Book Clubbed

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/07/fashion/07clubs.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

I read this article a long time ago in the NYTimes and it made me laugh because it talks about how to politely get out of a book club. Having been in a couple myself, I understand the dislike of reading books you’d rather not read. I mean, you are going to be spending a considerable amount of time reading a book. You might as well enjoy or want to read it.

But it’s tricky, as with most things involving other people, you always end up managing some political intrigue. You’ll find there is the one person who wants to sway the vote for the upcoming book by talking to others and getting them to vote differently. In one of the clubs I’m in, this recently happened and I found it incredibly annoying because #1) the books that month were my choice #2) because I think this kind of pandering is immature. If you don’t want to read the book, don’t vote for it. But do not try to influence other people’s votes. What the heck? #3) In the end, everyone really enjoyed the book so there!

Regardless, it seems like with some people, you will never find a book you will agree on. Even if there are 7 completely different people in a specific group, it’s difficult to find 2 people who will enjoy any given book. And there’s always some darn book that I really have no desire to read, but I read it any way if I have the time. Because sometimes books are like that – there’s a reason why the proverb “You can’t judge a book by its cover” exists. They end up surprising you. Not that I can think of a specific example at the moment but you know what I mean.

And on the other end, you’ll have some people who just want to read a book so badly that no matter how many times everyone else rejects it as a choice, they still keep presenting it. Persistence works sometimes. And sometimes you just wonder why they don’t read the book on their own instead of putting a whole group of people through the torture of reading a book they’ve already decided they never want to read.

Ahhh who would have thought reading a book would be such a problem?