What else are they reading?
Posted by: Rebecca Vnuk
Just out of curiosity – do you give your group members time to chat about what else they might be reading? This article from NPR on “The Joys of Reading Many Books at Once” got me thinking about it – I would suspect that most book club participants are big readers, so they are likely to be reading more than just that month’s discussion title.
Other members of the group may (or may not) be interested in what everyone is reading. In most of the groups I’ve participated in, people end up chatting about other books while we’re waiting for the discussion to start, or while things are winding down. In fact, in the last group I moderated, this is what spurred me to have our end of the year discussion be a “Book Chat”.
At the very least, paying attention to these side conversations can help the moderator choose new books – based on actual title suggestions or even just listening to what your participants are interested in reading about.
September 21st, 2010 at 7:16 am
Our library holds an informal book chat every Saturday morning for an hour. Our Friends of the Library provide the food (bagels and fruit) and the library provides coffee and tea. We call it “Books and Bagels.” It’s been a big hit. We have about 10 people show up each week, many of them regulars. It was so popular that when we closed for the weekends this summer there was a loud protest about what we would do with the group! They decided to meet by themselves one Saturday outside behind the library in a little gazebo.
We were a bit apprehensive about how the program would go over, but it’s been great. The librarians take turns as facilitators, so that whoever is working on Saturday gets to facilitate. It’s been a wonderful way to get to know the patrons of our library. Everyone should try it! If people don’t like to read, they don’t come to the library!