59 pages • 1 hour read
Dot HutchisonThe Butterfly Garden
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2016A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Book Club Questions
General Impressions
Gather initial thoughts and broad opinions about the book.
1. Did you find The Butterfly Garden to be an engaging narrative? What aspects of the novel (e.g., dialogue, plot, descriptions, characterizations) did you find to be the most compelling?
2. The Butterfly Garden combines elements of mystery, suspense, and horror. Did you find some of these genre influences to be stronger than others? Which did you feel were the most interesting?
3. Compare The Butterfly Garden with other novels in Dot Hutchison’s The Collector series, contrasting their narrative voices, character arcs, thematic elements, and more.
Personal Reflection and Connection
Encourage readers to connect the book’s themes and characters with their personal experiences.
1. The novel’s protagonist and her fellow prisoners mostly resign themselves to their situation and never forcibly resist their captors. Do you find this behavior relatable? If you were in their place, what would you do?
2. Taking into account their personalities, strengths, and creative interests, which of the novel’s characters do you most identify with—Inara, Lyonette, Bliss, Danelle, Hanoverian, Eddison, etc.?
3. The ending of the novel introduces a plot twist involving Sophia, who turns out to be a former prisoner of the Gardener. Did this come as a surprise to you? What are your feelings about this development?
4. Inara reflects that, in the Garden, “clinging” to memories of the past was often excruciatingly painful. Have you ever found yourself in a similar situation, when it seemed preferrable to forget happier times?
Societal and Cultural Context
Examine the book’s relevance to societal issues, historical events, or cultural themes.
1. Family dynamics and loyalties are prevalent themes of The Butterfly Garden. Discuss both the positive and destructive aspects of strong family bonds in the novel.
2. Examine the novel’s satire of modern society’s reverence for youth and beauty, especially regarding the male gaze.
Literary Analysis
Dive into the book’s structure, characters, themes, and symbolism.
1. Discuss the novel’s use of biblical allegory and its relevance to the story and its characters.
2. Part of The Butterfly Garden’s literary subtext invokes classic works of fantasy or the supernatural, e.g., Poe, Hawthorne, Grimms’ fairytales, etc. Discuss the effect of these allusions, particularly regarding the story’s less realistic elements.
3. A motif of the novel seems to be the moral ambiguity of the creative arts. Examine the characters’ use of artmaking in the novel, whether for good or for evil.
4. Discuss the novel’s use of butterfly imagery and its corresponding themes of transience and rebirth.
Creative Engagement
Encourage imaginative and creative connections to the book.
1. If you were making a film of The Butterfly Garden, what actors would you cast in the key roles? What director would be your choice?
2. The poems of Edgar Allan Poe are frequently referenced in the novel. Write a poem in the style of Poe on one of the book’s themes or as a partial summary of the plot.
3. Write a first-person scenario from the point of view of Desmond, delving into his feelings for Inara and his deeper motivations for reporting his father to the police. Your perspective does not have to correspond with Inara’s.
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