Book Clubs and Questions

I started a book club months ago for friends in a reading challenge group we created years ago. It’s super casual, but come meeting time I still wanted them to feel like it was a legit book club, not just a chat that happened to discuss a common read for an hour. I wanted to elevate it and offer focus to our discussion. It was in preparation for our first meeting that I noticed a distinct need I hope to help fill.

If you’ve ever wanted to start a book club among friends, you may have noticed how scarce discussion questions are with certain books. You may have also noticed existing discussion groups and virtual book club questions are not posted or, very rarely, they’re behind a pay wall.

Make no mistake, there are plenty of links you can follow from a simple online search but none of them yield anything functional. You’ll find reviews aplenty, empty pages requesting discussion questions, and links to other linked groups repeating the same cycle of nothingness.

Is there a reason why discussion questions are so hard to find despite several sites, pages, and groups announcing their book club pick? Are book clubs elitist or is there something I’m missing?

I understand unpaid and unrecognized labor (hello, teacher life). I understand wanting readily available resources but I also understand the frustration of one sided relationships where you feel like you’re doing all of the creation and sharing but receive nothing useful in return only to later feel guilty setting healthy boundaries because people now depend on your resources. Can you tell which group project kid I was?

The good news is this: I’m already curating questions for my own personal book club so lucky for you I will be sharing them on my site to use and adapt as needed. Those who lack a conscience may try to pass them off as their own but truly my heart is with those book lovers who wish they had more guidance during or after reading to engage with fellow book dragons.

While I won’t be going full teacher mode and creating chapter by chapter reading questions, I make a concerted effort to follow my model for book club facilitation: intro questions, style questions, content specific questions, then subtext questions with a fun mix of hypothetical where appropriate.

If you have read any of the books I post about, I would LOVE LOVE LOVE it if you shared your response to any questions you feel comfortable with. Even better?
Add some of your own questions in the comments.
Happy reading everyone!