Guide · 40 questions

Book club questions that work for any book

Good book club questions are open. They don’t have a right answer, and they ask what you thought rather than testing whether you read chapter twelve. These forty work for almost any book.

To get things started

1. Sum the book up in one word. Why that word?
2. Out of ten, what would you give it, and what would have made it a ten?
3. Did you want to keep reading, or did you have to push yourself? Where did that change?
4. What did you expect from the cover and the blurb? Did the book live up to it?
5. Was there a line or passage that stuck with you? Read it out.
6. Would you recommend it, and to whom?

About the characters

7. Who did you like most, and who did you like least? Did that change as you read?
8. Which character felt most real to you?
9. Did anyone make a choice you couldn’t understand? What would you have done?
10. Whose point of view was missing? How would the story change if they told it?
11. Which character changed the most from beginning to end?
12. If you could ask one character a question, who and what would it be?
13. Did you trust the narrator? Why or why not?
14. Which character would you most like to be friends with, and which would you avoid at a party?

About the story

15. What was the turning point for you?
16. Did the pacing work? Were there parts that dragged or felt rushed?
17. Were you surprised by anything? Did you see it coming?
18. How did you feel about the ending? Would you change it?
19. If there were a sequel, what would happen in it?
20. How did the setting shape the story? Could it have happened anywhere else?
21. Was there a scene you’d have cut, or one you wish had been added?
22. What questions were you left with when you finished?

About the bigger ideas

23. What do you think the book is really about, underneath the plot?
24. What do you think the author wanted you to feel or think by the end?
25. Did the book change your mind about anything?
26. How does the title connect to the story? Would you have given it a different one?
27. Did anything in the book remind you of your own life, or the news?
28. Is this book of its time, or could it have been written today?
29. What does the book say about family, love, power or belonging?
30. Were there symbols or recurring images you noticed? What did you make of them?

About the writing

31. How would you describe the author’s style to someone who hasn’t read them?
32. Did the structure, such as time jumps, multiple narrators or letters, add to the book or get in the way?
33. Was the dialogue convincing?
34. Would you read something else by this author?

To wrap up

35. Did talking about it today change how you feel about the book?
36. Has your score out of ten gone up or down?
37. How would you pitch it to a friend in a sentence?
38. What book would you pair it with?
39. If it were made into a film, who would you cast?
40. What should we read next, given what we thought of this one?

For non-fiction

Most of the questions above still work. A few extras for non-fiction:

• What’s the one idea you’ll remember in a year?
• Did the author convince you? Where were they weakest?
• Have you done anything differently since reading it?

Keep the questions going between meetings

Many of the best thoughts happen halfway through the book, not at the meeting. Bookbunch asks each bunch a fresh question about the book every day and gathers everyone’s answers in one place, so there’s plenty to talk about by the time you all finish.