I’ve been in the same book club for a little over five years now, which in itself isn’t that surprising. Lots of women are in book clubs. Even Oprah has a book club. But the biggest difference I’ve ascertained is that in my book club we actually discuss the books. (Not saying Oprah doesn’t; we all know she does!) That my group discusses the books shouldn’t be surprising, either, because that’s the idea behind a book club. Read, gather, discuss. But, by far, the most frequent complaint I hear from other friends in other book clubs is, “We never get around to the book. We all sit around drinking wine and socializing all night. I didn’t even bother to read the book for this month!”
Occasionally, there will be one or two members of our book club who haven’t finished the book for the month, but hardly ever without good reason. Tough deadlines, heavy travel, illness. I don’t know that I’ve ever heard someone say, “Well, I just didn’t get around to it.” Our group comprises two professors, several business owners, working moms, single women, and stay-at-home moms. Our ages range from oh, I don’t know, probably mid-thirties to mid-sixties, which creates wonderfully diverse discussions. Because we are in many different stages of life and have such different vocations, we don’t get mired down in naptime and diaper discussions, which is easy to do when you gather with same-stage-of-life friends. We’re not anti-social, of course. We show up, we pour the wine, we laugh for a bit, and usually within half an hour one of us says, “Hey, should we get started?” And the thing is, we do. Everyone wants to. We love books, and we’re there to share what we think, and to learn what everyone else thinks, about the book we just read.
We choose our books thoughtfully, usually twice a year. Because we live in West Michigan, with snowy winters that encourage lots of reading by the fireplace, and sunny, bright, summers that don’t, we choose one long book for the summer and don’t meet during June, July, and August. In May, we all bring some suggestions—books that have been recommended to us, books our mothers loved, books we saw at the library, or books we heard reviewed—and we sort through them, toss out ideas, and choose enough books to get us through Christmastime. Then, at the December meeting, we do it all over again and choose the books for the rest of the year. This May, however, we had so many great books to choose from, and such enthusiasm, that we actually chose books for the entire year. A definite first! We’re all looking forward to relaxing by the fire with spiced wine or cider while we enjoy a little more time dissecting November’s book choice.
We are deliberate about the books we choose, and try to read an amalgam of fiction, non-fiction, business, biography, and the rest. Although I’m sure that most of us pick up some beachy-reads in the summer, our summer book club selection isn’t one. A few years ago we picked two for the summer, and each read one or the other (a couple very ambitious members read both): John Adams, by David McCullough and Theodore Rex, by Edmund Morris. I can confirm that if you take a very large, hardcover, John Adams to the pool, you will be relegated to the “very weird” category by all of the other women there with their Janet Evanovich!
One of the books we read this year, Three Cups of Tea, is Greg Mortenson’s story about how failing to climb a Himalayan peak called K2 changed the course of his life. The book is about his promise to a Pakistani village to return and build a school, for girls, in their remote, isolated village. It’s about his decision, his trials, his perseverance, his wife. He succeeded in building that first school (don’t worry, that doesn’t ruin the book for you; read it anyway), and has gone on to build 73 more with the help of his Central Asia Institute. Nicholas Kristof wroten an article in the NY Times last Sunday, It Takes a School, Not Missles, which admittedly has a political slant, but nonetheless sums up Greg Mortenson’s accomplishments quite nicely.
Three Cups of Tea probably isn’t a book I would’ve picked up on my own. Nor is A Fine Balance, by Rohinton Mistry which has become one of my all-time favorites, or Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, which everyone else loved but was one of the few books, in all these years, that I didn’t connect with. Exposure to books that are off my radar, hearing opinions and ideas that rub the edges of mine, and the joy of knowing these women and sharing these books with them is worth the sleep I miss when I’m still finishing a book at 1:00 AM the night before book club. Or being put in the “very weird” category when I’m reading at the pool. Definitely worth it.
