Rhonda Bailey is a member of “Word Chasers” in Dahlonega, Georgia. In this interview, Rhonda recalls the books that stirred memorable discussions on a variety of issues, including immigration, autism and evolution. She also mentions how her group has successfully recruited new members and reveals how they celebrate Reader’s Choice Month, which is in December.

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

A: “Word Chasers” has been in existence since July 2004.

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

A: We have 10 members, all women, ages 51-85.

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

A: We meet at 1 PM on the second Tuesday of each month at the local Chic-Fil-A.

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

A: We eat together at the restaurant and then discuss the book.

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

A: I am the facilitator, but it's a shared endeavor. We do use the reading guides when available.

Q: What kind of books do you read?

A: We read anything that sounds interesting to the group.

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: In the beginning, the choosing of the book was random, but we decided to have one meeting each year that everyone brings book ideas to and we draw enough titles to have for the year.

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

A: We had great discussions with The Good Earth (we also watched the movie together), The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Gap Creek, In His Steps, The Tortilla Curtain (made us all think about what immigrants face), In the Presence of My Enemies (touched all of us), The Memory Keeper’s Daughter, Monster (great discussion about evolution), Water for Elephants and Other People’s Rules.

Q: How do you keep things fun?

A: With the variety of personalities and age range of our group, it does stay interesting. Everyone is good to share their ideas.

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

A: Let the whole group contribute. Let everyone share, and respect all participants.

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

A: When we read The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, one grandmother in our group came to the meeting, sharing that she had just found out that one of her grandchildren was autistic. She gave the book to her daughter to read, which gave them a little understanding of this illness.

There have been times that no one liked the book. When this happens, many don't read the book and everyone shares their dislikes, then we just spend the time talking about other things. Even with others, we may have liked them, but there just wasn't a lot to say about them.

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

A: We place a request with our local library 2-3 weeks prior to our meeting for the next book. We never need to buy the book. There are people from our community who are unable to attend the meetings who get the book from the library to read. The library always gets about three to five extra books each month.

December is Reader's Choice month. We meet at someone's home for potluck. Each one reads a book of their choosing and shares a little about the book with the group.

We place our meeting info in the events section of a local magazine at no charge. We have gotten new members that way.

The library is a great promoter of our group.

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