Anastasia, moderator at SFBC, visits fellow moderator Damo in Dublin in Aug of 2025
Let’s imagine that the entire population of Colonial Park
(where East Shore Area Library (ESA) is located) all read the same book, and
they all somehow magically fit inside a meeting room at ESA to discuss the book.
The library has enough chairs for everyone, and the meeting room has enough
space for everyone. And everyone even has a little leg room. And somehow one
book was able to appeal to the many different demographics of the town.
Obviously, this would not be possible in real life. However,
Library Manager of Madeline Olewine Memorial Library (MOM), John Grayshaw is
the creator and administrator of the Science Fiction
Book Club (SFBC) on Facebook, whose member count just reached 15,000
members in December of 2025. The members aren’t from just one town they are
from all around the world: US, UK, Germany, France, Italy, Poland, South
Africa, Australia, Japan, and many more.
The book group has two monthly Group Reads. There is a
Classic Group Read which is anything published more than 20 years ago, and a
Modern Group Read which is anything published in the last 20 years. Members
nominate and vote each month to decide what novel or short fiction collection
will be read, then each week there are weekly discussion posts. There is also a
weekly short fiction discussion too.
Additionally, John has conducted over 100
interviews with science fiction authors, as well as biographers,
historians, and other experts including, David Brin, Neal Asher, C.J. Cherryh,
Larry Niven, David Gerrold, Samuel Delany, Lois McMaster Bujold, William F.
Nolan, Hugh Howey, Andy Weir, Kim Stanley Robinson, and many others.
John does a lot of research for these interviews pouring
over previous interviews so that he can balance asking questions that have
never been asked before with asking questions he knows will have interesting
answers. This amount of research paid off last January when the expert lined up
for the Q and A about Edmond
Hamilton and Leigh Brackett fell through so John ended up answering the
questions himself.
Also in January, John completed a 3-month research project
about all the "Lost Stories" from Harlan Ellison's "Last
Dangerous Visions." LDV was a sci-fi anthology project that Ellison started
50 years ago but never completed. After Ellison’s death, his friend and fellow
writer J. Michael Straczynski got a version of the project published in October
2024. John started wondering what happened to all the stories JMS didn't use
and that still haven’t been published in other places and would any of them see
the light of day in the future or were they lost to time. John started reaching
out to the authors and eventually published an article in Amazing
Stories Magazine.
For a group this large John needs some help managing it, so
he has 5 group members that are also moderators. Their diversity reflects the
group’s diversity. Anastasia lives in
West Virginia, Heather in Tennessee, Damo in Ireland, Tanya in the UK, and
Stevie is in Australia. “We’re covering as many time zones as possible. The sun
never sets on the SFBC,” said John. John points out that there is a lot of work
that is done behind the scenes to make the group run smoothly. Damo writes the
Group Read discussion questions, Tanya draws a sketch of a Sci-Fi author every
month, and Stevie combs through the posts looking for spammers.
Anastasia, moderator at SFBC, and her service dog Hoodoo visit creator/administrator John in PA in 2022.
No matter how large the group grows, John feels it is important
to maintain a “small town” feel. For instance, every member is personally
welcomed to the group when they join. New members say what some of their
favorite novels and authors are before they join and this is shared in an
introductory thread so that existing group members can learn a little something
about the new members.
John credits perhaps an unlikely source as the model for the
group, Stan Lee and Marvel comics. “When I was a kid and reading comics Stan Lee
had a way of making Marvel seem like a cool club that you were a part of just
by reading the comics. The way he would say in the footnotes ‘for those of us
in the know, we know this happen is issue 89 of Amazing Spider-Man. Or he would
say ‘Smart readers already know this is from Fantastic Four 134.’ It didn’t
even matter if you had those issues or not, it still made you feel like a part
of something. And that’s the feeling I always wanted people to have from the
group. We’re not just a generic group on Facebook we’re the place all the cool
kids are hanging out and by being here you are one of us now.”
And projecting this feeling of community has worked well.
Many group members tell John that SFBC is their favorite group on Facebook. Or
that they are only still on Facebook because of the SFBC.
“Best fb group bar none!” said group member YiFeng You from Massachusetts.
“Honestly, been at fb near the beginning, no other discussion group comes
close. In fact, probably the best book discussion group I’ve been in period in
real life or online.”
“Great group - keeps adding to my TBR list and learn
something new each week about SF,” said group member Ivor Watkins from the UK.
“Also it’s polite, respectful and welcoming - an oasis in FB waters.”
“Great job by admins & moderators for keeping a fair
atmosphere,” said group member Maurice Parrod from France. “Always a pleasure to come here and reading
and discussing about SF.”
With members so spread out across the world John said, many
of the Group’s members have commented that it is great to find a community of
readers rather than feeling like a lone and isolated reader like Harold Bemis
from the Twilight Zone episode ‘Time Enough at Last.’
Other than the sense of community John has cited several
other keys to the group’s success. John shared that sometimes it takes a long
time for something to grow. He started the group in the summer of 2010 but it
didn’t reach 1,000 members until the summer of 2015. And that’s when he started
doing monthly group reads and the group started its rapid expansion.
The last two lessons are more specific to online
groups/message boards. John said, “In today’s world people often read books and
join book groups to relax and escape the everyday news cycle. The last thing
they want is to reencounter the news of the days in their read groups so the
moderators and I do our best to keep real world political talk out of the
group.”
“The final lesson is it is an unfortunate fact that many
people try to join read groups not to discuss things, but to get some free
advertising for their latest book,” said John. “The group’s rules ban such
promotion and any member who tries it is banned from the group”
So, the next time you are at a program at the East Shore
Library or just there getting some books. Just for a second imagine 15,000
people crammed into the library because if you do you’ll know how lucky we are
that we live in a time where it is possible to have a place where we can share
a sense of community with so many people around the world because of a shared
love of something like Science Fiction.
