in the club
Story By Mike Overall, Photo by Shaila Creekmore
While many readers have always gravitated toward book clubs, the literary groups, as noted in a recent national news magazine article, are rapidly gaining in popularity among all age groups.
Book clubs are flourishing in Jonesboro, and not just at the Craighead County-Jonesboro Public Library, where the clubs remain a staple of the library’s multiplicity of offerings to its burgeoning list of patrons.
The proliferation of book clubs was determined following an informal but widespread survey of churches, schools, coffee houses, reader-friendly restaurants, bookstores, retirement villages and homes, senior citizen centers, various ASU groups and departments, and other outlets that welcome or sponsor book groups.
The public library currently holds three discussion groups each month, two for women and one for men. And this summer, a book club has been added that meets once a month, at noon on the third Monday. The women’s groups meet at 6:30 on the fourth Monday evening of each month, and another at 10 the following Tuesday morning. The Male Perspective club meets on the fourth Monday night at 6:30.
“We do outreach programs to promote the book discussion groups through our website calendar, internal bookmarks and the summer ones have been promoted via our ‘Read Me Then Leave Me’ traveling books that are circulated throughout the area,” a library official said. “The books utilized for discussion have an information sheet in the back to inform readers of their use in book discussion programs.”
The noted American travel writer/essayist/novelist Paul Theroux, in a recent interview, said fiction writing and the reading of it have always been the activities of a tiny minority of people, even in the most-literate societies.
With all deference to Mr. Theroux, sales of books nationwide are up from the past several years, trade publications report. Alas, though, sales of great literary works have not risen dramatically.
Theroux also said the age of the e-book is upon us. Analysts estimate Americans will buy on the order of six million e-readers this year – and by 2014, an estimated 32 million people will own one.
Occasions spoke with several dozen devoted readers regarding e-books versus Gutenberg’s seminal invention of movable type, and the group was almost evenly split. And, age was not a critical factor in the readers’ choice of electronic-versus-traditional books.
“I regard books as a living organism and feel closer to the writer when I hold his creation in my hands,” one reader said. “And, I love the smell of books, both new and old.”
Devotees of e-books aren’t as hidebound in the traditional sense and see a new tradition emerging with the digital revolution.
“My Kindle has the capacity to store numerous books,” one older woman said, “and I can select one at the flick of a finger. They are easy to read and compact enough to carry around with ease.”
Book clubs are popular among the older set, particularly those who live in retirement homes and villages, or at senior centers.
Inveterate reader Virginia Shackelford of Jonesboro leads a discussion group at St. Bernard’s Village. “It’s usually a lively discussion,” she said. “And, I’ll do everything I can to promote such groups and reading in general.”
Book clubs are a fixture at many schools, whether public, private or parochial, and churches as well. The books read by students and adults vary according to the readers’ ages, and the subject matter covers a variety of topics.
Coffee shops have always catered to those with a literary bent, and Jonesboro’s are no exception. One, The Edge on Aggie Road, caters to five clubs that meet for book reviews and discussions.
Emil Williams, pastor at Magnolia Road Baptist Church, leads a group whose charter members were “all clergy.” After 15 years, Williams said, “we are pretty eclectic in our reading – works of history, novels, social commentary, biography and religion.” The group, which Williams said does not read dogmatic tracts on religion, now includes several lay members.
Devoted book club member Steve Ewart, director of public transportation for the city (JETS), said he “eagerly anticipates our monthly camaraderie as we share our different insights into the month’s reading. When circumstances prevent me from attending a meeting...it’s almost as if I have missed Communion.”
Retired businessman Jimmy Upton of Jonesboro said he decided to join a book club “to be exposed to great books of fiction and nonfiction that I didn’t have the opportunity to read when I was in school at the University of Alabama and later during my career as a Silicon Valley businessman.”
Many book clubs emanate from the ASU faculty, and the works they read are many and varied.
Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series of vampire books are enormously popular with young adult ladies, some of whom said they formed their own clubs to review and discuss the popular novels. “It’s like young women used to sit together and tell ghost stories, except we’re talking about vampires in a modern-day setting,” said one young lady.
Many older women are reading the Sookie Stackhouse series of True Blood vampire books by Arkansas writer Charlaine Harris.
The Arkansas Center for the Book at the Arkansas State Library in Little Rock selected the True Blood books for this year’s popular adult reading program, “If All Arkansans Read the Same Book.”