Authorbanter Club in Hyderabad creates a platform for independent, emerging, self-published, semi-published authors to engage with readers. “Authors can easily interact with book lovers online but they have to depend on book launch events or meetup sessions to connect with readers offline and discuss their book. However, only few people know of these events,” says book lover Biswarupa Barik, about what led to the formation of the club with Nusrath Ali Quadri, a former IT employee in September 2025. The idea behind the club is to create an experience for the author and make audience engagement easy.

Bridging the gap

The duo have been associated with Hyderabad Reads, a silent community reading movement inspired by Bengaluru’s Cubbon Reads for three years now. During the interactions, they found a gap between authors and readers. “Getting through reputed publishing houses is not easy for all. Even if some of them manage to do that, they are not able to engage with readers directly. We wanted to create a space for authors to have a face-to-face interaction.”

Gallery Cafe in Banjara Hills and House Of Gourmet in Jubilee Hills have been the two venues that have hosted these curated two-and-half-hour sessions. “Authors do contribute towards the logistical costs but the club creates an experience for them.”

While the first half of the event is for readers to browse through the book, the second half has a Q&A session followed by a book signing session. The club has hosted 40 authors of English and Hindi books such as Ashwinikumar Aiyangar, Anu Bulus, Preeti Jha, B Maria Kumar (retd DGP), Rahul Patil, Varun Anantha and Reshma Bangarimath including Alamkrutha Gamini and Chaitanya, writers who connected virtually from the US.

For details, call: 78424 78734/ 98661 47767 or mail: oflineclubhyd@gmail.com

Published - August 11, 2026 11:10 am IST