DineToRead.ie is not just any old book club, though it is that too; it’s a book club with an impressive online presence to support the club. DineToRead do regular meetings, over a meal, as you’d expect, but they also have a set of online tools to support the club’s members as well.

Couldn’t any book club have a website? Of course, but then there’s talking about it, there’s doing it, and there’s doing it well. DineToRead fall in to the latter category.

Meetups are an important social aspect of any book club, and it’s great to see the marriage of online and offline social aspects with DineToRead. Small, local meet-ups are regularly organised where a number of club members meet in a nice quiet venue, have food, and discuss the book of the month, amongst other topics, I’m sure! While other sites (especially forum sites) replace the book club tradition with an online-only format, DineToRead.ie have left this intact. That, I like!

What can DineToRead do in the future? Well certainly there’s potential for more local meet-ups. Even in the other cities (currently meet-ups are based in Galway and Dublin). There’s scope, once membership increases, to negotiate special member rates/bulk rates for the book of the month. I’m sure they’re already looking at other markets, but this concept seems pretty portable to me!

Finally, the one feature missing that I expected there, is book reviews. It can be micro reviews (encourage Twitter us!), or full on reviews, and it could be any book, or just the book of the month, for now. Bonus points go to tying in reviews from Amazon, or other review sites like LouderVoice.com!

The site is from those who brought us DineToMeet.ie which is dating service, although not as tacky as many dating websites out there. However, DineToRead do stress that it is not a dating service, merely a social service for those with a common interest.

DineToRead : The way every book club should be!