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Recently I’ve become aware of a couple of discussion groups that are slightly different from the norm, and I thought I’d share information about them with Book Group Buzz readers.  Who knows — you may like these ideas and decide to adapt them into similar groups at your library, or just among your friends. “Novel [...]

Many women’s magazines feature some sort of book recommendations, and More magazine takes it one step further:  their feature, called “Eat, Drink, Read”, showcases not only a discussable book, but a custom cocktail to go with it.  You can enjoy a “Little Miss Princess” cocktail with Peggy Orenstein’s Cinderella Ate My Daughter, or perhaps a [...]

Stephen King stopped being a regular Entertainment Weekly contributor last year. I really miss his monthly essays about all things pop culture. I think my only nitpicky issues with his columns involved his habit for calling himself “Uncle Stevie” and any of his writing about music (which, I thought, always pigeonholed him as being a [...]

In the last post I talked about resources for book group leaders in selecting titles for discussions. For those facilitators in a hurry, here’s a short list of titles recently published that would make excellent choices. Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin–a quiet portrait of a boyhood friendship and the choices young men make [...]

Connie Willis has won the latest Nebula Award for her two novels Blackout and All Clear, which together form a single story. These books are an exciting return to form from a writer who had not turned out a novel in years. But it’s not the first time that Willis has explored the Blitz years of [...]

Last week my colleague David Wright and I presented for our library’s Volunteer Appreciation event. We decided to frame our presentation around the “treasures” of the library–those books that librarians love to tell patrons about, the ones that they send to the volunteers to tape and glue and keep limping along year after year. David [...]

This is the second post about the books selected by readers for a recent meeting of the Williamsburg Regional Library’s staff book group. The theme for the meeting was books set in the Middle East or South Asia. Connie and Melissa read two of the works of Jean Sasson, which claim to be autobiographies “by [...]

This just made me grin – a collection of literary tattoos.  Perhaps your group could agree on a design, and all show their allegiance to book club by getting one? http://www.buzzfeed.com/melismashable/20-awesome-literary-tattoos

I’ve mentioned the wonderful nonfiction blog Citizen Reader here before, but I wanted to point out that she has a new post up specifically for book club possibilities.  Here in this recent post, she gives a list of memoirs and biographies that would make great discussion picks. I read much more fiction that nonfiction, so [...]

The staff book group at Williamsburg Regional Library met today to discuss books with Middle Eastern and South Asian settings. Over a great potluck lunch of Mexican food (our meeting was originally scheduled for Cinco de Mayo but got postponed) our readers pulled out their usual variety of interesting choices. Laurie from Youth Services had [...]

As Oprah is ending her syndicated show, The Nielson Company has compiled statistics on the effect her book club has had on book sales over the past 10 years. You can find the full story here.

In Erin McGrath’s The Seamstress of Hollywood Boulevard, readers meet the beguiling Nell Platt.  Nell grows up poor in rural Kansas.   To escape her bleak life, she marries at 17,  but finds she’s traded one sad situation for another. A talented seamstress, she decides to leave her husband and two baby daughters behind to run [...]

Having grown up in a family of teachers, summertime always gets me in a travelling mood. I’m staying put this year, but here’s a nice list from the Telegraph of 24 books that will send readers on a trip around the world. I like the idea of travel-themed book group meetings. Instead of fighting with [...]

I love hearing about which books and authors writers themselves love or feel influenced by. I am that annoying person at author readings who asks that timeworn and tested question that some authors love and others avoid: What are you reading? I even asked Tim Gunn when I met him. Yes, nerd factor supreme. So, [...]

For Booklist’s Mystery Month, I wanted to remind all the book group leaders out there of some invaluable resources when it’s time to choose a mystery for discussion. First, our own Gary Warren Niebuhr, has written a guide just for this purpose. Read ‘Em Their Writes was published in 2006 and I’ve turned to it [...]

This week, 2011 Seattle Reads author Chris Cleave is in town. I was fortunate to meet him while he spent an hour answering questions on the library’s Facebook page. He was charming, fun to talk to and obviously pleased to find himself featured in Seattle, where the now widely named “One Book, One Community” program [...]

I finally found time for Dave Cullen’s work of investigative reporting, Columbine, and it’s even better than I expected. Like many, I became fascinated by the terrible events as they unfurled on television and in the newspapers. What would make two young people execute such a horrific plan? Was anyone else involved? How did they get [...]

It’s juvenile, I know. But I can’t resist doing a biblio-double take when I see distressingly similar book covers and then sharing those “separated at publication” twins. The latest pair? The Golden Prince by Rebecca Dean and An Unlikely Suitor by Nancy Moser. Both are well reviewed historical fiction set in similar time periods featuring [...]

Recently the Downtowners Book Group at The Kansas City Public Library discussed one of my favorite book group titles, Mudbound by Hillary Jordan. This book has a compelling plot, realistic characters, and a solid pace. It would be a good choice for mystery book groups looking for something different. I’ve used this book in discussion [...]

There are times when I watch action figures in action and I think, “If that were me, I would just roll over and give up.”  What is it that keeps these people going forward when others would retreat–gumption?  Johnny Merrimon has gumption. In John Hart’s The Last Child, we meet Johnny one year after his [...]