The Fifth Season Book Club Questions
Welcome to the Buddy Book Club – we have a light-hearted comedic podcast that covers a variety of books. The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin is a fantasy novel set on a supercontinent called the Stillness, which is prone to earthquakes and other crazy geological events.
We did a full breakdown of N.K. Jemisin first novel in the Broken Earth Trilogy on our podcast episode. We got to chatting about, V8, unconventional relationship dynamics, and dramatic last lines. Safe to say this wasn’t one of our favorite books so fans of the series beware.
Our book club questions try to be a little more outside the box/comedic than your typical book club questions – hopefully you enjoy them.
Book Club Questions – The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
-> Is Fulcrum the worst customer service ever? They show up late, charge a 100 year loan (monopoly pricing), act cocky, then the town explodes.
Reminds me of Comcast customer service.
-> When Damaya gets bullied at Fulcrum, the bullies put booze in her juice. Is this… really a punishment?
I wish I got bullied like this at school. Is this where the D.A.R.E. “you’ll get offered free drugs” myth comes from?
-> Alabaster tells Syenite to go wingman for him by literally telling Innon to just come back to his place and to bring champagne. Is this the evolution of wing-manning or just extreme confidence?
Tough ask for Syenite, but maybe this is the future of wing-manning.
-> What did you think of the last line of the book? ‘Have you ever heard of something called a moon’. Was this completely random and a weird cliff hanger or did we just miss some deeper subtext?
I’m still trying to understand what happened in the book let alone what the moon has to do with anything.
-> Syenite, Alabaster, and Innon have a consensual love triangle, do you think this type of relationship could ever work with you?
I think the ability to have a 2-to-1 vote would always be nice, right now there’s a lot of split votes in disagreements.
-> Is there enough action in this book? It’s mostly walking and world-building. Do you agree or disagree and does it matter?
The Buddies disagreed on this one, it seemed like a book that was setting up future books rather than a full fleshed out story.
-> Did you notice a lot of references to someone licking their lips before talking? What is the rational behind that? Dry mouth, hungry, anxious, crazy, lustful, pretending to be a snake, thinking deeply? What do you think it was?
Seems like something you’d see Voldemort do but not sure the reason for it in this book?
-> What was your favorite scene in the book? We were both partial to the scene where Syenite kills her own baby to avoid its capture. How did this scene make you feel?
Very uncomfortable, but the scene that elicited the most emotion.
-> Were you shocked by the fact that all three main characters are the same person?
I feel like Christopher Nolan has ruined all surprised around timeline stories, now I just assume everything is different timelines.
-> Will you be reading the second book? Was it good enough to get you to pick up the second one (The Obelisk Gate)?
We passed on the second one, it was too above our pay grade.
-> Who would you cast in a movie version of Fifth Season?
Check out some of the books we’ve casted so far.
