WVBC monthly: chapter 03
sharing our March WVBC pick with you!
Hello, dear readers!
Spring is in the air! Last weekend NYC enjoyed her first 75+ degree spring day and the city took advantage of the (albeit fleeting) moments of warmth and sunshine. We are officially in outdoor reading weather…catch us on the West Side Highway for the foreseeable future.
ps. if you missed last month’s recap, be sure to check it out below!
Included in this month’s recap:
Recap of our March WVBC pick: All The Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker
Member Moment: Meet
Local business love: the New York Public Library, West Village branches
What else we’re reading right now: a peek into our ‘Just Read’ lists.
ps. this post is too long for email, so we suggest reading it on Substack!
WVBC March Pick: All the Colors of the Dark
This month’s WVBC pick was a beautiful, sweeping story and collectively one of our favorite new reads. Cue the *I just finished the book and tears were shed* texts! At 608 pages it was a daunting (and heavy) book– but we all finished right on time…with someone getting her last few pages in over appetizers at our March meeting!
It’s hard to pinpoint the genre this book belongs to. Some chapters were written like a true suspense thriller and had us sleeping with our nightlights on. Others were beautiful and poetic, like a classic love story. And there’s a mystery woven within each chapter that keeps you guessing (and second-guessing) the characters from start to finish. The following quote sums up the book quite nicely…
Chris Whitaker has written a novel about what lurks in the shadows of obsession and the blinding light of hope.
Member Moment: Meet Chelsea Martin
WVBC: Rapid fire intro Qs!!
Zodiac sign? Cancer sun, Sagittarius moon, Virgo rising (yes, they all matter)
Kindle or physical book? Kindle
Preferred audiobook platform? Audible
Most beloved NY bookstore? Three Lives & Company
All-time favorite author? My girl Elin Hilderbrand gives me the true escape I often need
Favorite book of all time? The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah
WVBC: Chelsea, tell us about what brought you to New York.
NYC was a dream as a little girl, and in college, I worked tirelessly to make it work, but ultimately, I could not afford to take an unpaid internship and pay NYC rent, so I pushed that dream to the side. I moved from San Diego to Austin, Texas where I lived for 5 years and honestly had the “perfect” life - the big apartment, the nice car, the great group of friends, low cost of living, the list goes on. But something was missing and I felt almost too comfortable and craved more growth in the formative years of my mid-twenties. I traveled to Europe often for work and felt a pull to move there, so I started looking into options to obtain my UK visa (the best move for a monolingual gal like myself). When I eventually realized a UK visa was not in the cards, I wasn’t sure what my next steps would be.
Ironically, I flew directly from London to NYC for a friend’s birthday, and due to the jet lag, I woke up early each day and went for a solo walk. We were staying in Meatpacking, and as I walked along the cobblestone streets of Meatpacking and charming historic corners of the West Village, I felt like this was the next best thing to Europe. One year later, I was living a block away from the Meatpacking hotel from that fateful trip!
NYC offers exactly what I was looking for when I felt the pull to leave my cushy life in Austin and move here. The energy of the city is intoxicating, nearly every person you encounter has a growth mindset and is looking to learn & evolve as a person, there’s cultural diversity & the city pushes you to be open to new perspectives, and there’s a collective sense of community for purely just living in New York and all being on this journey together. And hey, the direct flights to nearly anywhere don’t hurt either!
WVBC: You're widely known as our WVBC travel expert. But something people may not know is that you're also very knowledgeable about wine! How have you combined your passion for travel with discovering the wide-ranging world of wine?
There’s a book I have been reading called “Windows on the World” by Kevin Zraly, and that title is exactly how I view wine. Winemaking is typically embedded in the deep history of a destination, so in tandem with learning about (and enjoying drinking) wine, I am also receiving a robust history lesson of the destination. It has helped me better understand the geography of a region as well as feel more connected to various places all over the world.
Also as someone who wants to be constantly learning, I love studying wine because I feel like I will always be learning. There’s always a new breakthrough wine region, or a new winemaker doing interesting things with a storied varietal, or even just the fact that each year in wine is different (like how a 2020 vs 2021 white Burgundy from the same plot can taste very different because of the weather in those years!) It has been such a fun passion to dive into and complement my passion for travel as well.
WVBC: Speaking of travel...you recently launched your own Substack, Passport to Friday. What's the ethos behind it, and what can readers expect from the newsletter?
I actually started Passport To Friday as a business travel blog focusing on how to stay healthy on the road, airport hacks, destination guides for large cities, etc. This then transitioned into focusing on leisure travel, however along the way I got “too busy” and stopped writing. When I discovered the Substack platform (thanks, !), it just felt right to start sharing again. Passport To Friday is your passport to luxury travel inspiration, NYC life & musings, what I am packing & more!
WVBC: Tell us about your approach to hosting our most recent meeting to discuss All The Colors of the Dark.
Due to the heavy nature of the book, I wanted to have a cozy vibe & menu with tie-ins from the book while supporting as many local businesses as I could. I put a mix of real and fake candles all around my apartment and made a playlist that consisted of the Billboard #1 song for all of the years of the book (1975-2001).
We snacked on baked feta with “Saint’s Bees’ Honey” and “Patch’s Pirate’s Booty”. The main course was a fresh spring green salad and personal pot pies from Mikey’s NYC. For dessert, we enjoyed St. Louis gooey butter cake (as the book was set in Missouri) from Buttercup Bakeshop and honeycomb ice cream (aka from Saint’s bees) from Van Leeuwen.
WVBC: Any general hosting tips to impart to our readers?
I am very much in my hosting era infancy (which is why space for a large dining room was top of my wishlist when searching for a new apartment), but as someone who gets overwhelmed easily, keep it simple. Ina Garten talked about this on a Thanksgiving episode of The Daily, and I could not agree more. I love details and branding (menus, colors that complement each other, ambience), so I put my focus on that (which you can prep ahead of time!) and focus on a menu that allows me to prep prior as well and be with my guests. I also love incorporating a theme, ode to the season, the reasoning for gathering (i.e. book club!), pairing with a certain wine, etc.
WVBC: What has your journey as a reader looked like?
I have always enjoyed reading, but admittedly my reading journey was always very inconsistent up until a few years ago. I would “get busy” and not read for a couple of months at a time, and then I would start a book and get so hooked that I would cancel all of my plans and pull an all-nighter to finish a book in one day. Now that I am in WVBC and have a book goal to complete (my Virgo rising loves this), that consistency has also bled into my personal reading and has made it one of the most enjoyable parts of my daily routine.
WVBC: Outside of what we read as a book club, what does your lens to decide what to read next look like? Basically, tell us your dream genre/trope/style of story!
I love historical fiction or psychological fiction! Something that has a number of different threads in the storyline that you are trying to stitch together throughout reading.
WVBC: What are some of your go-to West Village spots? (cafés, bars, restaurants, shops, etc.)
My daily coffee is often Blank Street as I have their membership (one of my biggest hacks/secrets) and love the dog board they have on the wall. If not, I love sitting outside at Plantshed on a sunny day or grabbing a coffee at The Elk on the way to a WSH walk. Bagels from Apollo Bagels and croissants from L’Appartement 4F.
I love sitting at the bar at Joseph Leonard or Anton’s. St. Jardim for a great wine list & people watching. Martinis at Saint Theo’s or American Bar. Emmett’s on Grove for truly any time of the day/night (especially post dinner).
My favorite WV restaurants are Cecchi’s (another great bar to sit at), Tartine (love the casual vibe, spicy chicken & it’s BYOB), and L’Artusi (favorite pasta & yet another great bar to sit at). I could write so much more…I love my neighborhood!
Local Business Love: NYPL
Naturally, we love the New York Public Libraries, and the West Village has a few branches we like to frequent! Aside from being great places to check out books and cozy up to read, they also provide free high-speed wi-fi and make for a fabulous WFL (work-from-library) situation.
Jefferson Market Library: An icon of a building on 6th Ave! This library is a National Historic Landmark and was an operating courthouse from 1874 to 1877. To get to the reading/working salon, you have to climb up the tall lookout tower, which just feels cute and romantic.
Hudson Park Library: This one’s for the locals! Tucked away on Leroy Street, this quaint library offers communal desks and oversized chairs for visitors to enjoy. There is always room to work, making it a great option for a busy Monday afternoon.
What We’re Reading and Loving This Month
Last but not least, we’ll close each monthly letter to you with a recap of the books our members are reading that go beyond our WVBC picks. What are you currently reading? We’d love to hear from you in the comments!
Laura’s Corner
Connect with Laura on Goodreads and Instagram!
Start Without Me by Gary Janetti is a continuation of everything that I loved from his first book. These short stories are the moments that defined him, grudges he’s held, he’s relatable and too funny. I highly recommend the audiobook and I’m so glad I went back and listened after initially reading this a few years ago.
Famous Last Words by Gillian McAllister is the book I am recommending to everyone. I read this in just a few short days, I simply couldn’t put it down. The premise hooked me immediately, it’s Camilla’s first day back to work after maternity leave, she wakes up and her husband isn’t there. She gets to work and sees on the news that there’s a hostage situation developing in London, the police arrive and her husband is involved. I loved the pace of this book and the many turns it took before learning what happened. I love any book that has a writer or some aspect of the publishing industry intertwined and this one has both.
The Dutch House by Ann Patchett was recommended to me by my step mother and after reading the premise and then finishing the book… I’m still wondering why. The story is told by Cyril’s son, Danny, as he and his older sister are exiled from the house they grew up in by their step mother. This book would be great for a book club discussion, as it spans more than 5 cities, diving into the complexities of wealth, class, family history and relationships of all kinds. I related to the way Danny and his sister Mauve struggle with the untold stories of their past with both humor and rage. After finishing the book, I have to imagine this is my step mother’s way of telling me she can’t wait to exile my sisters and I.
Liquid: A Love Story by Mariam Rahmani hooked me with the premise—the narrator decides to give up her career in academia and marry rich, committing herself to 100 dates in the course of a single summer. By midsummer reality hits, taking her and her project—to Tehran. This book turned out to be so much more than I was expecting, exploring everything from sexuality to grief, relationships, self worth and ultimately, love.
A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams is a Pulitzer Prize winning play and highly regarded for good reason. This month I travelled to New Orleans for the first time and wanted to read something set in the city. Upon arriving to my hotel, The Ponchartain, I learned that this play was written HERE at this very hotel. I decided to listen to the audiobook while walking through the Garden District and fell in love with Blanche Dubois. She is a complex and tragic figure, known for her fragility, her illusions of grandeur, and her desperate attempt to escape her past. I was so excited to find a copy of the screenplay at Crescent City Books in the French Quarter that afternoon. It’s short but not necessarily sweet, diving into the themes of desire and sexuality, illusion vs. reality, class and social status, madness and mental deterioration.
Caylee’s Corner
Connect with Caylee on Goodreads and Instagram and subscribe to her Substack!
Big Fan by Alexandra Romanoff. I enjoyed this quick novella! It’s the debut book from 831 Stories, a modern romantic fiction company. If you’re in a reading rut and just want something bubbly and light – this one’s for you. I read it over a couple glasses of rosé and finished it one sitting. Cute!
Kayla’s Corner
Connect with Kayla on Goodreads, Instagram, and subscribe to her Substack!
The Gap and The Gain: The High Achievers’ Guide to Happiness, Confidence, and Success by Dan Sullivan. I read this one off Chelsea’s recommendation! It’s all about how we have an ‘ideal’ which is a moving target that is always out of reach; when we measure ourselves against that ideal, we’re in the gap. However, if we can shift our mindsets to measure against our previous selves, we’re in the gain. Easier said than done, but a good listen/read for sure!
The Tell: A Memoir by Amy Griffin. Wow! I have not stopped thinking about this story since I devoured it in its week of publication—this true story is so spellbinding that it practically reads like fiction. In her debut (notably, an Oprah’s Book Club pick), Griffin explores how, at the yearning of one of her daughters to know her better, she was able to turn inward with the help of psychedelic therapy and in turn, uncover painful childhood memories she’d long buried. Her search for truth spurs the confrontation of trauma, perfectionism, and what it means to free ourselves from the constant maintenance of appearances.
Xan’s Corner
Connect with Xan on Goodreads and Instagram!
From Here to the Great Unknown a memoir by Lisa Marie Presley and posthumously completed by her daughter, Riley Keough. I read this in one afternoon sitting. I could not put it down. Lisa Marie’s life was a story made in tabloid heaven, but the book's core was just a woman having a human experience. Her words made her relatable, normal even. She never chose to be famous, and that fame resulted in deep feelings of unworthiness, feelings that she never knew who she could trust, addiction, and loss, but also the joys of her life, music, and motherhood. Of course, the stories of her early years at Graceland and her marriage to Michael Jackson were the juicy, Hollywood heyday bites of gossip that fill the belly of my tabloid-loving guilty pleasures. But mainly, I related to the beautiful, heartbreaking, and poignant words her daughter, Riley, shared about her experiences with the death of her mother. It was a reminder that no matter how larger-than-life someone may seem, at the heart of it all, they are just a person navigating love and loss like the rest of us.
Thank you WVBC again for such a fun peak into your book club. As an honorary member 🤣 I like seeing what everyone is reading. As a wine lover myself, I love hearing about Chelsea’s wine journey.