Becoming Nicole (Nutt)

Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:

• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)

Consider these LitLovers talking points to help start a discussion for Becoming Nicole:

1. Discuss the differences between the twins, and when those differences began to emerge.

2. Talk about Wayne and Kelly Maines and the manner in which they dealt with Wyatt/Nicole's emerging transformation? How difficult is it for any parent to acknowledge a child's profound divergence from expectations? How would you have reacted if you had been in Wayne and Kelly's situation?

3. What about Jonas? Does he receive equal treatment from his parents, or has so much attention revolved around his sibling that he remains somewhat on the sidelines?

4. The author writes of transgender people:

If there is an inner distress...it arises from knowing exactly who they are, but at the same time being locked into the wrong body.... The dysfunction arises not from their own confusion, but from being made to feel like freaks or gender misfits.

What is your reaction to transgendered individuals? Has this book altered the way in which you understand their situation? Are you more, or less, sympathetic? Why?

5. What, if any, legitimate protections and/or rights should transgendered individuals expect from society?

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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