Armchair BEA: Networking...In Real Life?!

Design credit: Emily of Emily's Reading Room

 

 Today's topic for Armchair BEA is:

Networking...In Real Life?!

We are supposed to share a positive "real life" experience and even though, I don't have any partnerships with local bookstores - we don't really have any - and haven't met any fellow book bloggers in person yet, I still felt like contributing to this topic.

My positive bookish experience is joining a book club at my local library. Having a little man I don't get to spend too much time solely around adults, so when I first heard there was a book club in the making, I had to sign up for it right away. There are no age restrictions which has positive as well as negative sides. We range from about 22 (I think) to 65 years in age and everybody's tastes are very different. Right now, it seems I am the only one who is into all things paranormal - whether YA or non-YA - while the majority of the others prefer non-fiction books. When I first saw the list of books planned for the first year, I was a little bit intimated since I hadn't heard of any of the books, apart from one. I have to say though, out of the first four books we have read, I thoroughly enjoyed three. They were books I probably would have never picked on my own and it's not because their subjects aren't interesting, but simply because they wouldn't have been on my radar with what I am usually reading.

So joining the book club has been very rewarding on many levels already. I get to discover new books from all kinds of genres, and I also get to interact with like-minded book lovers. Our last read was Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist (see my review here) and I was so surprised how far apart opinions were. One person outright hated it while I was on the other side of the spectrum and absolutely loved it. It was very interesting to hear everybody's thoughts and have a real face-to-face discussion which is not really possible in the blogosphere - not on that kind of level, anyway.

 

 

Another thing I love about it is that we got to meet author Anne Raina in our second meeting. She is from this area and co-wrote Clara's Rib with her sister Clara Raina Flannigan (see my review here). The book is about the many, many years Clara spent at a tuberculosis hospital in Ottawa, Canada. It is a very intense book and it was such an amazing experience to be able to talk to Anne about how she experienced her sister's illness and how it affected everybody in her family. I was completely mesmerized by this book and all the additional stories Anne Raina had to tell. This has definitely been one of the best book-related experiences yet for me.

*****

This shall conclude today's post, but I would love to hear from you. Feel free to leave a comment, telling me about your book club or any other bookish experiences.