Reading Groups

Tomorrow is National Reading Group Day in the UK.
Reading Groups are a good thing.

Getting together and talking about books is fun. Reading groups can help you find all sorts of things you wouldn't have otherwise, it's great for people who want to broaden their reading experience. And if you find yourself with a book you don't care for, well even an unfinished book can be an experience. Besides the books that members don't agree on are often the ones that stimulate the most debate.

At the moment I belong to, and co-run, a teenage group at work.
This has led me to read a variety of books I might not have otherwise, and also made me appreciate (or at times become annoyed at) the teenage book market. There's a lot of good stuff out, and some absolutely brilliant authors (Sarah Dessen, Tabitha Suzuma & Jaclyn Moriarty, to name a few) - however there is a ridiculous quantity of paranormal romance, or books packaged to look like paranormal romance.
The teenage group is good because all the members read what they like, or what they come across, then recommend books and authors to the others, or sometimes warn them off.
This is nice way to run a group as it means there's no pressure to obtain and read a particular book and it allows people with different reading styles to meet and chat and expand their reading.

I sometimes think I'd like to join an adult group too, although I think I'd probably go for a genre specific one. Or one that deviates from the standard one-book-in-one-month format, as I have way too much to read as it is.