Are you suspicious of books that are hugely popular?  Why?  Are you less likely to read popular novels or more likely?  Or does popularity even enter into your selection process for choosing what to read? 

What other features can you think of that recur in many of these twelve novels that aren’t noted in Hit Lit?   

Four of the twelve novels are written by women.  How do these novels portray a different vision than the ones written by men?  In particular, are women more richly characterized by the female writers, or do men sometimes achieve the same level of dimensionality?

Why do some books grab you and others don’t? There are many possible reasons you might choose to read a particular novel, but what’s the number one aspect of a story that reliably and regularly hooks you?  Why does it have so much appeal? 

What are some of the differences between these commercially successful books of the 20th century and recent bestsellers?

Which of the novels you’ve read lately, either popular or literary, contain some of the ingredients detailed in Hit Lit? 

Recall some very popular novels you read a long while ago.  What stands out now after all these years?  What is it you remember?  Particular characters, the plots, big dramatic scenes, or something else?  Why do you think you remember that aspect apart from others?

Have you reread a novel that you loved long ago?  What was that experience like?  Did you like it more, less or differently?

Most of the books on this list of highly successful novels are not stylishly written.  Does that matter?  Should it?  Do novels that are full of beautiful prose have the same kind of emotional impact on you as those with more unadorned writing?  How does the style itself affect you? 

Should students of literature be required to study popular novels as well as the literary classics?  Should schools include Valley of the Dolls, Jaws or The Godfather in their English curriculum or only books like To Kill a Mockingbird?  Or is this a case of dumbing down the curriculum?

Which of the twelve recurring features do you think is most central to a book’s success in general?  Which of the twelve is most central to your own reading experience?

In the “Juicy Parts” section, the author argues that in all these novels there’s one sexual episode that is life-changing for a character, or somehow crucial to the outcome of the plot.  Can you think of other novels you have read where this is also true?   Why do you think this is such a widespread device?

One argument Hit Lit makes is that a common thread that runs through all these bestsellers is a focus on American values or American characters of various kinds.  Do American bestsellers challenge conventional American myths and beliefs or pander to the conventional views that Americans have about themselves and their society?

Which of the twelve novels that Hit Lit examines have you read?  Of those you’ve read, which do you remember most vividly or most fondly?  What aspects of that novel stay with you?  Are any of these aspects related to one of the twelve recurring features the book describes?

Have you seen “The Golden Place” show up in another novel you’ve read recently?  How would that novel have been different without the presence of this Edenic time or place?

Discuss the tension between urban values and rural values.  Does this same conflict exist in other books you’ve read lately?  Is this part of what some describe as the “Two Americas?” 

Why do we like mavericks as protagonists in fiction?  Do these characters succeed or triumph because they rebel against convention, or do they eventually succumb the pressures of normalcy?  Take Scout, for instance.  Will she always be a rebel, or will she learn to work within the system as Atticus does?

When we read books like Jaws or Godfather or The Exorcist what are we learning that is different about human nature or the way the world works than when we read Kite Runner or Franzen’s The Corrections?

When you choose to read a book rather than watch TV or a film, what are some of the factors that go into making that decision?

Which of the novels on this list of twelve bestsellers do you think people will be reading a hundred years from now and which won’t last?  Why?