Crossings is the book club for today's Christian family. Its mission is to provide you with the best from the Christian literature, books that will educate, inspire, and enlighten you, help bring you closer to God, learn more about His word and raise a loving Christ-centered family. At Crossings, you'll be a part of a growing community of Committed Christians, who share their personal stories, hopes and prayers through the exclusive member magazine and the special prayer web site.
The club relies on what could be called a standard operational procedure for book clubs: an enticing introductory offer is combined with an obligation to buy a certain amount of books within a certain amount of time at a discounted price, and spiced with an attractive catalog that helps the members wade through the plethora of reading choices.
Let's see how this works in more detail.
Crossings Book Club features two different selections. Initial selection is intended for prospective members: it is available for everyone to search through and browse. This is where you choose your five introductory books from. Member selection expands on this inaugural library significantly, and is accessible to active members only.
Initial Selection
To potential members, Crossings Book Club offers a diverse selection of Christian books on a range of subjects.
Bibles, naturally, are an important theme in the club's collection. In addition to the Bible Store where you'll find several different versions of The Book itself, there is a whole section of Bible reference books that will help you achieve a deeper understanding of Gods words. Learn about 1000-plus Bible prophecies and their fulfillments in the Old and New Testaments; get acquainted with the role of women in the Bible; find answers to every question unbelievers may come up with; tackle the book of Revelation even if you're not an advanced student of the Bible; understand the difference among 20 religions... these are just a few of the many topics addressed here.
The biographies section is filled with fascinating and inspiring stories about ordinary people who were blessed by a touch from the divine, and also about famous historical figures and celebrities who were (are) sincere people of faith, a fact that had played an important role in their achievements.
At Crossings Book Club you will also find many books aimed at helping Christians on a daily basis: the power a simple prayer can have in your daily life, how faith can help you turn obstacles into advantages, inspiring and motivating titles that represent a profound framework for your spiritual growth and help you face the challenges that rise along the way.
Furthermore, there are books on healthy living, relationships, devotionals, home & hobbies and, last but not least, children's books – it's never too early to start developing Christian attitudes.
Finally, if you are just looking for a bit of a relaxation, there is a Christian Fiction category. Here you will find the latest novels from a range of sub-categories – women's fiction, contemporary romance, historical fiction, historical romance, suspense & thriller – books with an unequivocal Christian quality about them, written by such renowned authors as Beverly Lewis, Colleen Coble, Lori Wick, Jerry B. Jenkins and many others.
Member Selection
Once you become a member of the club you will have a much wider selection of books to choose from. Members have access to all the books carried by other Booksonline.com clubs (over 70,000 titles), such as the renowned Book-of-the-Month Club (for a bit more "literary" selection), Doubleday Book Club, The Literary Guild, One Spirit Book Club (spiritual and inspirational books), The Good Cook, Rhapsody (romance books), Mystery Guild, Children's Book of the Month, Black Expressions (books by, for and about African Americans), History Book Club and many others. Note that all the same rules apply to these books (a purchase counts toward member's commitment obligation etc).
Joining
Joining Crossings Book Club is quite easy: it takes only a few minutes and can be done on the club web site. Not even a credit card is necessary. To each new member CBC extends a great introductory offer: 5 books of your choice for 99¢. Simply start shopping and add five books to your cart. When done, you will be taken to a page where you can review the contents of your shopping cart. At this point you can still remove an item if you change your mind and continue shopping for another one. You are also offered an opportunity to buy one more book for just $5.99 (look in the upper right corner) and thus reduce your commitment right away. It's a fair offer, so you might want to take it.
At the next stage you will need to enter your personal information, which includes your name, shipping address and e-mail address. Phone number is optional. That done, you will be prompted to choose your billing method. You can either pay by credit card, or select the “Bill Me” option in which case you will be sent an invoice to the address you provided on the previous page.
The last step requires you to set up a password which you'll need to access the members only area. Setting up the password will also confirm your membership. And that's it. You're in.
Modus Operandi
As a member you will receive the free Crossings Book Club catalog approximately once every 3 weeks. Each issue of the catalog features two Selections, new books chosen by the club's editorial panel as the most interesting reads of the moment. In addition, there will be over 180 other books for you to consider.
The catalog offers real value. Christian literature is a very popular subject at the moment, there are tens of Christian books being published each month, so the editors have to cut through a lot of titles to come up with the ones you should consider. Becoming a Featured Selection, therefore, is no small feat. Only the best, a crème de la crème, make it to that status. Moreover, the Selections these days are accommodated to your personal taste, based on your previous purchases and declared interests. The catalog, therefore, provides a great way to keep current with the happenings in the Christian literary world, find out about the latest titles from your favorite authors, or discover some fresh new talent. Many people actually keep memberships in different book clubs mainly for this reason: to receive recommendations on what's hot.
The current Featured Selections will be sent to you automatically, unless you tell the club otherwise. You can do so online, via the club web site, or by returning the Member Reply Form (included with the Magazine) through regular mail. This practice is known as “negative option” or “advance consent” marketing and it has been utilized by book clubs such as Crossings for more than eight decades. Some people consider it a nuisance, a relic of the past, others find it convenient.
While we are inclined to agree with the former group, in all fairness it needs to be said that these days the hassle really is reduced to a minimum: it's just a matter of logging in to your account on the club's official web site, selecting the “Featured Selections” tab and clicking on the “Don't Send” button. And that's it. You're done. It only takes a minute or so of your time once every three weeks. The important thing is not to forget to do it, and Crossings Book Club will even assist you in the matter by sending you a reminder e-mail before the Selection is shipped.
Finally, if you do happen to forget to cancel the Selection, you can always send it back if you really don't want it. You won't even have to pay for the return postage so long as the package was not open.
Managing Your Account Online
In this respect Crossings Book Club deserves much plaudit: the web site makes it easy and convenient to manage every aspect of your membership online. View detailed order and payment history; check the account balance, remaining commitment, and the shipping status of all recent orders; respond to the current Featured Selection or view older Selections; change your billing and shipping address and other personal details including payment method; choose shipping method, and, of course, browse or search CBC's entire library and place orders.
You might also want to participate in the club's online community called Crossings Corner, where you can share your own book reviews and recommendations with other club members. This is also the place to find exclusive interviews, read profiles of your favorite authors and excerpts from their latest books, participate in short story contests, pray for people in need or request a prayer for yourself through the Prayer Corner, share your ideas or interesting tidbits from your life in the Crossings' message boards, and find out about Christian conferences in your area to attend.
Once your commitment to the club (4 books in 2 years) is fulfilled, you are free to cancel your membership. The process, not surprisingly, is a trifle more difficult than joining. You don't have an option to simply close your account online, but instead have to send an e-mail to CBC's customer service, or a written cancellation request to the Member Service Center. A bit of a complication, in our opinion not entirely necessary. But then, perhaps we are being too finicky here. It is, after all, just one simple e-mail.
It goes without saying that you will always be welcome back should you decide to rejoin. You can do so simply by visiting the club web site and enrolling again, as described earlier in this review. Also, from time to time the club might send you an invitation to rejoin; usually there is a special offer attached to such an invitation, and these offers are often even more advantageous than the standard one available on the web site (lower commitment, for example).
From the great introductory offer, via club discounts to various special offers, savings are undoubtedly one of the best things about Crossings Book Club and for many probably the #1 reason to join. This being such an important subject, we have put together a separate page with detailed information on it and a real-world example.
Shipping Rates
A word or two on shipping charges as they are somewhat complicated. With the initial order the cost is $5.74 for the first book and $1.99 for each additional book. Somewhat high, but we suspect this goes some way toward recouping the loss Crossings has to be generating by giving you first 6 books for practically nothing. With subsequent orders the charges are $3.99 for the first book and $2.49 for others. If your total order exceeds $25, CBC will charge you $2.49 flat shipping rate for the whole package.
Free shipping would have been better; it certainly has a nicer ring to it, plus all decent online book shops are offering it. That said, with online retailers not each and every item is usually eligible for free shipping, so you might end up having to pay for it anyway. Crossings Book Club, on the other hand, will ship you everything you put in your basket for $2.49 as long as the total of your order exceeds $25. So, all things considered, this is not a bad deal.
For credit card orders, Express Delivery is available. Express orders incur an additional $5.99 per shipment. State sales tax will be added if shipped to NY, PA, IN, TX, TN, NJ, or SC.
Payment
Crossings gives you an option to pay by credit card (Visa, MasterCard, American Express), or be billed later. If you choose to pay by credit card, you will be charged when your order ships. Otherwise, the bill will arrive with the shipment and you can settle it either by using your credit card, or by sending in money order or check.
In order for this to work, the club grants you a certain amount of credit. Each time you pay on time, your credit increases, up to a maximum of $500. Note that you might be charged a late fee (approximately $4), if your bill is not settled on time. However, this fee can usually be removed by giving a call to customer support and explaining why the payment is late.
Billing methods are part of your profile and you can add or change your preferred method as you like. You will also have a chance to change the method during the checkout process. If you don't, the method specified the last time you ordered from the site will be used.
If you are a book enthusiast and a person of Christian faith and would like to broaden your knowledge of Gods teachings and achieve spiritual growth, then joining Crossings Book Club is certainly worth a serious consideration. You get first five books for next to nothing, up to 85% discount on all subsequent books you purchase, a shiny magazine in your mail every three weeks or so with book reviews and author interviews, plus you get to participate in an online community of like minded people.
Since you are not required to part with any money up front, joining is completely devoid of risk. If for whatever reason you don't like the introductory package, or if you simply change your mind, just return the package to Crossings within 20 days and that's that. No strings attached.
The only real downside to the whole deal is the somewhat awkward business model the club employs, which requires you to take action if you don't want to take action – that is, buy the proposed book. In our opinion, however, this inconvenience is more than offset by the benefits of membership.
Good thing is, even if you feel the practice is an absolute deal breaker, you can still take advantage of the incredible introductory offer of 5 books for 99¢ if it tickles your fancy. How? Join, take care of the commitment at once and cancel. You can walk away with 9 hard-bound Christian books for $60 or so, and that includes shipping charges. Hardly a deal you will find anywhere else.
