Point Omega Reading Guide & Discussion Questions

Book Club Discussion Questions

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For supplemental discussion material see our Beyond the Book article, The Omega Point and our BookBrowse Review of Point Omega.

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!

Introduction

Documentary filmmaker Jim Finley is divorced and adrift in New York City and looking for a subject for his next film. When he learns about Richard Elster, a scholar who was an advisor to the military for the War on Terror, he thinks he has found it. He follows the reclusive Elster out to a desert cabin in an attempt to convince him to be in a new film. The men spend their time discussing philosophy and politics, spinning their mental wheels, until the arrival of Elster's daughter Jessie. Sent by her mother, who dislikes Jessie's new boyfriend, Jessie changes the dynamic and sets Finley on edge with a confused attraction. When she suddenly disappears, it throws the men into a tailspin that forces them to confront the realities they've been hiding from.


Questions for Discussion

1. What was Elster's motivation for inviting Finley out to the desert? Did he ever intend to be in the movie, or was he simply lonely?
   
   
2. Characters are introduced abruptly in Point Omega, with context and background information revealed later. For example, we don't find out how Elster and Finley meet until pg. 60, or about Jessie and the watcher's meeting until the end of the novel. How does the pacing of the novel shape the reading experience? Does immediate immersion and gradual context pull you into the story faster, or hold you at a distance?
   
   
3. Elster tells Jessie and Finley that he goes to the desert to escape "the usual terror" of measured time which he feels is unavoidable in cities. He believes that time is, at heart, about fear, and that literature is meant to relieve that fear. Do you agree with his view of time and literature? Consider the origins of literature in oral traditions, which used narrative as a means of connecting to the past in what could be considered a refutation of time.
   
   

Unless otherwise stated, this discussion guide is reprinted with the permission of Scribner. Any page references refer to a USA edition of the book, usually the trade paperback version, and may vary in other editions.