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Found out my book club picks way more books by men than women
I was looking at our reading list from the past two years and counted the authors. Out of 24 books, only 7 were written by women. I found this out when I was making a list for a friend who wanted to join. It really surprised me because we always talk about wanting diverse voices. I guess we just never paid attention to the numbers. It makes me wonder if we're missing out on some great stories. Maybe we just pick what gets talked about a lot online. Has your club ever checked its own list like this? How did you fix it if you saw a problem?
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thea_bell3d ago
I saw that part about making a pie chart and it's so true. My group had the same kind of shock when we actually looked at our list. We didn't make a hard rule, but we started taking turns picking and the person who picks has to find at least three options by women or non-binary authors for everyone to vote on. It sounds like a small thing but it totally changed what books even got on our radar. We were just picking from the same pool of books everyone talks about. Now we find way more interesting stuff.
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the_hayden4d ago
My friend's sci-fi club in Austin had the same issue. They read 15 books last year and only three were by women. One member made a simple pie chart and it was a real wake-up call. Now they have a rule where every other pick has to be from a non-male author. It forced them to look harder and they found some amazing stuff they would have missed.
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