The Murder Mystery Book Club

After a bit of tomfoolery, the Murder Mystery Book Club had its first meeting. The tomfoolery was brought to you by Victoria, the group's founder, who did not realize when she told us to meet at the Dunkin Donuts on Howland Boulevard there was more than one location. When the majority of us went to the wrong one, we were unapologetically directed to drive another 15 miles to her location. 

Anyway, Victoria started this entire group. She's a severe woman who just turned 80 and has lots of rules and opinions. One of her edicts was to set the five of us down and explain how book clubs work. 

HOW BOOK CLUBS WORK

• This would be a murder mystery book club. 
• All books must have 300 pages or fewer.*
• There'd be no chit-chatting until after our meeting was over, because we'd be focusing on what we read.** 
• The person "hosting" the book club (location to be determined) would be responsible for finding and distributing the books for the next book club. 

Which brings me to Victoria's opinions. I pushed back on one person finding six copies of next month's book, driving all over the county to hunt down the book club member to ensure sure woman received her copy. "That's how book clubs work," she insisted. "I think we are all grown adults. We can find our own book." I countered. This is a hill I'm willing to die on. I won't be responsible for another's participation in a voluntary event.  

Apparently Victoria has never been challenged on anything in her life and did not appreciate my mutiny. But with the other four on board, I won--though, come to think of it, I could have distributed copies of The Redeemed (which is a murder mystery***) and forced them to read that.  

Victoria also stated that "there wasn't enough time" to read a book for September, so therefore, we'd start in October. One of the more timid women whispered to me, "But, there's three weeks left in September." And I pointed this out to the rest of the group, suffering Victoria's glare. But I did acquiesce, perhaps we could meet October 1 if that would give everyone enough "time" to read our first book. 

What I found as the meeting went on was that the other four were whispering to me when they didn't agree with Victoria, expecting me to be the mouthpiece. I didn't mind. It's going to be my book club too (at least that's the current plan). I suspect we'll all find our place. I just didn't want to be responsible for scouring the planet for someone's book when they can go to the library and get their own book club book. 

The Thursday Murder Club is the first book. Oops. It just so happens it has 364 pages.  

Now then, I am making Victoria out to be a bit of a dictator. She was. And me being the youngest in the group did nothing to work into her good graces, but she'll get over it. Or she won't. (I don't know why she made a big deal about my age, but she stopped the conversation and said only to me, "How old are you? 45?" And when I shared my age, she accused me of fibbing.) But she also took feedback from the lovely--LOVELY--group of ladies and once she calmed down, Victoria was quite pleasant, interesting and funny. I made sure to thank her profusely for putting this together, which seemed to soften her up. I also started a group chat, which wasn't too difficult but the rest of them seemed impressed. 

Lest you think this was an unpleasant experience, it wasn't. It truly was a lot of fun. However, I noticed my social meter was in overdrive and it took more than a quiet hour watching the rest of the Diamondback's game to reset. I've met many Victorias. She moved here in the past year from New Jersey, then lost her husband. She wants friends and connections and doesn't know how to go about doing it. My personal feeling is that the group will form organically and whatever unreasonable expectation Victoria wants will would be mutinied by everyone else over time so that this will be everyone's murder mystery book club. 

*Most murder mysteries are more than 300 pages because of the nature of the genre. 

**Riiiigggghhhhtttt. Tell a group of women they can't "chit-chat" and see what happens?  

***I didn't mention I write books.