reading.”
Meeting at a pub introduces a social atmosphere that is more appealing to younger people, he said.
Shaffer agreed that the social aspect of a book club is a big draw for many people. The regulars in her book club have become friends who share other interests as well.
“We’re friends now. We go to author talks together, organize board game nights, and participate in (charity) walks. We’re a good group,” Shaffer said. Socializing over Books Last year, Melanie Busby founded The Purple Pallet Book Club, a combination book and craft club that meets monthly at the shop she and her husband own, KB Electric in Limerick.
Busby saw it as both a social outlet and a ministry of sorts, a way to reach out to women in the area.
“The whole object was for me to meet new people,” she said.
She originally started the club with her sister-inlaw, who is an artist, and the pair decided to incorporate a craft into each meeting. The group has made wall hangings out of yarn, paintings on canvass, and, recently, face scrubs after reading the book “Girl Wash Your Face.”
Pairing the club with a craft enhances the book discussion, Busby said.
“It gives us a chance to explore our creative side,” she said. “While we’re painting or doing a craft we have more time to get to know each other.”
Adrian Alexander also initiated a new book club several months ago as a way to meet more people.
His club focuses on classics, and he got it started through Meet Up.
“I work as a computer engineer and, outside of work there is very little deep communication about subjects that are important,” Alexander said.
While his book club is still new and attendance has been sparse with only a handful of readers, nevertheless, he’s pleased to have started the club. He tries to choose titles like “Of Human Bondage,” by W. Somerset Maugham, that most readers aren’t familiar with.
“None of them had heard of these books and they liked them tremendously,” Alexander said. Cookbook Clubs Asha Verma, head of reader services at Norristown Library, learned a year ago about a Cookbook Club at a neighboring library. Intrigued, she attended a meeting and, afterwards, knew she wanted to offer the club in Norristown.
Similar to a regular book club, all members are expected to read through the book and critique it. But, they also each choose a recipe to make and bring to the meeting.
“We all share it. It’s like pot luck,” said Verma.
The club gets members to explore different ethnic dishes and overcome cooking challenges.
“The idea is to bring people together through food and find common ground,” said Verma.
She’s found that book clubs in general provide a valuable medium for people to broaden their perspectives and understand different viewpoints about all subjects.
“Reading stimulates the brain cells. It helps us expand our horizons,” she said.