5 years ago, I decided at the last minute to go to a bloggers conference. This conference was at a hotel here in Indy, so all I had to do was buy my ticket. I wasn’t new to blogging and writing, but I was new to making blogging friends. I had found an online community and a lot of friends from there were going. So the Monday before the conference started – on Friday – I bought my ticket! Friday at 6 I picked up a stranger who happened to live here as well and blog and also decided at the last minute to buy her ticket . . . and we went to dinner before the opening presentation. That stranger is now one of my best friends. She’s family. And what bonded us the most, was not blogging, but books.

So last year once I was fully back in Indy, we started a book club. It’s the one day a month we look and 5 of our friends look forward to the most. And it’s the promise that at least one book will be read for each of us. So here’s the 5 things that help us make the most of our book club.

• First of all, don’t take it too seriously. – Yes you want everyone to come and be comfortable. Yes you need to split the responsibility, etc. But this is mostly for fun and to spend time together. don’t forget that.
• pick a theme – There are 6 of us, we picked names out of a hat to create a rotation of who picks books, and we change themes after every rotation. So we have 6 fantasy books, 6 books made into a movie, this time we’re doing dystopian.

• create some ground rules – like I said in #1, you want to share and you want everyone to have fun. So create some ground rules so everyone knows what’s expected. We meet once a month, the ‘host’ chooses the book, brings a snack, and has 3 discussion questions. We expect everyone to read the book – obviously.
• Don’t make it too big – you don’t want too many chef’s in the kitchen.
• do things other than read together – you’re not going to talk honestly if you’re not friends. you’re also not going to spread your wings and read books you otherwise wouldn’t if you don’t really trust the other people. so be friends! go see movies sometimes! get your kids together! hang out!