Goodbye For Now Book Club Questions
These questions are just a jumping off point of course, but the spoiler warnings are real, so probably don't read the questions until after you've read the book.
1) Start Up: RePose and RePosers (Mild spoilers)
1) Start Up: RePose and RePosers (Mild spoilers)
- RePose takes heat from the press and from religious groups. What do you think those groups' reactions would be if this technology existed? Are their concerns legitimate?
- Why does Meredith start to become disillusioned with the virtual Livvie?
- For which of their clients does RePose seem to work best? And for whom does it work less well? What seems to make the difference?
- Who's your favorite RePoser? Who grows and changes the most over the course of the novel?
- Do Dash and Meredith seem like family? They're very different, but what do they have in common?
- There's a lot of loss in this book, but there's a lot gained as well, especially in the way of new and sometimes surprising family. What's gained here? What new love does RePose bring about?
- Does the technology in this book seem possible?
- How much of your identity is online? If RePose existed, how well do you think you could be recreated based on your online archive? How is the picture of you presented on Facebook or Twitter or other social media sites an accurate one, and how is it less accurate?
- How much time do you spend online, or, maybe more to the point, what percentage of your social time is spent socializing online? How do social networking sites make socializing easier and more fun? And how do they make it harder and less fun?
- If RePose existed, would you use it? Who would you contact? Would you video chat or just email? What would you say if you could?
- What should happen to our online identities -- our Facebook pages and old emails and video chats and Twitter feeds and archived texts and blogs, etc. -- after we die? How can social media help the loved ones we leave behind?
- Whose method of mourning seems more effective: Sam's or his dad's?
- Why does Sam tell Julia she can't RePose? Is he right or wrong to deny her the chance to speak with her daughter again?
- Meredith is really our own Dead Loved One, the only projection we know both before and after death, so she's our chance to see whether RePose really works. Does it? Is Meredith's projection a good likeness of her? A satisfying one? When she says things she's said before, do you feel more joy at remembering or despair at her loss?
- Penny and Josh both argue that RePose is for the dying. Who benefits most from RePose -- the dying, the living, or the dead? How does it help each of those groups?
- Sam feels that he's been forgiven at the very end of the novel. What sins does he think he's committed, and do you agree? Should he be sorry? How can he make amends?
- Why does Meredith get the last word? What hope does she offer?