I have always been a reader, and lately, I’m reading even more than usual, as I’ve discovered a very basic principle: time spent reading a book is time not spent doomscrolling on my phone. When the urge to mindlessly click arises, I’ve been reaching for a good, old-fashioned paperback instead.

I’m not at all opposed to e-readers (I’m a Boox guy), but lately, I’m really just enjoying everything about physical books: the heft, the smell, the roughness of the pages.

I’m also feeling the urge to connect with people around the books I’m reading, and man, that’s a problem.

Every online somewhat-social book community or app has its own set of gotchas. Goodreads is owned by a supervillain, Storygraph is leaning into AI (and made me feel about 900 years old seeing how The Youths are interacting with books), Book Wyrm is at least federated but there isn’t anyone using it, and so on, and so on. I keep logging stuff on Hardcover - feels like the most promising of the bunch, but boy, my tastes are out of sync with most of the other users there.

And even if these apps weren’t problematic, I’m discovering that basically, everyone else in the world is wrong about books. There’s a very specific kind of rage reading a smug, condescending book review about a book you love that’s obviously written by a 16-year old going through their clove cigarette and coffee phase (although, maybe clove-flavored vape these days?).

My buddy Kieran thinks the fundamental nature of reading (people don’t read as much or as often as they consume other kinds of media) means the elusive Letterboxd-for-books is simply impossible. He’s much smarter than me so I assume he’s right.

Real world book interactions aren’t much better. I’ve never been in a book club. I would like to join one - the local bookshop has several, as does the local library. However, I cannot find one that (a) reads books I want to read and (b) isn’t entirely women. I just don’t see any way to show up without looking like a creep. And based on what’s being read locally, I’d just be stealing wine while nodding about a book I wouldn’t read in a million years.

I thought about starting a book club for dudes, but that seems fraught - feels like it’s a bit of a needle to thread if you don’t want to end up manosphere-adjacent.

There is a science fiction book club in town. It’s managed via Facebook. When I asked if I could find out the books and meeting times because I don’t use Facebook, I was told that “out of respect for the club president’s time” details would only be posted to Facebook, full stop.

So right now, here’s what I’m thinking: I either (a) just read and keep my thoughts to myself, or (b) experiment with self-hosting something like Jelu and inviting only the people I know I can talk books with to use it. The convenience of an online space, but curated to non-dipshits. Or at least the right kind of dipshit.

Has anyone out there come up with a good solution for this dilemma?