so-called activity books, such as Martin Handford’s
Where’s Waldo?series, which challenged young read-
ers to find characters rather than to read about
them, while at the same time inviting readers to play
games, solve puzzles, and crack brainteasers.
Oprah Winfrey’s Book Club In September, 1996,
media personality Oprah Winfrey launched Oprah’s
Book Club on her daytime program,The Oprah
Winfrey Show. She would do more to popularize book
discussion clubs than any other person of her time.
Initially, many underestimated the potential appeal
of Oprah’s Book Club, including Winfrey herself.
From a relatively short ten- to fifteen-minute seg-
ment close to the conclusion of the show, the seg-
ment had grown significantly by the late 1990’s.
Shows featured Oprah discussing her choice of
books with a group of well-dressed women seated
around a tastefully arranged dinner table or coffee
table. Winfrey’s first choice, Jacquelyn Mitchard’s
The Deep End of the Ocean, though selling steadily
in 1996, toppedThe New York Timesweekly best
seller list within three months of the show and re-
mained there for twenty-three weeks. Sales figures
for the book were estimated at about 100,000 copies
before the show aired and ballooned to 850,000
after.
Winfrey’s second choice, Toni Morrison’sSong of
Solomon, first published in 1977, toppedThe New
York Timesbest seller list for the first time after
Winfrey discussed the book on her show. Sales fig-
ures forSong of Solomonsoared from 50,000 copies
in circulation before the show aired to 500,000 af-
ter. Winfrey also featured the hardcover version of
Morrison’sParadiseimmediately after its publica-
tion in 1998.Paradiseremained on the best seller
list for eighteen weeks, including four weeks at
number one.
The “Oprah effect” raised questions about the ex-
tent to which Winfrey’s endorsement influenced
sales of the books featured on her program. Evi-
dence supported the view of Daisy Maryles, editor
forPublishers Weekly, who once quipped that being
one of Oprah’s Book Club picks transformed a novel
from “well published and moderately successful” to
“mega blockbuster.”
Impact Where once mail-order companies brought
the bookstore to one’s mailbox, with the develop-
ment of the World Wide Web (1991) and the intro-
duction of Web browser software such as Mosaic
(1993), book clubs brought the virtual bookstore to
the home.
The growth and development of the World Wide
Web throughout the 1990’s also impacted how book
club members convened to discuss books. While ad-
vancing computer technologies made it possible for
more people to access book clubs, the World Wide
Web also removed the need for club members to
meet physically, or even in real time. Rather than
meet in club rooms, homes, or community centers,
more and more Americans joined virtual reading
groups, communicating through e-mail, online fo-
rums, blogs, and chat rooms.
Moreover, the growth in book clubs throughout
the 1990’s significantly affected women. One fea-
ture common to most book clubs was the fact that
most members were women. While book clubs gen-
erally encouraged many women, some of whom
never read, to read regularly, such clubs also satisfied
a social function, enabling women to organize col-
lective reading. In this way, book clubs grew along-
side the broader cultural movement toward self-
development and self-discovery characterizing the
1990’s.Further Reading
Farr, Cecilia Konchar.Reading Oprah: How Oprah’s
Book Club Changed the Way America Reads. Albany:
State University of New York Press, 2005. An in-
depth discussion of Winfrey’s widely popular
book club.
Long, Elizabeth.Book Clubs: Women and the Uses of
Reading in Ever yday Life. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 2003. Researched discussion of
book clubs within specific social and cultural con-
texts, complete with ethnographic material.
Strickland, Dorothy S., et al.School Book Clubs and
Literacy Development: A Descriptive Study. Report Se-
ries 2.22. Albany, N.Y.: National Research Center
on Literature Teaching and Learning, 1994. Re-
port documenting a three-part study of the effect
of book clubs on children’s literacy development.
Sponsored by the Office of Educational Research
and Improvement, Washington, D.C.
Nicole AnaeSee also Amazon.com; America Online; Blogs;
E-mail; Internet; Morrison, Toni; Publishing;Where’s
Waldo?franchise; Winfrey, Oprah; World Wide Web.112 Book clubs The Nineties in America