Book Club Discussion Questions for Clear by Carys Davies

1. Which of the three main characters, John, Ivar, and Mary, do you sympathise with most?
2. All three face challenging predicaments. How much choice do any of them have?
3. What do you make of the title?
4. What part do the landscape and weather play in the novel?
5. Clear is set at time of great social and religious turmoil. Does this story of clearances and a schism in the Protestant church seem remote, or do you see parallels with what's happening in the world today?
6. What do you think Mary's attitude to religion is?
7. If you could take a couple of Norn words and introduce them into the English lang to fill gaps, which would you choose?
8. Near the end of the book Mary says, 'You never knew in advance if a decision was the right one. All you could do was try to imagine a future and use that to help make up your mind in a difficult situation, and if you couldn't imagine the future, well, you had to make up your mind anyway.' What do you think – and what do you hope – will happen to John, Ivar and Mary after the last page of the book?

Unless otherwise stated, this discussion guide is reprinted with the permission of Scribner. Any page references refer to a USA edition of the book, usually the trade paperback version, and may vary in other editions.