Skip to main content

Reading Group Guide

Discussion Questions

Knitting Under the Influence

1. Why do you think there has been a resurgence of knitting in recent years by hip young women when it used to be the province of little old ladies?

2. Along those same lines, women friends seem very comfortable getting together for conversation only without the aid of say, a football game. How do knitting or other crafty activities enhance or change the nature of female friendship?

3. There are three main women in the story, all very different. Which character do you most identify with? Why?

4. What do you think of Jason's assertion, near the end of the book, that "people can act badly and not be bad people"? Is this true of him? Were you satisfied or frustrated when Sari forgave him?

5. Why do you think Kathleen is so unmoored in her professional life? Have you ever gone through a phase like that? What did it take to get you out of it?

6. Which side of the James/Sari debate about research versus therapy do you come down on? Why?

7. At times, Sari's parents seem so blind to Charlie's problems that they frustrate the reader. Why is Sari's final scheme with them successful when she's run into so many roadblocks with them over the course of her life?

8. Though the novel's protagonists are three single and childless women living in a big city, many of the storylines have to do with their family relationships, including those with siblings and children. Which of these connections reinforce your ideas about families?

Knitting Under the Influence
by Claire LaZebnik

  • Publication Date: September 1, 2006
  • Paperback: 416 pages
  • Publisher: 5 Spot
  • ISBN-10: 0446697958
  • ISBN-13: 9780446697958