The Book Club Continues!
The Book Club Continues!
An invitation to join our new "core group".
Hello everyone.
It’s been a wild few months. I’ve taken a deep dive into life here in Crestone, writing for our local paper, The Crestone Eagle, specifically covering local politics and bureaucracy. I’ve also recently taken on a more substantial role helping The Crestone Energy Fair revamp their branding and online marketing, in addition to prepping for another year of gardening.
Getting involved in my local community has been so rewarding that I often struggle finding the time to be online. The actual practice of community has taken over, and talking and/or writing about community has felt a lot less interesting.
I’m not going anywhere, and still have plans to revitalize and rename this Substack, but I’ve been relishing in the much-needed break. It’s been helpful to spend time in the real world and reassess what it is I want to share and spend my time on moving forward.
In the meantime, I’m reaching out to all of you today to announce the continuation of my book club. The book club has taken many shapes since its inception in 2020, and it will be transforming once again starting in April.
Here are the details…
The creation of a “core group”
Commitment and regularity on behalf of book club members has been a struggle, so we’ve agreed to form a “core group” of members who all agree to read and participate in the discussions, even if they don’t absolutely love the book that’s selected. (Sometimes we can learn a lot from what we don’t like!) Each member of the core group will get to select books, so we’ll have more than one host. This is the way book clubs generally function - there is a rotation and everyone gets a chance to choose a book. Of course excusing oneself from reading or participating in the discussion due to an emergency or unavoidable scheduling conflict is fine, but this should be the exception, not the rule.
Two months to read
Another struggle for people has been finishing one book per month, so instead we are going to do one book every two months, and meet twice, once halfway through, and once at the end.
Polls to select books and discussion times
To accommodate people’s interests and schedule, I will create polls for both books and discussion times. Each member of the core group will propose possible books to be voted on by the core group, and I will suggest several discussion times to accommodate as many people as possible.
Joining us once in a while is fine, but you don’t get access to the perks!
Perks include getting to select/vote on books, and voting on discussion times. If you want to join once in a while, you will have to accept whatever books the core group has selected, and accommodate the discussion times we’ve selected.
If you want to join our core group, either comment on this post or join our What’sApp chat and say “I’m in!”
You can join the What’sApp chat by clicking here - https://chat.whatsapp.com/JajFd76QjN72CYYy7zhOCW
Please let me know if you want to join the core group by Monday, March 18th so we have enough time to select a book for April.
If you want to participate either as a core member or just pop in and out once in a while, and you aren’t already signed up to receive our book club emails (where I announce what books we’re reading, and send out the discussion dates/times), please do so by following the directions below. Unless you are subscribed to the emails and/or in the What’sApp chat, you will NOT be emailed any details. I don’t want to bother my entire Substack audience, so I only send book club emails to those who have subscribed.
How to subscribe to receive book club emails…
If you’re currently reading this in your email browser, please click here to be taken to the web version. If you’re already reading the web version, you’re all set to continue…
In the top righthand corner of your screen, you should see the following icon:
Click on it, and then scroll down until you see “Manage Subscription” in the dropdown menu. Click on that.
Once you’ve done that, you will see several things related to your subscription, including the following:
In order to participate in the book club, and get access to the WhatsApp group and Zoom links, you need to click the box next to “Book Club”.
Once you’ve done that, you’re all set!
Any questions? Please comment below or respond to this post via email.
We already have about eight committed members, and looking forward to welcoming a few more into our group.