Why you should join an online book club in one word: Community
Books have long served as a trusted coping mechanism during stressful times. When we’re dealing with grief or mourning, uncertainty or heartache, we often retreat into the pages of a book– we thrust ourselves into a new world less bleak than our present reality, adopting the identity of characters within the story.
Books allow us to become somebody else even if only for a moment.
While reading may typically be a solitary activity and one which can allow us to escape from the world around us, it also is, when it comes down to it, all about community. Pulling us closer to the world around us. Connection. Intimacy. We read because we want to feel connected to not just the pages and to ourselves, but to others. We want to understand, to learn, to hear their stories in such an intimate way that we feel as if we were right there next to them.
Book clubs take this one step further and online book clubs, two steps further.
American author Gloria Watkins, known famously by her pen name “bell hooks,” said it best:
“What is so painful about reading is that you read something, and you don’t have anybody to share it with … what book clubs open up is that people can read a book and then have someone else to talk about it with. Then they see that a book can lead to the pleasure of conversation, that the solitary act of reading can actually be a part of a beautiful path to communion and community.”
Over the last year during the COVID-19 pandemic, many book clubs have had to turn to digital meeting platforms to stay connected. There were no more in-person wine nights and literary discussions over a decadent charcuterie board, but instead meetings through a screen. Wine still in hand but miles apart.
Some may argue online book clubs give less room for creativity of thought. Opinions are documented and can never be taken back if they’re posted online which makes you more cautious as to what you write and thus, detracts from the concept of a book club being a safe place to speak free of judgment. It interrupts the workshop environment flow where you can work through half-formed ideas with others.
Easily ignoring others’ opinions and loss of linearity are also said “bads” of an online book club because you can choose to not engage with a comment that doesn’t align with your own beliefs instead of being challenged to think deeper as you would in-person, and you can jump around from comment to comment in a pattern that is absolute chaos, not following the story in a linear direction as one should.
I get it. All fair points. Verbal discussion is immensely valuable- raw, unfiltered and vulnerable.
But here’s the thing:
Just because the book club is online doesn’t mean discussion ends or that it can’t be as intimate.
The discussion can be just as vulnerable, and you can have it with hundreds of other people rather than just a handful.
With online book clubs, there is never-ending space and freedom to explore what you want to, when you want to, with who you want to. You’re able to connect with people from all around the world, in different time zones, places you’ve never been. People in all walks of life, experiencing a day you’ve never imagined and a culture you’ve only ever read about.
There’s much to learn from the strangers of the world and online book clubs will turn these strangers into friends even if there are oceans and days and languages between you. The digital world gives us an opportunity to globally connect with people we otherwise never would have crossed paths with.
And the best part is… drum roll please… you can even do it without pants on if you want to since you’re connecting from the comfort of your own home! How cool is that? For me personally that’s the selling point. Comfort. Being home. An informal vibe. I like to be comfortable and absolutely loathe driving — if I must get in the car to go somewhere there’s an 85% chance I’ll come up with an excuse as to why I can’t go at the last minute. Sorry friends. I blame Los Angeles; the traffic makes us all assholes.
As a full-time student and regularly contributing freelance reporter for a community newspaper, my schedule is different every single week. School workloads can be heavy one week, light the next. There’s never much of a heads-up before events that I’m asked to cover which is simply just the name of the game. So, for me being an aspiring journalist and notorious homebody, online book clubs work best for me. They’re flexible. The posts will always be there so I can read and comment at my own pace and there is no pressure to commit to set meetings.
Back in 2018 I joined Belletrist on Instagram, an online book club founded by actress Emma Roberts and her best friend Karah Preiss. Emma has always been public with her love and adoration for Joan Didion which is what initially pulled me in. Didion is my favorite, Didion is her favorite. I knew then that the books they would choose each month would align with my interests, goals and passions.
And once I started engaging on the platform, I connected with other members who shared these same interests and a love for reading books that challenge us and force us to look within ourselves for answers.
I remember seeing a notification pop up from a random Insta username, and then another who had commented on my comment who had commented on her comment and so on: “Right? I couldn’t BELIEVE that plot twist.” “My God, I screamed so loud my neighbor came pounding on my door to make sure I was okay. Brilliant.” I can’t remember what we were reading at the time, but the point is we came together because of a book. Because of this platform.
And now nearly five years later we remain close friends though we’ve never met in person. Julie in London, now a mother of two toddler girls, and Maggie, a bank manager in Connecticut who recently got engaged. We keep up with each other on social media and as always, discuss literature together.
“I think online book clubs are one of the best things to happen for women,” Susan Reed said. Reed works as a high ranking professional at Ernst & Young and travels every week, domestically or internationally. Most of her time is spent in hotels, cars and planes.
She said she typically knocks out at least one novel each flight and used to feel lonely not having anybody to discuss it with once she got to her hotel. Often the story would be lingering in her head for hours, the characters a familiar ghost haunting her every move.
When Reed found an online book club that aligned with her interests, she was ecstatic. A colleague of hers had recommended Goodreads and she spent some time browsing through their active groups before choosing one. In early 2020 she came across Badass Women’s Book Club and has been actively participating in their discussions, too.
We discussed the origins of the book club for a bit — women started them way back in the 1700s when their “purpose” was to stay home and cater to their husband. The women met wherever they could get their hands on a few books and some quiet. It required little more than a thirst for literature and a desire to discuss it with like-minded women, and such is true today.
“With things so different now … women in roles of power, making lives of their own, we still have the opportunity to be a part of a book club if we want to, but online platforms give us the chance to do so even if we’re going 150 miles per hour and don’t have time for regular meetings,” Reed said. “We can connect with others in the process, which is another thing we can’t really do when we’re always on the move.”
Online book clubs are convenient, easy to navigate and stress-free. There are hundreds to choose from and thousands of virtual friendships that await you. Whether you’re a going-going-going professional or simply just enjoy being comfortable at home, sweatpants or no pants, generally just a no commitment type of person, this digital world of literature and intimate discussion will always be with you.
As F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, likely drunk while he did but it’s a seriously beautiful quote (I, too, say beautiful things while drunk):
“That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you’re not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.”
Damn right … you belong.
Get out there and join a community of like-minded bibliophiles, talk about books and life and share your experiences with other people. It all begins with a conversation and you never know, your story may help somebody feel abundantly less alone. It may be just what we all need right now.
