Book Club is a Speed Bump in My Reading

It has not been a good reading start to 2024.

My first book of the year was Holly by Stephen King. It was not a bad book, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as I usually enjoy his books.

My second book was for my friend book club. It was Celebrants by Steven Rowley. Again, it wasn’t a bad book, but I found myself doing anything but picking the book up to start reading again. I finally switched to audio in order to finish it.

I am now reading Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus for my community book club. Again, I don’t hate the book, but I find it easy to put down and not pick up again.

I’ve written before about how book club sometimes makes reading feel like work.

I’m definitely feeling that lately. Especially being in two book clubs.

Two book clubs mean reading two books a month that someone else chose for me.

My friend book club is usually not one that slows me down. We all tend to have a somewhat similar taste in books and choose books that most of us will like at least a little. Even so, feeling like I have to read the book makes it seem like work and makes it less enjoyable.

My community book club can be a challenge. It is a lot of nonfiction, literary fiction, and other types of books that I tend to avoid. I try to mix things up for them by choosing humor, fantasy, and other books they find odd.

I could be like others in the groups and not worry about finishing the book before the meeting, but I’ve always finished the books and now I see it as a challenge to keep the streak alive. So, I make it even more like work.

I read 4–5 books a month these days. That means half of the books I am reading are book club books. That really slows my reading down some months.

Audio helps, but then I miss listening to music when I drive.

I like being a part of the book clubs.

The friend one is less a book club and more a group of friends using the fact we all read the same book as an excuse to hang out, drink, and play games.

The community book club gets me out of the house and around other people. It keeps me from spending too much time home alone.

I just need to find a way to not let it consume all of my reading time.

That might mean reading two books at a time. One for me, one for book club.

I can set aside certain times of the day to read the book club book and also take it to school to read during breaks.

I can read the book for me when I just want to read for fun.

I can try to do more audio for book club to speed the process along.

I could also stop stressing about finishing the book and just try to have fun with my reading, but we all know that won’t happen.