Between The Lines

The book club has had a millennial makeover, with circles of strangers providing a surprising source of self-care. Let’s take a leaf out of their pages

- Kate Leaver

“I came up just long enough to gulp some air, then I was dragged under the water again,” I say to a group of women I’ve only met a few times. They’re looking at me with a mix of sympathy and fear, while I tell the story of the time I was caught in a rip-tide. “Each time, I thought it might be my last breath. But once I was safely back on the sand with a lifeguard and my friends, I felt this strange high – I was alive.”

This isn’t group therapy, but the bimonthly meeting of my book club. My story comes up while we are discussing The Water Cure by Sophie Mackintosh. It’s a bleak tale of three sisters isolated in their family home by parents who want to protect them from mainstream society. One of the rituals they’re forced to perform is holding their breath underwater for as long as they can. While reading those scenes, I found myself reliving those terrifying seconds. It was the first time I’d thought about that riptide in years. But that’s the beauty of book club: you never really know what’s going to come up or what you’ll end up sharing.

A Novel Idea