One of the things I love about my book group is that we adapt. Our book group leader will say that a night we planned to meet does not work for her, and then we will chime in on what alternatives are available to make our meeting happen. We often vote on a night to meet. We also vote on what to read. And if someone misses a meeting, we will have a conversation about the book that they missed when we get together again.
Some of the best book discussions that my group has had is when we come to a meeting “fired up” to talk about a book, whether or not we all liked it. That is what happened this month when we read CLASS: A Memoir of Motherhood, Hunger, and Higher Education by Stephanie Land. A couple of us had read Stephanie's MAID: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive and watched the Netflix series based on it. There was a lot of talk about some of Stephanie’s choices, which spurred a bigger discussion about class in America today. We touched on specific things from the book that had surprised us, as well as what we do as a country for people in Stephanie’s shoes.