I love to read. I consider myself a fairly voracious reader finishing about two books a month. Which is why I have been a member of about a million different types of book clubs. Most of them involve super light reads (think Shopoholic series), plenty of wine drinking and lots of complaining about our kids/husbands/jobs etc.
Until now.
Enter Well Read Mom– the Catholic woman’s (no need to be a mom) book club!
From their website, “Well-Read Mom (WRM) is more than a book club. It’s a way to accompany one another in reading the classics, great books and timeless spiritual works from the Western and Christian traditions in order to nurture our hearts and moral imaginations.” Their motto is to “Read More, Read Well.”
WRM curates a fabulous yearly book list based on a specific theme. Last year was “The Year of the Contemplative” and included reads like The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis and Hard Times by Charles Dickens. Membership in the organization costs $40 and gets you the reading list, a companion reading guide that contains information about the author and discussion questions, plus really great monthly podcasts focused on the latest read. Our group meetings have been so fruitful and rich; full of laughter and some tears too. Something about reading a really good book together, decoding the characters and their intentions and then discovering our different takes on them has created a deep bond between this small group of women in my community. We don’t all always finish the book and we don’t all always make it to the meetings. But everyone understand because, like the characters we are often reading about, life can get complicated and busy.
Last spring, I had the absolute pleasure of meeting Marcie Stockman, the founder of WRM.
What a joy she is to be around! Full of thoughtful questions and a true desire to know me and the other women in our local WRM group. She just leaves you with a warm and happy feeling in your heart. She reminded me of why it’s important to keep finding the time to read– I’m a better mom when I take a little time for myself. My kids get to see me doing something I love; something I hope they will learn to love too.
There’s no better time than the fall to start a Well-Read Mom book club. Check out their website for more information and to start a group of your own. Happy Reading
