ALN Book Club discussion
This topic is about
Redshirts
2018-2019 Collection
>
February - Redshirts by John Scalzi
date
newest »
newest »
message 1:
by
Emily T.
(new)
-
rated it 4 stars
Jan 28, 2019 09:38AM
Mod
reply
|
flag
Mod
1) Predestination vs self determination. If you found out that certain things in your life were being controlled by an outside force, how far would you go to influence a more favorable outcome?
2) Wacky hijinks and danger - how much is too much? Do we really care about the characters on a show so long as they give us a moment of entertainment? Should we care? Does the use of casual murder of characters to push the idea of a dramatic plot point desensitize us to the death of characters with whom there is no emotional investment? What does that imply for the audience's psyche?
3) Would you be willing to swap places with your doppelgänger if it kept both of you alive? If you were given a new body and a fresh lease on life, what would you do with it?
4) As a writer, how would you react if someone claiming to be one of your characters showed up at your place of business one day pleading for better treatment in your next work? Do you try to invent a way for even side characters to have fulfilling lives of their own, or do you kill them off as quickly as possible to fill a minor plot point?
5) The main literary characters in this story go to great lengths to more from their writer. This can be read as an analogy with how business treat their employees. Some care, other act like low level employees are extras and therefore disposable. How much obligation do writers have to treat their characters well? Is this subjective based on the genre?
6) Satire and parody as a genre. Who gets to decide what tropes are stale and get to be lampooned? This book deals a lot with skewering what the author presents as overused tropes in entertainment. Does this become an overused trope and of itself? How much is it "turning a critical eye on lazy technique" vs. risking becoming a lazy technique of sarcasm and making fun of other people's work, whether or not those other works deserve it? Scalzi does make a point of making sure even this book itself doesn't escape such commentary within its pages.
7) Does the shifting narrative style of the multiple codas add to the story in a meaningful way? Would you have been satisfied if the book ended after Chapter 23?
