Guest Post by Cindy Hudson: Author of Book by Book: The Complete Guide to Creating Mother-Daughter Book Clubs

Attention Moms (especially moms with daughters)! My friend and writing colleague Cindy Hudson has a wonderful new book out called Book by Book: The Complete Guide to Creating Mother-Daughter Book Clubs. If you're a mom with a daughter who loves to read (or a daughter with a mom who loves to read), this book is for you! Here is Cindy's story...

When I started out in my first mother-daughter book club nearly nine years ago I wasn’t expecting to change my life. I was merely looking to create a place where my nine-year-old daughter could be around people who loved to read as much as she did. At first I believe that’s all our group meant to most of us. We gathered once a month at each other’s houses during the school year to share a meal and discuss a book we had read. It was lots of fun., but nothing more.

As the months slipped by and turned into years, I began to realize just how much book club insinuated itself into the rest of our lives. That was especially true after I started another club with my younger daughter. My daughters and I read book-club books out loud between meetings, and we often talked about what we read as we went along. Through the characters on a page we talked about friends who support you and others who abandon you, first kisses, love, and heartbreak. We traveled through words to war-torn Sarajevo, China, Italy, and just down the street in our own hometown.

The magic of book club didn’t take place just in our own home. It wove a spell around all of us, binding our group together. Each time we met we were equals, not just a group of moms and daughters. The opinions and insights of the daughters were just as valuable in discussions as those of the moms. In this one area at least, we shared power with our daughters, and so we helped them gain confidence in themselves over the years.

We also created of community of friends we all knew we could rely on if we needed help. We brought food when someone was sick or suffered a family loss. We picked up each other’s children from school when we couldn’t get there ourselves. We went out together to restaurants, movies and plays. And occasionally, we went away to spend the weekend together. For me, mother-daughter book club provided the added benefit of helping me become a first-time author when I published a guidebook to help other moms start clubs of their own.

I often hear moms ask whether they should start a mother-daughter book clubs. “Is it worth it? I don’t know how I can make the time to be in one,” they say. I tell them they’ll never regret a single minute of the time they spend with their daughters reading the pages of a book.

Cindy Hudson is the author of Book by Book: The Complete Guide to Creating Mother-Daughter Book Clubs (Seal Press, October 2009). She is the founder of two long-running mother-daughter book clubs, and she lives in Portland, Oregon with her husband and two daughters. Visit her online at www.MotherDaughterBookClub.com and www.MotherDaughterBookClub.wordpress.com.

Comments

[Ellen Saunders]

Cindy's description of the mother-daughter book club experience brings tears to my eyes. I can relate - my daughter's and my life have been wonderfully enriched by belonging to a m-d book club for many years. I highly recommend starting one to anyone looking for a way to bond with their daughter... and Cindy's book is a great resource for starting one and making it work. Thanks, Cindy, and Kristin!