> The discussion goes on for one or two hours before it runs out of gas, and then the group picks the next book, and you agree to meet in another month or six w

> The discussion goes on for one or two hours before it runs out of gas, and then the group picks the next book, and you agree to meet in another month or six weeks. I have been running a book club for the past year and a half and that is a fair summary of how it goes. It is definitely hard to keep a discussion on topic for more than a couple of hours without it becoming a generic social event, especially if there are late arrivals. Productivity of work meetings tends to approach zero after an hour; so why should it be different for book clubs? Denser books should require more discussion, but doing it in a single session is hard. The social aspect is fun and is a part of why I run the book club I do, but it is a competing priority with the book itself and different people in the club prioritize the two differently. The prioritization changes for everyone as time progresses and the amount of alcohol consumed increases. Recommendation of having smaller meetings while the book is in progress deserves a trial. I will adopt it for the next book in my club. While we are holding these virtually, it seems that people are having easier time parceling an hour of their evening time so this will be practical. There are a few things that differentiates my book club from the authors description of how a typical book club operates. Firstly, I select the book that I want to read and I think my friends will enjoy that is of appropriate time investment. This means there is no griping about book selection and having to competing desires of multiple people. Secondly there is a set schedule: 7:30pm on the first Monday of every other month at my apartment. This means there is no griping about choice of venue (an issue in NYC) and rescheduling to fit prior commitments the participants have. I make an announcement on Facebook and people have a choice to participate or not. This has been working out rather well with turns outs of somewhere between half a dozen to a dozen friends depending on the book. Conversations have been good and organizational investment very reasonable.