Sixty Books a Year Book Club
I'm starting a book club.
If you are interested for 2026, apply here.
This is sixty books:
I googled "10 books" and copied over six images manually ā most from top 10 lists, count them if you want!!
What if you read (and had deep insights for) this many books ā in just one year?
What if you were introduced to 300 books from word of mouth, from close friends on the same journey as you?
Motivation
This will not be a walk in the park. It's not meant to be.
This book club is for those who can't help but be insatiably curious about the world they live in ā for those of us who derive an indescribable pleasure from intellectual rigor.
If you aren't satisfied with where you are in your literary life, and you know you could aspire to greater heights, read on.
Read What You Want
There are books out there for you. You won't be able to read most of them before you die. You'll burn out long before you finish all the reads on top 10 lists on YouTube alone.
As such, this book club will not prescribe books for you.
Similar to the Quiet Reading model, the most important thing is to show up.
We will not strive to be performative, or read what is popular.
You must pick what topics you feel you must dive into, what authors you want to consume in their entirety, what field of study you seek to master.
Five Books at Once
By reading multiple books in parallel, the mind is forced to find comparisons and overlap.
Ideas do not exist in isolation, and by having complex information sourcing, these similarities and differences will be illuminated.
Reading five books at once, while in conversation with five people also reading five books at once ā the extended mind of our group will be reading up to thirty books at any given time. That's a lot of ground!
You Can Do It
Sixty books is a challenge, but it is a doable one. I know, because I've done it ā multiple times:
Structure
Below is how I will try to set up the group, and depending on the applications I receive, how I will filter responses:
Group Demographics
The group is small because we need to be focused. Since we will be traveling great metaphorical distances with one another, we need to establish a baseline trust in each other.
The group should have diverse:
- Genre Preferences - For every biography reader there should be a poem reader, for every sci-fi/high fantasy reader, there should be a textbook reader, etc.
- Ages - Ideally two or three generations represented at the table, anyone from 22 onwards is welcome, all the way up through retirement (why 22? this is the age people graduate college and often become complacent with their learning as they settle into a career)
- Career Backgrounds - A group of six software engineers is not going to cut it. Sixty books and the conversations they inspire will be enhanced by having a combination of different lived experiences and expertise, from sanitation workers to podiatrists
- Gender/Race/Political Background - I won't be targeting these three specifically as the other three, but I'll be doing my best to keep these in mind as well for the application (i.e. I won't be asking for these directly)
In sum, the group, like the books, is meant to push the club into higher realms of understanding. A small, diverse thought group will cause our growth rate to accelerate and stay at a high velocity.
Synthesis Syncs
We will meet twice a month .
First, in the middle of the month to discuss our progress, and then at the end of the month to review what we learned and to share our personal takeaways with each other. Each member will get the floor to discuss their five books.
Transcripts and recordings of the calls will be saved so we can focus fully on the matter at hand, and can be reviewed at convenience later.
Software
Finally, the bespoke software.
I'll be building an extension of the Commonbase software for our group, which will allow us a place to collaborate and think about our books async.
Embeddings Visualization
As highlights and annotations are added to our Commonbase, we can visualize the clusters of our work in real time.
Annotation trees and joins are available as well to explicitly create data structures of thought.
Readwise Scripts
I use Readwise and as such will write scripts to connect highlights for e-book readers like myself.
[NB: On that note, the club will have little oversight about reading preference between physical, digital, and audiobook. If you can contribute annotations, highlights, and deep conversational value to the group, format matters little. (Though that said, I will prefer those who read over listen when possible in the application since reading requires more active engagement).]
Discord Style Chat with @ for Books and Authors
Not Yet Implemented
And here are a list of features I haven't built yet!
Discord Style Chat with@for books, authors, and our fellow members- Shared Visual Bookshelf with Filters (up to 360 books in one year!)
- OCR Highlight Uploader for Physical Books
- Synthesizing Highlights to Poems and other Art (check out From Toca to Trocars or You Will Be Fragmented 'Random Poem' Button)
- Content Templates for YouTube/Substack/etc.?
Conclusion
This club will be a challenge, but at the end of the year you could find yourself an expert on a brand new topic, or fully up to date on the ins and outs of a fantasy epoch, or impress your friends and family with how many concepts you are familiar with. Of that, you will decide.
What will happen regardless is that you will have read and comprehended sixty books.
And you will have met five other people as crazy as you about reading.
