The Night Circus Book Discussion Questions

SPOILER ALERT! Do not read any further if you have not yet finished Night Circus!! Below are a few discussion questions I found that I thought might help get the conversation started:

1. What role does time play in the novel? From Friedrick Thiessen's clock to the delayed aging of the circus developers to the birth of the twins -- is time manipulated or fated at the circus?

2. Behind the scenes, the delicate push and pull of the competition results in some sinister events (e.g., Tara Burgess' and Thiessen's deaths). How much is the competition at fault for these losses and how much is it the individual's doing?

3. What is Hector's role in determining the final fate of the competition? He lectures Celia about not interfering with her partner, yet he largely influences the outcome. How much does Marco's underestimation of Isobel affect the outcome?

4. Tsukiko is aware of Isobel's tempering of the circus and when Isobel worries that it is having no effect, Tsukiko suggests that " perhaps it is controlling the chaos within more than the chaos without." What and whose chaos is Tsukiko alluding to here?

5. Celia tells Bailey that he is "not destined or chosen" to be the next propietor of the circus. He is simply "in the right place at the right time ... and care[s] enough to do what needs to be done." In this situation, is that enough? Can the responsibility of maintaining the circus be trusted to just anyone, or, unlike Celia suggests, is Baily truly special? How does Celia's belief relate to the struggling philophies of the game, that is, nature versus nurture, and the ultimate outcome?

Night Circus

Yay, we're off an running on another round of the Ferret Book Club! Our first meeting will be at the Summer Shack after work on Thursday, October 27. Amy has made our club's first selection, Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. One of my favorite book reviewers, Laura Miller from Salon.com, describes it as "a tale of romance and dueling sorcerers set in a nocturnal carnival." Definitely an intriguing pick for the spooky month of October.

Check out the guidelines at the end of this blog for details on where and when we'll meet and for how we'll pick books. Feel free to add new posts, comment on old ones, or let me know how you'd like to change the blog or add items to it.

Happy reading!

Who Are You Sophie?

What a fascinating book club discussion today. Place: My house. Food: tasty chips, dip, snacks, mushroom soup, and cookies. Book: Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World: A Novel About the History of Philosophy. Many of us had not finished the book, but the discussion was lively, and we uncovered multiple connections between the philosophical ideas being described and the twists and turns of the story. In fact, the discussion may have inspired several of the readers to finish the book, and it definitely inspired me to reread the book some time, maybe.

I enjoy reading about philosophy, and I found the first half of the book an enjoyable read. Not only did Gaarder, in my view, provide an easy to read primer on philosophy, he also interwined the lesson with an intriguing mystery story. However, by the middle of the book, a great twist occurs that completely deflated any interest I had in following the mystery story to the end. I also felt that Gaarder was too ambitious tackling the entirety of Western philosophy and trying to cobble together a novel at the same time. The second half of the book felt entirely too rushed to me, and it became a bewildering rush of philosophers and philosphies and the dramatic engine of the novel portion of the book stalled for me.

Our next book club meeting is Wednesday, January 28. We'll be reading A.J. Jacobs' The Year Of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible. Also, don't forget to bring along three suggestions for books to read as we'll be picking our next three books.

Happy reading!

Belated Clan Of The Cave Bear

Forgive me for the lack of posting; the delay was definitely not for lack of good conversation, observations, and food. For this meeting, we trekked over to Hungry Mother for some new southern cuisine and some good discussion about Jean M. Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear.

My impressions of the book were pretty meh. I thought that Auel's descriptions of a the fateful meeting between the more developed Cro-Magnons (Ayla) and the doomed Neanderthals (the Clan) and the world that both species inhabited were inventive. But, I wasn't able to willingly suspend my disbelief for most of the book. Ayla was too perfect. Tall, blonde, unaware of her own beauty, she's a feminist 30,000 years too soon. Somehow she magically makes all of the jumps in logic that it would take an entire species to do all by herself. I also felt that the villain of the book, Broud, was fairly one-dimensional. I felt the author pulling her strings and manipulating me into hating him, waiting for him to get what was coming to him.

At today's book club meeting, I heard that a fellow intrepid book clubber watched the movie over the holiday's. We want details about how bad it was!

Unaccustomed Earth

Yes, this delinquent blogger is finally posting about our great discussion about Jhumpa Lahiri's collection of short stories, Unaccustomed Earth. As we ate a tasty Indian meal at the Bombay Club in Harvard Square, we discussed stories of children in various states of dislocation searching for identity, family, and love. I had never read the Namesake, also written by Lahiri, but I found her prose spare and yet perfectly descriptive of the characters' journeys to discover who they really are in relation to as well as outside of their families' Indian roots.

Have any further thoughts about the book? Don't be shy -- leave a comment!

Next up -- We travel to Hungry Mother to discuss Jean Auel's Clan of The Cave Bear. See you there!

And, don't forget to get started on Sophie's World: A Novel About The History Of Philosophy.

Next three books

At our last discussion, we randomly selected three people to choose books and picked the following three books:

Wednesday, October 29: The Clan Of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel. Amazon description: Although this story takes place roughly 35,000 years ago, its cast of characters could easily slide into any modern tale. The members of the Neanderthal clan, ruled by traditions and taboos, find themselves challenged by Ayla, who represents the physically modern Cro-Magnons. And as Ayla begins to grow and mature, her natural tendencies emerge, putting her in the middle of a brutal and dangerous power struggle. This first in the series of four is a wonderful story of survival. Ayla's personal evolution is a compelling and relevant tale.

Thursday, December 4: Sophie's World: A Novel About the History of Philosophy by Jostein Gaarder. Amazon description: Wanting to understand the most fundamental questions of the universe isn't the province of ivory-tower intellectuals alone, as this book's enormous popularity has demonstrated. A young girl, Sophie, becomes embroiled in a discussion of philosophy with a faceless correspondent. At the same time, she must unravel a mystery involving another young girl, Hilde, by using everything she's learning. The truth is far more complicated than she could ever have imagined.

Wednesday, January 28: The Year Of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible by A.J. Jacobs. Amazon description: Make no mistake: A.J. Jacobs is not a religious man. He describes himself as Jewish "in the same way the Olive Garden is an Italian restaurant." Yet his latest work is an insightful and hilarious journey for readers of all faiths. Though no fatted calves were harmed in the making of this book, Jacobs chronicles 12 months living a remarkably strict Biblical life full of charity, chastity, and facial hair as impressive as anything found in The Lord of the Rings. Through it all, he manages to brilliantly keep things light, while avoiding the sinful eye of judgment.

A night of Devils and the White City (and some wine and cheese!)

Sorry for the long time between posts. Our discussion this past August about Erik Larson's The Devil And The White City was fantastic. The book is a fascinating window into a period of history -- the end of the 19th century -- launched by the 1893 Chicago World's Fair.

Many of us felt that we didn't learn as much about the vaunted architect of the fair, Daniel Burnham, as we did about the devil lurking at the edges of the fair, luring victims to horrific deaths, Dr. H. H. Holmes. Larson, in his copious notes, let the reader know that he created and dramatized many of the thoughts that Holmes and his victims may have had based on notes from the time period as well as psychological theories of psychopaths. Is this purely a work of nonfiction if there are large pieces of dramatization inserted to fill in the gaps in the historical record? What are your thoughts? If you have any additional thoughts about the book, comment away.

Next up: Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri (Wednesday, September 17).