While discussing with friends and family, she found book clubs were a popular concept, but many found it difficult to find a club that was right for them either because of the books selected or people not finishing the book assigned to the club.
“I found especially since the pandemic that people are really hungry to be able to connect with others and we’ve had a lot of folks who join book club both in person and our online book club because they’re new to the area or they’ve just changed jobs and are looking for a new community,” Belfer said.
Thus came Belfer’s original idea for her business, an unbook club or anti-book club. People would sign up for the event, fill out a reading survey and when it came time for the event, Belfer would hand each person a book she selected for them.
That way people could enjoy the social aspect of a book club without worrying about not enjoying the book or people not finishing the book. During this stage of Belfer’s book club, she would partner with local restaurants and wineries, do pop-up events at different street fairs and became a semi-regular vendor at the downtown Long Beach farmer’s market.
Belfer was becoming busier and in the Summer of 2019, she quit her full-time job and opened up the first Bel Canto Books brick-and-mortar location inside of The Hangout. She then started hosting her book clubs at Bel Canto Books.
“That was just really lovely to be able to meet and see each other face to face,” Belfer said. “People would bring food and we did like clothing swaps, which of course we were only able to do for a couple of months before the pandemic happened.”
When everything went online in 2020, so did Bel Canto Books’ book clubs. What Belfer did not expect coming out of the pandemic, was keeping two of her book clubs online for people outside of Long Beach to continue attending.
“We have you know, predominantly our members are from Long Beach in the greater LA area,” Belfer said. “But we also have people joining from Northern California, Hawaii, the UK, every once in a while people will pop in from the Midwest and all over and we want to be able to continue to serve those folks and have these great conversations.”
The Burning Issues and Graphic Novels book clubs are the two that stayed online. Burning Issues book club is going into its fifth year and is a club for reading non-fiction novels about environmental and social justice.
The club is devoted to members being able to learn more about those issues and the actions they can take in their communities. Meetings are held via Zoom on the last Sunday of the month at 12 p.m. Pacific time.
The Graphic Novel book club is hosted on Zoom on the third Saturday of the month at 10 a.m. Pacific time. This club is for graphic novel enthusiasts and has given Belfer a greater appreciation for the format.
Late last year, Belfer kicked off her first in-person book club since the pandemic, the Alder and Sage book club. This club was co-founded with the restaurant Alder and Sage on Fourth Street.
Meeting in-person the third Thursday of every month at 6:30 p.m., members of this club can expect to read books that are contemporary fiction and non-fiction themed to the month. Regardless of the club being in-person or online, they are all free to attend.
“It’s really fun to be able to have a discussion amongst a diverse group of people both in age, in socio-economic background and in geographic location,” Belfer said.
“And then coming from all different professional sectors especially in our burning issue book club to see how those environmental and social justice books are resonating with them across their different experiences.”
Belfer has found that many members of the book club have positive growth through the community that is created in each individual club. She sees people post on social media about reading more books and people becoming friends, spending time together outside of the club.
When walking outside around Fourth Street or near Bel Canto Books’ other location at Bixby Knolls inside KUBO, Belfer will run into people she knows through the bookstore and it gives her a greater sense of belonging and community.
“That’s really exciting to see. People just you know, enjoying one another’s company and meeting strangers and finding out that they have more in common than they thought. That’s really lovely,” Belfer said.
The support Bel Canto Books has received has allowed them to grow into a new location. In mid-March, they will be opening their very first stand-alone location at 2106 E. 4th Street.
Belfer is also excited for the return of a literary festival co-founded with the Long Beach Public Library, The Festival of AAPI Books. The festival will be held on May 4 at the Michelle Obama Library and highlight authors of the Asian Diaspora and have children, teen and adult authors as well as various vendors.
You can continue to show your support to Bel Canto Books by attending their events, connecting with them on social media, joining their newsletter, and especially by joining one of their free book clubs.
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