The other night, I gathered four friends in a pub to discuss a romantic fiction book I had made them read for a book group. The trend for men-only romance book clubs had begun in LA over the summer — started by the 37-year-old writer Jason Rogers, who set up his own chapter called the Bromantics, intended to “better understand love, sex and relationships … and improve our emotional lives”. I was intrigued: Californians adore emotional outpourings, but how would repressed Brits (and one American) fare? Do we even have feelings? It turns out men will do most things for free alcohol, so copies of A Lover’s Discourse by Xiaolu Guo were duly read, maybe because I said there was more sex in it than
TRENDS
Inside the male book clubs that only read chick lit
A new wave of ‘bromantic’ book clubs are springing up in LA. Can they transform the emotionally repressed Englishman? Jonathan Dean gathers the lads
Jonathan Dean (centre) and, from left, Tom, Aaron, Fernando and Rich discuss A Lover’s Discourse
SOPHIE GREEN
The Sunday Times
