Started as a way of taking time out of their busy lives to enjoy the hobby they loved, the Silent Book Club, the brainchild of two busy moms who loved to read, has grown to be a space for thousands of readers across the world to enjoy the enchanting world of books.
Chapter meetings are held throughout the country, including in the Orange County cities of Huntington Beach, Newport Beach, Irvine, Tustin, Rancho Santa Margarita and others.
Now, as the November elections approach, the Silent Book Club “stands with the banned” as more books are challenged across the nation.
“Silent Book Club is a format that works across countries, cultures, languages and religion,” said Guinevere de la Mare, co-founder of the club. “It’s this sort of universal appeal of bringing people together through a shared love of books.”
The idea sprouted when de la Mare and co-founder Laura Gluhanich found that their busy lives in San Francisco prevented them from sitting and reading for pleasure. De la Mare said that she often found herself seated in book clubs, reading books she did not enjoy and did not want to finish.
“I felt the pressure of having to do my ‘homework,’ and was like, ‘I am a grown woman, I don’t have time for homework,’” de la Mare said.
So, de la Mare and Gluhanich began the Silent Book Club among their friends, finding spaces and time to read their own books and genres at their own pace, but doing it in the company of other people.
Two participants find a spot in the shade to read during their trip abroad for the Silent Book Club’s 2026 Italy Reading Retreat.
(Courtesy of the Silent Book Club)
As friends moved and word spread, new chapters across the country opened, leading the pair to trademark their company in 2016. Over the last decade, the business has grown to include more than 2,200 chapters across 70 countries.
The company also holds various events for readers, including their reading retreats. From Colorado to Iceland, the Silent Book Club invites participants across the world to join them in adventures and silent reading, bringing to life the spaces in which readers have once only dreamed or read of.
“We take these experiences and bring them to beautiful destinations around the world and provide a service for readers who are looking to escape,” de la Mare said. “It’s been almost entirely women, a lot of solo travelers, college friends, mothers, daughters, but there is the sort of permission for women in particular to say, ‘you know what, I’m going to just relinquish the control of having to do everything myself, and let someone else plan the trip, do all of the logistics, and be able to go and unapologetically surround myself with like-minded kindred spirits, go see beautiful parts of the world, and take that time.’”
This month, however, the Silent Book Club promoted their events and reading sit-ins in protest of banning books with Banned Book Week in partnership with the American Library Assn.
According to the ALA, 4,235 unique titles were challenged in 2025, making it the second highest year documented by the ALA, being narrowly beaten in 2023 by just five titles. Of these challanged books, 39% represented the lived experiences of the LGBTQIA+ community and people of color.
The ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom also documented in 2025 that 5,668 books were banned from libraries, with an additional 920 books censored through access restrictions, such as relocation or requiring parental permission.
“I feel very strongly about using our platform to help educate people. Helping people understand what goes on behind the scenes at local school board meetings, or the fact that in surveys of the American population, the majority of Americans, including Republicans, actually oppose book bans; they don’t agree with it,” de la Mare said. “By assuming or insinuating that a librarian, a school librarian or a public librarian who’s working in the children’s section, is going to hand a child a book that they’re not ready for is like assuming that a second grade math teacher is going to start handing out algebra textbooks to 7-year-olds. That’s just simply not what’s happening.”
Leading up to the November elections, the Silent Book Club hosted silent sit-ins throughout Banned Book Week to promote awareness surrounding these banned books and proposed measures, and, through the month of October, is selling limited edition banned book merchandise, with a portion of the proceeds going directly to the ALA banned book campaign.
Guinevere de la Mare,bottom left, poses with fellow adventurous readers during their 2025 Costa Rica Reading Retreat.
(Courtesy of the Silent Book Club.)
“Reading is inherently political. The simple act of reading and taking a stand against censorship, and fighting for the freedom to be able to choose what you read is the real motivator to get readers to the polls and fight for our right to read,” de la Mare said.
For more information and statistics on banned book, visit the Silent Book Club or ALA websites. A list of Silent Book Club chapters can be found at silentbook.club/pages/chapter-map.
— Carroll is a contributor to the Daily Pilot.