Those Who Knew Reading Guide & Discussion Questions

Book Club Discussion Questions

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For supplemental discussion material see our Beyond the Book article, U.S. Support of Totalitarian Regimes in Central and South America and our BookBrowse Review of Those Who Knew.

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!

On an unnamed island country ten years after the collapse of a U.S.-supported regime, Lena suspects the powerful senator she was involved with back in her student activist days is taking advantage of a young woman who's been introducing him at rallies. When the young woman ends up dead, Lena revisits her own fraught history with the senator and the violent incident that ended their relationship.

Why didn't Lena speak up then, and will her family's support of the former regime still impact her credibility? What if her hunch about this young woman's death is wrong?

Moving between the island and New York City, Novey explores the cost of staying silent and the mixed rewards of speaking up in a profoundly divided country. Fleet yet powerful, fearless yet heartfelt, Those Who Knew is a timely parable about the fall of patriarchy told by a riveting cast of characters: Lena and Cristina, each raising a son on her own and connected by the senator, Victor, who is as charismatic in public as he is vicious in private; Victor's brother Freddy, an irreverent playwright uncertain what degree of loyalty he owes his only sibling; a tourist named Oscar; and at the center of it all is Olga, an aging radical who deals pot out of her used bookstore and whose life will enter its third act.

What begins as a novel about hypocrisy and a possible murder becomes ever more complex, with every turn of fate raising new questions about what finally stirs a person into action.

Questions and Topics for Discussion

1. Idra Novey chose to set most of her novel in an unnamed place. What countries or histories came to mind for you as you were reading? Did Victor's celebrated public life and his dark private life bring any particular figures or politicians to mind? Did the fact that Novey opted not to link her setting to a particular nation's history change how you saw the power imbalances between the countries in the book in a way that you wouldn't have otherwise?
2. Those Who Knew begins with Lena but quickly introduces several other characters points of view, creating a mosaic of narrative voices. How did that choice keep the plot moving? What blind spots among the characters became apparent to you as the story moved between them? Did seeing the conflicting versions of the same events through each characters' eyes stir your empathy in ways that surprised you? Why do you believe Novey chose to write her story this way?
3. After staying silent for many years about his brother Victor, Freddy asks, "What it would take for there to be a true reckoning with the repressive roles men imposed on each other, a moment when acting despotic would finally be recognized as the weakness that it was." What does this question mean to you? Have any roles you've felt pressured to assume impacted a choice you made?

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