Discussion ideas and questions that work for your book club

Choose a book club discussion

It's time to come together, take your seat and begin your reading group discussion. How do you start? What are the ways you can keep the conversation moving and stay on task while having fun?

Gather around friends and let's pay book homage with these top dialogue ways that will keep your group  together for years to come.

The jungle discussion
This is the most popular way book clubs operate because of it's laid back style although a bit wild.  It's a feeding frenzy and chaotic with everyone talking all at once and over each other on how they interpreted the book.  How do you start?  Pour the wine and let the good times roll.

The slip of paper discussion
Someone will need to volunteer for this method before your next book club.

DIY: Write out questions related to the novel, and then cut the questions into separate slips of paper. Pass out one slip to each person or spread them out on a table for your group to choose which question they would like to answer.  You can even do this before the discussion starts so everyone can get a head start on how they want to answer.

As soon as the question has been answered everyone can then join in with their opinions.

Come prepared please
Take notes and or mark passages along your reading way so you will have tons of material to share at discussion time.  Book tools on Amazon.com are a great way to help you keep organized such as an Kindle E-reader, journal for book lovers and sticky notes like below-

One leader to rule them all
Maybe someone in your group wants to take the lead and bring a list of questions or thoughts to discuss for every book club.  If others want to step up and lead (a different discussion leader for every book club) the more the better.

Books with questions (Reader's Guides) included inside  
Novels such as:  The Storied Life of A.J. Fickry, Reading Lolita in Tehran and The Forgotten Garden have questions at the end of the story so the work is done for you and it will make your discussion that much easier.

It's so easy discussion questions

Start with:  Did everyone read or finish the book? (we call this confession time)

1.  What did everyone think of the novel? Hate it? Love it? and why?

2.  Who was your favorite character? or characters? or least favorite?

3.  Did you get what the author was trying to convey to its readers?

4. Was the book too long or too short? How long did it take for each person  to finish?

5.  How was the ending?  Would you change it if you could? What would be your alternate ending?

6.  Discuss other books by this author (if your group is familiar with his or hers work) and how similar their writing styles are regarding plots, characters, places etc.

7. Finish with:  Would you read from this author again?

Discussion time should not be so intimidating or boring that it ruins the fun of reading and sharing your favorite parts of the novel.  Enjoy the simple fact that you are all book lovers coming together to talk about your passion to read in bookish glee.  
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One more thing... if you want to add some rules into your group or book club discussion etiquette, check out the 'Start a Book Club with rules' page with more discussion time tips. Let's just say, it will keep your group from going completely jungle.

Happy reading book friends~