The Meldreth Men’s Book Club was established in June 2005 inspired by the formation of the Meldreth Women’s Book Club, which subsequently collapsed. We decided from the start that we would meet in gastropubs or restaurants, rather than in each other’s houses, so that we could focus uninterruptedly on the book under consideration. There are five members, drawn from a wide variety of professions.
We only read fiction. No non-fiction, plays or poetry, though narrative poems are allowable (e.g. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight). Books have to be reasonably short, usually 350 pages or less; the members are busy professionals and read them in moments snatched on train journeys or in the evenings or at weekends.
We settled on a fixed routine, from which we have not departed from the beginning, though a few additional refinements have been added. Each month, one member drives and chooses and books the venue. and one member brings along a short-list of six books, each with a brief description.
This usually means that there are a couple at least which nobody has read before. All of them must be currently in print and available. We vote on these. The proposer of the list does not vote, since it is assumed he would vote for them all; other members of the group can vote for as many books on the list as they like. The top one is purchased and read for the next meeting. If the voting is tied between two or three, we read them all, one a month. Books have been chosen from all periods and countries though on the whole we have stuck to the 19th and 20th centuries.
Some time after the beginning, we decided to rate books discussed on a scale of 1 to 5 and then more recently to rate the venues as well, for quality of food and value for money. Average scores are noted on a spreadsheet.
In recent years three of us have moved out of Meldreth into nearby villages, or into Cambridge, so it has become more difficult for everyone to be driven to the venue in one car, and we now tend to make our own way separately. Since one of us only has a bicycle, and not a car, the meetings are now generally held in or hear Cambridge.
In 2015 we celebrated our tenth anniversary, coinciding with our 100th book, by spending a literary weekend in Dublin. This involved a literary pub-crawl with a knowledgeable Irish guide who could quote large chunks of Ulysses from memory, visits to literary locations and museums, and discussions of several books by Irish authors over excellent meals. Commemorative mugs were issued (in a strictly limited edition) with tastefully designed logos giving the titles of the ten top-ranked books (in bright colours) on one side, and the titles of the ten bottom-ranked books (in blue and grey colours) on the other.
Our top-ranked book so far has been The Siege of Krishnapur, by J. G. Farrell, with Robinson Crusoe, by Daniel Defoe coming in a few points behind.
Our lowest score ‘hall of shame’ is shared by the following 4 books:
- Funeral in Berlin by Len Deighton
- The Italian Girl by Iris Murdoch
- Looking for Alaska by John Green
- Two Gentlemen Sharing by William Corlett