At the moment we are The Book Club Without A Name; occasionally the subject of a suitable name comes up and we bat various suggestions around... but then we get back to discussing books. We do, however, have our own custom designed T-shirt...

We are eight avid readers in number, a mix of male and female members:

Fred, the Tower of Fred horn section
Jean the Pianist
Joette the Architect
Leith the English Professor
Michael the Freelance Reader
Nou the Radio Show Host
Rob the Buggy Mandolin Player
Sarah the Early Musician

Heather the Farmer is a Book Club member emeritus. Suzanne the Drama Teacher was one of our founding members. We lost her to ovarian cancer in 2011. Larrie the Traveling Carpenter, another founding member, passed in 2024, from pancreatic cancer. We miss them both.

Our meetings occasionally include the off-stage company of one or more members of the junior division (who are now less junior than they used to be):

Aaron the Senior Junior Member and Ace Chess Player
Benjamin the Not So Recently Born
Ciaran the Ever-Ready Energy Bunny
Devin the Ever-Ready Energy Bunny Mark II
Nia the Ever-Ready Energy Bunny Mark III
Calder the Most Recently Born Of All

How we choose our books
We choose two books to read each time: a Primary Book, and a Secondary Book (which in theory complements some aspect of the Primary Book). Everyone does their utmost to read the Primary Book; the Secondary Book is optional. Currently, to ensure that everyone's book suggestions are given equal time, at the end of our meeting one member proposes three titles for the next Primary Book (each member takes his or her turn in sequence: alphabetically, by first name!). Everyone then votes from amongst the three choices to choose our next Primary Book.

The (complementary) Secondary Book is then selected by discussion. Originally the Secondary Book was selected from books on our Master Book List, a list which originated and was annually expanded at our January meeting. Use of the MBL has fallen by the wayside, since maintainance of the list had become more time consuming that it was worth. The final (circa 2008) Master Book List can still be consulted here; it's in PDF format, so you'll need Acrobat Reader (available from Adobe) or equivalent to view it.

Where and when we meet
We all live in the Vancouver area, and meet every two months at one of the member homes. Initially we met on a Monday evening, but we've been going with a Sunday pot-luck dinner format for quite a while now. There have been occasions when some or all of us attend readings or concerts (we've even ventured into joint play-readings on a couple of occasions). A chronology of our meetings and the books we've chosen is located here.

This page last updated January 13, 2025