Category: In The Club

Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read.

So, we all settled in and feeling back to normal after the holidays? No? Didn’t think so. Let’s all just forget about adulting for a few minutes then and talk book things! This week’s club agenda include rules, resolutions, and permission to backlist. Let’s get to it before I cough my face off again, because I’m somehow stiiiill sick. Take those vitamins, friends. Save yourselves!!!

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This newsletter is sponsored by The Red Address Book by Sofia Lundberg.

When Doris was a girl, she was given an address book by her father, and ever since has carefully documented everyone she met and loved throughout the years. Now, 96-year-old Doris sees the many crossed-out names of people long gone and is struck by the urge to put pen to paper. In writing down the stories of her colorful past—working as a maid in Sweden, modeling in Paris during the 30s, fleeing to Manhattan at the dawn of the Second World War—can she help her grand-niece Jenny, haunted by a difficult childhood, unlock the secrets of their family? And whatever became of Allan, the love of Doris’s life?

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Win Some Things! – Before we get to the goods, mozy on over here for a chance to win $100 to your favorite bookstore!

Resolution Reads – In the first Get Booked episode of 2019, Jenn and Amanda share their picks for resolution reading. If you’re rolling your eyes and thinking, “pero…..I don’t do resolutions!,” fret not. These books are just plain ol’ solid reads on everything from personal finance and sleeping better to witchery and demystifying yoga. Bwahahhaa… witchery.

• Book Club Bonus: Whether or not you and your clubmates consider yourselves “resolution people,” there is at least one area in each of our lives that we want to improve upon, a project we want to take on, etc. For example: I’d be really into reading some books about personal finance with my lady friends, ones that offer simple and practical guidance on investing or building up one’s savings. Everyone could set a goal (and yes, it’ll be different for everyone) and then track that progress with every meeting.

The Book Club Rule Book – Welcome to book club! The first rule of book club is: you do not talk about book club. The second rule of book club is: you DO NOT TALK ABOUT okay I’ll stop. A few guidelines can be pretty helpful in keeping book club going; Rioter Jesse Doogan shares her experience with club rules and suggest some reads for book club too. 

• Book Club Bonus: Take a look at your own book club and see what issues might be remedied with a few quick rules. Agree on hard parameters for book length and meeting frequency, set a rotation for whose turn it is to pick the book, etc. Rules are cool, dude! Me however? Jury’s still out.
• Related: Eeeek I’m in the middle of Once Upon A River and am loving it so far! Like Jesse says, no one weaves a fairy tale like Diane Setterfield. So good!

Don’t You (Forget About These) – 2018 came and went and with it went so many unread books! But don’t you feel like the door has closed on picking up last year’s remarkable reads. Don’t don’t don’t don’t…

• Book Club Bonus: You may be looking forward to this year’s releases, and who could blame you with all the amazing stuff coming in 2019?! But don’t feel pressured to only read new books, whether individually or in book club. There’s a whole wide world of backlist titles out there calling your name.  
• Related: Last week on the Riot’s YouTube channel, I talked about my reading “notsolutions:” things I won’t do in 2019. One of those things is to not read as many new books to make more room for reading older books. I’m stoked to finish V.E. Schwab’s Shades of Magic series, A Discovery of Witches, to re-read And Then There Were None. I’m reading for joy without regard to “importance.” Join me!

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Thanks for hanging with me today! Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com with your burning book club questions or find me on Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter, get it on the Read Harder podcast, and watch me booktube every Friday too.

Stay bad & bookish, my friends.
Vanessa

Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read.

Go, go, go, go go, go, go, shawty
It’s a new year
We gon’ read up like it’s a new year
We so gon’ read harder like it’s a new year
And we gon’ blow this TBR up in the new year!!

You can find us in the club… of books so there’s no snubs
Look buddy we got the blurbs if you’re into bookish plugs
We’re into reading ARCs from the big and the indie pubs…
So you wanna join this club? Well bring it in for a hug!

Feliz Año Nuevo and welcome to our first club newsletter of 2019! I’m back in action and here to remind you all that 50 Cent ain’t got nothin’ on us. Nothin’, I say!! If you haven’t abandoned me yet for that extended remix of our club anthem, you’re a true friend. I’m excited for all that this year has to bring and to get all up in the club with you fine people.

So: leeeeeet’s gooooo!

Album droppin’ in 2019.

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This newsletter is sponsored by Strangers in Budapest by Jessica Keener, new in paperback from Algonquin Books.

From celebrated novelist Jessica Keener comes the stirring, suspenseful novel Strangers in Budapest. When a young American couple, Annie and Will, move to Budapest shortly after the fall of the Communist regime, they have high hopes for their future in the enigmatic city. But Annie soon finds herself enmeshed in a stranger’s plan to avenge his daughter’s death. What Annie does not anticipate is that in helping him she will become enmeshed in a dark and deadly conflict that will end in tragedy and a stunning loss of innocence.

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New Year, New Goals

In the spirit of new beginnings, I’d like to start us off with a quick list of resolutions for the new year. Don’t worry, nothing too heavy here. Just some stuff to keep in mind to help us all lead our best reading lives.

1. Have fun in the club – We read for many reasons: entertainment, education, self-improvement, to master the witchcraft and spells for removing calories from cheese and making hair impervious to frizz. Whatever your inspiration, let’s all agree that book club should be fun and reading a thing of joy.

• Tip: Ignore the pressure to only read just what you feel you “should.” For example, I often talk to people whose book clubs always pick “serious,” highbrow literary fiction because they feel like they sort of have to, and… that’s pure crap! Life is short and there are too many books! If it sounds like a bore or isn’t bringing you any happy (whatever it is), skip it.

2. Read with intent – Read the types of books you feel like, but don’t forget to be thoughtful with your selections. Read books by marginalized voices, even if it means doing a bit o’ research.

• Tip: Use our Read Harder challenge as a guide! It will help ensure that your reading is diverse and inclusive, and you may just discover the book(s) you didn’t know you needed.
• Tip 2.0: The first episode of the 2019 Read Harder podcast will air on January 8th! Every couple of weeks, my co-host Tirzah Price and I will provide recommendations to fulfill each of the 24 tasks. The pod is available exclusively to Book Riot Insiders, so join up if you haven’t already. Start your free two week trial here.

3. If It Ain’t Working, Bounce – Sometimes the book group you’re in just doesn’t feel right. Susan never reads the book, your group only picks stuff by straight white men, or no one can ever get their sh*t together to meet up on time. Whatever the reason, ditch the club if it’s no longer serving you.

• Tip: Find another book group – check your local library or indie bookstore to see if they have any going, or check apps like MeetUp. You could also just be a badass and make your own.

That’s it for resolutions. Now go forth, read, and be well.

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Real Life Bad Bitches – “A few of my new friends in L.A. have this little book club they call The Bad Bitches Book Club, where we read books written by bad ass authors. I loved this idea and the book they were reading was The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin, so you know I’m in that club.” A. Where do I sign up for the Bad Bitchery? B. Read all about one Rioter’s recent return to IRL book clubs.

What the Club Taught Me – Many a life lesson is often learned in book club. Rioter Laura shares what she learned – the good, the bad, and the bookish – in her club experience.

New Year, New Books – 2019 is already set to bring so many fantastic books into the world! We’re getting new Angie Thomas, Elizabeth Acevedo AND an anthology edited by Ibi Zoboi… we are not worthy! Check out Bustle’s list of titles to plan around for book club. I’m super pumped for Five Midnights by Ann Dávila Cardinal. Boricua mythology + murder mystery = so much OMG (oh my gatos, obviously).

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Thanks for hanging with me today! Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com with your burning book club questions or find me on Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter, get it on the Read Harder podcast, and watch me booktube every Friday too.

Stay bad & bookish, my friends.
Vanessa

More Resources: 
– Our Book Group In A Box guide
– List your group on the Book Group Resources page

Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read.

It’s our last club newsletter of 2018! I can’t thank you all enough for welcoming me into your bookish hearts and book clubs this year. I’ve so loved getting to share my book club tips & tricks with you and love all of your amazing feedback! Let’s do it again in 2019, shall we? I’ll meet you in your inbox on January 2nd.

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This newsletter is sponsored by Flatiron Books and Legendary by Stephanie Garber.

After being swept up in the magical world of Caraval, Donatella Dragna has finally escaped her father and saved her sister Scarlett from a disastrous arranged marriage. The girls should be celebrating, but Tella isn’t yet free. She made a desperate bargain with a mysterious criminal, and the time to repay the debt has come.

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Come Read Harder – It’s here! It’s here! The list of tasks for 2019’s Read Harder Challenge have been released. Check out the list here or watch Rincey break it down on YouTube over here.

• Book Club Bonus: Use the tasks on this challenge as a reference when selecting your book club picks. It’s an easy way to remember to read more widely and inclusively. And in case you need recommendations…. ehhem…
• Related: I’ll be hosting the Read Harder podcast in 2019! Available exclusively to Book Riot Insiders, the podcast will be a biweekly show wherein co-host Tirzah Price and I will recommend some sweet selections to read for each of the 24 tasks. Our first episode goes live on January 8th – subscribe to Insiders here if you haven’t already and catch us on your podcatcher of choice!

Club de Controversy: Know what’s boring? A book club where everyone loved the book and agrees on all points. Enter these 10 controversial books for book club guaranteed to spark some saucier club discussions.

• Book Club Bonus: Remember that it’s okay not to like the book club selection, even if it’s one you picked yourself! The point of book club isn’t just to find a book that everyone loves and feels the warmth & fuzzies for; it’s more about the discussion that the book incites, which often happens most easily when the read is one that challenges us.

Dear Publishing Peeps – I get it: publishers want to sell books. I’m sure it’s so, so tempting to green light a salacious memoir of a former member of 45’s merry band of half wits when you just know that sh*t will move. But seriously, enough already. Read this open letter to book publishers on why these kinds of books should be left the hell alone.

• Book Club Bonus: What changes do you want to see in publishing? I can think of…. a few. Talk about those changes in book club and then consider drafting either individual or collective letter to publishers yourselves. Whether you choose to send them is up to you – start by getting your grievances out on paper and remember to speak with your buying/lending habits.

Where Books Meet Brushstrokes – You know I’m all about that audiobook life. I listen in the car, in the shower, while doing my makeup, etc. I’ve never tried painting while listening to a great book but this post makes me want to post haste!

• Book Club Bonus: Who doesn’t love a craft hour + book club mash up? Gather your club pals, bust out the easels & paint brushes and get to making art while you audiobook. What a great way to learn a little something or just be entertained as you decompress with your best Bob Ross effort. #burntsiennaforever

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That’s all I’ve got for you, my bookish pals. Thanks again for hanging with me in 2018! Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com with your burning book club questions or find me on Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter for tips and latest listens and watch me booktube every Friday too.

Happy holidays y feliz año nuevo, my friends! And as always, stay bad & bookish.

Vanessa

 

Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read. This week I’m writing to you from my bed where I’m laid up with a jumbo size bag o’ cough drops, a humidifier, and all of the tissues and tea. Though this laryngitis has me sounding like a sad, sad chew toy, book club business must go on.

*squeaks* To the club!

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This newsletter is sponsored by CEO of the Girl Scouts, Sylvia Acevedo’s Path to the Stars, a memoir for middle graders.

The inspiring memoir for young readers about a Latina rocket scientist whose early life was transformed by joining the Girl Scouts and who currently serves as CEO of the Girl Scouts of the USA. A meningitis outbreak in their underprivileged neighborhood left Sylvia Acevedo’s family forever altered. As she struggled in the aftermath of loss, young Sylvia’s life transformed when she joined the Brownies. The Girl Scouts taught her how to take control of her world and nourished her love of numbers and science. With new confidence, Sylvia navigated shifting cultural expectations at school and at home, forging her own trail to become one of the first Latinx to graduate with a master’s in engineering from Stanford University and going on to become a rocket scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

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Move over, Tudors: Make Room for Stuarts – That’s right, folks: the Stuarts are making a comeback! As another of history’s most notorious dynasties explodes into pop culture, peep these six books to learn a little more about the Stuarts of Scandalville.

• Book Club Bonus: Use book club to delve into pieces of history that you’d love to learn more about or brush up on. Consider branching out here: WWII, the Stuarts, and the Medicis are super interesting, but why not learn more about Che Guevara, the Armenian genocide, or South African apartheid?
• Related: I was semi-bullied as a kid in school by a girl who told me I was adopted (not true) because my real mother, Mary Queen of Scots, was beheaded for treason. Welp… that ride home from school with mom was supes awkward. 

Golden Books – The 2019 Golden Globe nominations have been announced and 19 of them are book adaptations! Books are just out here running sh*t. But we knew that, didn’t we?

• Book Club Bonus: Have a book club watch party this award show season. Pick an adaptation, then read the book the film or show is based on. Watch the adaptation as a group and discuss what it got right, what it got wrong, etc. If you’ve already seen an adaptation before you knew it was one, go back and read the original with book group and see if your love (or dislike!) of the adaptation has changed.
• Related: I looooved me some Killing Eve (Sandra Oh forever!) and am a little ashamed I didn’t know it was based on a series of novellas! Also, I met a woman who looked JUST LIKE VILLANELLE at a jewelry boutique in Montreal this fall and I kinda sorta just… stared.  

A Book and A Buzz – December 5th marked the 85th anniversary of the end of Prohibition. Huzzah! If you partake of the drink, check out these literary cocktail books that combine love of books and booze.

• Book Club Bonus: Have a little mixology sesh at your next book group, and do it cookie-exchange style for the holidays. Have each person pick a cocktail and make a batch big enough to share. Everyone will get a taster of each other’s cocktail for a flight of bookish booze. If you’re feeling super spunky, have everyone come up with their own drink (as opposed to picking one from a book) and give it a punny literary name, then bring copies of your drink recipe for everyone. Now be gone with the gin, you tequila mockingbirds!  

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Thanks for hanging with me today! Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com with your burning book club questions or find me on Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter for tips and latest listens and watch me booktube every Friday too!

And of course, I’m going to keep on reminding y’all that I’ll be hosting the Read Harder Podcast with Tirzah Price in 2019! Now would be a great time to join Book Riot Insiders if you haven’t already… go go go!

Stay bad & bookish, my friends
Vanessa

More Resources: 
– Our Book Group In A Box guide
– List your group on the Book Group Resources page

Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read. I think I’ve somehow managed to give you zero holiday-themed recommendations in the first newsletter in December?? Oh well, there’s still time. For now let’s talk Book Riot book club, yogic reads, handmaids, and border stories.

Off to the club we go!

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This newsletter is sponsored by Penguin Random House Audio. Keep up with your reading by listening to the audiobook – and never miss a book club meeting!

Keep up with your book club reading by listening to the audiobook. Audiobooks are the perfect complement to your busy schedule. Listen to new releases such as The Kennedy Debutante by Kerri Maher and read by Julia Whelan, and you can enjoy a whole new book club experience. For more listening suggestions, visit Tryaudiobooks.com/BookRiot.

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Nevertheless, We Persisted – That’s right, friends: Persist is back!  We’re hosting the last edition of our feminist Instagram book club for the year and we’ve announced this quarter’s pick! Head on over to the gram for the Instagram live discussion schedule. Be there!

• Book Club Bonus: You should definitely join us for Persist, but also: don’t be afraid to use the internets for your own book club purposes. You and your bookish companions don’t have to live in the same geographic area to get in on the book club action. Get your Skype/FaceTime/Slack/Instagram Live on – whatever works for you.

Good Reads + Deep Breaths – Yoga isn’t all backbends and headstands; it’s breath and reflection and mindfulness. Get centered and still with these 5 yoga books for yogic thinking. Namaste!

• Book Club Bonus: Bring book club to the yoga mat! Pick a yogic read for all of your yogis to enjoy and then attend a class together as a group. If there’s an instructor among you, have them lead your group in a flow at a location of your choice. Again, it doesn’t have to be a seriously physical practice; concentrate more on breath, stillness, and calm.

Return to Gilead – Margaret Atwood will pen a sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale! Maybe the premise of the first one started to feel like and less like fiction? Welp, back to Gilead we go! Under his eye.

• Book Club Bonus: If you haven’t already read The Handmaid’s Tale in book group, set some time aside to do so. There’s plenty to talk about there, but dive a little deeper and share your thoughts for where the sequel will go. Will it continue with Offred’s storyline or will it pick up in the future? Do you think it will align with the second season of the Hulu series? What terrifying predictions do you have?

An Interview with Gabino Iglesias – “I had this idea in my head: pulp walks into a bar and smashes a bottle in the face of literary fiction while reciting poetry.” Read more about Iglesias, his unique brand of barrio noir, and the wave of indie lit about the immigrant experience that he’s helping to usher in.

• Book Club Bonus: I’d love to host a book club that read three titles on the immigrant experience: anything by Gabino Iglesias plus Yuri Herrera’s Signs Preceding the End of the World and In the Distance by Hernan Diaz. These distinct works of fiction all tackle the same subject with very different modalities but are all hugely impactful and thought-provoking. I challenge you to unpack all of the commentary these titles have to offer: how Diaz’s use of a white character changes the narrative, how Iglesias tackles fear-based othering of brown people, Herrera’s mythological rendering of a border crossing tale. Dios mio, the possibilities.

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Thanks for hanging with me today! Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com with your burning book club questions or find me on Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter for tips and latest listens and watch me booktube every Friday too!

Also… a little birdie told me that someone whose names sounds a lot like Schmanessa Schmiaz is going to be hosting the exclusive Read Harder Podcast in 2019. Now would be a great time to join Book Riot Insiders if you haven’t already… jus sayin.

Stay bad & bookish, my friends.
Vanessa

More Resources: 
– Our Book Group In A Box guide
– List your group on the Book Group Resources page

Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read.

How we doing, friends? Welcome back! Congrats to all my US peeps who survived awkward talks with racist relatives around the Thanksgiving table. You did good! Now let’s get back to our happy place.

Let’s talk bookish prizes, bookish gifts, big romance reads, and money money money money (*falsetto*) MONEY! Ready? Vamos al club.

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Today’s newsletter is sponsored by sponsored by our $250 All the Books Barnes and Noble gift card giveaway!

Enter to win a $250 gift card to Barnes and Noble in support of our All the Books! podcast. Click here for more info.

 

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It’s All About the Benjamins, Baby – “I don’t like money, and I’m no millionaire. I work a 9-5 job. I teach yoga on the side. I sell some of my writing for small amounts of cash. I’m not a homeowner. So really, what I’m saying is: I’m totally normal.” I love this line by Rioter Aisling Twomey in her post on books about money.

• Book Club Bonus: Money talk can be uncomfortable but knowing more about it – especially as women and/or persons of color – is vital to our empowerment. Read a book about money with your pals for book club and get real about money matters. Share your experiences with the pay gap, strategies for saving, investing, retirement plans, how hard it is out here in these streets, etc. Crush the stigma around money matters and remember that knowledge is power.
• Related: It’d be like a day without orange juice if I didn’t sneak a 90s rap lyric into a header, wouldn’t it? Fun fact: my dad is terrible with names and refers to Diddy, the artist formerly known as Puff Daddy, as “el Big Daddy Puff.” Carry on.

Come Bearing Gifts – Alright folks. Thanksgiving has passed and it’s officially acceptable to start the holiday talk. Looking for some budget-friendly gifts for your bookworm besties this season? Check out these 25 easy DIY gifts for book lovers.

• Book Club Bonus: We’re knocking on December’s doors and end of year busyness can make reading time scarce for some. If your book group is strapped for assigned reading time but can squeeze in time for a meet-up, have a holiday gathering. Bring food and drink like I mentioned last week, exchange small gifts, and share your favorite reads of the year (book club picks or otherwise). Tis the season! Fit in the book love however you can.

Give her the Giller and the Rest of the Things – Esi Edugyan’s Washington Black is this year’s Giller Prize winner (not to mention a shortlist pick for a gaggle of other literary awards)! Read more about the one book Flare says you should read this year.

• Book Club Bonus: Washington Black isn’t your typical slavery narrative. George Washington Black is a eleven-year-old slave on a Barbados sugar plantation run by a sadistic master – ok, familiar. Then his master’s brother Christopher takes him under his wing and plot twist!!! Instead of subjecting Washington to further cruelty, he ends up taking the boy for a ride in a hot air balloon to places like Morocco, Novia Scotia, and the Arctic. His story becomes one of salvation and adventure, of self-invention and the wonder of youth. Discuss how Washington is able to overcome his circumstances, how his curiosity is crucial to his survival.

Fantasy Wins! – The 2018 World Fantasy Award Winners were announced earlier this month! A few of these titles have been sitting on my TBR and are waving at me like, “Hey girl! Yeah we see you! Remember us?!?” While I avoid eye/spine contact, check out the list of winners and find your next fantastic read!

• Book Club Bonus: Bruuuuuuuh. Victor Lavalle’s The Changeling is such a perfect book club pick! You’ll just be minding your own business and reading this nice story when BAM! A thing will happen and you’ll question everything you know to be good and true in this world. We read this at the bookstore in October and we all had a lot of feelings; it’s part fairy tale, part horror story with tons of commentary on the black experience, racism, fatherhood and … trolls.

Great Big Romance Read – The gals at the Ripped Bodice are out here killin’ it. They’ve inked a TV deal with Sony, they’re running the only romance bookstore in the country and tearing down stigmas, and now they’re bringing us The Great Big Romance Read. Their goal is “to connect romance readers all over the world and celebrate a shared love of romance by reading the same book during the month of December.”

• Book Club Bonus: I love when I get to share news with a built-in book club and this is one of those times! Lots of in-person and online discussion groups are already scheduled to talk about 2018’s selection, which so happens to be my fave Pride by Ibi Zoboi. Grab your friends and go to a meet-up if you can, or join in on the online fun for this fantastic classics remix (find the schedule here).

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Thanks for hanging with me today! Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com with your burning book club questions or find me on Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter for tips and latest listens and watch me booktube every Friday too!

Stay bad & bookish, my friends.
Vanessa

Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read.

Thanksgiving is tomorrow here in the states and I hope lots of tasty foodstuffs are in all of your futures! Funny story — as a kid I had to ask my mom why we always made turkey-related crafts in school for the holiday. My Mexican family ate pozole and ham back then. I was hella confused.

Wherever you are and whatever you dine on, whether with friends or family or just your super cute cat, I wish you all a very happy day of thanks. I’m grateful to all of you fantastic readers and the chance to bring you book club love each week.

Alright, moving on. I’ll keep it brief this week. To the books!

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This newsletter is sponsored by Penguin Random House Audio. Keep up with your reading by listening to the audiobook – and never miss a book club meeting!

Keep up with your book club reading by listening to the audiobook. Audiobooks are the perfect complement to your busy schedule. Listen to new releases such as The Kennedy Debutante, by Kerri Maher and read by Julia Whelan, and you can enjoy a whole new book club experience. For more listening suggestions, visit Tryaudiobooks.com/BookRiot.

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Issa Giveaway – I’m still recovering from my very first trip to Powell’s over my birthday weekend last month, yo. I may have blacked out for a moment somewhere in the gold room; all I know is that purchases were made. Get in on this action and sign up to win $250 to Powell’s here!

The Club that Cooks – The holidays approacheth and for a lot of us that means whipping up culinary masterpieces, or watching other people do so while we drink wine in the corner – amirite? Whether you’re cooking, gifting, or hosting Book Club: Cookbook Edition, check out this list of 2018’s best cookbooks.

• Book Club Bonus: Not everyone has time to read over the holidays – I for one work in Retailandia and will probs set up a cot in the bookstore soon! If you still want to make time for your bookish pals, turn book club into a holiday gathering with help from your favorite cookbooks. Everyone pick a different title and prepare a dish from said cookbook. Gather, munch, and maybe have a casual wrap-up of this year’s favorite reads. Eggnog and buttered rum optional. Hold the optional.
• Related: In more cookbook news, watching Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat on Netflix has a) made me a solid fangirl for Samin Nosrat, and b) bumped Coming to My Senses up a few notches on my TBR. I’m so pleased to see this memoir by Alice Waters of Chez Panisse fame on this list of 20 of the best food books from 2018.

Give Us All the Prizes – The National Book Award Winners have been announced and y’all…. I am SCREAMING my congratulations for all of the women and authors of color who graced that stage! Can we start a petition to award Elizabeth Acevedo a prize for Most Poppin Curls?

• Book Club Bonus: If your group read and loved The Poet X, do yourselves a favor and catch Pride by Ibi Zoboi. This reimagining of Pride & Prejudice is brilliant Latinx love + black girl magic on its own but is neeeext level fantastic on audio. It’s narrated by Elizabeth I’m-Just-Good-At-All-The-Things Acevedo and I can’t imagine a more perfect pick to do so. Discuss how the Bushwick setting and characters of color bring new depth and perspective to the classic.
• Related: While you’re at it, pre-order Elizabeth Acevedo’s With the Fire On High. Have you seen that cover?? I die. I just die.

BRB, going to bust out my head scarves and hoops right quick before accepting that I will never recreate this glory.

Grateful for Great Reads – You love the books, we love the books. We all loves ze books! Rioter Olivia Páez shares a list of the books she’s thankful for and that have changed her life.

• Book Club Bonus: Host Friendsgiving with book club! In between the stuffing of face and other traditions you partake in, take some time to talk about the reads you’ve been thankful for this year/life. I relate so much to Olivia’s excitement over finally reading a book that celebrated her Cuban culture. Share the stories that made you swell with pride, that taught you important lessons, or that simply shook your soul.

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Thanks for hanging with me today! Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com with your burning book club questions or find me on Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter for tips and latest listens and watch me booktube every Friday too!

Stay bad & bookish, my friends.
Vanessa

More Resources: 
– Our Book Group In A Box guide
– List your group on the Book Group Resources page

Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read.

The midterms are over and though I’m still sore over Beto, I sure did raise a glass for all the amazing women and people of color elected to office. This is a club, after all. Let’s pour one out and do a little dance!

Oh and then talk about books.

Let’s commence.

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This newsletter is sponsored by Witness: Lessons from Elie Wiesel’s Classroom by Ariel Burger.

The world remembers Elie Wiesel—Nobel laureate, activist, and author of more than forty books—as a great humanist. He passed away in July of 2016. Now, in Witness: Lessons from Elie Wiesel’s Classroom, we see him as never before—not only as an extraordinary human being, but as a master teacher. Written by Wiesel’s devoted protégé and friend, Ariel Burger, Witness takes us inside the classroom, where listening and storytelling keep memory alive. Witness provides a front row seat to these lessons in compassion, teaching us that listening to a witness, makes us all witnesses. In this book, Wiesel’s legacy lives on.

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Don’t Forget to Enter the All The Books Giveaway! We’re celebrating 200 episodes of All the Books by giving a lucky reader a $250 Barnes & Noble gift card. Enter here!

Club Style Quiz – No, this ain’t a fashion consult, although TBH that skirt with those shoes is supes last year. Let us help you find your book club style with just a few simple questions. 

Picture Perfect Reads – Stressed at work? Dating life a bust? Feeling crushed by the weight of the patriarchy and of living in a country run by a pompous pile of Cheeto dust? Then make sure to get your self-care in wherever you can, like with these spirit-lifting picture books for quick and delightful reading.

• Book Club Bonus: Set the Lit Fic and tear-jerker memoirs down for just a second and bring picture books to book club. Have every member pick one or two with a feel-good message and read them aloud at your meet-up. Pick ones with a solid storyline as opposed to just pretty colors, shapes, and rhymes. Use a sign-up sheet to avoid repeats among the group and agree to try and select books that aren’t super common (Corduroy, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, etc). In a mommy/daddy + me club? BYOB (bring your own baby) and make it a real party.

Nature-Happy Book Pairs – Nothing feeds my soul like curling up with a good book, except perhaps a little forest bathing among big beautiful trees. Treat yo self to the best of both worlds with these five books to read in some of nature’s masterpieces.

• Book Club Bonus: Pick a book on nature and take book club outside! If you don’t live near a national park or have time to get to one, fret not. That Terry Tempest Williams you’ve had your eye on pairs just as well with a nice brisk hike or walk in whatever nature spot is near you. If it’s feasible, hold book club at said nature spot – pack a picnic and some blankets and talk nature in nature.

Post-War Crime Reads – November 11th, 2018 marked the 100 year anniversary of Armistice Day, the end of World War I. LitHub recommends these nine titles from the Golden Age of mystery; set in the half decade immediately post-war, they speak to the “lingering desire to see the destructive intrusion defeated and the world made right again.”

• Book Club Bonus: I confess I’d never given much thought to how mystery fiction changed from before the war to after. Pick two mysteries for book club: one pre-war and one post. Discuss the changes in content, tone, character development, etc. as informed by their place in the war’s timeline.

5 books bearing witness to America’s carceral state – Last month the National Book Foundation launched Literature for Justice (LFJ), a three-year campaign that seeks to encourage  the reading of literature that “contextualizes and humanizes the experiences of incarcerated people.” This initiative includes the curation of a 15-book list of titles about the American prison system, five of which are highlighted by LitHub here.

• Book Club Bonus: There is so, so much to learn from reading up on the American prison system, from the school-to-prison pipeline to for-profit prisons and everything in between. Pick these important reads, then do a little good afterwards by donating your past reads to a local prison. Check with the prison to see if they accept direct donations or if it’s best to go through a charitable organization, and also check to see which types of books are accepted.

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Thanks for hanging with me today! Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com with your burning book club questions or find me on Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter for tips and latest listens and watch me booktube every Friday too!

Stay bad & bookish, my friends.
Vanessa

Bonjour, book lovers! Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read. 

Happy November! By the time you read this newsletter, the midterm elections will have taken place and there will hopefully be lots to celebrate! If not, I’m letting you know now that next week’s newsletter will be brought to you by tequila. *casts spells, burns palo santo, prays frantically in Spanish* 

For now, let’s have a little bookish fun and talk Nonfiction November, lady monsters, how the US’s hands are a lot o’ bit dirty and more. 

To the books!

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This newsletter is sponsored by The Man She Married by Cathy Lamb.

A woman whose memory is shattered must piece together her husband’s secrets and reevaluate her life, love, and relationships, in this gripping and thought-provoking novel.

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Have you entered our All The Books Giveaway? Enter here to win a $250 Barnes & Noble gift card as the podcast closes in on its 200th episode. That’s a lot of books!

November Rain – It’s raining themes, dates and causes, yo! We’ve got National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), midterm elections, Thanksgiving, Movember… all the things! It’s also Nonfiction November and Bustle has a list of twelve rad reads that fit the bill. One of them is by a little someone named Michelle Obama… no big deal.

• Book Club Bonus: In a book club with your besties? Girl Talk: What Science Can Tell Us About Female Friendship by Jacqueline Mroz seems like a pretty perfect pick for BFF Book Club. You love your friends, now get into the science of why. Some wine might be nice too, ya know? Do it for science.
• Related: This list of nine nonfiction titles about ghosts, vampires, monsters and such because don’t you just love it when truth really is stranger than fiction?

Monstress, Inc – Oh look! A giant pile o’ Vanessa Catnip: “From Circe to Carrie: 9 Literary Female Monsters You Don’t Want to Mess With.” Go on, get it on this. Catnip courtesy of Off the Shelf.    

• Book Club Bonus: I’ve already told you all how much I love it when a female villain is given nuance and depth, and suggested a book club discussion of how a fleshed-out backstory might change our previous perceptions of her. This week, I challenge you all to analyze what it is about lady monsters that make them such a terrifying force. Are they truly monsters? Are we just afraid of women’s anger? Of our power? Of our anger’s power?

Trauma, A Memoir – Recovery from trauma is an intensely personal process and no two people’s experiences are the same. Take these nine memoirs about trauma: each moving and heart wrenching in distinct ways.

• Book Club Bonus: These are all undoubtedly very difficult reads. For those comfortable taking them on, memoirs like these would make for some seriously inspirational reading. More importantly, I think they’ll provide some invaluable perspective on these difficult subjects for folks who’ve never been through them or don’t know anyone who has.

We’re Not Not to Blame – All this fear-mongering talk of caravans reminds me that a lot of people either aren’t aware of, don’t understand, or flat out don’t care about the extent of the United States’ role in destabilizing the countries these migrants come from. It feels like the right time to read this list of books on this very subject from Rioter Romeo Rosales.

• Book Club Bonus: Even the most progressive among us could probably still use a crash course in our government’s problematic involvement in Central and South America. Consider reading one of these titles for book club, especially if one or more of your members have a blindspot when it comes to our treatment of immigrants. A little bit of education and a meaningful conversation among friends could go a long way.

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Thanks for hanging with me today! You can find me on both the Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com if you want to say hola or if you have any book club questions, and sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter to get more bookish content by yours truly.

Stay bad & bookish, my friends!
Vanessa

Greetings, gals and ghouls! Welcome to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read.

It’s Halloween at last and my favorite month is drawing to a close! I’ve so enjoyed spending the whole month watching Hocus Pocus on repeat, devouring witchy reads, and busting out my “Brujeria Supplies” tote to freak out passersby. Now if only the orange monster in on oval lair in the house of white stone on Pennsylvania Avenue would leave us alone… that’d be swell.

Also, now all I can think about it this guy from Looney Tunes.

Enough of that mess. Let’s talk audiobooks, America’s favorite read, crime awards and more.

Onward!

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This newsletter is sponsored by Mariner Books.

“The edge of the stories in Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah’s debut collection Friday Black is razor sharp, ready to cut deep. This book is dark and captivating and essential. This book is a call to arms and it is a condemnation. Adjei-Brenyah offers powerful prose as parable. The writing in this outstanding collection will make you hurt and demand your hope. Read this book. Marvel at the intelligence of each of these stories and what they reveal about racism, capitalism, complacency and their insidious reach.”—Roxane Gay

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Audiophile Favorites – I know I’m generally the one with the recommendations here but PLOOOOT TWIIIIIST! We recently asked you to tell us about great audiobooks for book club.

That’s right folks: I managed to sneak in a Golden Girls reference yet again. Also, here are some of your fantastic suggestions. 

Volume Up in this Club! – Speaking of audiobooks: if you’ve been clubbing with me for a bit now, you know I heart the idea of integrating audiobooks in book group. Need help getting started? Check out this piece on six ways to host an audiobook club.

• Book Club Bonus: While there are thousands of new/new-to-you titles to listen to out there, give some thought to listening to a book you’ve read in print previously. Hearing it narrated – especially if it’s by the author – can add a whole new layer of meaning, nuance, and oftentimes hilarity. I have done this with Trevor Noah’s Born a Crime and David Sedaris’ Calypso. Holy crap, yo. Hearing their stories in their voices hit me smack in the feels and almost made me wet myself at least 5 times, even though I’d already read them once before.

To Read a Mockingbird – The people have spoken! The voting results for The Great American Read are in and Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird took the top spot.

• Book Club Bonus: We all know America’s favorite read is pretty much a staple in high school classrooms – but should it be? Give it a read in book club and see if you feel any differently about it now than you did when you first tackled it, or share your impressions as a first time reader. I for one think it might be high time to move on from the white savior thing, ya know? Discuss some more contemporary reads that you might suggest in its stead. There. Are. Lots.
• Related: The top 50 and top 10 finalists for The Great American Read were woefully lacking in diversity, a non-surprising but still disappointing side affect of the whiteness of the Western canon. Another book club tip: research overlooked reads and come up with suggestions for new entries into the canon. Go.

Book Clubs All the Way Down – Looking for a book club? Already in one but need a replacement because Karen didn’t read the damn book and watched the movie instead AGAIN? Consider joining Life’s Library, a new book club by John Green and his longtime friend Rosianna Halse Rojas.

• Book Club Bonus: My indie recently read Claire Fuller’s Swimming Lessons for book club and promoted it on social media. Fuller then reached out to thanks us for picking her book and offered to provide and/or answer any questions for our book group. Before you select your next read, try contacting the author and see if they’d be willing to participate similarly. I’ve been so pleasantly surprised at how receptive many authors are to communicating with their readers. Show them some love and maybe get them chatting about the books they’ve written.  

Bringing Books to a Knife Fight – Sort of. Except the knives are daggers and the fight is an award ceremony. Two lessons here: 1) My bookish metaphors don’t always work out. 2) The Crime Writers’ Association Dagger Awards have been announced.

• Book Club Bonus: As a lover of mystery books, I love me the Dagger Awards but lawd! #daggerssowhite. I’m thrilled to see Attica Locke take the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger but the nominees overall were not at all diverse. Read Attica Locke and give her her flowers, but also look for other persons of color writing mystery. Need some suggestions? Walter Mosley, Kellye Garrett, Alexia Gordon, Vaseem Khan, Maria Angelica Bosco, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Sujata Massey… I could go on. 

Trans People Won’t Be Erased – We love and support our trans brothers and sisters. Full stop. Here is a piece from Rioter Christina on 15 trans, non-binary, and gender non-conforming writers to get to know right now.

• Book Club Bonus: Please, please support the work of trans, non-binary, and gender non-conforming writers and then consider writing them a letter from your book group. Thank them for their books and remind them that they are seen and valued, in spite of so many efforts from nefarious parties to make them feel otherwise. Then call every damn elected official you need to to voice your opposition for the attempted erasure of the trans community. And of course VOTE. 

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Thanks for hanging with me today! You can find me on both the Twitter and the gram @buenosdiazsd. Shoot me an email at vanessa@riotnewmedia.com if you want to say hola or if you have any book club questions, and sign up for the Audiobooks newsletter to get more bookish content by yours truly.

Stay bad & bookish, my friends.
Vanessa

More Resources: 
– Our Book Group In A Box guide
– List your group on the Book Group Resources page