
Most book clubs are doing it wrong (2017) - jasim
http://jsomers.net/blog/book-clubs
======
tdeck
> A book club run in the standard way isn’t efficient or practical — it’s just
> a good opportunity wasted.

This kinda misses the point of most book clubs. The point is to have an excuse
to meet and talk to people - the book is secondary. In fact many people come
to book clubs without having read that month's book, just for the social
outlet. Perhaps that's silly from a literary perspective but it still serves a
purpose.

~~~
drusepth
I'm now wondering how common the two (or more?) types of book clubs in the
wild are.

I've always treated book clubs more like a shared class and get extremely
frustrated when someone shows up without reading the book/chapters ("they're
just wasting everyone's time") or when conversation temporarily drifts to non-
book-related topics. I go to book clubs for the insights and commentary I get
on books from people with different life experiences, reading history, etc.
There's plenty of other places you can go if you just want to be social.

I've definitely seen more "social" book clubs, too. I just assumed they were
"bad" or not serious, but I guess they're just targeted at people wanting
something different out of the book club experience.

~~~
watwut
> There's plenty of other places you can go if you just want to be social.

There is not? People don't socialize without excuse and did not for years.
People who want to socialize have to pick a hobby or interest and try there.
It may be sport, bookclub, game, something technical, whatever, but it must be
_something_.

~~~
satvikpendem
What about going to a party? That is a purely social event without any hobby
attached to it. Hell, you can find random parties to attend on Meetup or
similar if you really wanted, which I've gone to.

~~~
ozim
If you are extrovert and you are OK with dozens of strangers around you it
will work.

If you have hard time getting along with random people and you need time to
open up and get confident with others that is really bad idea. I think book
club where mostly the same people who are also less outgoing is better option.

~~~
satvikpendem
That's understandable. I wish there were a way of separating these two types
of book clubs then, a casual versus hardcore variety. I think by doing so,
fewer people would be disappointed when it turns out to be the opposite
variety of what they expected. Thanks for your viewpoint, it helped me
understand the idea better.

~~~
OJFord
I don't think it's difficult? It's just in the way it's described.

> Monthly social book club, not too serious, new faces always welcome.

> Monthly book club exploring everything from X to Y with a focus on Z.
> Newcomers wanting a place to discuss how P Qs R with like-minded friends
> always welcome.

------
crazygringo
> _Most book clubs are doing it wrong... You have one meeting per book.... The
> problem is that there’s no time to cash in on anyone else’s insights._

> _My book club started four years ago to read Infinite Jest._

Well SHEESH -- most book clubs aren't trying to read 1,079 page long books. Of
_course_ you're going to need to break that up.

But the idea that anyone else is doing it "wrong" is both nonsensical and
_incredibly_ arrogant. Book clubs are usually concerned with much shorter
books that are more easily accessible, where _of course_ you can understand
each others' insights afterwards.

And for me, the goal isn't just (or even primarily) to understand the _book_
better or "cash in", as it is more to understand your _friends_ better and
enjoy time together. Even if you haven't read the book at all, you can go to
hear what they have to say and discuss the topics raised generally.

(If your goal _is_ primarily to understand the book better, you'll probably
get a lot more out of reading reviews, analysis, etc. online that meeting with
friends, unless your friends happen to be English professors, writers for the
New Yorker, etc.)

~~~
wrsh07
Yeah this is written from a pretty narrow perspective

Relevant questions: what bookclubs was the author familiar with? and what
books were they reading?

The bookclubs I'm familiar with are all run by and for the sake of their
members, and if the goal is either encourage regular reading or just social,
they'll checkpoint at the same pace regardless of the book (eg every 2-4
weeks) and decide how much to read depending... on the book?

The idea that most bookclubs wouldn't do this seems very bizarre to me, and I
just can't imagine the sampling the author had done prior to this post

------
redisman
Few observations from my bookclub:

A bookclub is not a class. For most people it’s an excuse to get together,
have a drink and talk about a thing they like in a lightly structured manner.
What OP is describing sounds more like a study group.

If I don’t like the book I don’t want to read it for months and months.

~~~
koheripbal
An observation from my wife's book club. They spend 15 minutes talking about a
book that perhaps 50% of them red, and the remaining two hours talking about
other things.

The 1-2 women that were actually serious about book analysis quit the book
club.

~~~
cableshaft
Before the pandemic, I usually switched between attending 2 different book
clubs.

One is exactly how you said, and the other had a host who a list of prepared
questions and trivia to discuss, and pretty much goes down her list each time,
and everyone gets a chance to answer each if they have anything.

I've found value in both types. I learn more from the latter, usually, but I
enjoy the former, too.

------
divan
We run a group in Barcelona where we meet once per week and read the book
aloud. It's technically not a "book club", but rather "pronunciation
improvement group" – while we read, an organizer who is a native-speaker
corrects the mistakes on the go – but as we'd finished already 4 fantastic
books together, we obviously had a plenty of opportunity and time to discuss
what we're reading, I would qualify it's as a book club for sure.

This club format is not just great for improving English (you develop
listening, reading and speaking skills at the same time), but also have become
one of the most favourite activity of mine during the week – we usually meet
in some lovely place in the Saturday morning, drink coffee with croissants,
meet wonderful smart people, discuss life and books, while enjoying views on
Sagrada Familia.

Having this experience, idea of reading silently at home and then meeting once
to briefly share the opinion about a book, doesn't sound exciting at all :)

~~~
seedie
This sounds awesome and would be something I'd definitely join. (Sadly not
being based in Barcelona though :)

What books did you read and how was this event initiated?

------
sdenton4
My experience with a non-fiction book club was somewhere in-between the 'study
group' and 'social club' extremes. We ran the club via a meetup group for
about three years, with a 'core' group of ~10 people (of which about half
would show up each month). Each month would also bring a few random meetup
people who we would see once and never again.

a) Many non-fiction books are effectively a 'very good essay' in the first
couple chapters, followed by N*100 pages of lower-quality expansion on the
initial topic. It's completely OK if most people in the meeting don't read the
whole thing. It's also much easier to skip around in non-fiction books, since
the chapters are often more modular.

b) We would have a rotating 'moderator' who generally read the whole book,
usually before it got picked up by the group. The moderator generally picks a
subset of 'good chapters' which people can read if they aren't going to get
through the whole book. Usually intro + chapter 1 + two later chapters with
the best points.

c) For non-fiction, outside experience is often just as valuable to the
discussion as having read the book. Having a really relevant person involved
int he discussion is fantastic.

d) We also had a some great experiences with inviting the author to the
discussion group, for books written by people who live in the area. We would
often get ~20 people to turn out for these ones, and the authors were very
happy to come talk about the thing they care about to even our small group.

~~~
twic
> Many non-fiction books are effectively a 'very good essay' in the first
> couple chapters, followed by N*100 pages of lower-quality expansion

I wonder if an essay club, rather than a book club, would work. You pick
something short enough that it's easy to read, but still with enough ideas in
to talk about. You then have time to either dig into the text really deeply,
or use it as a prompt for a largely unrelated but still interesting
conversation, HN comments style.

~~~
sdenton4
Yeah, maaaaaybe. My guess is you'd end up reading a lot of book chapters for
the essay club.

The problem I think is that the economics of writing books is much more
author-friendly than writing longform articles. So by the time you put a
shitpile of research into writing something /good/, you really should be
writing a book. Even if the 'cream' of the content is about three chapters.
And the rest of the deep dive is still worth it for many readers (and those
who aren't reading the whole book for book club can still go back for the rest
later, if they want to).

------
cjf4
Any book club that gets people to read and show up is not "doing it wrong."

I'd be interested in a format suggested by the author, but I think I'm the
only one in my book club that would. The fact that I'm regularly reading and
talking about books with a group without any particular literary bent is
something very valuable to me, even if we don't mine every hidden treasure of
the books we read.

~~~
dorchadas
Seriously. I would absolutely be interested in a book club like that,
especially one that went through the "Great Books" or whatever...But I'm also
the only one of my friends who really reads outside genre fiction so sadly no
chance of that happening soon unless I can find one at the local university
that's open to the public.

~~~
wrsh07
You could start or join a remote bookclub / study group

Especially given current circumstances, this would possibly help you meet the
analysis goal

~~~
dorchadas
Aye, but I've found those generally tend to have _worse_ engagement over time
than in-person ones. Much worse, which is the problem. Though maybe I am being
too pessimistic about it; might look around and see what there is to be had.
I'd love one with a more academic bent.

------
CalChris
I was in a classics reading group. We met _weekly_ and plowed through
material. It was not a democracy but instead run by a guy who knew his stuff.
I read a lot of stuff I didn't want to (way too much gore in the Greek
tragedies for my taste).

It wasn't an excuse to meet and kvetch. It was closer to a class. It was about
the books. Every other book club I've been in has been a pale imitation. The
one I'm in now is stocked with PhDs and Berkeley profs and isn't even a drone
fest. It doesn't even reach a high school level of engagement with the
material.

Our sports club is sidelined because of the quarantine. So I'll admit, they're
not very good at this. I'm going to suggest that we read books about the sport
next time.

~~~
dorchadas
That classics reading group honestly sounds amazing. I wish I could find
something like that in person, or online.

------
officemonkey
One alternate way to do a book club:

1\. Meet every 3 to 6 months.

2\. Everyone bring books to swap.

3\. Everyone bring a list of books they really loved.

4\. Each person takes turn talking about the books they loved while sitting
around a dining room table with snacks and drinks.

5\. It's fun if other people have read the same books. It's even more fun if
they disagree.

6\. Last time I did this I added 10 books to my "To Read Pile" and traded
books with friends.

7\. Everyone wanted to do it again.

~~~
twic
Something i do:

1\. Find 10-20 friends

2\. Go on holiday for a week in a cottage in the middle of nowhere with
terrible internet speed

3\. Bring a dozen books each and put them in a huge pile in the middle of one
room

4\. Eat a lovely big meal together in the evening

5\. Mercilessly shame anyone who is doing anything other than reading a book,
cooking, or performing essential biological functions before dinner time

You don't all read the same book, but there will be plenty of overlap, and it
usually works out that there are a few books that many people have read.

~~~
officemonkey
I WANT TO GO TO THERE

------
aleyan
> The discussion goes on for one or two hours before it runs out of gas, and
> then the group picks the next book, and you agree to meet in another month
> or six weeks.

I have been running a book club for the past year and a half and that is a
fair summary of how it goes. It is definitely hard to keep a discussion on
topic for more than a couple of hours without it becoming a generic social
event, especially if there are late arrivals. Productivity of work meetings
tends to approach zero after an hour; so why should it be different for book
clubs? Denser books should require more discussion, but doing it in a single
session is hard. The social aspect is fun and is a part of why I run the book
club I do, but it is a competing priority with the book itself and different
people in the club prioritize the two differently. The prioritization changes
for everyone as time progresses and the amount of alcohol consumed increases.

Recommendation of having smaller meetings while the book is in progress
deserves a trial. I will adopt it for the next book in my club. While we are
holding these virtually, it seems that people are having easier time parceling
an hour of their evening time so this will be practical.

There are a few things that differentiates my book club from the authors
description of how a typical book club operates. Firstly, I select the book
that I want to read and I think my friends will enjoy that is of appropriate
time investment. This means there is no griping about book selection and
having to competing desires of multiple people. Secondly there is a set
schedule: 7:30pm on the first Monday of every other month at my apartment.
This means there is no griping about choice of venue (an issue in NYC) and
rescheduling to fit prior commitments the participants have. I make an
announcement on Facebook and people have a choice to participate or not. This
has been working out rather well with turns outs of somewhere between half a
dozen to a dozen friends depending on the book. Conversations have been good
and organizational investment very reasonable.

------
jamesjyu
I fully agree with the author on the problem, but the suggested solution of
doing periodic readings together is a hard sell for busy ppl to commit to - I
find synchronous reading boring.

There are a few ways to increase the chance of a book club:

(1) Reduce the reading length per session.

(2) Provide a carrot to encourage ppl to do the reading.

These two levers led a few friends and I to start something called Short Story
Club [1], which is really starting to take off now.

It's relatively easy to get folks to read a 30-40 page short story, and we try
to provide a free copy so people don't have to make a purchase. IMO short
stories are super underrated and overlooked - many of them pack a punch bigger
than the average novel.

We start each session with small group discussions over Zoom.

For the carrot, we get the author of the short story to come on the Zoom and
do a Q&A session, letting attendees ask their questions directly via video
like in a real event. So far, we've focused on science fiction, and we've
gotten Ted Chiang, Ken Liu, and Cory Doctorow to join us.

So, even if you're not doing short stories for your own book club, a better
way is to chunk up big books and meet periodically. Make it an event: if in
person make an effort to cook or provide good snacks, music, whatever it takes
to make it easy for people to commit to. And have good discussion points
ready.

[1] [https://www.shortstory.club](https://www.shortstory.club) \- if you're
interested, we have Hugh Howey coming next week to discuss WOOL, one of my fav
stories

------
navbaker
I’ve never belonged to an actual book club, but have followed along as a
podcast I listen to did a virtual book club. They did it as the article
suggests, reading a small portion of the book each week and discussing that
one portion for around an hour and a half.

If anyone’s interested, it is the Grey Company podcast, which began as a
podcast discussing the Lord of the Rings card game, but branched out to doing
the afore mentioned read through of Lord of the Rings.

Also of interest is Tolkien Road, a podcast which reads through and discusses
the Silmarillion and other Tolkien works in a bit by bit fashion.

------
tragic
> You would never run a class this way

As a literature graduate, this made me laugh. Maybe literature courses are
more leisurely stateside, but for me it was a book a _week_ (not 4 to 6 weeks,
as OP suggests). That was literally how classes were run.

And it was stupid for the reasons outlined. I remember my class on Ulysses
mostly because a) I was acutely conscious of not having been fully keeping up
in the 250 pages before the closing chapter and b) when I arrived at class it
became clear after about 2 minutes that only I had finished it, because I had
read it over the summer break because I was really keen on those bragging
rights, but everyone else has tried to read it in one week, which is a doomed
endeavour if ever there was one. It would have been a better experience for
everyone concerned if more than one person had done the reading, but that was
not realistic on the assumption that Ulysses can be polished off in the same
time as The Power and the Glory.

------
iandanforth
From the comments here it seems like we've got a case of an overloaded term.

Just like you need terms like "intramural" and "club" to differentiate the
type of sports team to which you belong there seems to be a need for a common
and well understood differentiation between book groups which are primarily
_social_ and which are geared toward analysis and/or study.

The objectives of the two groups don't seem to mesh well at all so perhaps
they are deserving of their own terms.

~~~
crazygringo
Me personally, I'd use "book club" for the social one, and "study group" for
the academic one.

The author seems to be describing a study group, not a book club.

------
searchableguy
Are there any good online programming clubs?

It would be fun to work on a project together every weekend.

------
cwhiz
The method described in this article sounds more similar to a college study
group than a book club. To each their own on how you enjoy reading a book with
friends. It’s pretty arrogant to just say “if you enjoy it this other way,
you’re wrong.”

~~~
kjaftaedi
Author seems to be gatekeeping and has little experience with clubs outside
their own bubble.

Would be fun to have this person attend a knitting club. Their head would
probably explode.

~~~
redisman
You’re not talking about knitting techniques?! You animals!

------
MilnerRoute
I always wanted a club where everyone was reading the same ebook -- and left
comments and highlights that were shared throughout the text.

Amazon's Kindle has this capability -- but I've never heard anyone who's
actually taken advantage of it.

~~~
MilnerRoute
Also, I think it'd be cool to see the highlights and comments left by
celebrities or "authoritative" readers. I'm really surprised this hasn't
become a thing...

[https://www.goodreads.com/blog/show/677-share-your-kindle-
no...](https://www.goodreads.com/blog/show/677-share-your-kindle-notes-and-
highlights-with-your-friends-beta)

------
DyslexicAtheist
anyone know of some good online book clubs?

I have this idea in the back of my mind for a while, which is a mailing list
or forum where members agree to read a specific book every 2 weeks and then
write a review about it or discuss it online.

every member gets to suggest a book as what to read next and whatever
suggestion gets the most votes will be read. it would be highly specific to
keep the communities small enough and to really dive deep on certain
works/authors. this could be done using categories. a category has certain
rules for the books to be read, and could be titles which are at least 100
years old (my pet peeve), in the public domain, and limited to n-authors, ...
one could then also have all future readings be descendents of that
category/author (e.g. in follow-up readings read only/everything that an
author has cited, or things they have read etc). kind of like a snow-ball
system. but there are many ways how to structure this to make it interesting
for different crowds.

~~~
DanBC
You could probably set on up on Tildes? (Although it might be a bit quiet at
first). [https://tildes.net/~books](https://tildes.net/~books)

~~~
DyslexicAtheist
cool thanks, this looks interesting. never heard of it. much appreciated.

------
divan
Another great experience I want to share is the online bookchallenge I
participated in, organized by Dmitry Dubilet (founder of Monobank). It marries
simple economic incentives design with love to reading books.

The idea is that each participant sends some money into the pool – 10 euros in
that particular case – and commit to read a book from the list in 3 weeks.
(There was a prepared list of diverse set of books like "You must be joking,
Mr. Feynman" or "Freakonomics"). By the end of the challenge, a simple oracle
mechanism was used to determine who read a book or not – everyone was randomly
assigned a few people who have chosen the same book and had to make a call to
talk about a book and check if person have read it. Once verification was
done, money from the pool have been divided between people who read the book.

I especially loved that concept due to the fact that it's almost exactly what
people in cryptocommunity try to do with tokens and cryptoeconomy – create
economic incentives (in a new way), new oracles (mechanisms of connecting
economic system to the offline world) and change peoples behavior in the
socially beneficial way.

But this time it was done just with a mobile banking app and a Google Forms.

~~~
frabbit
I think that's simultaneously the most depressing and hilarious thing I have
read on HN.

------
tehjoker
I think this sounds like an excellent approach for reading a long book that is
worth dissecting, but unfortunately it's a time intensive approach. I suspect
the once a month approach is a time-conscious approach rather than what we
would select for a serious reading.

------
clairity
what the author describes resembles salons[0] more than book clubs. salons
have some (negative) connotations of idle aristocracy, but can be modernized
to simply be a bunch of people getting together expressly to discuss
interesting ideas around wine/beer/coffee. those ideas could be a few chapters
of an interesting book.

i've always wanted to start a salon (insert lots of excuses for why i haven't
here).

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salon_(gathering)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salon_\(gathering\))

~~~
twic
I would say the opposite. To me, the characteristic of a salon is free-ranging
discussion on whatever the participants find interesting. What Somers is
suggesting is a tight focus on a defined topic.

------
magicroot75
Personally I'd go a step further and say if you want to really read the book
together you should read it together on Kindle and make shared notes and
highlights as you're all reading so you can note where others, or you, are
struggling. This would truly help it become a collaboration moreso than a
retrospective.

------
formalsystem
A book isn't something you're supposed to read and finish. It's a set of ideas
you develop over multiple reads, if a book isn't worth reading multiple times
it's probably not worth reading once.

This is obviously true for non fiction programming books where you can spend
years developing a library off of ideas from a single chapter but I was also
surprised to learn that it's also true for fiction books. My girlfriend
doesn't mind spoilers in novels because she reasons if a book isn't good
enough with spoilers it's probably not good enough without the spoilers too.

The goal should be to enjoy reading not read, it's deceptively unproductive to
force yourself to finish a book.

~~~
noizejoy
I respect and partially agree with what you’re saying. However, your post
sounds a bit too absolutist to me.

In reality books, like any form of communication are incredibly diverse on the
production as well on the consumption side. A novel is very different than a
reference. A teaching book is very different than a biography. Some books are
more about the journey - some are more about the destination.

There are many different ways to consume (some or all of) a book. And that’s
driven by both: how it was written and what a reader wants out of it at that
moment in time.

Books are one of the manifestations of the incredible plurality in our
species.

------
viburnum
That's a study group not a book club.

------
cafard
I am charmed by the idea that my neighborhood book club would ever consider
_Ulysses_ or _Pale Fire_. Now and then somebody comes up with something I
haven't read and enjoy encountering. Mostly I like the club for a) not
interfering with my ordinary reading, and ) a chance to get together with
neighbors over dinner and wine.

------
kashyapc
Very timely topic. Please excuse me for hijacking this to gather some input on
the following:

I'm curious to hear if anyone has stories, success or otherwise, and methods
on organizing a non-fiction study group.

(Assume: small groups, serious and experienced participants.)

Bonus marks for any "bear in minds" and "gotchas" when a plague forces you to
resort to online group readings and discussions.

~~~
xapata
I and 2 friends had a political science reading/discussion group that lasted a
while. The most important things were keeping the reading short and polemic,
and asking a question that we'd all respond to in writing via a short essay
before gathering to discuss. Oh, and drinking heavily. The writing was
necessary to keep us on track while drunk.

~~~
kashyapc
I see, keeping the reading short and focused plus an essay sounds effective.
(I'm not good with alcohol, so I'll skip that part ;-) I can stay on track
reasonably well without any external stimuli.)

This evening I'll be out at a nearby nature reserve with a fellow serious
participant to talk about organizing an advanced study/discussion group on
Greek & Roman philosophy -- mostly Hellenistic.

Thanks for the input, _xapata_ , much appreciated.

~~~
xapata
We were heavily inspired by learning about the Metaphysical Club. You could
say it was a sort of book club. Some of the United States' most famous
philosophers were members. They named the club ironically, because they hated
the idea of metaphysics. One of my favorite anecdotes was when they considered
changing their name to the "Whiskey Punch Club."

 _The Metaphysical Club_
[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000OI1AF2](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000OI1AF2)

------
sharker8
I've tried the "book chunk club" approach too. Same problem. The right size
chunk is a hard thing to optimize.

------
mcnamaratw
Never mind all that!

How about IJ? Have you folks made any progress at all on guessing what maybe
actually happens? For example do we know anything at all about Hal and Gately
digging up JOI's head? Even for example what possible use that would be to
anybody?

------
theriddlr
I've been to a tech 'code and bitch' ('stitch and bitch'). The premise was
really obvious because everyone knew not to bring a laptop.

------
Noos
What the author wants isn't a book club. He wants a secular Bible study. Most
people don't treat reading like that, though.

------
mattl
Did you ever finish Infinite Jest?

~~~
dade_
Reading that book needs a support group, not a book club. It was strange, I
think someone recommended the book to me, I started reading it, and
immediately regretted the purchase. Then, by chance watched 'The End of the
Tour' and realized who the author was. That attempt, I made it to the YEAR OF
THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT so many times I lost count. The book reminds me
of reading unformatted code, something from a decompiler.

------
satvikpendem
I see other commentors saying book clubs as primarily social gatherings and
about the book second. This strikes me as odd. If you want a social gathering,
why have the pretense of reading books, just organize the social gathering,
perhaps a weekly meeting at the local pub or someone's home. When I attend
book clubs, it's about the literary aspects of the book first and any social
interaction is incidental, such as if I really like another person's opinions,
I'll go chat with them afterwards. Indeed, I would be particularly annoyed if
I spent time reading a book and went to discuss it, and all I got were people
not talking about the book, either in depth or at least shallowly, and I'd
find another book club.

In regards to the ongoing nature of book clubs, discussing every chapter, I
think is is a great idea, and the best avenue I've seen it happen through is a
medium like Reddit (or Tildes.net), with a nested forum post for each chapter
that people can not only look back on now but in the future. Indeed,
r/bookclub and even other media related subreddits, like r/anime or your
favorite TV show like r/gameofthrones, have such weekly threads for reading or
rewatching the requisite media. This feels to me the best way to accomplish
the author's goals. Of course, there is no real social interaction, but again,
if you want social interaction, go to a social event that is explicitly (or
sufficiently implicitly) stated that it is for socialization, such as a pub
gathering. No one's going to be reading books with their friends at a pub.

~~~
sszz
Hmm I’d say all the book clubs I belong to are social first, book second; one
club spends the majority of each meeting roasting the people who haven’t read
the book, another good portion debating our selection procedures, and a
minimal amount of time on the book itself. Different flavors for different
people!

~~~
satvikpendem
If that's the case, why have a "book" club at all, rather than make a social
gathering? Let me be clear in that I also attend social events, but they're
called social events on the face of it. If I'm attending a book club, I expect
to talk about books.

~~~
chrisseaton
> If that's the case, why have a "book" club at all

To get a conversation started, but it doesn't matter where it ends up.

Do you understand people making smalltalk and the purpose of it? It's like
that.

~~~
satvikpendem
I said this in another comment, hope it clarifies my understanding:

Sure, I get smalltalk, and I now understand the dichotomy of book club types.
Some people are expecting book clubs to be casual and others hardcore. Our
definitions are not the same so our conclusions as to what book clubs should
be are also not the same. I like both approaches but I like them to be
delineated. If I'm with my friends I can appreciate it being a social
gathering with a theme, but if I attend a "hardcore" book club, well, I expect
it to be hardcore, talking about the book itself for most of the time.

