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Reading the write way |
2008-09-02 |
By Trey Alverson |
 Sarah Trowbridge ‘puts together incredible venue’ Earlier this year Fayette County library director Christeen Snell started receiving requests for a possible library reading group.
Snell turned the idea over to second-year librarian Sarah Trowbridge and now the popular book discussion group is entering its sixth active month.
“Because of Sarah’s efforts, this book club is the best thing to happen around here since coconut cake,” Snell said.
“With this group, we’re seeing people in here that we’ve never seen before. Sarah has put together an incredible venue for the discussion of literature that is both inspiring and educational for everybody involved.”
In response to the initial public input, Trowbridge developed a survey to gauge interest in what type books library patrons would like to read and discuss.
By April, a meeting time and an initial book had been selected. The group meets at the library at 7:00 p.m. on the third Thursday of each month.
When more than a dozen people showed up on a Thursday evening in late April to discuss E. M. Forster’s classic novel Howard’s End, Trowbridge was pleasantly surprised.
“I didn’t have a set of questions prepared,” Trowbridge said.
“I generally just tried to keep the discussion on topic and that format has continued to work well.”
Trowbridge stated that word of mouth has increased the number of people involved each month.
When the group met Aug. 21 to discuss Susan Orlean’s non-fiction bestseller The Orchid Thief, Trowbridge found herself scrambling at the last minute to find more chairs.
“People talk to their friends and tell them about the group,” Trowbridge explained.
“I set up an email list to solicit inputs for upcoming reading selections. The response has been outstanding. We have a core group of eight or nine readers who come back every month, but each meeting, we get a handful of first time attendees.”
Snell said that one of the groups’ major draws is hearing about the different ways people perceive what they read.
“It is amazing to me sometimes that everybody has read the same book. We get so many different interpretations and ideas,” Snell exclaimed.
“It really opens your eyes and gives you a more fulfilling reading experience.”
Trowbridge added that she varies the genres of the books selected to keep the group open to a vast array of different literary tastes.
“We’ve done classics like Howard’s End and contemporary fiction. The Orchid Thief was one of our non-fiction selections. In June we read The Book Thief which is actually considered by some as a book for young adults,” Trowbridge noted.
“Our May selection was Saints at the River by southern novelist Ron Rash. Also in May Rash held a speaking engagement here at the library that several book club members attended.”
Saul Bellow’s The Adventures of Augie March is the group’s September book. The expansive 1953 novel about the protagonist and his coming of age in Chicago is widely considered one of the best American novels of the 20th century.
Readers will have an extra week to follow Augie through his 500 pages of adventures, as the next meeting has been moved to Sept. 25 to accommodate a library book sale.
Copies of The Adventures of Augie March are available for check out at the Fayette County library in Fayetteville.
Trowbridge encourages anyone interested in the book group to pick up a copy and join the discussion.
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