Back in the waning years of the last millennium when pages were turned, books were read, and people gathered together in real space and time for socially un-distanced discussions, my literary path to demise began. As common with most closely kept confessions, this is not something I discuss openly with my literati buddies.

I would like to blame it on the likes of Susan Sontag, Katha Pollitt, even Carolyn Forché and other enlightened writers but that would be tremendously unfair to them. Clearly, I had the rotten luck of stumbling into a highly actualized group of readers during a time when I had barely enough wherewithal to find a suitable clean, dry blouse to wear. Having given birth to my second baby within two years only a week previous, I agreed to join my gracious neighbor Nancy’s book club meeting at her house one dark Midwestern winter evening. Oh, the allure of adult conversation, of well-read, established women with lives well beyond nurturing and diapers, I was excited at the prospect. As soon as I entered Nancy’s lovely foyer, I experienced the stark lessons of book club lore:

– every long-standing member will tell you how long they have been a member, in fact, truth be known, each one of them single-handedly created the book club

– customs vary but famous-for-that-dessert seems to trump discussion of any book only perhaps to be topped by a choice libation

– facilitator or no facilitator, that is the question, whether tis nobler:

– facilitator? Maybe there is hope. No facilitator? Caveat emptor for me being the only librarian in the room, yes books were my busman’s holiday

– And the drama of picking the next book, house, dessert, yes customs vary, but is it ever easy?

So mea culpa for sitting on Nancy’s lovely davenport praying that my milk would not come in until I could make an early exit that would not seem rude to my hostess and her friends. At that point in my career, I had already been the director of a college library, and a corporate library manager. My reasoning behind even trying to join a book club was to regain some semblance of sociability and brain capacity while raising my brood. And honestly, the thought never crossed my mind that I would even have an opportunity until Nancy had generously invited me to attend her meeting just a few doors down the block.

As I scurried home holding onto myself, what I felt on the release from this literary tension was the exalting freedom to read whatever and whenever I chose, a freedom I had not valued three hours earlier. There was no question that I would never return and my only concern there was being grateful to Nancy for her largesse. I started to ponder why others even subject themselves to the tyranny of forced reading as a vehicle for social interaction. Over the next few years, I did have a series of other fits and starts trying to answer the “should” call, but nothing stuck.

Until that is, several years later, when you could find my photo in the dictionary next to the definition of “irony”.

My kidlets were now in the hands of the public school system and I was ready for the next step in my library career. Full disclosure, I was seeking the school schedule as much as professional fulfillment. And as it turns out, life as a high school librarian has its benefits if you could learn to enjoy toying with teen angst. But, hold onto your bookmarks, to my amusement and slight dismay, irony of ironies, what became a highlight of that decade in my career? The student book club that I co-sponsored, of course.

The Reader’s Society met during lunch periods in a private alcove of the library that I had furnished to look salon-esque. Our members joined the club from every level of academic achievement, from advanced placement to special education, boys and girls, every facet of diversity and orientation was represented including first-generation Americans and children whose parents had been students there. It was joyful and a wonderment to me that these students joined of their own accord, no credit, no accountability required or offered. At one point, I asked one of our brightest stars what she got out of the experience and Christy looked at me and understood that I was sincere in my query.

Christy told me that she had the same students in all her advanced classes. That they shared a point of view and a drive to succeed and that it could be oppressive. The book club was the only time she was with everyone, where there was no leveling or ulterior motives lurking. She learned from everyone and loved the comfort of discussing books without the pressure of performance or achievement, our readers were fearless, free, and accepting. We had wide readers who shared their passion for their favorite genres, we read Cat’s Cradle and A Prayer for Owen Meany, The Princess Bride, and Frankenstein, we went on field trips to have discussions in bookstores and on college campuses. It was a delicious literary experience that still catches my heart when I pass a title we read together.

I continued to have other near misses with book clubs I felt compelled to try, but frankly, I learned over time that my favorite literary habitats were not the contemporary authors that everyone assumes I read, but the classics. And not those at the top of the cultural literacy lists that some book clubs enjoy but mostly Anthony Trollope if my confessions are to be trusted. Trollope, why Trollope I hope you are asking? A few thousand pages ago I do not think that I knew the answer, but I think that I have finally figured it out and this reasoning is a little shocking, and then there is that slight dismay in the mix.

My revelation is that I enjoy Trollope so dearly because he and I are in a very intimate book club, a conversation consisting of author and reader. Trollope is there with his readers, hearing the story with them, questioning characters’ motives, wondering why the author might or might not include some bit of background.

For example, in The Small House in Allington (1862), Trollope writes,

On the next day Lily Dale went down to the Small House of Allington, and so she passes out of our sight. I can only ask the reader to believe that she was in earnest, and express my own opinion, in this last word that I shall ever write respecting her, that she will live and die as Lily Dale.

And how about this in the conclusion of his six-book Barsetshire chronicle: “And now, if the reader will allow me to seize him affectionately by the arm, we will together take our last farewell of Barset and of the towers of Barchester…”

If Trollope does not resonate, how about someone a century more modern like William Maxwell? In The Chateau (1961) Maxwell engages with his readers thusly (italics are Maxwell’s):

“Why didn’t they answer her letters? It isn’t like them.
I’ll get around to that in a minute. One thing at a time. She blew the lamp out –
We have to hear about the lamp?
Yes. And settled herself between the damp sheets.”

I confess that authors to whom I gravitate take their readers into their confidences both subtly and outright explicitly. Here I would include a random selection of other favorites like Alan Paton, Nadine Gordimer, Banana Yoshimoto, and Our Ms.s Woolf and Oates. The suspension of time and place that reading affords us is a singular experience and it stands to reason that the human condition encourages group discussion and understanding. Honestly, I love that there are thriving book clubs for thee but not for me. And you know, maybe one day …not…

Finally, I must confess, as my personal humanity continually impels me to traverse that literary road not taken *sorry Oprah, not-so-sorry Reese* I am contently resolved to leave all the desserts and bottles of Rosé for sociable readers to enjoy, with my blessing.

– Gail Bush

Author’s Note: In “Confessions,” I am confessing my most vulnerable literary self to the reader. I am trusting that it is safe with you.