“Book clubs are totally dope – like English class if you were allowed to read only books that you actually like and snack and sip while discussing them.”
― Sam Maggs, The Fangirl’s Guide to the Galaxy: A Handbook for Girl Geeks
…and by “sip” I assume Sam means kegstands with beer and wine straight from the bottle, and by “snack” she means stuffing your face with greasy food straight from the back of a pub.
Last night my book club talked about Jennifer Egan’s Manhattan Beach. According to one of my fellow bookies who shall remain nameless but has a history of bibliophilic illness, “Manhattan Beach is a book about a beach. The beach is called Manhattan Beach. In between going to the beach and Anna’s home, people go diving and die. The end.”
Excellent summary.
Anyway, aside from plugging my own book club (did that come out right?), I thought I would use this opportunity to highlight the awesomenesss of book clubs. On top of meeting new people (hopefully), being in a book club means you have an excuse every month to rip it up while discussing pretentious subjects like art, literature, the art of literature, and literary art. Oh, and artistic literature, too.
I started this book club, Curling Was Full, in August 2009 and I’m proud to say we’re still going strong. Members have come and gone (there are only an Original Three left), but we always seem to have more requests for membership than we can handle. No surprise, then, that when Random House (before it was Penguin Random House) had a book club contest called Books Are Beautiful, we won!
Actually, we finished in second place (we all received a copy of Jowita Bydlowska‘s Drunk Mom) to We Don’t Bake Muffins, but I’m still convinced the contest was rigged. Something about screeching the judges and kissing a cod, I’m told.
Long of the short, though, if you’re not in a book club, start one. If you are in one, lament the fact that you’re not in Curling Was Full because, well, we’re full.
Purchase your copy online from
Richard H. Harris 