Update: My book club's 'no spoilers' rule backfired spectacularly last night
We met at Carol's place in Portland to debate the thriller pick, and she had this strict rule that nobody could mention the ending before page 200. Problem is, three of us had already finished the book, so we spent an hour dancing around clues like we were on a game show. I finally snapped and blurted out the killer's name while reaching for a second brownie, and the two people who hadn't finished just stared at me with these betrayed looks. Carol actually put her book down and said, "Well, that's the meeting over," which was fair but also hilarious. We ended up voting on the next book by drawing names from a hat, and I got assigned the one everyone's been complaining about for months. Has anyone else had a club rule that made things worse than just letting people spoil freely? How do you handle finish-time differences in your group?