- Why did Ishiguro choose to tell the story from Klara’s perspective? How would the novel have been different if Josie, or her mother, had told it?
- Did you relate to Klara? Find her likeable? Empathize with her? What about her character or storytelling made this easier or harder?
- Klara, a personified machine, personifies the sun. Why does she do this? What does it mean to be a person? Are all people humans? Are all humans people?
- When Miss Helen meets Klara, she says, “One never knows how to greet a guest like you. After all, are you a guest at all? Or do I treat you like a vacuum cleaner?” What does she mean by this? How would you react upon meeting Klara?
- In the novel, workers have been “substituted” by machines who do their labor. At various points in the book, we hear from characters who support substitution, like Josie’s father, and some who oppose it, like the woman at the theater. Why are their opinions different? Who benefits from substitution?
- Klara is an outdated model of AF, children who haven’t been “lifted” are kept from schools, and workers are dispensable and unwanted. How do you feel about this recurring theme of obsolescence? How do we treat obsolescent people and things?
- Why do parents choose to have their children “lifted”? Is it fascistic, as Miss Helen suggests? Is it eugenics? Is there an analogous practice to “lifting” in our real world?
- What has changed about each of the characters by the end of the book? Have they grown? Have their circumstances improved? Did you find it hopeful? Or tragic?
- What has the book taught you? About people, technology, or love? What will you take away from it the most?
- There was something very special, but it wasn’t inside Josie. It was inside those who loved her.
- Does technology change the way that we relate to one another? Does it enhance or limit our capacity for love?
Round Rock New Neighbors Book Blog
Welcome to our Book Discussion Group Blog! Here you find all our news and write-ups of our book discussions! To look for a blog entry about a book, use the search box at the top left corner or scroll down and click on the author or title in the list on the left side of the screen.
Sunday, May 7, 2023
Discussion Questions for Klara and the Sun (Meeting May 15th 1:00 PM Round Rock Public Library 2nd Floor Outdoor Table)
Thursday, May 4, 2023
Planning for the Future: Book Club Questionnaire Sent to Members Separately
Round Rock New Neighbors (New
Neighbors of Greater Round Rock) Book Club Ideas
Our Book Club seems to need some help.
History:
The Book Club was begun before I moved to Round Rock. I
found it soon after I arrived. My neighbor told me about it, though she wasn’t
a member. The group met at different people’s homes each month. I received the
files when another of my neighbors moved away and gave them to me. I have some
old files and booklists.
The first article in the file is an Amazon printout about Ulysses,
by James Joyce. I don’t think the Book Club ever tackled Ulysses. I
nominated it early on – I’ve always wanted to read it, but I wanted it to be a group
experience. The group didn’t vote for it. The next article is an Amazon
printout, with lots of reviews printed in full, about Anne Tyler’s Ladder of
Years. Then, there is a page that someone wrote about The Hundred Secret
Senses, by Amy Tan – looks like notes someone would use for presenting the book
to the group for discussion. There are some cut out articles from the Austin
American Statesman with lists of “Top Ten on the Modern Library List” (Ulysses
is #1) and “Austin’s Top Choices” (#1 = To Kill a Mockingbird. The date
of publication of the newspaper is cut off. James Magnuson’s picture is on that
page of the Statesman, with a list of his favorite 5 books – he gave us an
author visit years later. There’s a “Xerox copy” of a Statesman article about
Christopher Reich, and his novel, Numbered Account.
All these old records of the Book Club – what shall I do with
them? I would be sad to dump them in the recycling – better to pass them on to
someone who wants to archive and/or lead the Book Club into the future!
Moving Forward:
For now, I’d like to set up our next months of reading and
discussing books. If you didn’t nominate yet for this summer/fall, you haven’t
helped much…yet! I have created a
questionnaire that I hope will help us move in a good direction now, as we
might be emerging from the pandemic. Or, as we begin to accept that the
pandemic has changed us.
I have some ideas about things we could do. Meeting
in-person is best for everyone’s mental health but not necessarily for our recently
accepted habits. Barnes & Noble isn’t giving us any priority any more.
Do you like the following idea? Whoever is at a discussion meeting, e.g., our
May meeting when we discuss Klara and the Sun, (by Kazuo Ishiguri), (if they
want to) can suggest titles for 2 months hence. After we have gathered titles,
we vote at the meeting and choose the book with the most votes. Then, the email list receives a message
about the book, and the book title will be on the blog as scheduled for a
specific month.
Would this work for you?
________
In fairness to those who nominated, I will begin to schedule
the books that have already been nominated. There aren’t enough for our
scheduled “season”. We might skip a month or accept some new nominations. Maybe
nominating and choosing books can be a rolling procedure, with occasional votes
if several nominations arrive at the same time.
Would this work for you?
________
Status quo – in May and November, everyone who didn’t
present a book that half of the year nominates 1 book each for the next
half-year. Then everyone votes. Do
you prefer this? _______
Other ideas? (Insert here)
Would you like to take charge of nominations and votes? _______
Someone needs to do it!
The Blog – We have had a blog writeup each month
after our book discussion. Although I am a proponent of in-person discussions,
I did find ways to make the blog posts more easily and more detailed via Zoom. Sometimes,
before a discussion, the nominator has prepared something to post on the blog
to help the group prepare for the discussion. Would you like to take charge of receiving
preparatory material from the nominator and posting it on the blog? ______
Would you like to contribute something
to the blog on a regular basis? _____
Would you like to be “guest blogger”
occasionally? _____
Do you find the blog useful? _____
What do you search for on the blog? (Insert answer) Would you miss the blog if
it were gone? _____
Probably, the blog could stay online
even if no one updated it. If it stopped being updated, would you like to have
it available online as it is now? _____
Meetings:
Please check as many as you want to:
____ I want to meet in person only. I am willing to meet at
the library, at a subdivision clubhouse, at someone’s home, or elsewhere. (Please add some Ideas for where to meet and
especially whether your home would be an option for a meeting sometimes:
_____________)
_____ I want to meet on Zoom only
______I’d like to meet in person and on Zoom, seasonally,
e.g., Summer and Winter on Zoom; in-person when the weather is comfortable for
outdoors. (This might require an email in the morning before a scheduled
meeting)
I’d be willing to pay $2/month dues to the Book Club, which could
go toward the cost of Zoom _____ I’d be willing to act as “Treasurer” for
the group, arranging for payments and keeping records. ______
Nominations:
Here is my nomination - It’s late, and I understand that books
might already be scheduled for some months, especially if we don’t have enough
nominations for a vote.
Your name
Author & Title:
__________________________________________________________________________
More ideas for improving our Book Club: Insert here:
Thank you!
Sunday, April 23, 2023
We Discuss Lessons in Chemistry in Person
Our meeting at the outdoor table at the Round Rock Library was a high point! The book was delightful, the weather was beautiful, and the discussion of Lessons in Chemistry, by Bonnie Garmus, was fun!
Lessons
in Chemistry is a
popular book and had become difficult to get through a library! The book is
worth the wait, unless you have a Book Club discussion to attend! Thanks to
Carla, we had all read the book, and we had discussion questions about it.
Everyone enjoyed Lessons in Chemistry! We went through the questions, but your webmaster
neglected to take very many notes, so there won’t be much of a rendition of the
discussion. You had to be there! Here are some things said about the book:
Favorite
Character: The majority went for Six-Thirty. This was the same as with many
book clubs and readers on Goodreads! The
dog was not totally realistic but highlighted the intelligence and loyalty and
protectiveness that many dogs show. Joyce chose Mad. Mad knew a little too much
for her age! Joyce wondered whether Mad had become the way she was because of
her upbringing or whether she was just that way.
Question 1) It
seemed the relationship between Elizabeth and Calvin would have lasted, had he lived
longer. The relationship was one of mutual respect, attraction, and love.
Question 2) Among
us, we represented a variety of cooking styles. Most of us hadn’t thought to
think about the chemistry of cooking.
Question 3) Madeline was a child, so her imagination was very active. We thought she put characters into her family tree because without them, the tree would have been too spare, plus, the strong women (Cleopatra and Pocahontas) she added were clever and fitting solutions to her tree.
Further
discussion involved whether any of the book’s characters, e.g., Elizabeth,
Calvin, and Mad, might have been on the autism spectrum. We discussed how
libraries have changed since the 1960s, when this story supposedly took place. Ken
expressed anger he had felt when he read about the assault on Elizabeth. I had
felt anger during that description, too! We found a lot of the book to be
unbelievable, but that was the nature of the book – to require the reader to
suspend disbelief. After this well-written entertaining book, this author seems
to be one to watch for further offerings!
I will add
that although we didn’t discuss it, Elizabeth appeared in my mind similar to
the actress who played Beth Harmon in the movie for The Queen’s Gambit (Anya
Taylor-Joy). Joy would be the actress I would choose to play the role of Elizabeth!
Friday, March 31, 2023
Burntcoat: An Unusual Novel
The unusual
novel, Burntcoat, by Sarah Hall, inspired an unusual discussion! Some of
us had difficulty reading the book. One member said, “I gave up halfway
through. I just couldn’t keep up the momentum to finish.”
Someone said, “At the very beginning, I was about ready to abandon it after about 25%. Then I realized that as (the book) goes on, more is revealed that begins to tie it together. So, for me, the little bit of suspense that was involved with the question ‘how is this going to tie together next(?)’ was enough to keep me going. For me, it was kind of like putting together a jigsaw puzzle. OK, where is the next piece? It was hard, but then, I’m not a big fan of stream-of-consciousness writing, either. Am I glad I read it? I’m glad I struggled through it. It was very different. Would I put it on my-favorite-books-I-have-ever-read list? No. Some of the things I had questions about that I would have liked to know more about, never got addressed. For example, what did (Edith’s) art actually look like?"
Someone
commented, “There were details about studying in Japan but no details about
what she actually did with (what she learned). Does anybody know what those
things actually looked like when she was done?” To this, I said, “It was left to the imagination, probably purposely.”
Someone
said, “I didn’t get any of the art (parts).”
”One comment
was, “It started out with the stroke. That didn’t attract my imagination."
Other
comments included, “Hall can turn a phrase. (The book) had a rich vocabulary. I
found myself looking up words more than usual. It might have been partly because
of the British orientation.”
About the
physicality, someone suggested that it might have been to remind the reader
that this was the body (of Halit), as well as his mind and soul. I used the
word, “visceral” more than once in comments about the physical details described
in the book.
I said, “There
were parts that were well-written. The parts about the mother and her treatment
and how Edith coped with her mother were my favorite parts.”
One reader noted
that reviewers said, “Dazzling and completely satisfying” and “A brilliant
novel about love, art, and the fragility of life.”
About the
pandemic in the book, someone said the pieces didn’t fit together and go
anywhere.
“This was the worst pandemic,” someone opined, “way worse than the pandemic we’re in, though it wasn’t real.” Since the book was published in 2021, someone wondered whether the author was writing about an imaginary pandemic while the actual pandemic was happening. Someone else who wasn’t able to attend the meeting also mentioned this in an email. She wasn’t sure whether the pandemic in the novel was a coincidence or whether it was purposely adapted from the real one. At the discussion, there was a suggestion that maybe the author added the pandemic parts during the editing to make the book better, and maybe even longer.
Some of the
questions at the end of the book are thought-provoking. The idea about who will
tell your story after you are gone was the theme of a question and had been the
theme of a song in the musical, Hamilton.
We made a list
of stories we found in the book: Edith’s mother’s story, Edith as a child,
Edith’s experience of her dad leaving them, the cottage on the moor, a first
boyfriend, the Japanese studying (woodwork), Ali’s backstory, Halit’s
backstory, Edith’s brother who visited, the on and off friendship of Carolina
who helped Edith’s career as an artist, and the topic of grief that meandered
through the stories and perhaps was the main topic of the book. Someone suggested
motherhood was also a main theme of Burntcoat, with protagonist Edith
saying that she brought her art into existence but did not have a motherhood
relationship with it.
The discussion was slightly more disorganized than usual, but, as usual, brought out a good discussion’s worth of ideas about the book!
Sunday, February 26, 2023
The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating is Quiet and Steady…”Crunch Crunch Crunch.”
All 7 of us at the February Zoom discussion had finished and enjoyed reading The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating, by Elisabeth Tova Bailey. Marcia sent us to the author’s website, where we saw action video of the snail and listened to a recording of the snail eating. Here are some highlights from our discussion of 20 questions the author provided:
Question 1) There are 2 protagonists in the book, the snail
and the human. Did you find yourself drawn to one more than the other?
Marcia noted that the snail was nocturnal and was always back
to a resting spot before daylight. She related the illness aspect of the book to
the pandemic, because everyone has become more aware of illness and
handwashing. We discussed handwashing obedience and rebellion. In her nursing
career, Marcia remembered a germophobic doctor who particularly disliked the hospital’s
policy of allowing patients’ pets to visit them at the hospital. Dennis reminded
us that there are good bacteria in dirt. Carla said she had often told her
children that “…everyone has to eat their prescribed pound of dirt.”
Joanne said that the world is becoming complicated and
dangerous. I responded that, due to the prevalence of the media, we certainly
are hearing about everything complicated and dangerous! Joyce addressed the
author’s situation of finding a little companionship with the snail as a fellow
living creature and finding reduced connection and increased awkwardness with friends
who visited her, as her illness continued over time. Marcia said the author
seemed to find symmetry between herself, who couldn’t do things quickly, and
the always-slow snail.
Joanne said she got caught up in the writing itself. Carla was
concerned about the author as a person. Since the author seemed to be going through an idiopathic
(unknown cause) and debilitating illness, we all felt sorry for her. Various members
read aloud favorite passages from the book.
Question 5) Have you ever noticed a snail before? Marcia
enjoyed learning a lot of details about snails when she read The Sound of a
Wild Snail Eating. She remembered having a snail in a glass aquarium when
she was a child. The snail would climb the wall. Once, when the snail had laid
some eggs, Marcia’s older brothers scared her by telling her that the eggs
indicated a dangerous alien involved. Funny how memories from childhood stay
with us!
Marcia also noticed the snail’s “dart” hanging down in that
same aquarium. Reading the book, she knew just what that dart had been! Snail ‘love
darts’ are also mentioned in Gerald Durrell’s Birds, Beasts, and Relatives
(Book 2 of The Corfu Trilogy, of which our Book Club read Book 1, My Family
and Other Animals). My notes from reading The Sound of a Wild Snail
Eating mention that Durrell’s passage about trying to get snails to mate was
mentioned in The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating. Another adventure with
snails Marcia told us about was when Marcia’s cat once arrived in the house with
20 tiny snails on her tail…Marcia called her “snail tail” and cleaned all the
snails off the cat’s tail. It was good for all of us that Marcia had some
interest in snails and nominated The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating!
Friday, January 20, 2023
Discussion Questions for The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating
Discussion Questions for Book Club, From Marcia:
The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Tova Bailey
Book Club Group Discussion Questions for Monday, February 20, 2023 at 1pm.
These questions have Spoil Alerts; so, reading the book first is always my priority.
Also review these websites prior to Book Club discussion:
https://www.
https://elisabethtovabailey.
Make sure to scroll down and visit the other links as well including a recording of a snail eating vs a human eating, video of a snail moving across moss.
The author has listed the Book Club Group Discussion questions grouping into categories:
Reading Experience.
The Snail & Natural History.
Illness & Health.
Final Questions.
Again, Spoil Alerts when reading these questions.
All 15 questions are on the website. Here are the first four questions to get you started--under your Reading Experience:
- There are two protagonists, the snail and the human. Did you find yourself drawn to one more than the other? Does that say something about you as a person?
- Which chapter was your favorite and why? Was there a particular phrase, sentence, or idea that really intrigued you?
- Did you find yourself reading the book quickly to see what would happen next? Or slowly so that it wouldn’t end?
- Although the book covers a year of snail observations, the author notes in the epilogue that the narrative actually weaves together that year along with research the author did years later. If you think of the story in these two layers, the direct observations and the research years, does it change or deepen your understanding of the narrative and of the bond the author formed with the snail?