There Will Be No Tapping Out

When I was eight my grade three teacher was giving away kittens. And being an eight-year-old girl in a brand new school, with absolutely no friends, I needed that kitten. I begged and pleaded with my parents and when that didn't work I busted out the last weapon I had.

Puppy dog eyes.

My father was unable to resist and later that day I found myself walking home with a tiny black and white kitten tucked safely inside my orange nylon McDonald's backpack. Which is basically the same thing as walking around with a cat inside a pillowcase.

SO. MUCH. PAINFUL. FUN.

I named that kitten Casper and he was my very best friend. We did everything together. Which wasn't a lot because he was a cat who resented being carted around in a sac and I was an eight year old girl who finally made friends and spent more time on a playground than I did at home.

But Casper was my cat and I loved him and there was one thing we did together every night and that was hide under my covers at night with a book and a flashlight and read. When Casper was young he'd try and bat at all the pages and pounce on my head and my dad would hear me hissing at him to behave so he'd wander into my room with a rolled up newspaper to swat the cat and confiscate my flashlight.


Casper came back from the grave and wants to read with me. Or you know, my daughter's cat, FLUFFNUTS, wants to come in to eat. WHICHEVER.


That's when I soon learned I didn't need light to read. I could squint by the light of the moon and even though my eyes are now shot, it was totally worth it. Casper and I were reading buddies. It was the very first book club I was ever in.

Since then, I've avoided joining book clubs like I've avoided getting the herp. Only I was more successful in avoiding book clubs. Every now and then you'll see me with a swollen pus-filled lip and it's all I can do to refrain from chasing people with my herp-infected lip and spreading the love around.

Book clubs are different though. Being in a book club means standing there, figuratively naked (because public nudity is often illegal) and admitting that sometimes a girl just likes to read smut. It took me years to finally uterus-up and publicly admit that I love listening to NICKELBACK. The idea of telling the world what I read is terrifying.

You know what the literary equivalent of Nickelback is? Danielle Steel. Everybody reads her but no one admits to it. NOT EVEN ME.

So when this awesome company named Copia knocked on my email door, and asked if I would partner with them, start a book club and admit my literary tastes were as questionable as my musical ones? I said SIGN ME UP.

I may or may not have been high on herpes medication at the time. But it didn't matter. Because, you know, BOOKS. INEXPENSIVE BOOKS! READING! BOOKS, BOOKS AND MOAR BOOKS.

Thankfully Copia asked some other bloggers to join them as well. Bloggers with much better tastes than mine.  And hence, the Copia Parents Group was born.

I'll be honest; at first I was a little hesitant. I was also a little confused. I always thought the first rule of book club was not to admit there was a book club and clearly Copia was blowing it just by telling everyone they existed. But it turns out book club is totally different than Fight Club in that there is no sweaty Ed Norton, no Brad Pitt and no tapping out. However, like Fight club, there will be no shoes and no shirts allowed in my book club. No pants either.

NAKED BOOK CLUB!

Don't look at me like that. My book club is also a judgment free zone. So if you chose to be un-naked, I won't even blink. I may sigh heavily but I totally won't judge.

So it was all fun and games with my little naked book club with a membership of one, until Mr. Lady asked if I wanted to join a Copia group with her, Doug French of Laid Off Dad infamy and Jim Lin, a.k.a Busy Dad.

And suddenly, it didn't matter that the Copia app is pretty cool, or that you can read your friends' notes in the margins, create your own groups (and join mine!) and use it on an iPad, a laptop or even a Droid; no, the only thing that mattered was that I suddenly found myself in an honest to goodness book club with three of the smartest people I've ever known.

What do you get when you put a Harvard graduate, a teacher and the conference program manager for a huge company into a book club with a redneck?

I don't really know just yet. But I'm sure it will involve Nickelback and Danielle Steel at some point.

I'm actually kind of geeked out about the launch of our new little book club. It's a chance to do something I really love (read) on a social eReader platform I like (Copia) with people I adore. And I can do it NAKED, in my own HOME, with no one swatting at me with a rolled up newspaper while shutting off my lights. Unless of course my husband is home. Then all bets are off.

You should totally join our little geek tribe book group aptly named "Tanis, Doug, Jim, and Shannon Do Books" (you'll have to create an account and log in, but it's fairly painless and FREE, I promise, and TOTALLY WORTH IT) and then you too can add your notes in the margins or just read along and help explain the really big words to me.

I'd appreciate any help I can get.

You should hop on over to Copia and check it out. Grab an account and play along. We can talk to each other while reading books! And no one will shush us!!

To celebrate this new awesomeness that I've found myself a part of, Copia has graciously allowed me to give away a free book to TEN of different readers and the only thing you have to do is leave me a comment telling me what book you want to read, or the name of your favourite book, or better yet, tell me the worst cheesiest book you've ever read.

Just be sure to leave a valid email address so I can reach you if you win. All winners will be chosen by a random draw and not based on the quality of the literature they like to read.

JUDGEMENT FREE ZONE PEOPLE.

Disclaimer: I'm totally working with Copia. Yes they're paying me. And I like it. (Also go visit Shannon, Jim and Doug because each of them are giving away ten books as well. It's like a book bonanza. We're spreading books like I spread the herp come Christmas time.