6 Popular Online Book Clubs to Join
Book clubs help you to develop a passion for reading. It encourages you to engage in social interaction with others and broaden perspectives on issues. Book clubs provide a platform for intellectual discussion and community building. They offer both personal and social benefits to readers. This is why it is good for you to join one today. Here are six popular online book clubs you can join that will definitely be worth your time.
1. Ladies’ Lit Squad
Ladies’ Lit Squad is an all-female collective of book lovers from the world of fashion, art and media which primary aim is to ignite the passion for reading among members. It was founded by writer and blogger Sheree Milli and has since grown with over 7,000 members worldwide.
One remarkable thing this book club did in 2021 was to invite readers to join their “21 books in ‘21 challenge”. This was a monthly challenge where Ladies Lit Squad provided reading prompts and suggestions to help you broaden people’s reading repertoire, and make it through 21 great books in 2021. The books on their reading list feature different genres, but are all written by women or authors of color. You can easily get a recommended title from their bookshop.org page. This book club will keep you motivated to read always.
2. Goodreads Choice Awards Book Club
This is one of the biggest virtual reading communities you can find today. This group is only for the reading of books that have won the Goodreads Choice Awards. Members read the Goodreads Choice Awards winning books throughout the year. If you just want really solid book recommendations, then check out the Goodreads Choice Awards Book Club. The club works its way through top-rated titles from the site’s readers’ choice awards and uses group discussion boards to chat about their thoughts. This is another amazing club to join.
3. New York Public Library & WNYC’s Virtual Book Club
The New York Public Library teamed up with US radio station WNYC to launch its online book club which has been growing since April 2020 when it the merger took place. You can read all the chosen books for this virtual book club for free through NYPL’s e-reader app, which makes it easy to read any eBook in your library’s collection.
4. Lez Book Club
Lez Book Club was established in 2017 by Eleanore Pratoussy and since then members have been meeting in London pubs to provide a space for queer women to come together and share LGBT books. But the pivot to virtual book clubs has given the founder the opportunity to remove all physical boundaries from the group and open up this community of book lovers to queer and trans women, and nonbinary people, all around the world. Members of Lez Book Club have virtual meetings every month. You can check the group’s Instagram for further information about this book club.
5. OKHA
OKHA, is a digital platform which was born from a desire to see more queer Black stories and stories by authors of Black ancestry. This is a queer + Black book club, is housed on PRIM (a space for Black existence, showcasing the varying mediums used for storytelling). The primary focus of the club is on making African, Caribbean, and Afro-Latinx writing readily available. You can checkout PRIM for every relevant information from an author’s catalogue and written stories to video readings, films, documentaries, narrative podcasts and more. If you wish to read along with the OKHA book club then head to the Instagram page, where you’ll find the monthly book pick and all the details for OKHA online. These events happen on the last Friday of every month. This is a space for people of Black ancestry to laugh, learn, and celebrate Black writing alongside incredible speakers, artists, and authors.
6. Our Shared Shelf
Our Shared Shelf is another vibrant book club which was founded in 2016 by actor Emma Watson as part of her work with UN women. Emma selected a book with feminist themes every two months for discussion. She ended the formal book club in January 2020 and requested its Facebook and GoodReads community members to continue to share recommendations with each other. Her book picks focus on books and essays about equality and her group is a place for education and empowerment as much as an overall love of reading. This community continues to thrive on Goodreads, as well as Twitter and Instagram under the hashtag #oursharedshelf. On these platforms you will find book-lovers and feminists always discussing and recommending excellent titles. This is a lively community worth your membership.
