The Lantern Readers
Stoke Newington · 0.6 km
Why you’d fit
You chose Persuasion. Members here read one long classic a season and never rush the ending.
Reading The Age of Innocence
Now open in London · free to join
Tell us three books you love. We’ll introduce you to a small club nearby that reads like you do, and tell you exactly why you’d fit. Go once as a guest. Stay if it feels right.
Run a club instead? See Bookfolk for organisers
Your Reader Card
Pick three books you love. Watch your matches appear.
No personality quiz, no swiping. Your favourite books say more about how you read than anything else, so that’s where we start.
Tap three2 of 3 chosen
Your matches: The Tuesday Lot, strong fit; The Lantern Readers, strong fit; New Pages, strong fit.
The Tuesday Lot
Kentish Town · 4 km · 3 of 12 open
You chose Middlemarch. Members here love a long classic. They meet Thursday dinners, 4 km from you.
The Lantern Readers
Stoke Newington · 0.6 km · 1 seat open
You chose Middlemarch. Members here love a long classic. They meet Sunday afternoons, 0.6 km from you.
New Pages
Dalston · 1.2 km · 3 of 12 open
You chose Persuasion. Members here read for the longing. They meet monthly, Sundays, 1.2 km from you.
Nothing quite right? Start the club you want to join.
Circles
Whatever you read, there’s a table for it.
13 clubs
1 seat open
The Lantern Readers
Stoke Newington · 0.6 km · Sunday afternoons
One long classic a season, read slowly, discussed over cake.
The Age of InnocenceEdith Wharton
Reading The Age of InnocenceAsk to join →
Reading The Age of InnocenceAsk to join →3 of 10 open
Small Hours
Bloomsbury · 3.5 km · Wednesday evenings
Novels in translation, and the people who made them sound like that.
KitchenBanana YoshimotoReading KitchenAsk to join →
7 of 24 open
The Velvet Hour
Dalston · 1.5 km · Friday evenings
Romantasy, candlelight, and absolutely no shame about either.
Fourth WingRebecca Yarros
Reading Fourth WingAsk to join →
Reading Fourth WingAsk to join →3 of 12 open
The Tuesday Lot
Kentish Town · 4 km · Thursday dinners
Old colleagues who miss arguing about ideas, over a long dinner.
MiddlemarchGeorge Eliot
Reading MiddlemarchAsk to join →
Reading MiddlemarchAsk to join →8 of 30 open
Small Steps
Highbury · 2.5 km · Saturday mornings
One useful book a month, and one idea from it tried before the next.
Atomic HabitsJames Clear
Reading Atomic HabitsAsk to join →
Reading Atomic HabitsAsk to join →Waitlist
Salt & Myth
Hackney Wick · 2.2 km · Fortnightly Tuesdays
Retellings, ruins and anything with a labyrinth in it.
PiranesiSusanna Clarke
Reading PiranesiJoin the waitlist →
Reading PiranesiJoin the waitlist →2 of 14 open
Rooms of Our Own
Islington · 3 km · Monthly, Mondays
Sentences worth rereading, and a pub that knows our order.
Giovanni’s RoomJames Baldwin
Reading Giovanni’s RoomAsk to join →
Reading Giovanni’s RoomAsk to join →4 of 16 open
The Body in the Library
Clapton · 1.4 km · Monthly, Thursdays
Whodunnits, slow-burn thrillers, and a vote on who guessed first.
RebeccaDaphne du Maurier
Reading RebeccaAsk to join →
Reading RebeccaAsk to join →5 of 20 open
Footnotes
King’s Cross · 3.8 km · Fortnightly, Tuesdays
History, science and big ideas, one chapter argued over at a time.
SapiensYuval Noah Harari
Reading SapiensAsk to join →
Reading SapiensAsk to join →6 of 18 open
Far Shores
Walthamstow · 4.5 km · Monthly, Wednesdays
Spaceships, other worlds and the odd dragon, read for the ideas.
DuneFrank Herbert
Reading DuneAsk to join →
Reading DuneAsk to join →3 of 12 open
New Pages
Dalston · 1.2 km · Monthly, Sundays
This year’s most talked-about novels, before everyone else has read them.
Normal PeopleSally Rooney
Reading Normal PeopleAsk to join →
Reading Normal PeopleAsk to join →4 of 14 open
The Stoa
Bloomsbury · 3.4 km · Monthly, Wednesdays
Old questions, new arguments. One thinker a month, read slowly.
MeditationsMarcus Aurelius
Reading MeditationsAsk to join →
Reading MeditationsAsk to join →6 of 20 open
Still Waters
Stoke Newington · 0.9 km · Sunday mornings
Books on meaning, faith and attention, with tea and a little silence.
The Power of NowEckhart Tolle
Reading The Power of NowAsk to join →
Reading The Power of NowAsk to join →No commitment
Go once as a guest. Stay if it feels right.
Ask to join
Send a line with your Reader Card. Only the organiser sees your Reader Card and your note.Takes a minuteHear back
Organisers usually reply within two days. If it’s not a fit, we’ll suggest two other clubs. Nobody else is told.About 2 daysGuest evening
Come to one gathering. No payment, no commitment.Next gatheringTake your seat
If it feels right to you both, your first box is on its way.Your first box
Read together
Your own pace, never alone with the book.
See roughly where your friends are. Talk about each part once you’ve reached it. Nobody is ranked, nobody is behind, and nothing gets spoilt.
The Ribbon
Middlemarch · The Tuesday Lot
One line for the book, with your club as small marks along it. Only your own page number, ever.
The Margins
- Book I · Miss Brooke, openYou’re here
- Book II · Old and Young, sealed11 notes
- Book III · Waiting for Death, sealed14 notes waiting
- Book IV · Three Love Problems, sealed6 notes waiting
Chat sorted by part. Rooms ahead stay sealed until you reach them.
Tonight
Nobody yet tonight.
One tap to say you read today. Any amount counts, and a missed day is never mentioned.
MiddlemarchChapter XX · p. 202
Chapter XX
Not that this inward amazement of Dorothea’s was anything very exceptional: many souls in their young nudity are tumbled out among incongruities and left to “find their feet” among them, while their elders go about their business. That element of tragedy which lies in the very fact of frequency, has not yet wrought itself into the coarse emotion of mankind; and perhaps our frames could hardly bear much of it.
If we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel’s heart beat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence.
As it is, the quickest of us walk about well wadded with stupidity.
38 pages left in Book II
On this lineThe Tuesday Lot only
Marcus The roar on the other side of silence. I had to put the book down.
Priya Read it aloud on the bus. Nobody looked up.
5 more replies
The Commonplace
The lines readers couldn’t stop reading aloud.
Highlight a sentence, and share it with your club or the whole Commons as a card. Quotes from later in a book stay blurred until you get there.
- Your club’s lines, the readers you follow, and everyone.
- Shared under your club’s name, not yours.
- Mark a line to keep it. No like counts, no followers.
The box
Every object is there for a reason.
December’s box for The Age of Innocence, as Leila opened it.
- The book, box editionWith a bookplate in your name.
- Opera ticket bookmarkThe novel opens at the opera.
- Violet pastillesOld New York, sweet and bitter.
- Letterpress place cardFor the seat you take at dinner.
- A note from PriyaThe part only she could write.
Strangers, carefully
Meeting new people should feel safe from the first message.
Organisers verify their identity
Checked by our payments partner before a club can appear in Discover.
Guest first, always
Meet the club once before you pay or share anything more.
You choose what’s seen
Your Reader Card goes only to clubs you ask to join. Tuck your progress away any time.
Report and block
One tap, reviewed by a person within a day. No ratings or reviews of people.
What it costs
Free to try. Then your club’s dues cover your box.
Your guest evening costs nothing. When you take a seat, you pay the dues your club has chosen, £24 to £48 a month depending on the box your club chooses, and that includes the book and everything in the box. Skip any month before lock day and you aren’t charged.
- Your guest evening
- Free
- Monthly dues, set by your club
- £24–£48
- Skip a month before lock day
- £0
Questions
From your Reader Card: three books you love, what you want from a club, when you can meet and how far you’ll travel. Every match tells you why in plain words.
Sign up anyway. We’ll show video clubs you can join today, and tell you when a club opens nearby. Or start one yourself.
No. The Ribbon shows roughly where everyone is, and rooms open as you reach them. Nobody sees your page number.
Yes. Switch between them from the top of Today.
The book, a bookplate with your name, and a few objects chosen for that book by your organiser. Sometimes a handwritten note.
Only what’s needed to match you and send your box. We never sell it. Read the Privacy Policy for the details and your rights.
Your table is waiting.
Free to join. Your first evening is always as a guest.
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