Youngblood Reading Guide & Discussion Questions

Book Club Discussion Questions

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For supplemental discussion material see our Beyond the Book article, What's That Mess in the Mess Hall? and our BookBrowse Review of Youngblood.

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!

1. Take a look at the epigraph, Stephen Crane's "In the Desert." Why do you think the author chose to open the book with this poem? How does it set the tone? Discuss how the poem affected you before you began the story, and how your understanding and appreciation of it have changed since finishing the novel.
2. On pages 78 and 79, the American soldiers gather in the compound to witness a fight between a camel spider and a scorpion. Watching his soldiers, Lieutenant Porter thinks "I looked around and didn't see jaded boredom anymore but something else" (p. 77). What is it that Porter sees? Why do you think he chooses not to stop the fight?
3. Consider the fight between the scorpion and the spider. What can you say about this moment in the novel, both as a storytelling device and for its significance within the plot? What is the author trying to say with this scene?

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