Running With Scissors (Burroughs) - Discussion Questions

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)

Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for Running with Scissors:

1. Discuss your initial impression of Dr. Finch’s practices. How do they change throughout the book? Do you think he’s unconventional or is he dangerous?

2. Many critics have classified this book as a comedy. Do you agree?

3. Rather than transferring guardianship of Augusten to Dr. Finch, what should Deirdre have done instead? Did she have any other options at that time?

4. Which member of the Finch clan did you sympathize with the most? Which did you dislike the most?

5. Natalie and Augusten were the closest people in each others lives. What made them so compatible? They were thought to be so close yet a single event tore them apart completely. Was their relationship real or a means of survival?

6. Which of Dr. Finch’s “methods” did you find most bizarre?

7. There is a revaluation towards the end of the book. Did it surprise you or was it expected?

8. After the initial release of Running with Scissors, the family sued Burroughs claiming it contained fabricated material. Consequently, the book had to be classified as a novel rather than a memoir. Still, Burroughs isists that all of the stories are true. Because of the outrageous nature of some stories, do you think that some details were exaggerated to put the author in a more complimentary light?

(Questions by Katherine O'Connor of LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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