| Invite an Expert to Your Mother-Daughter Book Club Meeting by Cindy Hudson
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Have you ever thought of inviting someone other than the author of the book you read to your book club meeting? When you think about the topics covered in your book and who may be able to give you more information about them, you open up a world of possibilities for guests to invite. For instance, when the members of a mother-daughter book club near Chicago read the book Hoot by Carl Hiaasen, they invited a naturalist from a nearby forest preserve to attend their discussion. He brought a real, live owl, and was able to talk about owl habits and habitats. Click here to read the rest of the article.
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 | Don't miss our interview with author: Award-winning writer Bernardine Evaristo’s novel Blonde Roots asks: What if the history of the transatlantic slave trade had been reversed and Africans had enslaved Europeans? |  |
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Weekly Featured Book  | | The Journal Keeper: A Memoir By Phyllis Theroux Essayist Theroux has long captivated readers with her pitch-perfect rendering of the inner lives of American women. "The Journal Keeper" is a memoir of six years in her life, covering universal topics such as love, loneliness, growing old, spiritual growth, and death. “I loved this singularly honest and graceful book. The Journal Keeper reminds us that there is no such thing as an ordinary moment, and certainly no such thing as an ordinary life.”—Elizabeth Gilbert, best-selling author of Eat, Pray, Love |
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| Book Clubs for Preschoolers by Dawn Little
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Book Clubs are nothing new. Since the inception of “Oprah’s Book Club” people everywhere have participated in their own book clubs. Then the idea trickled down to classrooms and literature circles popped up, essentially a book club for students. Honestly, literature circles may have been around before Oprah! I think they just became a more accepted way of teaching since Oprah. More recently, children have begun to participate in book clubs outside of school, for pleasure! How wonderful is that! I’ve heard of adult book clubs, teen book clubs, and book clubs for elementary readers. . . all independent readers. But what about our smallest readers? Our pre-readers deserve book clubs, too. Click here to learn "How to Start a Book Club for Preschooler"...
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Finding that niche for your Book ClubBy Melissa LR Handa
How do you find your book club's niche? Sure, I guess, it’s possible for your book club to be niche-less, but—believe me—the more guidance you give the group from the get-go, the easier it will be for you to manage later on (and even to attract members initially). Without a theme, you may have a hard time shooting down Fred’s suggestion that you read “Dianetics”…again… Without a theme, you will struggle to find your direction. Every time you need to decide which book to read next, that decision will be a little tougher without that added push in the right direction. Maybe Vicky has joined the group hoping to read lots of novels, but when selection after selection is a dry piece-of-nonfiction, she feels like her opinion doesn’t matter to the group, and maybe to you, as her friend. In short, craft out that specialty. Maybe, according to the will of your members, it will be modified later, but for now, think of something to get you started. Click here to read the rest of the article.
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 | Don't miss our interview with author: A semi-autobiographical account of a young man born and raised in the worst slums of New York who ventures out to discover the meaning of life, and finds romance, mysticism, and purpose behind its very mystery. |  |
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Sooo... you've picked a stinker of a book for book club, now what?
How timely a topic! I picked "The Year of the Flood" for our November BB Book Pick, and well... I did not like it. As soon as I was about 50 pages in I started getting REALLY nervous. Had I just picked the ultimate stink bomb of a book? Am I now forcing several people to labor through this reading when they could be doing something else? What have I done? Are they going to kick me out of Book Club? Or just dread the next time I have to pick the book and suddenly all have plans for the night I am suppose to host? Agghhh!! Click here to read some hints and tips to use in case you pick a stinker book
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