Our Origin Story

What's better than chilling at home on a Saturday?

Chilling at your "Third Place" in the company of readers.

Irani Cafe became that place for us, where the idea for The Saturday Book Community and its various initiatives were discussed. It's part of our origin story, and the famous Irani Bun Maska inspired the name for our monthly book meet-ups " Books' Maska".

Let's go back approximately 11 months, when PuneReads had their first edition. I was new to Pune and had no friends in the city. At that time Pune did not have a lot of book clubs, and finding readers in the city was difficult.

Then by chance, I happened to stumble across a @pune_reads post and attended their first edition. Approximately 30 odd, shy and silent folks showed up( this part leads to another story which I might write soon). So, I started going regularly to almost every edition. Initially, people did not hang out after the silent reading session, and everyone went back home to their respective homes/plans.

It was only during monsoons that we came together as a group. We were now a regular group of about 10-15 people who came to read every Saturday. The crowd then was very low, in single digits at times, but we still met every Saturday, cause we had found our tribe. We sat under this old shed, reading silently in the incessant patter of rain.

Now, we wanted to hang out and chit-chat after reading in the park (which closes at 11 sharp. Like they almost locked us in once ), so that's when we started going to Irani Cafe regularly for hot tea/coffee(I prefer black tea) in the cool morning winds in the rainy season. We used to sit and talk endlessly in that place for hours at a stretch. At times we used to sit from 11-4 at Irani.

Let me tell you how we persisted in coming out in the rain to read every Saturday, even when it was damp and mushy. We formed a small WhatsApp grp and we would literally check in every Friday if anyone was coming to Kamla Nehru Park(btw that's where all this @pune_reads magic happens).

As months went by, our small group grew, and we met numerous new readers. We invited them to do "Chai pe Charcha" with us at Irani Cafe. A lot of them became regulars like us, some even joined our friend circle. ( The servers used to give us a lot of side-eye looks for siting and chatting for such an elongated time frame. But now, after almost a year, there is a foot-long table reserved just for us.)

Soon enough, by the winter months, we became fast friends. We spent most Saturdays now talking about love, life, and books. Our every Saturday schedule changed as such: We met and interacted with new readers till lunch time, then spend the afternoon in cozy eateries where there is good coffee and comfortable seating arrangements. Then if we were in the mood for something sweet, we would head down to Meridian Ice Cream for a double scoop of the sexiest ice-cream ( we experimented with the weirdest flavor combos like gulkand and coffee mocha ). It became a regular thing for us, and months passed by. Seasons changed as we talked about books, life, and more.

But I realized that as our bond grew stronger, we were talking less about literature and our love for it and more about love & life in general. This is when Tanmay, Prathmesh, and I got together and talked about organizing a book meet-up. So that we could specifically discuss books and get recommendations.

At our first meet-up, we were not at all serious, we were just doing it for fun. It was a novel thing for us and I was damn nervous about hosting it but we did it. It was perfect, it was soo much fun. And the best part is I loved hosting it. It went very similar to what I had envisioned in my head, maybe even better. That's when we realized this was something really cool and people enjoyed it as well and that we could do it again and again.

I have a lot of fond memories of attending book meet-ups in Mumbai, pre-pandemic. I had a lot of enriching conversations and met so many readers from different walks of life, which I wouldn't have in my circle. I wanted to emulate that here as well and give more people a similar experience. ( will write about this part in detail later)

We conducted our 2nd meet-up at The Orange, Art, and Book Cafe. It's such a beautiful space, situated in a quiet area, and a mirror that would turn anyone into Narcissus. After doing this meet-up at Orange, our reach kinda blew up, we got a lot of new readers. That's when we realized that we might have to put some work into it and do it in an organized way. Especially since we were creating this wonderful space and it was actually helping people.

In March, we came up with a whole host of things. We organized a museum visit, hosted a book meet-up, and then a poetry open mic.

Pranav came to us and said, "I want to host an open mic". His idea was to give writers space to perform/recite their works in an intimate and comfortable setting (Since a lot of writers are at times unsure and shy). The Orange cafe was perfect for our vision and it turned out splendid. The open mic received a really amazing response and we look forward to conducting more.

Now, it was not just the three of us, that were propelling this community forward. Everyone in our circle was helping us initially with opinions and validations(those are very important btw). We realized we were not just a book club but a proper community. Now, it's a full house of people willing to help us in their way, not just the original members but the new folks who were ready to pitch in as well. Whether it was Vedanti who helped with the management, Yashvi who helped with her creative name suggestions, Pranav with basically his presence, Vaishnavi with her beautiful bookmarks, and many others. It's truly a community initiative now.

This is how our origin story turned into an organized effort, and we hope to continue welcoming more readers, writers, artists into this community we call our own.

A takeaway: It's really hard to find social groups after college. Even harder for us folks with such a niche interest. So, it feels really nice to create a space where one can find people with similar interests and become friends too. And not just that, but I can say most of these people are really decent ( a rare commodity these days), well, we had our share of bad apples but we were able to deal with them to the best of our abilities.

Check out more upcoming events and initiatives .

P.S. This is my first time writing something this big. So, do drop in comments and please share your stories as well.