The Club Makes a Match

A love match, that is. With a book.

For those that thought it was with a human, I say to you: we have enough friends already, and have you been on Hinge recently?

The nose miners (I mean children) of New York City return to school today, an experience rife with matches: will your homeroom teacher be the mysterious youngish man, or the fossil the building was constructed around? Will your bestie be waiting for you in 5th period English, or will she be living it up with the rest of your friends in Bio, leaving you with an incurable case of FOMO? As the girl who bought her school supplies in July, my nostalgia peaks this time of year. I even perused the supply aisle in Target to see if anything has changed since my days of color coordinating Mead notebooks (it hasn’t). And while I’ll never feel the thrill of reading my class schedule for the first time again, I can find out what books I should be reading from the library.

The Brooklyn Public Library offers Bklyn BookMatch to card-carrying bibliophiles and anyone who walks in off the street. The free service provides a customized, five-book reading list for you, personally created by a librarian. I discovered this in a newsletter, when it announced the BPL would be offering book matches live for one day only in the Central Library. I thought they did that everyday, being librarians.

I went after work, completed a form…and then got too hungry to wait the 30 minutes for my recs. But now I’m here and committed to finding recommendations not for myself, but for the club. Because there will be a time when we need a solid pick because we waited too long to send AM our choice and she’s written us off.

I’ve kept our reading preferences purposefully vague, and not just because it’s our modus operandi. I’m curious to see what the librarian selects for us. I’ve provided our last read, and well as our current selection. I’ve also noted that we’re willing to try any book once, because they put a word limit on sharing dislikes. Anyone that knows The Club will know our scorn can never be shackled.

I’m so excited to share our matches with you…in two weeks. Which is about the same time it takes the average Murray Hill male to reply to your witty comment about his summer vacation story in your dating app chat.

Until then, I’m sorry the tiny humans will be taking all the subway seats on your commute.

 

EV

 

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The Club Sharpens Its Pencils

Today is the first day of school in NYC, meaning all those empty seats on the subway during this sweaty summer will now be filled by pre-pubescents who have yet to discover the magic of anti-perspirant. Instead of their stench, however, I will be remembering the sweet scent of fresh looseleaf in a binder so obnoxiously bright, I could have landed a plane with it. Back to school shopping was my favorite; I once asked my mother to go to Staples the week after school ended. Color-coding my notebooks and folders by class helped me start the school year on the right foot, along with consulting my friends on their schedules as soon as the envelopes hit our mailboxes. A part of me would be lying if I said the long weekend didn’t make me want to pop into the nearest stationary store for a new notepad, or investigate who would also be taking AP Lit.

Instead, I bring you the next best thing: back-to-school reading, which will definitely put you in the collegiate state of mind, if you weren’t there already. Lit Hub pulled together a comprehensive list of campus novels to transport you to ivy-covered halls, or wherever you wished you had gone to school. No recommendations of your own, you ask? Well, the greatest campus of all would be Hogwarts, so I would certainly suggest dusting off your copies and heading to Platform 9 3/4, especially as Harry and the gang are celebrating 20 years. But why would I need to provide any additional recs, when Lit Hub has proposed THIRTY titles to suit all your desires?

For example, want to read about campus cults? Sign up for The Secret History. Feeling like this is the year you’ll reach #relationshipgoals? Possession, My Education, and The Virgins cover a variety of directions your relationship could go in. I’m devouring the copy of Eligible I picked up during our book brunch, so I’m definitely looking to score a copy of Prep (and if you haven’t, read EW’s interview with the author about her debut novel, and how that cover came to be). Tana French has also been on my list for a while; I’ll be pushing her closer to the top of my TBR list with The Secret Place.

Have a favorite not included on this list? All you teacher’s pets can leave them in the comments section.

 

–E

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