Book Clubs

Book Club Service: How We Can Support You and Your Club

What is the Book Club Service?
  • We find the book titles you request for your club. We bring these in through interlibrary loan prior to your book club meeting.

How do I register my Club for the service?
  • Contact Kate at the library, by phone at 687-3382 or Megan
  • You must have a book club name and a main contact or club convenor as well as a second contact in order to register. Print the Registration Form or stop by the library for a copy.

Can any book title be requested through this service?
  • Almost! Most book titles are available; however these must be a minimum of six months old as public libraries do not interlibrary loan new items. Newer titles, especially best sellers, are often difficult to bring in because of popularity. In this case we recommend the convenor provide another title.
  • Convenors are asked to provide the library with a list of accurate titles, authors, and the dates for each monthly book club meeting. Special requests for different formats such as audio or large print needs to be included.
  • Any request for a specific title needs to be provided at least two months in advance in order for us to get the books in from other libraries, any later and there is no guarantee the book will be in before the meeting.
  • We greatly appreciate getting a full list of titles in advance of the year's meetings. Please feel free to use our form.

How does the library fill the requests for Book Club books?
  • Interlibrary loan staff members send out an email to all participating public libraries in Ontario asking for the requested title.
  • When a response is received we request the title directly from the other library. The number of libraries sending the book determines how many copies GPL will have available for the Book Club.
  • Books can take anywhere from five to ten business days to arrive once ordered. Please note, delays do occur around stat holidays and during a shutdown period of two weeks at Christmas and New Year's as book deliveries do not take place. Additional time for filling requests is required at this time of year. We greatly appreciate your patience when delays in the delivery of items do occur.
  • Once the books arrive these may require additional processing if the title is not in GPL's catalogue.
  • When the books are ready, the Book Club convenor is contacted and they are responsible for contacting their Book Club members with the book information.

Can I place a hold on my Book Club book?
  • The answer is yes if the book is in the library's collection.
  • If we do not have the book in our library, staff will manually record your name/library card number and a hold will be placed by order of request date when the books become available

What do I have to provide in order to pick up my Book Club book?
  • Library staff need the accurate title of the book, the author, your Book Club name, the name of your convenor and your GPL library card.

Are there any resources you can recommend for use at our Book Club?
  • Yes absolutely! A great digital resource GPL library users have access to through our website is Novelist Plus where you can search among hundreds of thousands of popular fiction and readable nonfiction titles. Find author read-alikes, book lists, book discussion guides, and more.
  • There's Fantastic Fiction with over 40,000 bestselling author bibliographies with all the latest books, covers and descriptions.
  • What about GoodReads? Visit this site and meet your next favourite book.
  • Here's a few more:

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