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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
Entertainment
Stephanie Convery

Silence please: how book clubs without the chat help focus the mind

Elevated view of people sitting on chairs reading books
Silent book clubs have become global since one began in 2012 in San Francisco, with chapters opening on every continent. Photograph: Andriy Popov/Alamy

It’s commuter hour on a late-summer morning and the sun is still stretching through the leafy canopy of Melbourne’s Queen Victoria Gardens. In the cool, concrete sanctuary of MPavilion – the city’s annual architecture installation/event space/public shelter – a small group of people sit reading. Some recline on beanbags, some perch on stools; others lean against the fluted concrete wall, breeze running through their hair. For close to an hour, nobody speaks; they just read.

This is Silent Book Club, where there is no required book list, no entry fee, no organised discussion. Just reading, quietly, in company.

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