Our Get to Know Our Clubs series gives you an inside look into book clubs using Bookclubz, in case you need a little inspiration. These clubs are building unique communities on our platform, so let’s admire their ingenuity and creativity.
With the holidays upon us, we thought it would be the perfect opportunity to highlight a longstanding and truly heartwarming club on Bookclubz, the Book Belles. The Book Belles, who are on the cusp of their 20th anniversary, describe themselves as a group of “strong women with strong ideas who love books!” They have elaborate themed meetings (see below) and even use code names sometimes!
Read more about these cool traditions, and about how their club has evolved and their bonds as club members and friends have strengthened over the years. We spoke with their club’s unofficial secretary and historian, Cynthia Price!
Tell us a little about the Book Belles and how your club came about.
I had been in a few book clubs, but none suited me — mainly because they were large, which meant not everyone had a chance to share their thoughts. As an introvert, I wanted a smaller club where everyone’s voice could be heard. I reached out to a few friends who were interested. We expanded the circle in the coming months, eventually agreeing to eight members and monthly meetings.
It’s important to note that your book club has been meeting for an impressive 20 years. How has your club evolved over time? How has using the Bookclubz platform helped your club?
Our group agreed early that the meetings would be held at our homes and the host would serve dinner. It could be takeout or home cooked (or made by a spouse!). At one point our group grew to 10 members, which frustrated me because my dining table only seats eight. And I didn’t like the idea of balancing food plates, drinks, and books in my living space. Two members left because of family commitments, and we agreed to remain at eight members. That’s worked wonderfully.
The Bookclubz platform has been a game changer for me as the unofficial secretary and historian. With the Bookclubz platform, I can post all meeting dates and locations, as well as the book we’re reading. We all love that it pulls in a cover of the book, which helps when we’re at a library or store looking for it. Now when I get emails or texts about our next meeting or the book title, I refer them to Bookclubz. It’s cut down on reminders because everything is posted.
There are so many other features we’ve yet to explore!
Most of us like knowing our meeting dates and books for the year, but we weren’t always good at wrangling. In 2019, we started something new. At our January meeting, each member brings up to three recommendations and briefly shares why she is recommending them. We then vote, and the top vote-getter from each person is selected. We then fill in the remaining months.
We almost always have a BYOB – Bring Your Own Book. Each member reports on a book she read and wants to share with the others. It’s rather like our elementary school book reports!
With such a long and rich history, can you pinpoint a most memorable moment from your book club (funny/fun/inspiring) that you'd like to share with our audience of bookclubbers?
We describe ourselves as “a group of strong women with strong ideas, who love books! Discussing them is another matter!”
We always talk about the book, but sometimes it takes a while to get to the discussion because we’re so busy catching up on each other’s lives. So much happens between meetings. And after 20 years, we have strong bonds. We laugh – a lot. Zoom was great during the pandemic. We couldn’t imagine not connecting, but as soon as the weather warmed, we met outdoors.
A few of our members go all out for hosting. The table settings are incredible, and often themes from the books are carried out. When we read “A Gentleman in Moscow” we had caviar! The same member who did that also baked with her aunt the orange marmalade cake from the Mitford series by Jan Karon.
This past year we read “D-Day Girls” by Sarah Rose and one of our members gave us all code names to use for the meeting. That was fun! Another member, who is a gourmet cook, hosts elegant sit-down dinners that expand our culinary horizons.
We all travel and early on, I brought back bookmarks from someplace I’d been. I gave one to each member, and a tradition was born. I bought a beautiful bowl and have every bookmark in it. It’s so fun to see them from all over the world! Because I’m a scrapbooker and list maker, a member asked if I had kept a list of all the bookmarks and who gifted them. I wish! I barely remember my own.
The irony is that most of us don’t use the gifted bookmarks. We’ve all found our own way to display our collected bookmarks. I’m almost always using an envelope or receipt to hold my place in a book.
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How do you host successful meetings and inspire thought-provoking discussions?
I confess: We’re not well-organized when it comes to the discussions. We usually start with “What did you think?” and go around the room. We’ve found our best discussions come when we are divided about the book or we all dislike it – it’s as if we’re trying to find the good in the book! We work hard to ensure every member shares her perspective.
We also agreed we wanted to be a social book club. Whoever is the host provides the meal. One member lives out of town, and when it’s her turn to host, we visit on the weekend to allow for travel time and a slightly longer meeting. For members who don’t cook or have room to host, we’ll go to a restaurant. We’re quite flexible as long as food, wine, and dessert are involved. Oh, and books!
How do you typically choose your book club book? Do you stick to certain genres or does anything go?
We agreed that our focus was fiction. Sometimes a member wants to read a nonfiction book, and most of us push back and say, “You can use it as your BYOB!” We tried reading a classic once a year but discovered we prefer to focus on newer books because there are so many great ones to explore.
We also agreed that books must be readily available through libraries or available in paperback. Most of us don’t want to add 12 books to our homes each year, although sometimes after reading a book from the library, some will buy it to read again.
What are the top 3 books your club has read this year? Any books that elicited a strong response?
If you asked each member of Book Belles to name her top 3 books, there would likely be no consensus, but there would be overlaps. That’s what makes book club so fun – by the end of the year we’ve read something that appeals to everyone. One book that elicited a strong response was “There There” by Tommy Orange. It’s a difficult book, and you don’t really say you liked it, but you appreciate the story and what the author conveyed. We were all glad we read it but we were exhausted from it.
What’s it like discussing other people’s work, critiquing it and praising it?
Everyone in the group loves the written word. And many members have worked or still work in the communications field, which leads to discussions about structure, word choices, and grammar. We also have connections to authors and have invited them to join us, although we only focus on the positive when we meet with authors.
One of our first in-person meetings once we were all vaccinated featured Rachel Beanland, who lives in Richmond and wrote “Florence Adler Swims Forever.” She came to our host’s home and shared about the research and more details about the family story that led to her writing the book. We peppered her with questions and appreciated her taking the time to share her writing journey.
We’ve probably had a half-dozen authors join us, including Adriana Trigiani, whom several of us know. She joined us via a conference call, clearly before the days of Zoom.
How are you celebrating the holidays with your book club this year? Does your club have any long-standing traditions to finish the year?
In our early years, we would read a holiday book and have a gift exchange. After a few years, we elected to not read a book because we had so much fun catching up, eating, and exchanging gifts. We pick a theme and each person brings a gift. Then we draw numbers and whoever draws one, picks first. We go until everyone has picked a gift. Sometimes we “steal” a gift, but that’s rare. This year’s theme was “Merry and Bright.” Past themes included handmade, holiday magic, imagination, warmth, and green (as in sustainability).
What’s the key to sustaining a thriving book club for so many years? What advice do you have for other book clubs to help keep them together?
Our book club works because we’re all friends and genuinely enjoy our time together, which is why sometimes the book isn’t discussed as much as it should be! We’ve developed rules – guidelines, really – and we’ve adapted as needed. We all love books and we’ve found many ways to share our love of books.
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