June 2006

Julie Desmond belongs to "The Read Hats" from Marshfield, Massachusetts. She and her fellow book club members enjoy getting into the spirit of the meetings with themed desserts and decorations, as well as tote bags they've each decorated with the name of their club and the books they've read. However, these fun-loving women also prefer to keep their discussions organized and on topic to make the most of each meeting. Read on to learn more about their diverse taste in literature, as well as an amusing anecdote involving THE DA VINCI CODE and their local pastor.

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

A: Our group is called "The Read Hats" (spoken as RED but meant as a "READ" a book). We've existed for three years.

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

A: There are 12 women in our group, all of whom are in their late 50s and early 60s.

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

A: We meet every 4-6 weeks in the homes of the book club members.

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

A: Yes, we love to eat. The hostess provides most of the food, which we try to limit to desserts with coffee, tea and soft drinks.

Occasionally we try to theme the dessert to the book we are reading. When we read The Secret Life of Bees we had some honey-dipped cookies. One of our members baked "Read Hat" cookies, little hat-shaped cookies with purple icing and red sugar sprinkled on them.

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

A: The hostess leads the discussion by asking each person to comment on whether she liked or disliked the book. Then we religiously use the questions from readinggroupguides.com to continue our discussion. Occasionally, we read a book that doesn't have a guide, like Becoming Finola, and we use the generic questions to pattern our discussion.

Q: What kind of books do you read? 

A: We read various genres: novels, mysteries, current bestsellers, classics, and nonfiction.

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

A: We select one book at each meeting, but keep a running list of books members recommend to consider at upcoming meetings.

We do check the bestseller list also. Often, if we've won a contest on readinggroupguides.com, we read that novel. The last free book we received was  When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin and we had a lively discussion (even though the guide was not yet available) that included character development, medicine (heart-related surgery, etc) and religious symbolism.

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

A: Some of our favorites were My Antonia by Willa Cather, Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracey Kidder, The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult, Founding Mothers by Cokie Roberts, The Color of Water by James McBride, and The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.

Q: How do you keep things fun?

A: We introduce creative snacks related to the themes of the books. Often, the hostess has a symbol or artifact related to the book on display, like a kite hanging from the ceiling when we read The Kite Runner, a geisha doll when we read Memoirs of a Geisha, or some art history books when we read The Passion of Artemesia. One member often brings a hostess gift related to the book, like a sandal hanging on a chain replicating the sandal Annie wore in When Crickets Cry or a beeswax candle the evening we read The Secret Life of Bees. When we read The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck, one of our members had recently returned from China and shared her photos with us.

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

A: "Stay on track" by trying to keep the discussion on the book and not talk about the neighborhood gossip. Give everyone an opportunity to speak. Our system of going around the circle, allowing each member to give their opinion of the book before the discussion questions, works well. Welcome new members. And most of all, use readinggroupguides.com to facilitate your meetings. The questions keep the group focused, and this creates a hospitable atmosphere where members' comments are recognized as worthwhile.

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

A: We have had an occasion where several members absolutely hated the book selected and refused to finish reading it.

It made for an interesting evening's discussion, trying to present redeeming value by those who read the book in it's entirety.

We've never selected trash, but the tastes of our group do vary. Sometimes something simple is viewed as no challenge and many members prefer the challenge. Also, when reflecting on this question we realized we lost 3 members possibly because we weren't welcoming enough.

Several members of our group work or volunteer at a local church. Our pastor at church was interested in our book group and often made recommendations since he was an avid reader. When we read The Da Vinci Code it created a bit of havoc! It was not a book he would recommend. We convinced him we viewed the book as a thrilling mystery novel with lots of innuendo. He accepted our analysis to some degree and continued to give us recommendations like The Color of Water by James McBride and we recommended The Kite Runner to him.

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

A: When we first met and one of our members came up with the idea for a name "The Read Hats," we purchased plain white cotton totes to use as book bags and decorated them with our book club name. Some members record the title of each book we've read on the bag using fabric marker. Some of us have purchased journals that we use as we read to record parts of the books, descriptions, character traits, etc. that we want to share at our meeting.