Toronto has no shortage of book clubs, but Books & Bars Club is taking a decidedly more social approach to getting people together around a good read. Founded as a Toronto-based community for women, the club combines books with the kinds of experiences that make exploring the city more fun, from dinners and cocktail classes to picnics, brunches, bookstore crawls and themed events. While the books provide a common starting point, the bigger goal is creating genuine connections and friendships among women across Toronto and the GTA.

The community is now approaching 300 members, with thousands more following along online, and its events take place at different venues and neighbourhoods across the city rather than in a traditional clubhouse. For founder Ava Chandrakanth, that flexibility is part of the appeal. She built Books & Bars around the kind of book club she wanted to join herself, one that brought together reading, new experiences, great conversation and the opportunity to meet people.

We spoke with Chandrakanth about how Books & Bars came together, the challenge of making new friendships as an adult, and why sometimes the most important thing to come out of a book club has nothing to do with the book.

What is your business called and what does it do?

Books & Bars Club is a Toronto-based social book club and community for women who love books, good conversation, trying new experiences and meeting new people.

I always say we’re a book club, but we’re definitely not a traditional one.

We bring women together through curated experiences across Toronto – from monthly book discussions and dinners to cocktail classes, picnics, brunches, bookstore crawls and themed social events.

The book gives everyone something to connect over, but the friendships and community are really what make people stay.

What made you want to do this work?

It actually started very casually.

I was talking to some of my friends about a book I had read and realized that none of us really read the same genres. I remember thinking that I wanted to find other women who were excited about the same kinds of books I was.

But I also knew I didn’t want to start just another book club where everyone sits in a circle once a month and discusses a novel.

I love trying new cocktails, discovering restaurants, dressing up, meeting new people and doing interesting things around the city, so I wanted to create something that combined all of that.

Honestly, I built the kind of book club I personally wanted to join. What surprised me was realizing how many other women wanted exactly the same thing.

What problem did you want to solve with the business?

Initially, the problem was simple: I wanted to find women who loved the same books I did and create a more social, exciting way to connect around reading.

But very quickly, I realized Books & Bars was solving a much bigger problem: making female friendships as an adult.

Toronto is a huge city, but finding your people can still be surprisingly difficult. We have women in the club who grew up here, but also women who have moved to Toronto from the UK, Australia, India, the United States and elsewhere. For many of them, Books & Bars became one of the first places they turned to when trying to build a circle of female friends in a new city.

That’s become one of the most meaningful parts of the business for me.

There’s a group of five women who all met through the club around the same time. They now hang out independently, celebrate each other’s birthdays, and even go on dog-walking dates together.

Knowing that five people who might otherwise never have met are now part of each other’s lives because they happened to walk into the same Books & Bars event gives me so much joy.

We’re really just creating the space. The friendships take on a life of their own.

Who are your clientele/demographics?

Our community is primarily women in their 20s and 30s from across Toronto and the GTA, although Books & Bars is open to women 21+.

We have women who were born and raised in Toronto and women who moved here from all over the world.

Some are avid readers. Some are getting back into reading after years away from it. And some absolutely come to an event having read half the book and hoping no one asks too many detailed questions!

What tends to connect everyone is curiosity. They want to meet new people, try interesting things around the city, have better conversations and be part of a community that feels fun and welcoming.

How does your business make money? How does it work?

Books & Bars operates primarily through a monthly membership model along with ticketed experiences.

Members pay a monthly fee that gives them access to the community, member programming and events throughout the month. We also host ticketed experiences, particularly when there are additional costs involved, such as dinners, cocktail classes, workshops or larger-scale events.

We’re now approaching 300 members, with a wider community of more than 5,000 people following Books & Bars on Instagram.

We’re also beginning to work more closely with restaurants, hospitality partners, publishers, authors and brands that naturally fit our community.

One thing that’s important to me is keeping the core membership accessible. I want this to be something women can genuinely make part of their social lives, rather than something they attend once or twice a year.

Where in the city can we find your profession?

Pretty much all over Toronto.

We don’t have a permanent clubhouse – I joke that Toronto itself is our clubhouse.

One weekend we might be doing a picnic with skyline views, another month we’re at a restaurant discussing a book over dinner, and the next we’re learning how to make cocktails, doing a bookstore crawl or taking over a beautiful venue for one of our larger events.

A big part of Books & Bars is discovering the city together, so I love partnering with different restaurants, bars and local businesses and giving our members an excuse to experience places they may not otherwise have found.

Wherever there are books, drinks and a suspiciously large group of women passionately debating a fictional man’s red flags, there’s a decent chance you’ve found us.

What is the best question a prospective customer could ask a member of your profession when comparing services? Give the answer as well.

I think the best question is:

“Will I actually feel comfortable coming by myself?”

It’s easy for a community to look welcoming online once everyone in the photos already appears to know each other.

The real test is what happens to the woman attending her first event alone. A lot of our members come to Books & Bars without knowing a single person in the room, and we intentionally design our experiences around that. There is always something to talk about, opportunities to interact naturally and an atmosphere where arriving alone is completely normal.

If somebody walks into an event by herself and walks out having exchanged numbers with someone she genuinely wants to see again, that matters far more to me than whether we hosted a perfectly executed event.

What is the best part about what you do? What is the worst part?

The best part is seeing friendships exist completely independently of Books & Bars.

I’ll hear that women who met through the club are now going for dinner together, celebrating birthdays, walking their dogs together or building their own group chats.

At that point, Books & Bars has done its job. We created the room where they happened to meet.

The hardest part is that building a community is incredibly human.

People’s lives change. They get busy, move cities, change jobs or go through different seasons of life. Members come and go. An event you’re convinced will sell out sometimes doesn’t, while something you put together almost on instinct suddenly has a waitlist.

You learn very quickly that community isn’t something you can perfectly engineer. You can create the conditions for connection, but people ultimately make it their own.

What is your favourite joke about your own profession?

I started a book club and somehow became a part-time event planner, restaurant negotiator, cocktail researcher, amateur matchmaker and investigator of fictional men’s red flags.

Ironically, actually reading the book might be the easiest part of the job.

Where can we follow you?

The best place to find us is on Instagram. That’s where we share our upcoming events, monthly reads, behind-the-scenes moments and plenty of evidence that Toronto women have extremely strong opinions about fictional characters.

PAY IT FORWARD: What is another local business that you love?

One of our favourite local partners is Eataly Toronto.

We’ve had the opportunity to collaborate with them on several Books & Bars experiences, and they’ve always been wonderful to work with. I love businesses that understand that hospitality isn’t only about food or drinks — it’s about creating an experience people remember.

Eataly does that incredibly well, and they’ve been such a great partner in helping us create memorable experiences for our community.