Mammouth Café
#mastobookclub
Has #mastobookclub came to an agreement on a book? If not, maybe we can take a vote? 🤷♀️
My suggestion for the first club reading in category, FANTASY, is @welshpixie 's NaNoWriMo book, "Spacegal Fruitpie and the Quest for a Good, Meaty Sausage" (if not considered too SCIFI or EROTIC), which means waiting until the end of the month for her to finish.
Or, if you're really in a hurry, @signalstation 's book, Microwave Coven (99 cents), (unless that's considered too horror genre).
It might be nice to start with a Masto-authored title. ;)
@felyn @Waldenpond @wilkinsmicawber @lostnbronx @And_Zoidberg @mrgah @artemysia @clhendricksbc @katebowles @lauraritchie @ShorterPearson @Tdorey @oreolek @tricycles @spacekookie @lyndi_hopkins @katrani @taiQuinn
This is going to work better if people remember to use the #mastobookclub hashtag, which a lot of people are not yet doing. ;)
Also, see my other toots in that stream about potential comm problems.
In case people don't know how it works yet, at least on the desktop browser UI. You can add a pinned column for the #mastobookclub hash (or any other hashtag you want to follow).
First search for the hashtag, then click the hash result to display the hash's stream, then click the parameters icon at top-right of the column to find the "Pin column" option, and check it.
This will keep the column in your UI until you "Unpin" it.
Finally, there is the eventual matter of sharing our thoughts about the book. That will need some thinking about too for similar reasons — 500 chars will seem very confining.
But who knows... We're exploring. Maybe we just cross that bridge when the time comes.
Cont...
Second, there may be those times you're in a sub-group conversation (a few people only). In such cases, it's better to put the name of the person your responding to at the very top of your toot, and the names of others underneath. This makes it clear which person one is specifically talking/responding to so there's no confusion among others who should be primarily paying attention.
Cont...
Three more considerations on comms...
First, it's not going to be practical (very soon) to @ reply all interested participants in a toot each time like people are doing now. There won't be any room to say anything else, or even mention everyone. I suggest people just use the hashtag as the conversation key to follow, and reply only to people asking questions, or to no one at all if you're only making a general comment.
Cont...
Probably most important, everyone would need to be willing to step outside their preferred domain once in a while (not every time); read something they might not normally choose to read. In my opinion, that's where the give/take value of a book club comes from.
Otherwise you'll have to narrow the club down to a specific genre or two and people will join or not based on those choices.
As for how this works, since it seems many are curious but intentionally on the sidelines, you'd probably want to keep it very flexible — a revolving-door club. A given person could participate in one round and skip out on the next, etc depending on their tastes/interests in books and time availability during that period.
Book selections would be group votes, of course, based on proposed ideas and within a set period of time, sufficient to make a fair choice?
I think this is a good idea, and you've certainly got enough interested to go with it. Just need a hashtag to bring conversation together and give others something to follow.
Maybe this mashup is too obvious/typical, but it's something I'd easily remember, and clear...