Linda Coakley is a member of "The Book Worms" in Cape Porpoise, ME. In this interview, Linda shares insight about her club, including the fact that she and her fellow members will arrange a time to visit the local bookstore to scope out new titles. She also mentions a few books that they enjoyed discussing and talks about the rewarding experience of chatting with a local author during one of their meetings.

Q: Does your group have a name and/or a theme? How long has your group been in existence?

A: Our group has been together since 2002. We call ourselves "The Book Worms."

Q: How many members do you have? How many men, how many women? What age are most of your members?

A: We are all women, ages 40s to 70s. We have seven members now.

Q: How often do you meet? Where do you meet?

A: We meet monthly at the office of one of our members.

Q: Do you eat at your meetings? What do you eat? Who brings the food?

A: We munch on snacks, cold drinks and rotate bringing in the food.

Q: Who leads the discussion? Do you use reading group guides?

A: We do use the reading guides and rotate the monthly discussions. We have also created a question sheet to fill out before the discussion.

Q: What kind of books do you read?

A: We read a variety of books --- fiction, nonfiction, biography and classics.

Q: How do you choose your books? Do you choose one new book at each meeting, or do you choose the books for a number of meetings ahead of time?

A: We select a few titles at a time. We all bring titles to the club and decide. Once per year we have our meeting at our local bookstore and look at the new titles.

Q: What were some of the best discussions or favorite books the group read?

A: We all enjoyed The Kite Runner, Water for Elephants and many more. However, on May 7th we invited a local author to our group. We read her book and she led our book discussion evening. It was a wonderful experience to have an author with us. She answered questions about writing and publishing. We would definitely recommend groups to do this if they can.

Q: How do you keep things fun?

A: In the past, some months were not fun! The meetings were very mundane. But as we continue to meet, we have a sense of humor about what we read and try to be interested in each other’s lives. We change our meeting place in the summer and try to make it all interesting.

Q: What advice would you give to other reading groups?

A: Enjoy the time you meet with friends, enjoy the reading and invite an author to attend if you can.

Q: Do you have any horror stories, amusing anecdotes, or other special tales to tell?

A: We have had a couple of meetings in the beginning where the books were terrible, and only the person who recommended it liked it! Little discussion took place!

Q: Is there anything else unique or noteworthy about your group that you would like to share?

A: We are a small group that gets along very well. There are three retired ladies. We have all been in the medical or dental field, and some of us still are. We have had a member pass away, and that is always sad. But we continue to enjoy READING!

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