My Search For The Next Best Book

*Note* The below blog post is a guest blog from our Twitter friend Lori, founder of “The Next Best Book Club.” This content does not necessarily reflect the views of Better World Books (as our lawyers make sure we say). We love having guest bloggers and invite you to email [email protected] if you are interested in covering a book or topic on the BWB Blog. Thank you, Lori!

More times than not, after people discover TNBBC and its blog, they will ask me “So, what got you into reading?” and I always find it difficult to answer that question. Not because I don’t know the answer, but mostly because it’s not as easy to define as one would think.

See, initially, I owe my love of reading to my mother. She planted the seed at young age with weekly trips to the library. I remember hiding out in my bedroom, reading ravenously, finishing the books I’d borrowed days before our next scheduled trip. I remember peeking through my mother’s bookshelves, and sneaking down a copy of Stephen King’s IT when I was 12, and terrifying the crap out of myself for weeks yet refusing to put it down because it was just that good. I remember going through a period of reading only the books that my high school English Lit classes assigned us and simultaneously enjoying them while being somewhat underwhelmed by them. And somehow, shortly after that, reading sort of fell to the wayside.

Then I suddenly fell back into a regular reading pattern as an adult. At first, I would read what was lying around, and then run out to the bookstore to buy another book when I was done. Soon, I was buying three or four at a time. Before I knew it, I was buying more books in a week than I could read, and was building up quite a backlog. When I had bought all of the books I had wanted, I started searching online for books that were similar to the ones I had been reading, and adding them to my to-buy list.

It was around this time that I discovered Goodreads.com. Goodreads offers readers a way to “shelve” and track the books they want to buy, bought but haven’t read, and we can post reviews on the ones we have read. The site also gives readers a way to connect with other readers via book groups, many of which I quickly joined. Disappointed with the participation in the existing groups, I decided to create a group of my own. I wanted it to be a place where readers could recommend books to each other, and talk about which books they were buying, and reading, and enjoying. I wanted to find people out there who were like me, endlessly seeking the next best book. Thus I christened the group “The Next Best Book Club.”

Dubbed TNBBC by its original members, The Next Best Book Club turns 4 in September and has the incredible honor of being the largest, most active group on Goodreads. In addition to discussing what we are currently reading and seeking recommendations from one another, we also nominate and vote in monthly group reads. In addition to those, I also have the unique ability to host monthly author/reader group discussions. Authors and publishers agree to supply TNBBC with a book giveaway, and the author of the book agrees to participate in a discussion of their novel with the winners of their book for the entire month in which the book is being featured. I love seeing the authors and readers interact with one another.

The interaction between author, publisher, and reader is what continues to fuel my love of reading. So, what keeps you reading?

What do you like most about online book groups and why? What do you like least? Thanks for your input in helping make the Better World Books community better for you.