Silent book clubs offer readers a low-pressure space to re-engage with the page | Canada Voices

Three years after the onset of the pandemic, it dawned on Rachel Pisani that she hadn’t finished a book the entire time.

She could hardly be blamed. More people are having trouble staying with a book to the end; life’s busy, our focus frayed from scrolling. Still, the realization landed heavier for Ms. Pisani: She’s a bookseller.

“Between COVID and parenting, I found myself unable to focus on anything,” said Ms. Pisani, a store manager at Queen Books in Toronto.

“I have two kids under 5 now so the days of free time are very much in my past – I get one evening a month to myself. How do I meet people? How do I talk about the things I like, which are books?”

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Ms. Pisani decided the only way would be to schedule uninterrupted reading time into her life, and then extend that opportunity to others. Last year, she launched Slow Burn, a quiet book club that she hosts at the shop, at bars and in parks. People show up with their own books, Ms. Pisani sets a timer and everyone reads in silence for an hour.

“For me, the way my life is, if I waited for the perfect opportunity to read, it would never come,” said Ms. Pisani, who at this month’s session was diving into On The Calculation of Volume, Danish writer Solvej Balle’s experimental opus about a woman trapped in a time loop, reliving the same day in perpetuity.

Silent reading groups like Ms. Pisani’s are mushrooming across the country, from Prince Rupert to Grande Prairie to Winnipeg to Charlottetown. Run by volunteers, the clubs take over bookstores, libraries, parks, cafés, bars and distilleries, readers huddled over their books in silence together.

“Welcome to introvert happy hour,” reads a tagline for Silent Book Club, which counts some 2,000 chapters around the world, including many in Canada. “BYOB (Bring Your Own Book),” the websites quip. “Quiet, screen-free joy is the goal,” reads a March invite from one chapter in Tisdale, Sask.

The groups are low-pressure, with no assigned readings or organized discussion. Still, the idea is for people to hold each other accountable when a hand reaches distractedly for a phone.

And, to socialize in person. In Toronto, after Ms. Pisani’s timer goes off, the readers go out, discussing what they’ve read, or not. “I facilitate the conversation, but I try not to camp-counsellor it and be like, ‘What did you think of the book?’ I don’t want to do that. That’s why it’s not a book club,” she said.

On a recent Friday, readers gathered in a greenhouse filled with flowers in Beaverlodge, Alta., estimated population 2,454. Bring Your Own Lawn Chair, the invite read.

“I just thought, wouldn’t it be wonderful to sit in a greenhouse where it smells amazing and read for an hour?” said Kirsten Clark, a 33-year-old college instructor who runs the town’s monthly club.

She’s found reading away from home, with others, lets her concentrate: “You’re somewhere separate without all those distractions. You’re not seeing your full laundry basket that should be thrown into the washer before you sit down and read.”

The group includes seniors, a father and daughter, and a woman who recently moved to town. “It’s a low-stress way to start making connections,” Ms. Clark said.

At the Vancouver chapter, every format of book is welcome: e-books, comic books, textbooks and audiobooks, with headphones. Pam Ang, a 30-year-old legal assistant, started the twice-a-month meetups, wanting a more relaxed book club.

“People tell me they wanted a way to devote a set time to reading but they didn’t want a traditional book club. They didn’t want to be chained to a certain book to participate,” Ms. Ang said.

For some, silent book clubs are bringing back reading for pleasure, after long spells of going without. Finishing an English literature degree – mountains of books to read and dissect on deadline – artist Kim Stevens felt “read out.”

“Reading for pleasure? What is that?” laughed Ms. Stevens, who’s now 58 and co-owns a creative community space in Toronto.

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By the time she joined the Slow Burn nights at Queen Books, she was reading for the love of it again. She’s dipping into various genres: memoir (Patti Smith’s Bread of Angels), historical fiction romance (Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Atmosphere, about a female astronaut), and self-help (The Mountain is You: Transforming Self-Sabotage into Self-Mastery).

“Even though it’s just an hour of reading, it’s very restorative,” Ms. Stevens said.

Nakul Upadhya, a University of Toronto doctoral student in machine learning, finds the sessions temper his workaholism.

“As a PhD student, most of your time is crying and dying over paper submission deadlines,” said Mr. Upadhya, 26. “If I have a deadline in two weeks, I’ll read an academic paper instead of a book. There’s that hustle mindset.”

The Slow Burn reading club decelerates his pace. At this month’s session, he dug into Red Rising, Pierce Brown’s dystopian science fiction novel.

“To hustle later, you do need to chill now,” Mr. Upadhya said. “You need to take some time to recharge, to appreciate company and stuff that’s not your work.”

He also likes that this form of social networking is free: He brings his library book and that’s it.

Today, the movement is branching out to reading retreats, an unhurried form of travel that builds reading time into each day. Slow Travel Co. brings women together to travel and read, with trips planned for Aruba, Maine and the Maldives in the coming months. Silent Book Club will host its own retreats in Italy and Iceland this year. “You’ll be surrounded by fellow readers who understand the need for both connection and solitude, coming together for meals and adventures, then drifting back into the comfort of your own story,” reads the Iceland invite.

Silent reading groups are part of a wider shift to socializing offline. Earlier this month, the Amsterdam chapter of The Offline Club brought 300 people together at a 17th-century church to read, paint, craft, write letters and play boardgames, with live piano accompaniment.

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“People join to slow down from the rush of life, get set hours for focused, undistracted reading and be in a calm space where they can meet like-minded people without any phones in sight,” said Ilya Kneppelhout, co-founder of The Offline Club.

With some phone-free events, there’s socializing but also some built-in distance: You’re reading your own book, knitting your own sweater, gluing your own collage, alongside others.

Research suggests there’s value to these semi-solitary, social pursuits, a 2024 study concluding they boost connection and restore energy.

That’s part of the appeal, Ms. Stevens says.

“It brings together people of different ages who share a common interest in putting their phones down and experiencing time together in real life, as opposed to separately.”