The Big Bad Book Blog

October is designated as National Reading Group Month by the Women’s National Book Association. The mission of National Reading Group Month is to increase public awareness of the joy and value of shared reading. Special events are being held throughout the month in each of the association’s 10 chapter cities: Boston, Dallas, Detroit, Los Angeles, Nashville, New York, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Seattle, and Charlotte, N.C. These events are open to the public, so you might consider doing some mingling with reading group members if you live in one of these cities. If you do attend, consider preparing and bringing a discussion guide for your book, as well as some free copies of the book, to hand out.

As we’ve mentioned before, reading groups can be an effective way for authors to find a readership and build word of mouth. Reading groups love author contact and will be more inclined to select your book if you offer to participate in discussions in person or via audio/video conferencing.

If you can’t attend the National Reading Group Month events, here are a few other places to find and connect with reading groups:

• bookclub.meetup.com
• readerscircle.org
• your local bookstores
  

When you think “book club,” you may think of old biddies, crumpets, Aquanet, doilies, and a mystery novel. Or you may think of that blasted “O” sticker you spent ten minutes peeling off your copy of Bookspan from Time, Inc. The two companies joined forces in 2000, when Time’s Book-of-the-Month Club and Bertelsmann’s Doubleday Book Club combined to create Bookspan, which now operates over 35 book clubs. continue reading