{"id":7847,"date":"2026-08-27T13:08:21","date_gmt":"2026-08-27T13:08:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=7847"},"modified":"2026-08-27T13:08:21","modified_gmt":"2026-08-27T13:08:21","slug":"is-reading-dead-not-at-the-bay-areas-thriving-silent-book-clubs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=7847","title":{"rendered":"Is reading dead? Not at the Bay Area’s thriving Silent Book Clubs"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u201cI wish we had a book club without homework,\u201d Guinevere de la Mare remembers telling her friend Laura Gluhanich back in 2012 when the two women \u2014 who\u2019d become friends over their mutual love of books \u2014 were catching up at a San Francisco wine bar.<\/p>\n

Read more Dolly Parton had plans for avatar show, musical, Billy the Kid cartoon before she died<\/a><\/p>\n

She\u2019d been feeling stressed about not having finished a recent book club selection and began imagining what it would be like to just sit and read with friends, rather than meet up to talk about what they\u2019d read.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s do it,\u201d Gluhanich said.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s how Silent Book Club started in San Francisco, according to de la Mare. Today, it\u2019s grown into a global movement described widely as \u201cintrovert happy hour,\u201d with more than 2,200 chapters in 70 countries and on all seven continents. Meetups have been held in locales as far-flung as Antarctica\u2019s McMurdo Station.<\/p>\n

But in the first couple of years, it was just Gluhanich and de la Mare. They started meeting up regularly to read, with just one rule: They had to each read one chapter of their respective books before they could start chatting. Soon, other friends heard about the practice and wanted to start their own reading gatherings. In 2015, Silent Book Club launched a website and social media accounts and began to formalize how people could start their own chapters.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom there, it really has just been an upward trajectory,\u201d de la Mare says. \u201cWe definitely saw the most significant growth after the pandemic. People were really, after lockdown, looking for ways to get back into the world in a safe, low-stakes way. Silent Book Club catered to that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The booming popularity of Silent Book Clubs stands in stark contrast to a series of statistics about the state of reading in the U.S.: A popular Atlantic article last month that confidently declared \u201cThe end of reading is here\u201d in its title cited reports that fewer than half of all adults reported having read a book in 2022, and that the proportion of Americans who read for pleasure on a given day fell to 16% in 2023 from 28% in 2004.<\/p>\n

Yet de la Mare remains bullish on the future of reading.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\u201cAre people sitting by the fire reading leather-bound hardcover classics in the evenings? Nope, that\u2019s definitely not happening as much anymore. Are young adults reading? Absolutely. Romantasy is booming,\u201d de la Mare says. \u201cIf you spend a minute on BookTok or talk to independent bookstore authors who are bringing communities together to rise up and fight against Amazon, there is a huge movement of people who are very passionate about reading.\u201d<\/p>\n

Younger people in the millennial and Gen Z cohorts are also combining reading with socializing to combat loneliness, she says. \u201cConnecting through books and book clubs is one of the ways they\u2019re doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Silent Book Clubs have established a strong presence in the Bay Area. The trademarked organization gives each chapter a license to use the brand, and organizers agree to follow the format: Hold a free meetup in a public place, and set aside an hour for quiet reading, with an option for people to stay and chat afterward. Beyond that, chapters are given flexibility to pick the time, frequency, location and method for publicizing their events, de la Mare says.<\/p>\n

As a result, bookstores, libraries and individuals have taken the template and run with it, building their own reader communities around the world. \u201cWe try to keep our arms as open as possible to make room for more readers,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

The meetups are particularly helpful for people who are new in town as a tool for making new friends, de la Mare adds. \u201cYou can identify as a book lover and find \u2018kindred spirits,\u2019 as Anne of Green Gables would say.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more I\u2019m a Walnut Creek native, and I don\u2019t hate calling it \u2018The Nut\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n

That\u2019s how Cleo Brock got involved with the San Jose Silent Book Club chapter. \u201cI\u2019d just moved to the Bay, and I didn\u2019t know anyone,\u201d she says. \u201cI ended up finding some really good friends through this. To dive into talking about how good a book was \u2014 or how bad \u2014 you realize how many other things you have in common with people who read, separate from literature.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brock, along with friends and co-moderators, Michelle Berg, Hannah Nielsen and Amy Ly, now run Silent Book Club events in San Jose and Campbell nearly every week, moving between libraries, cafes, parks and pubs, coordinating sessions for readers of different book formats \u2014 the group hosts monthly audiobook walks, and recently hosted a \u201cMatcha & Manga\u201d meetup at the Campbell cafe Maruwu Seicha.<\/p>\n

At Banter Bookshop, which opened in Fremont in 2022, around 10 to 20 people come to the store after hours on the second Wednesday of each month for Silent Book Club, according to owner Amy Davis.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been very positive for the store,\u201d she says. \u201cIt seems to bring a lot of joy to a lot of people.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a wide range of ages represented in the readers who attend the Fremont events, and some of the Banter Bookshop regulars are starting to build friendships. They seem to appreciate the hour of quiet time, as well as the opportunity to take a break from screens, Davis says.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we do have to pay attention to refocusing and building our stamina for focus,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s great to see people are still making it a priority.\u201d<\/p>\n

If You Go\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are chapters in Oakland, Concord, Richmond, Benicia, Pittsburg, South San Francisco, Millbrae, Burlingame, San Mateo, Redwood City, Sunnyvale, San Jose, Fremont, San Francisco and Santa Cruz. A new Silent Book Club chapter in Livermore is also in the works at Word on the Street Books, a new bookstore set to open later this summer.<\/p>\n

Or, if you\u2019ve got the time and money, the organization also offers reading retreats around the world, with upcoming destinations including Sardinia, the Colorado Rockies, Regency England and Vietnam.<\/p>\n

Go to silentbook.club to track down the meeting times for a convenient chapter near you.<\/p>\n

Read more Where are 49ers\u2019 big concerns entering preseason finale in Vegas?<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“I wish we had a book club without homework,” Guinevere de la Mare told her friend Laura Gluhanich back in 2012. “Let’s do it,” Gluhanich said. So began the Silent Book Club, now a global phenomenon. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7846,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-things-to-do"],"yoast_head":"\nIs reading dead? 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