Book Club Experience

For my book club experience, I attended a book club at the Wells County Public Library where I’m employed. The meeting occurred on February 21, 2019 from 6:30 - 8 PM. This book club has been meeting for several years and has had numerous names. It is currently just known as the “Book Discussion” group. It had previously been known as “Who picked this book anyway?”.  The group meets once per month and reads one book per month. No snacks or drinks are provided but patrons can bring their own. This group meets in the library’s “Parlor” meeting room. The facilitator of the discussion was Teresa Dustman, the library’s circulation department manager. She has been responsible for this book club for seven years and enjoys it immensely.

All books are selected a year ahead by the facilitator and participants from the list of books on Novel Conversations. Novel Conversations is a statewide lending library that specializes in loaning to discussion groups throughout Indiana. Multiple copies of a title can be selected preempting the need for the library to purchase extra copies of a title for a book group. There are five regular members in this group. The group does not focus on a particular genre and reads as much nonfiction as fiction. The group tends to pick titles they would not normally read on their own. Nearly every month Teresa is told “I never would have read this…” by a group member who just really enjoyed a book. This brings Teresa a great deal of satisfaction.

For this meeting the book discussed was the biography “The Astronaut’s Wives Club” by Lily Koppel.  This 2013 title discusses the wives of the Mercury seven astronauts and how, since they were experiencing similar circumstances and issues, they formed a club to support each other. Since I have not read the book, I attended the discussion as an observer and not a participant. For this event only two patrons attended. The other members were not able to attend and Teresa was aware of this. The group uses email to communicate between meetings.

Once the discussion commenced Teresa was clearly in charge. It was obvious that the group dynamics were well established and everybody knew their role. While Teresa was the clear leader she did not dominate. She would ask a question or make a statement and the members would comment. The feel was informal, familiar. Three friends sitting around a table having a friendly conversation. Both attendees actively participated and were respectful of each other, no one participant dominated.

A variety of questions / topics were discussed. Teresa is very good at crafting questions that can lead to lengthy discussions. There were no “yes” or “no” questions. Teresa and one of the participants were both old enough to remember some of the events associated with the Mercury program. This made the discussion more interesting, with them relating what they remember of the media coverage of the astronauts, and how that did or did not match to reality. One topic of interest was the boys will be boy’s attitude NASA maintained. While they tolerated philandering by the 

astronauts the wives were to behave in a manner that reflected middle American wholesomeness.

Changing social norms in regards to journalism was also discussed. They talked about how the press coverage and the terminology used, would not be acceptable by today’s standards. Describing a woman as “big boned” for instance. Gus Grissom being a native born Hoosier and Purdue grad is a natural focal point for Indiana book discussions, and this was true here. Of interest was his wife breaking social norms by suing NASA for negligence regarding her husband’s horrible death. Filing the lawsuit led to the rejection of the family from the rest of the space community and an additional great deal of hate mail. Finally, the group had some criticisms of the structure of the book. As more missions and astronauts and their wives are added to the space program it was more difficult for the participants to keep track of the characters.

Overall, the group enjoyed the book and it was definitely not a title they would have typically picked on their own. Both attendees indicated that they tended to mostly read fiction. I myself found the experience pleasant and could see myself enjoying leading or participating in a group. I actually might have an opportunity to do so soon. We have a group of men in our library who would like to start their own book club and if we get enough interest I will be tasked with facilitating. I hope that I can do as well with my club as Teresa does with hers.