4 of 28

From Jo-Jo at http://jo-jolovestoread.blogspot.com... "Welcome to another week of Book Club Chatter where I hope to discuss all things book club on a weekly basis. I thought this would be a fun way for each of us to share one little tidbit every week.
So here is my question for you this week:
Does your book group have an open membership that allows new people to join every month, or do you follow a set of guidelines before allowing a new member to join?"

My mystery book club which met last night has an all welcome policy as it's hosted by Barnes & Noble and meets at the store. However, there is a core group of about nine of us that attend every month. We do have newcomers once in a while but most don't stay more than one or two times. I think it's because we are very honest about the books we read... to the point, sometimes, of ripping a book to shreds. That's not to say that we want everyone to agree. Actually, the discussions are much more interesting when there is friendly disagreement.

My other group has only three members. We are a very tight circle of friends. We've been together since July 2003 when we met through Oprah's book club website. We haven't read one of her choices since that first book. We were a bigger group but, for a variety of reasons, it's now just K, C and me. We invited someone I knew to join us a few years ago. She was always asking me about my group and the books we read. I discussed inviting her with the other two girls and they agreed. She came to our group for about a year. For reasons I, to this day, still do not understand, she stopped coming. I have no problem that she did that. I completely get that she had her reason(s). My problem was that she never said "goodbye". She didn't answer emails, didn't return phone calls... just ignored us. I didn't even want an explanation... just a short email saying something like "I've decided not to continue with book club. Thanks." Common courtesy, if you ask me. She's a mom at M's school so I see her quite often and she has purposely avoided me. Too bad... her loss!

Yes, I think he looks better now but, he completely epitomizes the 80s Hair Band look in this picture. And, yeah, I think he was still pretty cute back then :o)