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I’d like to see book clubs sprout up more around Millennials. Think about your own group of friends: at least one of your moms is in a book club, meeting up with other mothers to chat about the latest historical fiction or speculative thriller they’ve read. But where is that same engagement among our own generation?
It seems pretty painless: choose a book, choose a time, READ IT, and then get a discussion going. But it’s always the last step that trips the most people up. Creating questions that everyone will be able to relate to is a daunting task, but here are some tips to keep the chatter going:
To learn more about book club questions, visit this very cool book club for The Lovely Bones.
Ask questions that aren’t too complicated, but also are not too simple. It’s always important to make sure that you’re including everyone, so it’s wise to not link the book to discussion of the space-time continuum (unless it’s The Time Traveler’s Wife!). But at the same time, don’t underestimate your audience; people could be turned off by a dumbed-down query like “Could the car be important to the story?” (Alternatively, “The author seems to use cars as a recurring motif. What different meaning could they have for each character?”)
There will always be people in the club who do not finish the book on time – be sure to include open-ended questions so everyone can contribute. To ensure that you’ve got some open-ended questions, look at the book’s themes. In The Lovely Bones, heaven is not only a theme, but also a space (another trope to consider!). Middlesex is all about the liminal state, of being in-between countries or even bodies. Disgrace looks at sexuality and public versus private spheres.
Encourage personal experiences. This develops right out of the prior tip: Let members know that it’s all right to affix personal viewpoints, to share their own stories while working through thematic and plot matters. If you end up on a tangent but everyone’s interacting, then wait until there’s a lull in the conversation and suggest a snack break. When you’re sitting down again, you can get everyone back on track with a more book-oriented question.
Respect everyone’s opinion. Don’t start a fight just because you are offended by what someone says – instead, ask them what they mean by their comment.
Share the wealth. Depending if your friends are more leaders than followers, let them set up the next meeting. These two things are important: consistency and diversity. So, try to do a new book each month, or every six weeks depending on your schedules, and have a new person head each round. With this, you can be sure that everyone stays involved and feels valued. Having new leaders ensures fresh new questions every time you meet.
To see a great example of book club questions, check out this book club for The Lovely Bones.
Tags: book, book club, Literature, lovely bones, questions
Posted in Literature · December 19th, 2009 · Comments (0)
The phrase “book club” to me is automatically associated with classics like Charles Dickens, or modern works, but it’s always rooted in the realms of literary or social commentary. But a lot of the time, that isn’t what people are looking for – so you shouldn’t be surprised to find that book clubs span a ton of other categories besides the usual mystery/thriller, historical romance, and memoir. Be creative and try introducing one of these categories to your book club – just think of the fun you could have coming up with book club questions!
Cookbooks
Why not? Cookbooks can be highly personal, especially if it’s well-written. An added benefit to trying to figure out the chef author’s life, personal history, and so forth, is that you get to try out the recipes. Yum!Sample questions: How did food impact the cook’s childhood/adulthood? Did you find these recipes frustrating? Did you try improvising ingredients?
Graphic novels
Why not? A lot of graphic novels are very deep stories, only enhanced by stunning visuals.Sample questions: How do splash pages and irregular panels express broad concepts like intense emotion and the shifting of time? Does the style allow you to better accept outlandish settings like space or futuristic dystopias? How do the writer and artists work together to express characterization and plot development? Did any parts take you by surprise? Were you able to detect patterns in either storytelling or art?
Erotica
Why not? If everyone is comfortable enough to talk about sex and what turns you on (this is the kind of thing I’d see more in a college dorm than a room of mothers), then you could have some truly illuminating discussions about culture, sexuality, and even identity. Also, these are usually short story collections, so you can interact only as much as you’re comfortable with.
Sample questions: Which lover (male, female, or in a same-sex story, clarify which character) did you find yourself identifying with? Why does the author decide to set the story in a bedroom/office/airplane bathroom? Were there elements to a story that unnerved/disgusted you, and why? Is there artistic merit to erotica?
Photo collections
Why not? A picture is worth a thousand words. Think you can come up with more than that in a discussion?
Sample questions: (Steer away from technicalities – unless you’re all photo buffs! – and stick with personal reactions.) Why did the artist decide to use color/black-and-white? Is this a candid or a posed photo, and how does that affect your reaction? What is the message that the artist is trying to transmit?
Audiobooks
Why not? This isn’t so much a theme as a different style of experiencing the content, so perhaps this will dip into the Sedaris and Patterson categories. But introducing the audiobook option could ensure that more members get to actually read the book before the next meeting, due to the ability to have it in the car or on a morning jog. Plus, it can be a more personal experience to have a book read to you by someone, especially if it’s narrated by the author him/herself.
Sample questions: Were you surprised at how good/bad the narrator was? Did the story have one or more narrators, and which works better? Did you find yourself focusing more or getting more distracted listening to the book? (Plus other questions based on the specific category you choose.)
Learn more about book clubs and the questions you can ask at this digital book club, which is currently covering The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Tags: book, book club questions, digital book club, Literature, lovely bones
Posted in Literature · December 19th, 2009 · Comments (0)