For book lovers, the Internet is a 24/7 playground. We can shop to our heart’s content, visit authors web sites and lap up book reviews on dozens of great sites by journalists and bloggers. I started Athena’s Bookshelf more than a year ago as a way to recommend reads for women, but something didn’t seem right. Something was missing. As I do with most ideas, I let it sit on the bench at recess and when the idea was there, we could play ball. The missing ingredient wasn’t on the Internet; it was in real life. What was missing for me was the visceral. I needed to see my friends, share a drink and discuss books, but it had to be fun, fun, fun. I wanted to combine the beauty of the Internet with 3D laughter, not just LOLs on the screen.

But to share my love of books *only* with fellow book lovers wasn’t quite right, either. After all, we already blog about books, buy books and support authors. We needed to get out beyond our recliner and reach out to our non-reading friends. We needed to get all evangelical about reading – coaxing our girlfriends to read and exploring life through the magic of books AND the magic of girls night out. YES! Even though I *thought* it sounded like a good idea, I think I have good ideas all the time, but my believing it doesn’t always make it so. I wanted some proof.

Enter Jenny.

Jenny is a new friend of mine and upon telling her about my new book club/reading revolution she looks up and says, “I don’t think I’ve read a book in years.” She went on to say she loves to go into book stores but has no idea what to pick out or where to start. Jenny is a nurse with a wild sense of humor. I recommended she lose her second reading virginity to THIS LITTLE MOMMY STAYS HOME by Sam Wilde. She’ll get the perineum humor and hopefully the book will entice her to come back for more. Another and another and another.

Jenny is now a member of my chapter 1 of BEbabes. My challenge for you all, since you are reading this and not your non-reading friends, is that you don’t bristle when a friend says, “I don’t read,” aka I only read Glamour/People/Star/TIME, or the other excuses we hear which we’ll talk more about next week, and probe them (geeeeently) for what their interests are. See, great book lovers are also great matchmakers. We don’t just push our own reading interests on people. We find out more about them – even from the type of TV shows they like to watch – and suggest some books they may like. I assure you, just like Jenny did, they will appreciate it.

I hope you’ll consider starting up a chapter of BookEndBabes, not because I’m trying to build a castle, but because I genuinely believe that reading benefits our society at large. I will help you in any way you can to get set started. Our challenge for the weekend then is to not only invite the low-hanging fruit – the lit lovers whose bookshelves are stuffed full – but the Jennies out there.

Let the conversion begin. – Malena Lott