That book club member who read the wrong copy for 9 weeks

Had a guy in our reading circle in Portland show up every Tuesday with a copy of a totally different novel with a similar cover. For 9 weeks he kept saying things like "I don't get the hype about the lighthouse" and "the cousin subplot feels rushed." Finally I asked to see his book and sure enough, it was some 1980s mystery novel, not the historical fiction we voted on. He looked so embarrassed but honestly I admired his commitment. I just wondered how many of our discussions he followed along with purely through context clues. Have any of you had someone in your group who was clearly not reading the right thing and how long did it take to figure out?

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gavin_hill2711d ago

My buddy Dave pulled this exact move in our Denver sci-fi club for two months, reading a Michael Crichton book while the rest of us argued about a space opera. He kept nodding along and throwing in vague stuff like "the ship's AI felt untrustworthy" and honestly nobody caught it until he tried to defend a character who never existed in our pick. Turns out he was so invested in his wrong book that he finished it, and now he re-reads our actual selections before every meeting just to feel like he earned it.