Dark Matter (Crouch) - Discussion Questions

Discussion Questions
(We'll add the publisher's questions if and when they're made available; in the meantime, use these LitLovers talking points to help start a discussion for Dark Matter...than take off on your own:

1. In what way is Jason like the Box, the mysterious cube-ish chamber?

2. What does "superposition" mean? Can you explain it?

3. Talk about the various universes Jason inhabits. Which do you find most disturbing or frightening? Consider this question, which has been posed by ethical philosophers regarding multiple universes: if a murder takes place in one universe, would we find it as horrifying if there were other universes in which the murder doesn't take place? What about the Holocaust in World War II or, say, slavery before the U.S. Civil War?

4. This book explores the nature of identity. Who is the real Jason? Is there a real Jason—could a case be made that he is not the Jason with a wife and son who narrates the story? Out of all the versions of Jason, what makes him...him?

5. What would your alternate universes look like? What dreams, in your own life, did you choose not to pursue which, if events in Dark Matter happened to you, would return as alternate universes? Ever wish that were possible? How different a person might you be had you chosen one of those different paths?

6. During his search for "home" what does Jason come to learn about himself, flaws and all? What does he come to value?

7. Have you read or watched other works of speculative fiction about the nature of identity? Consider Ursula K. Le Guin, Neil Gaiman, or Peter F. Hamilton. What about the movie Sliding Doors or The Man in the High Castle, either the 2015 film series or the book by Philip K. Dick? How does Blake Crouch's Dark Matter compare with any of them—how does it stack up?

8. What about the science? For those with little scientific knowledge: were the book's scientific passages a detraction, something you had to plow your way through, or maybe just skim over? For those strong in the sciences: was the writing too boiled down, merely "popscience"? Or was it a fairly legitimate description of today's scientific theories?

9. What is the theoretical underpinning of multiple universes? Do you believe they exist?

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

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