Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Unclean..unclean..I am wearing the leper's bell..no one likes me in the village

155 replies

taxiforme · 03/02/2012 12:43

AIBU to be so f*ing angry for being "rejected" by the village book group?

I am trying to "make friends" in the village I have moved into. Thought I would join the local book group via a friend that I had made who was a member and I kind of knew in passing the other members as their kids are friendly with my DH's kids...

Ohhh they go out for curries, they drink wine, sometimes they read books.

On saying I would pitch up for the next meeting I was told "oh no..I will have to put it to the other members"

..eh?

I am now told that "they feel they have enough members and cannot accept more"..there are EIGHT of them.

I feel so rejected and unwelcome but suspect that this is the work of the "XXName of the VillageXX Mums' mafia".

I am not a member of this sacred sisterhood. I work full time and don't wear Boden or Birkenstocks and have never been to Centreparcs..also I am a bit common. I have been seen in ASDA. I have a bit of an accent, too. I was asked if I was from "the North country" the other day.

What to do? Set up my own group sacred to the memory of "Princess Daisy" and "flowers in the attic" with a bit of jackie collins and bridget Jones thrown in? Or buy some flat ergonomic sandals, an overpriced flowery skirt and pay £1200 to sit in the rain in a wooden shed in Wiltshire as an effort to blend in?

Fight? Or resign myself to drowing in a well of loneliness of puffa jackets and John Lewis samples?

OP posts:
CailinDana · 03/02/2012 12:45

Why do you even want to join? You don't seem to like them.

TheSpreadingChestnutTree · 03/02/2012 12:45

They sound like a bunch of wankers anyway. Could you really stand their company?

SiamoNellaMerda · 03/02/2012 12:48

My SIL is ever so very smug about her Book Club and the mahvellous dahling types in it. It just makes me want to go round there and puke up on her Laura Ashley sofa, do a couple of twirls, call them all cunts and leave! Start an alternative one - it'll be much nicer and oversubscribed in minutes I'd imagine!

lesley33 · 03/02/2012 12:48

tbh I think it is hard to live in a small village if you don't "fit" in with the type of people who live there. Its fine if you live in a commuter village where people drive in and out, but don't really mix. But if it is more a village that has community life, I think it can be lonely if you don't fit in. This is why my DP who grew up in a very small village vows never to live in a village again.

Sorry - no words of advice though.

scaryhairydroopytits · 03/02/2012 12:48

Unless you have a penchant for discussing the failures of other people's cleaners and the merits of local private schools I wouldn't bother.

GeraldineHoHoHobergine · 03/02/2012 12:48

If I were you I'd set fire to a bag of dog poo and post it through their book group meeting hut. When they rush out to see who did it throw several copies of Katie prices autobiography at them. See how they like them literary apples.

SiamoNellaMerda · 03/02/2012 12:49

And LMFAO @ Geraldine!

Jjou · 03/02/2012 12:50

They sound horrible taxi - how big is the village? Are there any more book-group rejects to bond with?! Smile . I hate people like this though, why can't they put themselves in somebody else's shoes and think about how hard it must be to move to a place where you don't know anybody, and how much courage it requires to try and make new friends? Gah!

IUseTooMuchKitchenRoll · 03/02/2012 12:50

You don't like them, they don't like you. Where's the problem?

I think it was a mistake to just say that you would come along if it's a private little group of their own creation. It would be up to them to invite you.

There must be people around that you will get on with, you just have to find them.

GeraldineHoHoHobergine · 03/02/2012 12:50

Notice my poor use of grammar. I didn't learn that at no stinking book group, that's for sure.

SarahDoctorIndyHouse · 03/02/2012 12:52

Oh I feel your pain. But I agree with Chestnut. Their loss. I think book groups bring out the worst in people...

If it makes you feel any better a (former) close friend (who knew I was keen to belong to a book group) borrowed a book of mine and used it to attend a book group from which she made a point of excluding me. 'Like we can't do everything together.' Agreed, but buy your own sodding book then. In fact her reason for leaving me out was that the group came from our workplace and all the other members were on a higher grade than me. So that was alright then.

Dana OP may well have liked them before they demonstrated such cliquey-ness!

kreecherlivesupstairs · 03/02/2012 12:53

Book clubs are, IME, very cliquey. One that I wanted to join wouldn't let me in case I upset the dynamics.

GeraldineHoHoHobergine · 03/02/2012 12:53

I have had another thought, why not set up an alternative group that runs congruent to the book bastards one? Eg acid and macramé or cooking with tins? DON'T invite them.

Hedgeblog · 03/02/2012 12:53

Grin geraldine

porcamiseria · 03/02/2012 12:54

listen, I have learnt that trying to make "new local" friends is a recipe for disaster. as basically you are befriending people with whom have nothing in common bar a postcode. I have been burnt!

so FUCK them, really. get on with your life, dont be in such a rush to make friends. Make more effort to see/call/email your old "real" mates. Sometimes a half hour call with a genuine old mate is all thats needed. in time you will meet nice people

and hold this grudge, hold it. One day they night want your help and you can FUCK THEM OVER BAD!!!!!! what goes around comes around

cunts

Adversecamber · 03/02/2012 12:54

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

FannyPriceless · 03/02/2012 12:55

Maybe they picked up on your attitude towards them? And this can't be the only thing going on in the village, surely?

I struggle to find my way thorugh village politics too. One thing I have learnt is to say very little at the start, until the lie of the land is a bit more clear.

My alarm bells went off when I read that you had pretty much invited yourself along to the group. Tut, tut, that's really not how to do it.Wink If you really want to join, you are supposed to wait six months, be really nice and say very little so people realise you are not going to upset the status quo, then start dropping vague hints about how the book group 'sounds interesting', then wait to be invited to join. Something like that.Confused As I say, I'm still finding my way too!

porcamiseria · 03/02/2012 12:55

anyway you work full time!!!! you dont even need these bitches!!!!

bumpsnowjustplump · 03/02/2012 12:58

Taxi if you are in the SE then I will join your club. I know how you feel being an outsider it is pants!!

Hassled · 03/02/2012 12:59

Oh I had "left out of the book club" angst a few years ago too. There was something especially galling about it because it was a book club, and I like books. Anyway, turned out that the book club women were then, and are now, wankers. It would have been hideous.

What you need to do is write a best seller about your experiences with the Book Club Bitches. Then give them some copies and ask if they'd like to discuss it at their next meeting.

WowOoo · 03/02/2012 13:00

My friend was talking to me about her book group and how two random women were let in without a vote. They sometimes don't read the books either. Shock horror! Shock
She's so outraged that she's starting another one. Such an over the top reaction.
Why don't you start another one or a film club or something?
It all sounds like too much bitchiness for my liking.

Anyway, they'll put it to the group who'll say 'hell, yeah bring her in' and then you'll make some new friends...Give it a bit of time.Smile

QuietTiger · 03/02/2012 13:00

I live in a "village" of 20 houses (so more like a hamlet really) where 1/2 the village is inbred related and the other 1/2 all work in a similar profession. Seriously, in a village of 20 houses we have 14 doctors/surgeons. To say the place is like Stepford a bit cliquey is an understatement. You either fit in, or you are an outsider.

I've found the best way to cope with it is to let 90% of the politics go over my head and not get too "involved". I've also made my own friends outside the community. It's taken 3 years and the fact that DH comes from the oldest farming family in the village and has been here longer than anyone else to even get acknowledged.

It's their loss.

Sidge · 03/02/2012 13:00

God I can't imagine anything worse than a Book Club.

Poncing around waxing lyrical about some overwritten pretentious 'literature' that I wouldn't waste money buying as it's so blardy dull.

I am a member of a solo book club - I lie in bed with a cup of tea and some toast reading stuff like Lee Child, Marian Keyes and Stephen King and I don't have to dissect and analyse it afterwards. Bliss.

Garliccheesechips · 03/02/2012 13:00

I don't care to belong to any club that will have me as a member..

Original poster
taxiforme · 03/02/2012 13:01

Oh God I am laughing...

Thanks for all this. No, you are right I probably wont like them much really....but I felt so bollocky mad.

I need a name for my new book group!! Something to reflect the aspirational needs of today's modern woman. Has to be as sexy as err..a bit of Peter Andre in a velour tracksuit.

Sh*t, it's 13.00 and I am still in my dressing gown and uggs.

OP posts: