Not all girls or even moms feel comfortable sharing their personal views in a group setting. If you find that the same members contribute to the discussion at each meeting, you may need to implement activities that encourage all members to express their opinions without shining the spotlight on them in embarrassing ways. A few suggestions:

Round-robin questions. Have the hostesses develop one or two questions in advance that everyone needs to answer such as, “talk about a memorable scene from the book and tell us why it made an impression on you,” or “which character was your favorite and why.” Start with the meeting hostess and go around in a circle answering the question.

Questions in a hat. Again, the hostesses can develop a list of questions or everyone in the group can bring one to share. Write them all on separate sheets of paper and put them in a bowl or hat. One by one daughters and their moms pull a question and answer it before passing the hat to the next person in the circle.
One thing you liked/One thing you didn’t like. Each person starts off discussing one thing she liked and one thing she didn’t like. The ice-breaker may be enough to encourage reticent participants to keep going.

Game Show. Use the rules of your favorite game show, like Jeopardy or Deal or No Deal to pit moms and daughters against each other with information from the book. Discussion can follow after you’ve brought out some important facts from the book.

Is there a discussion opener that worked particularly well for your group? Send it in to [email protected] for posting here.