BART launches book club at Rockridge station
OAKLAND - BART wants people to get into reading books on its trains, which might mean more people missing their stops.
Nevertheless, BART this week announced its first book club for riders, called "One Book, One BART."
The club's first selection is Hua Hsu's "Stay True," which the transit agency said in a press release is "a bracing coming-of-age story set in 1990s Berkeley that recently won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Memoir."
To kick off the club, BART officials will be at the Rockridge station in Oakland from 4 to 6 p.m. Wednesday, with a prize wheel for riders to win free copies of "Stay True," BART-themed bookmarks, special book club T-shirts, and more.
Berkeley's Revolution Books, which is featured in "Stay True," will be there to sell copies of the book and the Oakland Public Library will have a table with information about its collection and programs as well as a button-making station.
"One of the undeniable benefits of taking BART is the ability to read while you travel, and nothing passes time on the train quite like leaping into a great read. Books, like transit, have the power to take us to lands far, far away (even if those "lands" are just the next stop on the line)," BART said.
The agency said it hopes to honor the long tradition of reading books on BART while celebrating the literary ecosystem in the Bay Area "from our region's trove of independent bookstores to our incredible libraries to our made-in-the-Bay writers, poets, and literary scholars."
BART is partnering with seven independent Bay Area bookstores that happen to be accessible by BART to offer a 20 percent discount on "Stay True" when someone shows their BART ticket or Clipper card (mobile Clipper cards work, too).
Those stores include: Moe's Books and Revolution Books near the Downtown Berkeley station, Reasonable Books near the Lafayette station, Orinda Books near the Orinda station, Banter Bookshop near the Fremont station, Folio Books near the 24th Street/Mission station in San Francisco and Books on B near the Hayward station (readers can order online with promo code "BART" to receive the discount and free shipping, as Books on B's storefront in Hayward is temporarily closed).
One Book, One BART will also connect people with in-person and virtual events from May through August. Go to the book club's page on BART's website at https://bartable.bart.gov/featured/one-book-one-bart-our-first-book-club.
